Jamie's Fans

We are Jamie Oliver fans - even My Beloved will watch his show on the food channel with evident pleasure and we have set the VCR to record "Jamie at Home" so we won't miss a single show. We like his insouciant attitude toward cooking while he produces dishes that make our mouths water and wish for smellivision.

On a recent program about peas and broad beans, he made a spaghetti sauce using the contents of Italian sausages squeezed out of their casings for the meatballs and sprinkled the top of the finished dish with fresh, raw green peas, a brilliant (Jamie's favorite word) idea to give lively flavor and crunch to the dish.

When I made it a few days later, I added some homegrown Swiss chard to the sauce, which was a nice addition, but I didn't have any fresh peas on hand. I did have a small handful of snappingly fresh tiny green beans from my garden, so I cut them up and sprinkled them on top. They added color, crunch and a wonderful fresh greenness to the dish, confirming our admiration for Mr. Oliver's ideas.