Here I am, back in the market town of Devizes in England, looking out at a clear blue sky. Blossoms are emerging and spring is definitely in the air, although the nights are still chilly. The lady wife picked me up from Heathrow after having shopped for food at London’s Portobello Market. After picking up Puffin, our Jack Russell terrier, from the friends who look after him while we are away, we had a light supper of a small selection of French cheeses. The rye bread was from an artisanal baker, and was chewy and full of flavour. We forget how good bread can be after years of eating awful factory-made rubbish.

The next evening, we had a couple coming for dinner and I decided to cook four plump quail, or batair, also from Portobello. Here in England, the birds have more meat than their small, scrawny desi cousins, and one will do per person if there’s some vegetable accompanying it. Just a week ago, Zain, my brother Navaid’s marvellous cook in Karachi, had made us some delicious curried quail in yoghurt sauce. But we did need two birds each.

I made small incisions on the breasts, and placed slivers of garlic in them. Then the quail were marinated in red wine with ground cinnamon, black pepper and some red chilli. Some fresh rosemary was placed in the cavities, and the birds were allowed to sit in this marinade for a couple of hours before being placed in a hot oven for half an hour.

To go with the quail, I made a risotto with a selection of wild mushrooms (yes, also from Portobello). After sautéing a sliced onion in lots of unsalted butter, I added the Arborio rice and stirred it until all the grains were coated; a glass of red wine went in next and as soon as the liquid had been absorbed, the usual chicken stock followed, a ladle at a time.

All this while, the rice was stirred to keep it from sticking to the bottom. Salt and freshly ground pepper were chucked in liberally and when the rice was half cooked, I threw in the chopped mushrooms. More stock and more stirring until the rice had absorbed all the liquid it was going to. At this point (around 20 minutes), you need to check for ‘doneness’ to get it just right. As I have written before, this takes lots of practice, but is well worth it. In fact, a good risotto is a labour of love.

Although everything was delicious, I noticed that the flavours in the quail were not as pronounced as they should have been. I quickly concluded that this was because my spices had been sitting in our kitchen for six months while we were away in Sri Lanka and Pakistan. Spices, specially the powdered kind, lose flavour within a few months, so I make it a practice to chuck away the old bottles and jars when I get back, and buy a new lot.

Last night I cooked a couple of duck breasts, again in red wine. I used a heavy iron griddle heated to a very high temperature. Before cooking, the layer of fat was removed as leaving it on results in a lot of hot, sizzling grease being produced. We both like our duck undercooked, so when I pulled the meat off after cooking for about four minutes on each side, it was still red in the centre. After removing the duck breasts, I threw in half a glass of wine onto the hot griddle and let it reduce while scraping the bits of duck fat into the sauce. This was poured over the breasts and served. It was delicious, even if I say so myself.

Let me repeat what I have written earlier about cooking in wine: as its boiling temperature is low, the alcohol burns off before the dish is ready, and so none of the usual religious injunctions apply. Only the flavour remains, and there’s no law against that.