Another easy recipe, hardly anything at all to do here – practically cooks itself! This is essentially a Mediterranean dish and the scents of the herbs, garlic and oils are pretty important. Ripe, flavourful tomatoes are necessary too – if unavailable, use a tin.

• Ingredients: one aubergine (eggplant), one courgette, 500g tomatoes, several onions or shallots, a red pepper, fresh oregano, thyme, basil, garlic, salt, pepper. Quite a lot of olive oil.

• Alternate ingredients: A tin of tomatoes, vegetable marrow, chilli/s, other peppers, fennel, beans(fresh green or a tin of cannellini)

• Method: Wash and slice all the vegetables. Starting with the onions, add them in turn to a large heavy pan (medium low heat) in which you have poured enough olive oil to cover the base generously. Once the onions have begun to soften, add the aubergine, then courgette and pepper slices. Gently move around the pan, turning the slices of aubergine and courgette over to gently brown on both sides. Keep an eye on the heat and turn everything down if it begins to stick. Add a little more oil if necessary, remembering that once the slices aubergine have reached a certain stage they will start releasing oil again.

Finally add the chopped tomatoes, garlic, herbs and seasoning. When the tomatoes begin to bubble turn the heat down and cook very slowly, stirring occasionally, covering the pan if you want to, putting it in the oven if you want to, until everything has melded together but with the individual components still intact. Throw on a handful of basil. Eat hot or cold, with crusty bread, homemade chips, a piece of meat or fish, or with some beans. A very accommodating bowlful.