India Express: easy & delicious one-tin and one-pan vegan, vegetarian & pescatarian recipes – by the bestselling ‘Roasting Tin’ series author

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Iyer says she finds the story “romantic”, and when she recreated the journey, “We took the overnight train journey with a train picnic, listening to my parents’ stories about all the amazing food. Vintage’s Square Peg has signed India Express: Fresh and Delicious Recipes for Every Day by Rukmini Iyer, author of the Roasting Tin series (Vintage), which has sold over one million copies worldwide.

So I’ve cut out the butterflying stage, on the basis that prawns here are the perfect size to crumb and fry as they are. Now, I just feel like my mum must have felt so isolated - my dad was at work, and she was doing her medical exams. This collection follows Iyer's wildly successful roasting tin series, rightly considered cookbooks for our times. This curry, known as rajma, is a classic – I ask my mother to make it every time I’m home for a birthday.When I said I wanted to scan some of the originals for the book, she was very much like, ‘These are the only letters I have’. You can think of this as a sort of South Indian raita – tiny, crisp cubes of aubergine are fried with mustard seeds and curry leaves, scattered with sea salt and served with yogurt as a side dish. You can find her recipes, recipe videos, events and newsletter information through the links in the menu. I’m tremendously grateful to Pene Parker, David Loftus and the whole team at Vintage for bringing the project so vibrantly into life.

I was pleased to find that the recipes are pescatarian in that they are either vegetarian, vegan or fish based. These parathas are inspired by Seema Pankhania’s epic recipe for Mob Kitchen, an amazing hangover cure. In this version I bump up the veg with a whole pack of peppers, and it all goes in one tin because it’s an easy way to brown off the onions, spices and veg without standing at the stove and stirring. Everyone will feed you more than a full meal, be really offended if you don't eat right, then try and feed you more. Four years ago, Iyer took the same journey with both of her parents to really discover the food of those regions – and everywhere in between.What I wanted to do was think about what makes the Roasting Tin accessible and popular, and then bring a spin on it – which was the food that I grew up with, Indian-inspired foods, [and] still have something you could make on Wednesday night,” she says. Their trip collided with harvest season: “there was loads of this date palm jaggery, which is a bit like molasses; and it was a big deal because it was the first press. Iyer’s dad would always be well-equipped for his long train journeys, sent off with an array of snacks cooked by his mum. I served the fish with a pot of masoor dal which was also a very simple recipe and utterly delicious.

One of them, from my grandad, must have been written when I was little; he was like, ‘Thank you for sending pictures of baby Rukmini. You’re in your own compartment, like the old fashion train carriages, and you’ve got vendors going up and down the train,” Iyer says. Iyer wanted to showcase these distinct regions, while staying true to the ethos of all of her cookbooks. If you come across any nice, fresh okra, this is a lovely way to use it as well – just remember to dry the okra thoroughly before slicing it into 1cm pieces and it’ll crisp up beautifully in the oil rather than go squashy. The Roasting Tin Around the World’ was named in The Sunday Times, the Guardian and the Daily Mail’s Best Cookbooks of 2020, with ‘The Green Roasting Tin’ listed as a The Sunday Times Bestseller of the Year in 2019.So a lot of the book is how can I bring some of these lovely flavours into the food without making someone have to stay in the kitchen? Chapters feature easy weeknight one-tin and one-pan curries, everyday Bengali and South Indian recipes, snack and brunch ideas, and a weekend project section for more ambitious cooks. There are plenty of recipes to occupy the weekend – making puris, methu vada (fried lentil doughnuts) or homemade paneer. Mum won't use the originals anymore because she's too worried about the airline paper, so she's pasted and photocopied,” Iyer explains. A day of visiting relatives would consist of several meals – mid-morning, lunchtime, and then again mid-afternoon.

She is a die-hard Francophile – speaking French helps tremendously – but put her anywhere and she is happy. Iyer grew up eating similar things to any other child of the Eighties in the UK: “pasta, chicken nuggets, the usual trashy food that people would eat then,” she rattles off. A teaspoon of chilli flakes will give you a good kick of heat in this dish; reduce by half if you’re after a milder dish. It’s a route her father would travel back and forth when he studied at the University of Kolkata Medical School, where he later met her mum – a journey that took 36 hours at the time. As fans of her previous cookbooks will know, Rukmini Iyer has been inspired by a range of global cuisines over the years, from Spanish to Vietnamese.Creative and unusual ingredient combinations abound, and the book is infused with the classic Bengali and South Indian flavours of curry leaf, Nigella seed, coconut, lime, and cardamom.