Roasted Tomato, Sweet Onion and Goat's Cheese Tart

This is basically a very easy-to-make pizza. Just buy the pastry in a ready-made sheet (life is too short to make your own) and add whichever toppings take your fancy. I could not be bothered to make a tomato sauce from scratch, just to make this tart, so I used fresh tomatoes here. If I make my own Italian tomato sauce for a pasta dish, I usually steal a bit from it and keep it in my freezer just for this recipe.

If you don't like goat's cheese or onions, use mozzarella and asparagus, or a billion other creations. Salami and ricotta is insanely good - Mrs Ribeye's favourite, actually.

Puff pastry sheets are on offer this week at my local supermarket at just £1 for 2 sheets, so today this recipe comes in at £1.50 per serving, including a green salad. Even when the price goes back up to £1.79, this still comes in at a fantastic £2 per serving for a light lunch or winter starter. Or make smaller individual tarts for a fab snack with drinks.

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS:

2 large onions, finely sliced into half moons
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 teaspoon of dried thyme
Pinches of salt and pepper
2 puff pastry sheets (425g total)
2 large tomatoes, finely sliced
200g goat's cheese, cut into 1cm dice
1 teaspoon of dried oregano
1 egg, beaten

Green salad, to serve

Preheat oven to 200c. Fry, on a low heat, the onions with the olive oil, thyme and salt and pepper until soft and golden (30 minutes approx). Lay out the pastry sheets and top with the onion mix, leaving a 2cm margin around the edges. Scatter slices of one tomato per pastry sheet over the onions. Dot cubes of goat's cheese over the tomatoes and sprinkle with the oregano. Brush the exposed pastry edge margins with the beaten egg. Bake in the oven until the pastry is golden and the cheese has melted (25 minutes approx). Serve one tart, with the green salad, between 2 people.

Cheat's Jewish Chicken, Kneidle, Lockshen and Kreplach Soup

Chicken soup should not just be eaten when you're ill. It is a low fat, quick, delicious meal which can be as substantial as you like - depending on how many accoutrements you decide to add. Here, I have added the classic lockshen (noodles) kneidles (dumplings) and kreplach (wontons/tortellini), but you can add a combination of any of these.

There is a cafe in north-west London which serves this soup exactly as I do here. Not a chicken in sight and as authentic as Jewish chicken soup should be. My mum, Mrs Ribeye Sr, would hate this soup - she thinks chicken soup should actually contain chicken. Whatever you do, don't add fresh carrots - the tinned variety are just perfect for this recipe.

Mrs Ribeye demands this soup on a Sunday night instead of a sandwich -and who am I to deny her? This winter staple comes in at an incredible £1.50 per serving.

You could bump up the cost a bit, and still stay under budget by adding some shredded, cooked chicken. But a chicken soup containing actual chicken would be complete sacrilege, regardless of what my mum says.

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS:

4 tablespoons of Telma chicken soup powder, or 3 regular chicken stock cubes
400g tin of sliced carrots, drained and rinsed
1 litre of water
1 egg
75ml water
100g matzo meal or dried breadcrumbs
100g dried tagliatelli, or other noodles
100g dried beef tortellini
Pinch of black pepper, to serve

Mix the Telma or stock cubes with the litre of water in a large pan and add the carrots. Simmer on a low to moderate heat. Mix the egg, 75ml of water and matzo meal or breadcrumbs in a bowl and leave for 5 minutes to allow the gluten to develop. Roll the paste into golfball sized dumplings and plop them gently into the soup. Add the noodles and tortellini and simmer for 15 minutes. Serve with crusty bread.

Russian Salad (Insalata Russa)

My old-ball-and-chain, Mrs Ribeye, is Russian - actually from Syktyvkar in the Komi Republic, close to the Ural mountains. Russian salad is actually Spanish. Mrs Ribeye hates things that say they are Russian, but are not authentic. But, Mrs Ribeye loves this Russian salad.

I first had 'insalata Russa' in a fabulous traditional family-run tapas restaurant in Caleta, a small village on the south coast of Tenerife.

My Dad, Mr Ribeye Sr (who just came back from a trip to Caleta), said that the old tapas place has gone all 'up-market' (naturally), but that a new tapas bar had opened recently and was making the Russian salad just as well, but at 1998 prices. Hurrah!

I haven't taken Mrs Ribeye to Caleta yet, but I will.

Eat this salad (actually more of a potato/fish pate) with a good warm white bread, a cold bad red wine and a fresh tomato and spring onion salad. You'll not only love it, but you'll wonder how you made such a fantastic dish for only £1 per serving.

Serves 4 for a starter or light lunch, or 8 as tapas

INGREDIENTS:

500g floury potatoes, such as King Edward or Maris Piper
200g tinned tuna, drained
1 large Spanish onion, finely chopped
100g pickled gherkins or cornichons, finely chopped
200ml mayonnaise
Pinches of salt and pepper
1 tablespoon of paprika
Warm crusty bread rolls, to serve

Boil the potatoes whole and with their skins still on, until soft. Peel the potatoes, while hot and with a cloth to protect your hands, and transfer to a mixing bowl. Add the tuna, onion, gherkins, mayonnaise and salt and pepper and mix well, breaking down the potatoes as you go, until you have a thick paste. Place on a serving platter and smooth the surface until you have an even dome. Sprinkle with the paprika. Refrigerate and then serve with the warm bread. 

Chorizo and Broccoli Sunday Frittata

By the time Sunday comes around, all my ambitions to go food shopping go out of the window, in favour of staying in, watching DVDs and spending some quality time with Mrs Ribeye.

So, the best thing to cook on a lazy Sunday afternoon is... anything I can find in the fridge. Today's bounty includes a chorizo sausage, a bunch of broccoli and a whole load of store cupboard staples. Put it all together, and it's frittata time!

Try any food combination you like, whether just-bought, or leftovers (the chorizo in today's recipe was left over from my Leek and Chorizo Potato Skins that I made mid-week) from last night's dinner: Ham cheese and peas, salmon and courgette, bacon and tomato, chicken artichoke and chili... But this one is superb (best ever, actually).

Leftovers, strictly speaking, should be considered free, but even if you use fresh stuff, these frittatas come in at only £2 per serving, at the most expensive.

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS:

4 large potatoes, peeled and cut into 3cm dice
1 large bunch of broccoli, separated into small florets
1 teaspoon of salt
250g chorizo, cut into 1cm dice
2 onions, thinly sliced into half moons
2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
2 tablespoons of olive oil
12 eggs
100ml milk
Pinch of black pepper
8 slices of buttered wholemeal toast, to serve

Boil the potatoes and broccoli in a large pan and add the salt. Take out the broccoli after the 5 minute mark and then the potatoes at the 10 minute mark (5 minutes after the broccoli) and set aside both in a bowl. In a large grill-friendly frying pan, fry the chorizo, onions and garlic in the olive oil, on a moderate heat, until translucent. Add the broccoli and potatoes and warm through. Preheat your grill to a very high setting. Whisk the eggs and milk in a jug and add the pepper. Arrange the ingredients in the frying pan evenly, to ensure a fair distribution. Pour over the eggs and milk mix and cook for 5 minutes, without stirring or moving the pan at all. Place the frying pan under the grill until the top is set, but not too brown (3 minutes approx). Cut the frittata into 4 thick wedges and serve with the toast.

Chicken Satay Skewers with Peanut Sauce

Chicken and peanuts is hardly the sort of double act you would expect to go so well together. But for some reason, chicken satay is here to satay.

Whatever you do, don't be tempted to buy ready-made peanut sauce. It's either watered-down peanut butter, or an oily bland mess. My recipe for peanut sauce takes 5 minutes to make and is not only wonderful accompanying this chicken dish, but also fantastic as an Oriental-inspired noodle salad dressing. Just add cooked noodles to raw stir fry vegetables and coat with the sauce, for a quick lunch or summer starter.

You could also serve this with my Japanese-Style Grilled 'n' Chilled Aubergines for a nice contrast of flavours and textures.

Chicken satay is the archetypal street food all over Thailand, and as such, is cheap to make. £2 per generous meal serving, or £1 as a snack at your drinks party.

Serves 4

Chicken Satay Skewers

INGREDIENTS:

800g free range chicken thighs, skinned, boned and cut into 4cm dice
Thumb of ginger, minced,
2 cloves of garlic, minced
50ml soy sauce
50ml sesame oil

Salad greens (undressed), to serve

Marinade the chicken in the rest of the ingredients. After at least 2 hours, or preferably overnight, thread the chicken pieces onto metal or pre-soaked (to prevent burning) wooden skewers. In a blisteringly hot pan or barbecue, cook the satays until slightly charred on the outside and cooked-through. Serve with the Peanut Sauce and green salad or my Japanese-style aubergines.

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Peanut Sauce

INGREDIENTS:

I small onion, grated
Thumb of ginger, grated
2 cloves of garlic, grated
25ml olive oil
Juice of 1 lemon or lime
25ml soy sauce
25ml water
1 red chilli, finely chopped
1 tablespoon of sugar, or 25ml maple syrup
3 tablespoons of crunchy peanut butter
25ml sesame oil

In a small pan on a moderate heat, fry the onion, ginger and garlic in the oil until translucent (5 minutes approx). Add the rest of the ingredients and turn the heat off. Mix well and leave in the pan until cool, to let the flavours mingle.

The Mighty 'Man-wich'

A guys' night at our place means big drinks, Will Ferrell movies and BIG FOOD!

This creation is a trucker's (or pretend trucker's) dream: Every food group imaginable, trapped between two doorstop-sized pieces of bread. If it was up to one particular friend of mine, he would eat this every day of the year (in fairness, he does have a bit of a deathwish).

Eat very occasionally - but do try it. I guarantee that once you go man-wich, you won't go sandwich.

Get the guys to supply the booze and you supply the grub. It's a great deal. These badboys will only set you back £3 per serving.

I love lamp.

Serves 4

INGREDIENTS:

1 small white cabbage, shredded
1 small onion, finely chopped
50ml olive oil
25ml cider or white wine vinegar
Pinch of celery seed
1 teaspoon of sugar
Pinches of salt and pepper
4 large potatoes, cut into French fries (skin left on)
Sunflower or vegetable oil for frying
4 thick slices ham
4 thick slices pastrami or corned beef
8 slices salami
1 ball of mozzarella, cut into 4 slices
4 eggs
2 large tomatoes, thickly sliced
8 thick slices of white bloomer bread

Firstly, make the coleslaw: Mix the cabbage, onion, celery seed, sugar, salt and pepper, vinegar and oil in a bowl and refrigerate until needed, preferably overnight to let the flavours mingle.

Secondly, make the French fries: Fry the potatoes in the oil on a moderate heat until golden and crunchy.

Thirdly, make the filling: Pile a slice of ham, 2 slices of salami and a slice of beef to make a three-way stack. Repeat 3 more times. In a dry pan on a moderate heat, lay the stacks in a single layer and fry until warmed-through. Place a slice of mozzarella onto each stack and keep cooking the stacks until the cheeses has melted. Place each stack onto a slice of the bread. Turn the heat in the pan up, add a tablespoon of oil and fry the four eggs, making sure the yolks are still runny. Place an egg onto the cheese layer of each stack. Place a handful of French fries, followed by 2-3 slices of tomato, and finally the coleslaw onto each stack. Top with the second slice of bread.

NB. The man-wich construction from top to bottom:

Bread
Coleslaw
Tomato
French fries
Egg
Cheese
Three-way meat stack
Bread

Serve immediately (as if you wouldn't...).

Chinese Won Ton 'Spaghetti with Meatballs'

I really like messing around with recipes and combining cultures - Beijing meets Bologna. These won ton meatballs make a fantastic partner to stir-fried vegetable noodle 'spaghetti'. Try it - you'll see.

Cheap as chips and twice as nice. £2 per serving, makes this a fantastic mid-week meal for me, Mrs Ribeye and our friends.

Serves 4

Won Ton 'Meatballs'

INGREDIENTS:

500g pork mince
20ml rice wine or dry sherry
30ml sesame oil
30ml sunflower or vegeatble oil
2 tablespoons of plain flour
1 egg, beaten
6 spring (salad) onions, finely chopped
Pinches of salt and pepper
100g raw prawns

Mix the ingredients together (not the prawns) into a smooth paste. Take a prawn and encase it in a ball of the pork paste to a 4cm diameter. Refrigerate the won tons for 2 hours to firm-up. When the vegetable noodles are almost ready, steam the won tons until cooked (15 minutes approx). Serve on top of the vegetable noodle 'spaghetti'.

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Vegetable Noodle 'Spaghetti'

INGREDIENTS:

1kg stir fry vegetables
Thumb of ginger, minced
2 cloves of garlic minced
25ml sunflower or vegetable oil
1kg pre-cooked egg noodles
50ml dark soy sauce
25ml sesame oil

4 spring (salad) onions, finely chopped, to serve

In a blisteringly hot large pan or wok, fry the vegetables, ginger and garlic in the oil, until translucent (10 minutes approx). Add the noodles, soy sauce and sesame oil and fold through the vegetables until the noodles have re-heated.
Garnish with the chopped spring onions and serve with the won ton 'meatballs' on top