Rachel Roddy's recipe for baked leek and egg gratin | A kitchen in Rome

"The book I (re)ordered was Beaneaters and Bread Soup, by Lori de Mori and the photographer Jason Lowe. Gathered over decades of living just outside Florence, the book is a collection of wonderful, practical Tuscan recipes, and also tells a story of Tuscan food through portraits of photogenic local artisans: a chestnut grower, a bee keeper, a man who makes knives I would mention more if I could find the book, which I suspect was borrowed and never returned you know who you are! (Unless I have got this wrong and it is behind the bookcase.)"

"One recipe I don't need to wait for, though, is Lori's sformato, which I have been making on and off for years. The word sformato means something taken out of a form, and it's an umbrella term used to describe a great number of bakes. Lori's consists of a layer of well-seasoned spinach covered with a duvet of besciamella (bechamel) seasoned with parmesan, and it inspired this week's recipe, which is another good example of how so much cooking is simply repetitive behaviour seasoned with fresh thoughts."

"The fresh thoughts here are from a summer meal at a restaurant near Arezzo, where, as a vegetarian option, they baked leeks in individual terracotta dishes, poured over bechamel enriched with lots of cheese, then flashed the dishes under a grill. When I complimented the owner on the good idea, she mentioned that it works with spinach, too, and that you could also snuggle a few hard-boiled eggs into the vegetables for a more complete meal."

Many books went missing during sorting, prompting a replacement order for a favored Tuscan recipe volume. A sformato is a baked dish meaning something taken out of a form and covers many bakes. One version layers seasoned spinach under a bechamel enriched with parmesan. A restaurant near Arezzo inspired a variation that bakes long-cut leeks in individual terracotta dishes, pours over cheese-rich bechamel, then grills them. The owner noted the method works with spinach and that adding hard-boiled eggs makes a more complete meal. Long leek lengths arranged upright produce a cluster resembling standing logs.

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