Any good kitchen needs a selection of knives to be able to function properly. There is no point is setting about trying to fillet a mackerel with a blunt blade. It won’t be sharp enough for a clean cut and you will end up having to hack at it to even make a start at piercing he skin and you will end up with a ragged torn strip of fish.

Over the years we have built up an odd selection of kinves. the most recent addition are two stumpy wooden handled Opinel Inox knives. They were a gift from my sister Anne-Marie have have quickly developed into our daily work horses. Regularly sharpened they are keen enough to quickly cut through the skin of a tomato, slice onions and garlic  and make light work with meat and fish.

When not on the chopping board the knives live  in a knife block next to the basket of oils. There re one or two in there that hardly make it out.

My favourite knive is a long steel blade that I stole from my mother when I left home. I can remember as a boy taking out into the garden to peel the bark from pieces of wood I was trying to turn into bows and arrows. It can be made ferociously sharp when it will make light work of anything I put it to. It needs a certain amount of respect shown to it and periodically the kids will be astonished by my yelping as I take another small slice of skin off the top of a finger and I hold my hand high in the air to try and reduce the flow of red blood. The blade itself is stained and pock marked with age – it must be at least fifty years old.

Actually the herbs were only a good few pinches of fennel seeds mixed with some more salt and crushed to a powder in the pestle and mortar. Garlic was then added and loosened slightly with with touch of olive oil. This mixture was then rubbed into the underneath of the pork belly with my fingers as the oven was put on to its highest setting. This required some negotiation as a dish of vegetarian lasagna was warming up for the rest of the family’s tea. With some slight of hand the lasagna was extracted out of the oven for twenty minutes as the pork belly went in at a sufficiently high heat to start blistering the skin and bring on the crackling.

Once the skin had started to blister the oven was turned down (and the lasagna returned) and the pork moved onto a more benign metal plate to be finished off. Ideally it should have had another two hours in a very slow oven. Time to cook completely through with the meat falling off the bones, no burning, and a crisp crunchy skin.

We didn’t have that time and compromised with the oven turned too high and hoping for the best over an hour. Ten minutes before eating I took the pork out and put it on a serving dish covered with some foil and a tea towel. Potatoes were boiled, quartered and fried and a gravy was made with a good splash of sherry into the pan. The bones slipped away from the meat and plates were cleaned.

We were still listening to Mark Eitzel.

The mushrooms were cut from the log whilst a large pan of water started to boil. I took my new frying pan and melted a small pat of butter to which I added a finely chopped onion. That was given five minutes and the odd stir through to soften before I added a squashed, chopped clove of garlic.

Once the water was boiling I started to cook. A bag of tagliatelle and more was put into the boiling water. I turned up the heat under the pan with the onions, chopped up the mushrooms and stirred them in and gave them a few minutes to wilt before throwing in a good glass of white wine. That bubbled for another few minutes whilst I grated a good couple of handfuls of Parmesan.

Grating done I poured in a tub of double cream and drained the pasta. Once the pasta had been drained and shaken it went into a clean white bowl. Before I poured over the sauce I stirred in the Parmesan, some chopped parsley and plenty of salt and pepper. The kids turned their noses up at the mention of mushrooms but all their plates were clean.

This evening we listened to the bitter sweet ruminations of Mark Eitzel. All in preparation for doing battle with Plan B.