Stevie Parle's favourite spring recipes Spices are important in my food, and if you have a reasonably well stocked spice drawer, a bowl of lentils suddenly becomes something exotic and delicious. Once you are confident with spices, if you don't have what a recipe reqires you can often use something else instead. Fennel instead of anise, or chilli instead of paprika, even nutmeg instead of cinnamon, you can't really go too far wrong. Spring is the best time of year for the cook, though on British soil it seems slow to arrive. Even once the land has started to wake up after the long winter it still takes a while for food to actually grow, leaving us with the 'hungry gap. Luckily, when we are feeling like eating spring food but the soil hasn't quite caught up we can look to our European neighbours with slightly warmer climes for help. Italy and France can provide early? peas and broad beans, though they don't really compare to the excitement with which I greet the first box of British asparagus, or really really fresh local peas, so young and tiny that you can eat the whole pod. It Is in the spring that British produce comes into its own. Our spring vegetables are second to none. With the first bunch of asparagus I buy, I generally eat it just with butter, but after a couple of goes I try experimenting with new things. This thoran was the result of one of those experiments. A thoran is a classic south Indian way to cook vegetables, quickly, dry, with grated coconut, curry leaves and mustard seeds. I give a version for each season in my book but there are countless more. Each one has slightly different seasoning and cooking times but do experiment, peas, beetroot, cabbage and even crab work very well. Fresh curry leaves make it significantly tastier,and they are increasingly easy to find. If you can't find them, add a little coriander, it won't be the same but it will taste almost as good. The chicken recipe below is one of the most popular at the restaurant. Mastiha or gum mastic is the sap from the mastic tree on the island of Chios. It has a wonderful taste, or more truthfully a perfume, of trees and green leaves, of wood and exotic places. It's a little tricky to find,steenbergs sell it, and you can get it on amazon (of all places). Often you find in middle eastern shops. If you can't find it, add a couple of cloves to the crushed cardamom. The dish will still be wonderful, it will just be lacking slightly the lovely woody smell. The tart is a wonderful deep, aromatic version of a simple almond tart. The hazelnuts go wonderfully well with the rosemary and the pears, almost bland in their lack of sweetness add a beautiful counter to the sweet nut mixture. Stevie Parle's Dock Kitchen Cookbook: Real Home Cooking from Around the World by Stevie Parle (Quadrille, RRP £25) is available for £16 plus £1.25 p&p from Telegraph Books on 0844 871 1515 or at books.telegraph.co.uk.