Reminiscent of the viennoiseries in French pastry shops, these turnovers are all about elegance underneath their perfect golden flakiness. To make them, first make caramel and let some pears simmer in it. Then, assemble them by spreading the rough puff pastry into an oval shape, making sure there’s more dough around the outside than in the centre of the turnover. This way, the edges will puff up more, resulting in a sublime-looking pastry.

With their apple and cranberry compote filling and whipped cream, these turnovers are reminiscent of the store-bought flaky pastries of our childhood. Spread compote on a sheet of puff pastry, then fold it to create a closed triangle. Once the turnovers have been cooked and cooled down, open them slightly to add a good dollop of whipped cream. No need for moderation.

We were inspired by classic pumpkin pie to create these phyllo turnovers filled with pumpkin purée, honey and spices. The sheets of phyllo pastry are basted with brown butter, which makes these heavenly little pockets as crispy under your teeth as autumn leaves under your feet.

Use store-bought pizza dough to make this speedy focaccia. Simply roll the ball of dough in herbs and cook it in a pie mould. Moist on the inside and crispy on the outside, you’ll get a winning aperitif every time.

After tasting this delicious Sichuan street food specialty, the kitchen team developed a homemade version. Add a generous garnish of ground pork and ginger to a bowl of noodles, topping it with a sesame sauce that’s both fragrant and spicy. This recipe will have the flavour sparks flying at first bite!

Chicken Drumsticks with Indian Spices

Light as a feather, these moist little buns with black garlic butter, a trendy ingredient, possibly make the best accompaniment to a bowl of soup. It’s not surprising that this winning combo is offered at Café RICARDO restaurants. As clients have often asked for the recipe, you’d better take notes! It’s now or never!

There are classics we love making in advance, like braised beef. In this case, we were inspired by Korean flavours to give the meat a stronger flavour. Ginger and Korean chili pepper are mixed together in the blender to create an aromatic paste, which eliminates the need to chop the ingredients by hand. Add this mixture to the pot before cooking and it will enhance any other ingredient divinely. The meat cooks in a generous, all-purpose sauce (great as a base for soup!). All that’s left to do is to shred the meat and it’ll be ready to garnish ramen or sandwiches.

When you want to cook with local ingredients, it can be difficult to replace lemon or lime in some recipes. But local sea buckthorn, a small orange berry that’s very acidic, deserves to be better known, as it may be a perfect replacement! In this recipe, we use it the way we would for lemon meringue pie, replacing lemon juice with a speedy homemade sea buckthorn juice. Hurrah for local ingredients!

Give a toast with a popsicle? There’s nothing better to do on a beautiful sunny day. These iced lollies are inspired by the Paloma, a classic cocktail made with grapefruit juice, lime juice and tequila. Simply freeze the mixture in popsicle moulds, then eat them in the shade.