Controversial, maybe, but these sandwich fillings dial up the taste factor and fit pretty well in a soft white roll

If I was forced to choose, I’d say I’m a butter, cheese and pickles man. I love mine open and I tend to go for sourdough, even if that does induce eye-rolls from many. I’m talking, of course, about sandwiches, a subject on which everyone has wonderfully strong opinions. What bread to use? Cut it on the diagonal or straight down the middle? Is it OK for anyone over the age of seven to cut off the crusts? And that’s before you even start discussing what’s going inside. Slices of tomato: sublime or soggy? A handful of crisps: critical or criminal? A lettuce leaf or two: lovely or limp? Fish finger sandwiches: right or wrong? Such seemingly innocent questions, yet ones that incite such firm feelings. (My reply to that last question, incidentally, is revealed by today’s first recipe, which takes the concept, dials it up and feels pretty strongly about the presence of a soft white roll.)

The Basques work wonders with fresh peas: try them with fried cod, fino and jamón, pork belly with fried eggs, goat’s cheese toasts or in crab and pea rice

As with any proud Basque, peas have played a huge part in my culinary education – they even feature in one of my earliest kitchen memories, of five-year-old me podding peas with my mother. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that peas are one of the most important ingredients in our cooking tradition, and we happily eat them for breakfast, brunch, lunch and dinner, as well as a raw snack. Every spring, we Basques turn into pea-obsessives, because that’s when guisantes lágrima come into season. They’re much smaller than regular peas, and much, much sweeter, and we cook them every which way, from roasting and frying to stews and salads – they’re so revered that we call them “green caviar”. Lágrima peas are next to impossible to get hold of in the UK, but that’s not to say you can’t use fresh British peas in similarly delicious and varied ways.

‘Bakery scent’ added via microcapsules to postage stamp celebrating ‘jewel of French culture’

The French Post Office has released a scratch-and-sniff postage stamp to celebrate the baguette, once described by President Emmanuel Macron as “250 grams of magic and perfection”.

The stamp, which costs €1.96, depicts a baguette decorated with a red, white and blue ribbon. It has a print run of 594,000 copies.