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quantities of onion or garlic to suit your taste. You could add a big pinch of dried chilli flakes, a handful of basil or thyme or a couple of anchovy fillets, or pepper it with stoned black olives and rinsed capers. For a really gutsy pasta sauce, add a skinned, chopped chorizo or a small glass of red wine right at the start, once the onion has softened. You really can’t go wrong with it.
When fresh tomatoes are cheap and in season, or when they are bursting from their growbag, use them in place of canned ones, for a paler, fresher-tasting sauce. You don’t have to skin and deseed the tomatoes – just push the finished sauce through a sieve to get rid of the indigestible bits. I’d leave out the tomato purée and sugar too: when reduced down, really ripe tomatoes have their own sweetness and summery intensity.
The quantities below make enough for 2 generous servings of pasta.
a splash of olive oil
1 small to medium onion, chopped
1 large or 2 medium garlic cloves, finely chopped
400g can of chopped Italian tomatoes
2 teaspoons tomato purée
½ teaspoon caster sugar
salt and pepper
Heat the olive oil in a saucepan, add the onion and garlic and sweat for a couple of minutes so that they soften but do not colour. Add all the other ingredients and stir well, squashing down any tomato lumps to help break them up (if you want this sauce to cook quickly, strain the tinned tomatoes before using them – but I prefer to condense that liquid by cooking, which deepens the flavour). Bring the sauce to a very gentle simmer and cook slowly for 20-30 minutes, until it has reduced and thickened. You will need to stir it from time to time, and watch that it doesn’t catch and burn at the bottom. Check the seasoning. Either use straight away or cool and store in the fridge (for 3-5 days) or freezer (for 3-4 months).

Besides infusing meat with rich flavours, marinades can be really useful as a stay of execution for meat that should have been cooked the night before. You could put it in the freezer (but once defrosted it will need cooking immediately). Alternatively, when meat is just on the margin of its recommended use-by date, marinades are a quick and easy way of buying just enough time, safely.
Marinade ingredients fall into three groups: oils, which seal the meat from the air and carry the other flavours; acids, such as citrus fruit or vinegar, which help to tenderise the meat; and herbs and spices, which can be chopped or ground and added to cold oil or, as they do in India, warmed very gently in oil to release all their flavour. You can also add all sorts of flavourings such as honey, ketchup, soy sauce, horseradish or mustard. Speediest of all, you can use oil to thin down almost any ready-made pesto, curry paste or harissa for a very simple marinade.
Here are some ideas for marinades you can knock up fast depending on what you have to hand. To use any marinade, put the meat or fish in a shallow dish, coat it with the marinade, then cover with cling film and leave in the fridge for up to 8 hours, until you are ready to cook (fish would generally be marinated for a shorter time but if it’s a question of making it last between breakfast and dinner, then a longer period is okay). Then remove it from its marinade, leaving some of the liquid and flavourings clinging to it, and grill, fry or roast it.
Use around 3 parts oil to 1 part vinegar or lemon. Exact quantities of herbs and spices don’t matter but you won’t need much more than around a tablespoon of chopped herbs or a good pinch of spice to give great flavour.

Thai curry paste thinned to a coating consistency with coconut milk
Olive oil, dried oregano, chilli (flakes or fresh), lime or lemon juice
Olive oil, ginger, garlic, a squeeze of lemon, chopped parsley or coriander

Olive oil, white wine vinegar, sliced white onion, bay leaf and a few whole peppercorns
Olive oil, garlic, capers or chopped black olives, lemon juice, pepper
White wine, soy sauce, grated fresh ginger,