friends have been raving about maria elia’s modern vegetarian cookery book for months. i’ve been resisting buying it as i have several other books which i need to make better use of but i finally succumbed a few weeks ago.

this lemony pasta with all my favourite seasonal vegetables – peas, broad beans and asparagus – was the first thing i cooked, not least as it was another way to use up some of the basil excess which i’ve been working my way through for the past week.

it’s got a freshness that belies the creamy sauce – the lemon and basil both contribute to this as did the fresh, barely cooked peas which i used. asparagus season is coming to an end in the uk so you need to hurry up and sneak this dish into your menu planning at some point soon.

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heidi’s pasta salad has a red wine and saffron dressing which i really wanted to try – she describes it as being vibrant and robust so i decided to try and recreate the recipe she took it from.

the original recipe is for vegetable salad in saffron vinaigrette and is from diane worthington's the taste of summer (heidi has the book, i don’t). apparently it uses orzo so, as i still had half a pack to use up after making asparagus orzotto, i used this as my starting point. add a couple of bunches of asparagus, fresh peas and some toasted halloumi and things were looking good.

the dressing is as heidi describes and work wonderfully with the other flavours. i’ve had this as a packed lunch most days this week and have loved the combination of flavours and textures – slippery orzo, fresh crunchy vegetables, salty squeaky cheese and that punchy dressing.

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