Yumi is going back to her mother's country with this particular culinary love affair.

Zenzai is the name for Adzuki Beans when they're cooked and sweetened, but still hold their beany shape. There's fantastic info about it on this website which is particularly helpful if you love cooking Japanese food!

Sweetened beans can be a weird concept if you're not accustomed to it - but give it a chance, it's extremely digestible and leaves the body feeling invigorated and powered!

ZENZAI

200g Adzuki Beans

1 Litre of water

150g brown sugar

pinch salt

Boil the adzuki beans for 45mins. Drain and rinse them well then top them again with fresh cold water and bring back to the boil. Consider how watery/thick you want your finished product to be when you add the water. (Motto: "You can always add more [water, in this case], but you can't take it away!") Cook for 15 mins before adding the sugar and salt. Allow some water to evaporate but not so much that the pan is dry. Check the beans after another 30 mins. You want them soft and yielding.

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Borrowing heavily from Maggie Beer's famous recipe for SOUR CREAM PASTRY, Yumi gets super-inspired in the kitchen and devises a PIE RECIPE for the ages.

SMOKED ALMOND PASTRY

In a food processor, mix 240g plain flour with 30g smoked almonds. Add in 160g chilled, cubed butter and whizz for 20 seconds.

Add in 125g sour cream, and 40g of olive oil and whizz together for 30-50 seconds, until the dough forms a ball.

Get the dough up out of the food processor, and roll into two balls. (If you love metrics, I weigh the base ball to be 340g (bigger) and the lid ball to be 290g.)

Wrap in plastic or beeswax and refrigerate until needed (at least 2 hours, overnight is fine).

FILLING

Dry roast 1 big, cubed sweet potato for 20mins on 180C.

Dry cook 500g baby spinach until it's all wilted. This looks goofy like the pan is overfilled but it shrinks down, be patient and watch it doesn't catch on the bottom of the pan.

Allow the sweet potato and the spinach to cool.

Combine these ingredients with 500g fresh ricotta, 120g finely grated Grana Padano (I used the microplane) and a pinch of salt.

Mix well.

TO ASSEMBLE

Pre-heat the oven to 180C.

Roll out the pastry in 2 pieces.

The larger piece goes into the base of the pie.

If you're prepping ahead, you can stop here and refrigerate the crust. This will also prevent shrinkage!

Fill the pie with your sweet potato-ricotta-spinach mixture.

Top with the lid.

Trim, decorate, get fancy with the edges (or don't) and remember to cut a slit in the lid for steam to escape.

Brush the lid with a whisked egg yolk, a shake of salt and a generous sprinkle of sesame seeds.

Bake for 30-40 mins. Serve in fat wodges with a side of tomato sauce.

LOSE YOUR MIND and RELISH THE LEFTOVERS!

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It's not brain surgery or rocket science, but heating up some leftover rice *can* be a sexy meal ticket. *cough*

Simon gets inspired with a meal for one that'll take you 4 minutes to put together. Bonus points if you made the lemon salsa from last episode!

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