Braised tomatoes, chickpeas & chard

cooking whilst in limbo

Jul 16, 2025

∙ Paid

We moved out of our little flat in Hackney in February and have been in limbo ever since. You could say we are “between homes”, but that would imply we know with certainty the home we are going to next, which we don’t.

All our things have been packed away in a storage unit since the beginning of the year. This has been challenging, both logistically and emotionally.

Logistically - where is the 25cm fluted tart tin that I need for my job tomorrow? Who knows. Most likely, right at the back of the unit, behind the bikes, the bedding and the almost immovable box with “BOOKS” scrawled on the top.

Emotionally - I miss my things! The stainless steel tongs that fit in my hand just so — no flappy, unwieldy moments — and twirl spaghetti just so. The oat-coloured mixing bowl my granny gave me, with three small chips around the rim, that is the perfect vessel for any mixing situation. My pride and joy Roberts radio that provided the gentle, calm wake up call of Radio 4’s Today show, unlike the affronting phone alarm that has done the job so aggressively for the last however many months.

As a definitive home bird, I miss having one. Most of all, I miss having a kitchen — a space to cook, a space to be, a space to live — that I can call my own.

Over recent weeks, this unsettled feeling has affected the sort of cooking I am drawn to. I am cooking (if you can indeed call some of these assembly jobs “cooking”) and eating the things I find most comforting on repeat.

~ Boiled eggs with marmite soldiers.

~ Fried eggs on doorstep-thick slices of toast, also slathered in marmite.

~ Peas, by the bowlful. Sometimes, like this. More often, simply with olive oil, maybe a squeeze of lemon, salt and pepper.

~ Tomato sauce *anything*: pasta shells with burst cherry tomatoes and basil; tomato-braised greens to use up one of the many bunches in our veg box; chickpeas in a brick-red brothy sauce of their own making (thank you chickpea liquid).

And this brings me to today’s recipe - a showcase of two seasonal ingredients (chard! cherry tomatoes!), but also the thing I have been cooking over and over again in an attempt to feel soothed, while feeling settled is still a (little? long?) way off. Call it summer comfort food, if you will.