9 top chefs reveal the one dish they’d eat forever

From nostalgic Sunday roasts to falafel pitta stuffed to the brim with pickles, we asked eight of the world’s top chefs and home cooks to name the one dish they’d never tire of.

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1. Chetna Makan, cookbook author and Bake Off finalist

“It would have to be a chicken curry or a chicken biryani. It could be the best butter chicken, or my mum makes this masala chicken, which I have actually shared on my YouTube channel, but it’s just the simplest chicken curry. But the way she makes it, it’s just insane. It’s basic, but it tastes incredible.

“I’ve made that recipe myself at home, but it doesn’t taste the same as hers. She’s making it in India, so maybe it’s the spices of the place, or maybe it’s that the chicken tastes different. And it’s her. When you’re making it yourself, it’s never the same, is it? So it has to be that.”

2. Clare Smyth, Michelin-starred restaurant chef

“Roast chicken, no question. So nostalgic, we had one every Sunday as a family. Just a really nice roast chicken with roast potatoes. I don’t do it every Sunday now, but it’s easy, and you need your roast kit. I use Hexclad’s big roasting tray, and the rack is key; no trussing required. Brine it if you’re fancy, or don’t; season it all over, stick it in the rack, into the oven, baste it as you go. Potatoes go in the bottom too, roasting in the chicken fat, and the tray’s non-stick so clean-up is nothing. One tray, even the gravy. I love that.”

3. Alasdair Gill, chef and writer

“I’d say that after weeks of cooking rich, fine-dining food for clients abroad, all I want is a French baguette with some butter and a pickle. There could be a whole book on what chefs really eat in their downtime – even when you’re working with incredible cooks, you’ll still see them munching on things like a Colin the Caterpillar cake or a Greggs takeaway.

“I’ve also got a real sweet tooth, and I’d love to be a pastry chef — pastries and desserts are some of my favourite things. If I had to choose one, it would be a cherry almond frangipane tart. Frangipane tarts are the best; I love them.”

4. Donna Hay, Australian food stylist, author and presenter

“My favourite dish from my new book is the whole lemon cake. It’s like a classic whole orange cake, which I love, with that same juiciness, syrup and everything going on.

“You simmer thin-skinned lemons for about an hour and a half until they’re soft to break down the pith, then blitz it all up, mix it into the batter and bake it. It has that same juicy, syrupy quality I love in a whole orange cake. It’s delicious.”

5. Vivek Singh, Indian chef and restaurateur

“My all-time favourite dish is prawn malai curry (prawn, coconut and cardamom curry). I first tasted it as a child, aged eight or nine, at a Bengali wedding, and the memory has stayed with me ever since. The atmosphere was full of warmth and generosity, with guests seated at long tables and fed course after course as part of this extraordinary display of hospitality.

“Then a small bowl of golden prawn curry arrived. I had never eaten prawns before, but with puri it was completely delicious – rich, fragrant and gently spiced. It is still my favourite dish to cook and share. I only put it on menus occasionally because I never want to fall out of love with it.”

6. Andrej Urosevic AKA AndrejCooksFish, fishmonger and content creator

“Chicken feet. I love fish and I could eat it twice a day, but my love of chicken feet goes back to when I was about five, visiting my grandparents on their farm. It was a Yugoslav farm – a very basic enterprise, just a house and a chicken coop.

“I was curious, so I laid down a trail of corn kernels, propped up a wicker basket with a stick, attached a long rope and hid behind the barn until a chicken went underneath. That evening, I was served chicken bouillon with chicken feet. They made me eat them, and the trouble is, they tasted so nice – gelatinous and really tasty. Now I get them in Chinatown, either braised with beans or cured in salt vinegar.”

7. Nigel Ng aka Uncle Roger, Malaysian cookbook author, restaurateur and content creator

“It really depends where I’m at. I gravitate towards Asian food more personally, so in London my favourite dish is the fried rice at Speedboat Bar; it’s got strong flavours. If we’re talking the Western hemisphere, I loved the egg handkerchiefs at Bancone, although I don’t think they serve it anymore; that was years ago. Speedboat Bar is the one I’d go back to now, as of current time. If I want pasta, I’ll go to Manteca.”

8. Sarit Packer, co-founder of Honey & Co restaurant

“For me, it’s falafel in a pitta. A full pitta with all the salads, the whole thing. I could eat it till the day I die. There should be five or six falafel in there with the cabbage salad, the pickles, tomato salad and tahini.”

9. Ilhan Mohamed Abdi, cookbook author and recipe writer

“My all-time favourite is saur and suga. Suga just means sauce. My favourite is a stew version with really soft, falling-off-the-bone lamb in a rich tomato stew with carrots and potatoes. Delicious.

“Saur is the closest thing to grits or ugali, a really thick porridge (but it’s not porridge; it’s made from semolina). A lot of people don’t like it, but it would be my death row meal – it’s really smooth; my mum cooks it in coconut milk rather than water, so stock and coconut milk together. My little sister hated it, so I hardly ever got to have it. Once it cools down, it’s almost like a custard, similar to the semolina pudding you’d get at school, or like polenta. You plate it up, create a dip in the middle and put the stew inside.

“There’s quite a lot of spice in the lamb: cumin, coriander, garlic. The stew is in my book, and the saur is too, but in the book the saur is matched with an oxtail stew instead, though you can mix and match.”