Many a Gallic treat is based on a hearty dose of butter.

Education in Bavaria is tough. You fail sports, you have to repeat the year.

Mum and Dad grew vegetables and every day it would be beans for dinner and we'd have to go and pick them, and weed and stuff. If you wanted your pocket money you did your chores.

I think for me the final push to move to Paris was the fact I wanted an adventure and I was slightly bored of my life in London.

There are a lot of potatoes in Swedish food. They love their potatoes in all forms, they even put potato puree on their hotdogs. You can order a hot dog that has the frankfurter in it, then you have mustard or ketchup, then potato puree and deep fried crunchy onions.

Rubbing meat or vegetables with sweet and savoury spices before roasting or sizzling on a grill is what summer nights are all about.

I will always look at my little Paris apartment with fond memories but I am too old to be sleeping on a futon bed!

Ramen is Japanese soul food, appealing to old and young, rich and poor.

Fig season is a joyous time of year for me. Back in my Paris days, the markets would be filled with piles of these squidgy fruit, no doubt sent up from the sunny south where they grow in abundance.

I would try and barter a cake for some help with coding. I'm not the best coder. I have some basic HTML but that's about it.

Those Frenchies may know their pastry, but you can't beat a bit of British cheese.

The Great British summer has many qualities, but unfortunately guaranteed warm weather is not one of them.

With patisserie, unlike with cooking, you have to be very precise; you can't just add a bit of this and a bit of that, because your cake starts melting. There's a lot of technique involved, but you can still be creative. Because of my artistic background, when I have that freedom I tend to do things a little bit out of the box.

I remember a trip to Malaysia to visit my dad's family when I was eight. It was Christmas and they roasted a whole suckling pig on the fire and it made me nauseous.

I haggle with French grannies over their old knick-knacks and walk away with some real gems.

While we Brits love a curry, the French get their spicy kicks from the culinary traditions bestowed by their North African population.

Crab meat is surprisingly sweet in its purest form, which is why it is often pepped up with zippy chilli and lifted with citrus.

Crumpets for me are the quintessence of a British afternoon tea, the ideal winter warmer that would welcome me home from school.

Eating wantan mee in Malaysia is my earliest memory. The street sellers there have a whole cooking set-up on the front of their bikes.

For me, the best burger buns are made from an enriched dough, soft and absorbent enough to soak up all the juices.

I inherited my 1960s copy of 'French Provincial Cooking' by Elizabeth David from my mother Gabrielle, who in turn inherited it from her mother Frances. It was my bible when I first moved to Paris aged 26.

Back in my school days, when I would scuttle off with a cheese roll, an apple, a box of Sun-Maid raisins and a Penguin bar, my packed lunches were reassuringly predictable. And I liked it that way.

When I studied at the Parisian cookery school Le Cordon Bleu, making shortcrust pastry was one of the first techniques I learned.

Don't be afraid to play with combinations and quantities of spices to create your own bespoke spice rub.