Food

loads of them

simple things like garlic, olive oil, chilli flakes and a sauteed vegetable like shredded courgette, mushrooms ...

very good stuffed pasta can just be served with a sage butter

the key with this kind of thing is the quality of the ingredients, dressing the dish with eating quality as opposed to cooking quality olive oil, fresh herbs...

All the pestos? Rocket, spinach, basil, watercress, pepper etc

For a quick dinner, I usually make rocket pesto linguine with baby pomodori. I've always got rocket, parmesan and pomodori knocking about, and it's even tastier if you chuck in a handful of frozen seafood. 15-minute dinner!

@cornelius_blackfoot Thanks man, that's good to know. Might just buy a heap of stuff and freeze into portions. Are we talking restaurant-sized orders then?

@mands Marky Market?

All the pestos as suggested.
Plain butter/oil + herbs options as suggested.

If you are looking for other solutions, there are two I typically do:

• White wine: you can use this with different ingredients combinations, works really well with seafood and/or vegetables. On top of the regular soffritto, you saute the ingredients and then add white wine. Let the alcohol evaporate, and if none of the ingredients has starch in it, add some corn or potato starch to create a sort of cream.

• Creamed vegetables: this is in general a way I create my sauces by treating the same ingredients in separate ways in the same sauce, according to how I cut and cook them, they yield different textures. For example, think of a vegetable that has a softer component than the other, like the core of courgettes with respect to the outer part. I typically dice the outer part coarsely and saute it, when that's done I add the softer part very finely diced. Add the right balance of water and oil, together with covering it with a lid, and you'll achieve a cream of the softer part with the other remaining at a different consistency.