Winter

This classic French dessert is much easier than you'd expect, and always a crowd-pleaser. Doused in its own caramel sauce, it's fabulous with a dollop of double cream.

Rizogalo is a traditional Greek-style creamed rice pudding that can also be served cole. Often spiced with cinnamon and lemon peel, it is also delicious served topped with nuts and honey.

Add some gourmet elements to the beloved Aussie pie with chunks of steak, succulent vegetables and crisp pastry crusts.

As a sea-faring people for most of their history, the Portuguese know a thing or two about seafood and what to do with it, as this Portuguese-style seafood stew demonstrates.

Slow-roasting the veal breast with a selection of vegetables adds great flavours to the juices left behind in the pan. Serve this tender, tasty meat on soft polenta with a good splash of the cooking juice.

Heavier on the pasta than a classic minestrone, this soup is an excellent choice on a cold winter's day.

A great source of both fibre and vitamins, plus calcium.

Light, fluffy and moist, this divine mandarin, polenta and macadamia cake is packed full of flavour and is beautiful served sliced as morning or afternoon tea.

Sweet, dense and oozing with sticky golden syrup, this gorgeous steamed pudding is perfect served warm with a dollop of cream or ice-cream for an indulgent weekend treat.

Borlotti beans are also known as cannellini beans, but they're actually a paler, plumper variety of the humble kidney bean. This tomato and borlotti bean soup makes a nourishing lunch or dinner.