‘Pumpkin is my polo neck’: how to cook the season’s finest vegetables

I was slow to understand that in autumn, in Italy, while the words cambia stagione, or change of season, might be a reference to the geographical phenomenon, they are just as likely to be about clothes. Il cambio stagione is the change of seasonal wardrobe. Which, of course, happens everywhere when the weather changes. Only I’d never had words for the day I decide which summer clothes can be worn for months yet, but with tights, and which need pulling, along with other woollens, from the suitcase under the bed. Next thing I know, I’m greeting my polo necks like old friends and getting excited about ankle boots and a sequined cape.

A similar thing happens in the kitchen, although happily it’s more mental than physical. When we stand in the kitchen and take stock, we decide that courgettes are going to be around for a while yet, but enough of the raw and the grilled; now, they need warming up. That is, cooked until soft and mixed with linguine, egg and parmesan, carbonara-style. Alternatively, there is a wonderful River Cafe-inspired way, which involves cooking coins of courgette in a large amount of butter, rendering them almost velvety, and making them ideal for pasta, or to sit beside roast chicken. A third, Greek way is braised with potato and lemon in a quarter-pint of olive oil. It is a useful method that can be applied to other vegetables, including carrots and apple, pumpkin and kale.

Meanwhile, pumpkin is my polo neck. I have taught three cooking lessons this month, and in all of them we made Sicilian baked pumpkin with sweet-and-sour red onion. It looks like a jewelled party when paired with sausages, chickpea flour pancakes or hunter’s-style chicken (another polo neck). If you make the pumpkin, make one-and-a-half times the quantity in the recipe, because it keeps beautifully. Press it into a jar, which reduces it to a sort of chutney, and use in sandwiches or as a relish for a slice of pie. Speaking of which, I will be making roast pumpkin, mushroom and chestnut pie next week, and again at Christmas for my sister, who declared it more autumn than autumn. I have also pulled two bags of lentils from the back of the cupboard. The first will be braised, to go with fried eggs, as I did in one of my earliest columns almost nine years ago.

And the broccoli ankle boots. Of course, broccoli never really went away, but it is at its best once the first chills arrive – both the classic tree broccoli and the lime-green romanesco, with its extraordinary fractal buds that remind me of Madonna in her Jean Paul Gaultier cone bra. While it might seem counterintuitive to cook broccoli until it collapses, it is at this point, when cooked again in olive oil with garlic and chilli, that it becomes an almost-cream, and one of my favourite and essential outfits for pasta, which can be topped with parmesan or toasted breadcrumbs, depending on the weather.

Tea-towel-on-the-knee meal |Since writing about the chip omelette, I have made one almost every week. Felicity Cloake/Anna del Conte’s Marmite spaghetti is also perfect, sometimes with added anchovies. I might need to write a whole column about that.

What I read this week |Still on the subject of chips, Tom Lamont’s great and melancholy long read, A funeral for fish and chips, is even more evocative as an audio podcast. You can also hear Anya Von Bremzen’s long read about how her childhood borscht has become emblematic of Putin’s assault on Ukrainian culture. It’s an extract from her spectacularly intelligent and funny book National Dish, which explores the relationship between food and national identity, and which is one of my books of the year.

Chop, chop |The Ballymaloe Cookery School’s chopping boards: I don’t think the Instagram demonstration of how they clean them was intended as a sales pitch, but Pamela Black talking about bacteria, rubbing in salt, scrubbing “like an old washer woman”, then rinsing thoroughly before propping a board on its side to dry in the sun certainly sold one to me. They are handmade from hardwood, solidly beautiful, and I won’t rest until I scrub one (they have a shop).

The best things I ate this week |Two breadcrumbed, deep-fried balls of mashed potato with a middle of melted provolone and ham, from the takeaway under our flat. Even though a significant part of their deliciousness was the fact that someone else had made them (and cleaned the frier), I will definitely be making them at home. The black grape, tomato, basil and red onion salad with sausages eaten at a friend’s house will also be recreated.