Roast chicken thighs with roast squash, leeks and two punchy dressings

I’m delighted that it’s roasting tin season once again, and what better way to kick it off than with this chuck-it-in-the-oven sticky miso chilli chicken with squash and leeks? The sesame, miso, garlic and ginger marinade can go on the chicken ahead of time if you like (in which case, I’d include a squeeze of lime juice), but if you’re short on time, five minutes before cooking will do the trick. The vegetables cook under the chicken, in the manner of potatoes sitting under a rotisserie chicken, but with the added hit of flavour from the miso. Then, to make it really sing, there’s a punchy sesame, chilli and coriander dressing to finish.

A spicy Turkish dish with big flavours and big pasta, all topped with garlicky yoghurt sauce

Biber salçası is a Turkish paste made from concentrated cooked red peppers and salt. It comes in two varieties: acı (spicy) and tatlı (sweet). The hotter version adds a deep, umami heat to cumin-spiced lamb in this pasta recipe, which in Turkey is known as markana. Traditionally, markana is served with garlicky yoghurt and a generous drizzle of chilli butter enlivened with pul biber and sumac. With flavours this loud, it’s best to use a large pasta shape such as paccheri, because its cavernous middles can hold satisfying morsels of the filling.

Flavour Heroes: 15 Modern Pantry Ingredients to Amplify Your Cooking, by Gurdeep Loyal, is published by Quadrille at £27. To order a copy for £24.30, go to guardianbookshop.com

Nutty in flavour and creamy in texture, autumn’s bounty of squash and pumpkin has many uses, both sweet and savoury

The shops are heaving with pumpkins and squash, and though there are so many different varieties to choose from, most of them are interchangeable. My favourites are kabocha, crown prince and delicata, for their deeply nutty flavour and creamy texture, plus they hold their shape well when roasted or braised. And if you’re carving a pumpkin for Halloween over the coming weeks, don’t waste the flesh: chop it up and throw into a risotto. It’s hard to imagine that such deliciousness could come from such a ghoulish grimace.