Summer pudding. One of the achievements I am most proud of is that I can cook. And I cook very well.→[More:]Now this might not be a big thing to many of you, but I grew up in a household where we ate beans on toast for tea three times a week, egg on toast three times a week and fish fingers and chips on Friday. Occasionally a tin of stew with powdered mashed potato.

I was never hungry, but there was no variation, except at Christmas when we would have egg & chips for Christmas lunch. I actually enjoyed school dinners, and had it not been for them, I would never have eaten fresh meat, fruit or vegetables.

Explanations: My dad drank, most of the money went on booze, not luxuries like proper food. Also, we lived in the Midlands, so we had 'breakfast, dinner and tea' not 'breakfast, lunch and dinner'.

So, I taught myself to cook after I left home, and I'm pretty good at it, I think. I love food, love buying the ingredients, love preparing it, love eating it, love serving it to friends ...

Anyway, I got home on Wednesday afternoon and went to the supermarket. I needed to clear some space in my tiny freezer compartment and so moved out the remains of a pack of frozen summer berries (raspberries, currants, etc.). So I decided to use them in a summer pudding, which I made yesterday and refrigerated overnight. I had just enough berries to make two little individual puddings. I used hardly any sugar - I like the berries to have that bit of tartness.

I'm eating one now, with a big dollop of thick Greek yoghurt on the side. The taste and smell is absolutely wonderful.

Mmmmm ...