There is always food and good music.

I cooked for myself this evening.

By way of preparation I took three frozen chicken thighs out of the freezer last night. I had picked them up last month at The Farmer’s Market and then found I had no immediate use for them so into the freezer they went.

Lunchtime today, in an Irish rain that swept across Liverpool and came down in great gobs of wet, I walked up to Bold Street to buy onions and harissa from Matta’s.

It made me wish that I could find the opportunity to make the trip up there every week. Walking through Matta’s it is impossible to think of anything else but of all the good food that has been cooked from there in the past and will be cooked in time to come.

Home and I gave the chicken thighs 30 minutes to marinade in smoked paprika, ground cinnamon, crushed garlic, salt, lemon juice, grated onion and olive oil.

I then put a pan on a low heat and cooked up the thighs gently.

In the meantime I chopped up a preserved lemon, two thin green peppers, a good squirt of the harissa and a very good handful of coriander.

Once the thighs were cooked I stirred them into the rest of the ingredients and then tipped them on a plate with some giant couscous.

I ate it listening to the start of a party next door and the warm inner glow of the new Giant Sand album.

I can’t help feeling that the world could move on a better plain if more people were to take time out of their day to listen to a bit of Giant Sand.

I should also mention that the idea for the cooking came from the Morito Cookbook and that there is always a need for good beer – especially those made with sea-water.