24: Chicken patties with rosemary and pancetta, p39, and 25: Roast pumpkin and spicy tomato sauce, p47

More little patties - Nigel does like his patties, burgers, meatballs, fishcakes, etc. I don't often make them as I like to prepare food quite quickly and simply, and chopping everything up, mincing the meat if it's not minced already, mixing, chilling, shaping, then cooking... always seems like a lot of extra steps and extra washing up to do for an okay return, but just as good as doing something simpler. Maybe when I've got a decent sized kitchen, with more than 2ft of half-depth worksurface and a dishwasher, I'll change my mind! Or maybe some more of these recipes will start to convert me... the pork patties from a few weeks ago were mighty fine...

These chicken ones were very tasty, but not as good as the pork patties - I think we like our chilli too much! Not being able to find minced chicken anywhere, and preferring to use slightly better quality chicken anyway, I used the breast meat from the chicken I jointed on Friday and minced it up in the chopper pot of my Braun Multiquick. Love my Multiquick - had it for years, and got the metal one instead of the plastic one for about £20 when Boots clearly made a mistake and mispriced it, it was selling for about £70 at the time. It's perfect for when you need to chop/blend/mix slightly smaller amounts than if cooking for more than 2-4 people, or just dealing with one ingredient. I make breadcrumbs, blend soups, whisk egg whites, mince meat, chop herbs/onions etc (if doing more than a few).

The raw mixture was quite crumbly and wasn't holding together very well (bits of onion falling out everywhere) so I was worried they wouldn't keep their shape, but after making little patties and leaving them to one side for 30mins as in the recipe, they did actually firm up fine and could be popped in the pan easily. I quite liked the method of browning them quickly on the hob and then braising them in the oven, in some of the chicken stock made the other day, which gave a thin gravy to serve.

Served with the roast pumpkin (actually butternut squash - the half leftover from the pumpkin soup last week), roasted in the oven with tomatoes, garlic and chilli. I left the tomatoes pretty much as they came out of the oven, very slightly mashed, rather than chopping them too much as they were so hot and we were hungry!! Very yummy indeed, but T's squash aversion continues. He did have a little though and ate the tomatoes (doesn't like cooked tomatoes, unless in a tomatoey sauce), but he left most of the little heap of squash I gave him. Luckily I think there's only one more squash/pumpkin-based recipe left...