THIS is an easy and quick recipe that a friend of mine, and mother-of-three, Rachel Thompson gave me. I love cooking when I have loads of time on my hands, when I can put music on . . . I like cooking for dinner parties for example. Everyday cooking isn't as much fun, I have to admit. My two children, who are two years old and one-and-a-bit respectively, aren't at the sitting down for dinner stage yet.

I like all food in general. I chose meatballs because they're a great way of trying to get the kids to eat meat, which I find really hard to do as they don't really like it. You can pretend they're footballs and play with them and when you're making them they can squish them.

My own favourite dish is probably roast chicken, with my mum's secret stuffing recipe. I think there's a turn at the moment in back-to-basics cooking.

I'm not a big fan of heavy sauces and I quite like food to be quite natural. The things that you'll always find in my kitchen are pasta, houmous, raisins . . . a lot of kiddy things really. I'm not very good at dessert or baking . . . I'm much more of a main-course person."

What you need 350g pack Swedish meatballs (for mothers who don't have time to make them) 1 pack spaghetti tomato sauce 1 onion 2 cloves garlic 1 tsp dried oregano 1 tbsp unsalted butter 1 tbsp olive oil 700g bottle tomato passata pinch of sugar salt and pepper 100ml full-fat milk Put the onion, garlic and oregano into the processor and blitz to a pulp. Heat the butter and oil in a deep wide pan, add the onion and garlic mix and cook over a low heat for 10 minutes until soft.

Add the bottle of passata and then half-fill the empty bottle with cold water. Add this to the pan with a pinch of sugar and some salt and pepper.

Cook for 10 minutes. The sauce will appear thin at this stage but don't worry as it will thicken later.

Stir in the milk, cover and simmer for 10 minutes. Add the meatballs and simmer for a further 10 minutes.

Meanwhile cook the pasta as per instructions and serve.

TV presenter Derek Davis's 'CHANCER' CHOWDER

"THIS chowder is very easy to do. I don't believe in complicated cookery. If someone asks me for a recipe . . . well, I can cook souffle potato but I will never start giving lessons in it, or anything that requires split-second timing. If you've got people in you really don't want to be cooking all day.

"You can add extra milk if you need to thin it to stretch it. I'd serve it with garlic bread or hot crusty bread. It's a wonderful supper meal. There are variations on it and you can turn it into a fish stew by adding four boiled and diced potatoes.

"There are a lot of things you can do but what you should never do is use smoked or oily fish. When you go into a restaurant and you see lumps of salmon floating around a chowder, you know it's there for one reason . . . it's cheap. It's cheap and it's nasty and it doesn't work. It must be white fish and some shellfish . . . molluscs and crustaceans.

"If you want to go to the trouble of shelling some mussels you can do that and, if you want to, add more or less prawns. But you don't put mackerel in, you don't put trout or tuna in, not smoked haddock, smoked cod, smoked coley . . . unless you want something that smells entirely of smoked fish. Those flavours are too dominant.

"Be aware that scallops and prawns cook quite quickly so when you bring those scallops back to the boil, they're pretty much cooked and the more you cook them, the more rubbery they get.

"I've been cooking variations on this for more than 30 years, I suppose because I've an abiding interest in fishing and I have a huge interest in food.

"The flavour you want is full and filling and creamy and rich and fishy, but not oily fishy. Be aware of cooking times. The real genius of a fish cook isn't that they can pick it up and throw it into a pan or a pot.

The real genius is timing. Even a humble chowder chef like me knows you can't put everything into the pot and boil it up.

"They have different cooking times and you want your prawns to be succulent."

What you need Half kilo white fish (if possible two different textures like cod and monk), filleted, skinned, and sliced 1 cup fish stock made from a cube or by boiling white fish bones with a glass of wine and some herbs and seasonings.

6 large prawns or a cup of medium prawns, shelled and sliced long ways 1 teaspoon Pernod or pastis or Ricard or finely chopped fennel leaf (but don't overdo it . . . it's only a hint) 1 cup of cream a few cups of breadcrumbs salt and pepper 1 dessertspoon of Parmesan cheese 4 queen scallops Simmer the white fish until soft in half a litre of milk until soft. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Add the stock and keep it on the simmer.

Slice the scallops. Separate the orange roe and slice that separately.

Add them to the mix.

Bring to the boil then add the prawns. Add in the Pernod or fennel leaves. Mix in the cream and the Parmesan.

Thicken with breadcrumbs.

DJRick O'Shea's PERFECT BURGERS

"I LOVE to eat, eat well and eat out whenever the budget allows but can I cook personally? Not unless you count putting pizza and garlic bread in the oven, no. Being brutally honest (and this might explain a lot) the last time someone tried to show me how to cook I almost sliced my thumb off (I still have the scar to prove it) making spaghetti bolognaise. I was a teenager.

"All the cooking is done by my wife. I'm the helper monkey who stirs things and gets stuff out of the cupboards but she has done it so well all these years that I'd be embarrassed to try and cook for her.

"But I can lash up pasta for the kids or a simple potatoes, veggies and oven-baked fish meal, or the simple burger recipe here. To me, the perfect burger has to be made of good quality beef, nice trimmings, lashings of mustard (a pickle always helps) and, if it comes with giant railway-sleeper-size chips smothered in vinegar then all the better.

"I try not to go to burger joints too often these days but when the mood does take me I've grown a serious habit for Real Gourmet Burger in Dun Laoghaire since it opened but the queues are always out the door and the wait can be up to an hour at peak times so the family have to plan ahead."

What you need 1lb of round steak mined salt and pepper 1 onion 1 egg

Fry the onion in a little oil, let it cool, then mix it into the beef with the salt, pepper and just enough egg that the mixture isn't too wet.

Divide the mixture into four, make them into burger shapes, pat them out and dip them into a little flour.

Grill until done to your liking.

Serve with your favourite accompaniments. Mine are lettuce, American mustard, decent buns, pickle and a slice or two of onion.

TM Chef Isaac Allen's

WHOLE BARBECUED BALLYCOTTON MACKEREL WITH CRUSTY WHITE BREAD, OLIVE AND TOMATO SALSA

"IN summertime we go fishing a couple of times a week, generally speaking in the evening. We can see the tide in Ballycotton from our top window so when we see the tide coming in at the right time of the day and the sun is shining, we grab the fishing rods and off we go.

"The boys absolutely adore fishing. We can actually walk across the beach from our house and there are lots of little rock pools on the way.

"If the conditions are right, you can get little shrimps, limpets, periwinkles and things like that, which we also bring home with us and you just boil them up and eat with some mayonnaise.

"The weather is a huge decider but in an ordinary summer, the mackerel season is from about the beginning of June until the middle of September.

"You get it coming in with high tide and they're as easy as anything to catch. Off we go with a couple of feathers and in an hour we can have 10 or 12 mackerel.

This recipe is perfect to eat with your hands. If you have it, bring a few little sprigs of fennel or thyme for the cavity of the fish, if you remove the guts, although it's not essential. Dont' forget to bring a bottle of beer too.

That's as far as we would go with it generally. We just keep it as simple as that."

What you need Good-quality baguette Fishing rod Disposable barbecue For the salsa 2 ripe tomatoes, roughly chopped 1 dessertspoon of roughly chopped gherkin 2 dessertspoons chopped olives 2 cloves of garlic, roughly chopped 2 spring onion, roughly chopped 1 dessertspoon chopped basil Salt, pepper and sugar for seasoning juice of quarter to half a lemon Put ingredients in blender. Pulse them until they are not completely pureed but still have some texture to them. You will now have quite a loose salsa.

Catch the mackerel, which will come in at high tide on a sunny day.

Remove the head from the fish. Then on both sides of the fish, using a sharp knife, make three small incisions at an angle. Sprinkle with a little salt and pepper and barbecue on each side for about three minutes.

Bring the salsa with you in a jam jar. Make an incision in the baguette and butter the salsa onto the bread with plenty of juice, which soaks into the bread . . . although not so much that it falls apart.

With your fingers, break the flesh off the fish when it's cooked . . . if it comes off easily you know it's done.

Place the fillets in the baguette and munch it on the pier, sitting in the sun . . . if there is any.

Reporter Lisa Cannon's EASY CHICKPEA SALAD

"I'M not vegetarian but my aunt, who is a macrobiotic, gave me this recipe. I do like cooking but I don't actually get an awful lot of opportunity to do it. When I do have time, I love to look at recipe books and try and cook as much as I can.

"I did have a dinner party about a year ago and I had eight men over for dinner . . . my boyfriend and his seven friends . . . which was quite a feat! I delved into some Jamie Oliver books and some old recipes of my mum's and family members' . . .

and the guests were over the moon.

"I was very much trying to impress him at the time. I eat out a lot and always on a Saturday night and Sunday.

"On Saturdays I'd often eat in Town Bar and Grill. I'm also a huge fan of Saba. It's cool in there and it's reasonable as well. I hate spending loads and loads of cash on food, which can be quite irritating at times. You don't want to fork out a couple of hundred for a meal that you know you could have cooked yourself for half the price. On Sundays, I eat out with my father in Cruzzos or Oscar Taylor's in Malahide.

"In my fridge you'll find a lot of houmous and cheese. I lived in France for a couple of years so cheese and wine are big favourites of mine and I like a lot of the smelly cheeses. I try to eat salads and I love savouries so I eat a lot of nuts.

Thai and Chinese are big favourites too. I shop as I need and I'm not organised because of the job.

"I could be in London one minute and Paris the next so I try and maintain myself as best I can. I generally just get a lot of stuff delivered from Tesco but if I could shop I like to go to Marks & Spencers because I like a lot of their salads, which are great for working in TV because you can just stick them in your bag and away you go."

What you need 1 tin organic chickpeas block of feta cheese, cubed drizzle olive oil freshly chopped mint freshly chopped coriander juice of one lemon cracked black pepper and a little sea salt Mix it all up for the most delicious salad that's really healthy as well.