Catherine’s Originals denies Mondelēz claims in London high court of ‘passing off’ and trademark infringement

The owner of Toblerone is taking legal action against a tiny British vegan chocolate brand which it claims has been copying the Swiss chocolate bar’s famous chunky shape.

Mondelēz has filed papers at the high court in London accusing Catherine’s Original’s of “passing off” and trademark infringement with its O’bar – a length of chocolate divided into segments each with a rounded semi-oval hump.

In 2014, 13% of the population of this Belgian city described themselves as flexitarian. This year, 83% did. Here is how everyone was convinced to eat their greens – and love them

Sixty bowls of slime-green soup sit waiting for the children to arrive. Pupils rush in from their morning lessons, grab the bowls by the handles and start slurping. No complaints, no refusals. (OK, maybe a few “bleurgh” faces.) Chicory soup dispatched, they get stuck into the main course: falafel, Mediterranean vegetable tagine and couscous. Some ask for seconds; most grab a piece of fruit for dessert and run out to play.

This is a typical Thursday lunchtime in BS De Stadspoort primary school in Ghent, Belgium. Similar meat-free menus are being eaten in other schools and nurseries across the city, plus community centres, care homes and assisted living facilities, not to mention many work canteens and restaurants. Thursday in Ghent is officially “Veggie Day”, with residents encouraged to eschew any meat or fish. So how did a city get its children – and everyone else – to eat their greens?

Poach your leeks to perfection, then pair with pickled pears and nutty miso

I have a great respect for the leek, which is possibly the most demanding vegetable in its need to be freshly cooked before consumption. A warm leek, fresh from the pot, is an ethereal, collapsing sigh of diaphanous veils, whereas cold it can all too easily become a slippery and almost slimy mess of hopelessness.

Jackson Boxer is chef/owner of Brunswick House, Vesper and Dove, all in London, and culinary director of Cowley Manor near Cheltenham and the Henrietta in London

Jackfruit is a blank canvas that absorbs flavour brilliantly – it’s all about seasoning it generously and giving it enough time for the aromatics and spices to do their work

I’ve just made yet another disappointing jackfruit curry. Any tips for making it more flavourful?
Sally, by email
“The trick with jackfruit is not to rush it,” says Eroshan Meewella, founder of Sri Lankan street-food joint Adoh! in central London. “It absorbs flavour brilliantly – spice, curry leaves, coconut milk, tamarind – so you just need to give it time.” Don’t be shy with those flavours, either, because, as Sally has discovered, jackfruit is something of a blank canvas. Sanjana Modha, author of Modern Masala, suggests treating it a bit as you would tofu: “You really have to build flavour around it. Think of jackfruit as a sponge that’s going to absorb your masala. And I cannot emphasise enough how you’ll need more onions than you think.” And she ain’t kidding: for a curry to feed four to six, Modha uses “at least” four large onions. “You must spend time caramelising them properly, so start by getting those onions really golden by frying them with a couple of cinnamon sticks, cloves and cardamom pods.” That will take a good 45 minutes. “Then add ginger, garlic and chillies – don’t be afraid to season generously with all your ground spices.” You’ll want some acidity, too: “Lemon, lime or tamarind towards the end to balance everything.”

On to the jackfruit itself, which Luke Larsson, head chef at Khao Bird in London, always uses fresh from an Asian supermarket: “It’s just a hundred times better [than tinned], and it’s such a delicious fruit when fresh.” Modha, meanwhile, tends to go for tinned young green jackfruit in brine: “Drain and rinse it really well, then pat it completely dry using kitchen towel.” She fries it first in neutral oil (rapeseed, sunflower), until golden and slightly caramelised: “This gives it much more flavour, then I marinate it in ground spices and a spoonful of mustard oil for a few hours, or even overnight, before adding it to my curry.”

Got a culinary dilemma? Email feast@theguardian.com

A smoky tomato broth, a grilled peach, tomato and almond ‘ricotta’ salad scattered with roast almonds, and a sparky tomato tarte tatin

August is peak tomato season. This most versatile of fruits can be put to just about any use, from raw to slow-cooked and from oven- or sun-dried to desserts (believe it or not, they go incredibly well with summer berries, especially strawberries and raspberries). Not only that, but tomatoes have high glutamate levels that rise even further as they ripen, which gives them an umami kick. However you prepare them, though, the key thing is never to keep tomatoes in the fridge: the chill breaks down their cell structure and, even more importantly, affects their flavour in an alarming way.

Fragrant, punchy vegan dishes that can be kept in the kept in the fridge or freezer for an easy midweek dinner

Whether you love it or loathe it, tofu is one of the most versatile ingredients in any kitchen. For me, it’s the saviour of stressful dinner times, because it cooks in minutes, absorbs flavour like no other and packs a real nutritional punch. Here, it plays two very different roles: crisped until golden in a fragrant, spice-infused Vietnamese-style pho, and mashed to give body and bite to bold, punchy Thai-ish fishless cakes.

Jerk aubergines, lentil-stuffed courgette, griddled pineapple with maple syrup … Meat-free doesn’t need to mean treat-free when it comes to barbecue season

I’ve recently turned vegan. How do I have a great barbecue?
Nia, by email
Happily, most vegetables benefit from a bit of barbecue action, but the key is not to get too carried away, says Genevieve Taylor, author of How to BBQ: “There’s a real leaning for people to overdo barbecues, but you should approach it just as you would any meal, with one central star and a few sides. After all, there’s no other meal where you’d be expected to eat a chop, a sausage, a kebab and a chicken wing.” Not a meal you’d find Nia devouring, sure, but you get the general idea.

Shaun McAnuff, author of Original Flava: Easy Caribbean, would be inclined kick things off with tostones. “They’re a bit like crisps,” he says. “Boil green plantain, which are more dense and not as sweet as yellow ones, then peel and cut into thick circles.” Smash those flat with the bottom of a mug, then barbecue until nice and crisp and serve with guacamole or salsa. Alternatively, grab some aubergines, Taylor says: “They’re such a sponge for smoky flavours.” Slice lengthways, brush with oil, season and grill until soft. “Spread a filling, such as walnut paté with spices, herbs and pomegranate molasses, over the slices and roll up.” Those would be nice at room temperature, which also helps with getting ahead.

Got a culinary dilemma? Email feast@theguardian.com

This cool summer dish can be easily enhanced with a range of store-cupboard staples

What’s your favourite hot weather food? Mine’s gazpacho. I’m joking – gazpacho’s lovely, but cold noodles are my top pick because, in the summer, they meet me exactly where I am in both the cooking and the eating. They don’t need much by way of cooking, and they can be dressed and paired with many a store-cupboard ingredient – in today’s case, tahini, miso and sesame oil. Best of all, cooling the noodles shocks the starches, which makes them firmer and gorgeously “QQ”, a Taiwanese term used to describe food that’s delightfully bouncy and springy. Which personally, is how I’d like to feel all summer long.

Keep things simple, outsource and prep ahead where you can, and never forget the golden rule of canapes …

My daughter is getting married: what vegetarian and vegan canapes can I make at least a day ahead?
Sue, by email
“Canapes need to be no more than two mouthfuls,” says Barney Desmazery, author of One Dish Four Ways, “unless you’re going to provide something to eat them from, but in my book they’re then no longer canapes.”

You’ll not want anything too labour-intensive. “Sue is going to be making them tens or hundreds of times over, so outsourcing some work with store-bought ingredients is an easy win,” says Richard Makin, AKA School Night Vegan and author of Stress-Free Dinners. Also remember that, as with most things in life, less is usually more: “Good ingredients always triumph over complicated recipes,” says Desmazery, who recalls a wedding he once attended in Liguria, Italy: “There was a round of aged parmesan with knives for guests to break off shards, and that was great.” Granted, parmesan isn’t one for Sue’s vegetarian/vegan spread, but you get the idea.

Got a culinary dilemma? Email feast@theguardian.com

These compulsively snacky salt-crusted spuds are a Canary Islands favourite – and an unusual but excellent way to cook our own early-summer crop

If you’ve ever visited the Canary Islands, you’ll be familiar with papas arrugadas – often translated, somewhat unappetisingly, as “wrinkly potatoes” – which pop up on every menu there. And not, generally, as a side dish, but as a standalone snack to be enjoyed with drinks. I do love a place that takes the spud seriously, and perhaps it’s not that much of a surprise, given that the first potatoes to reach Europe passed through the Canaries on their way from Peru, which, along with the similarity between the rocky soils of the Andes and the islands, probably accounts for the long history of cultivation.

Though many unusual early varieties are still grown for local sale, the Canaries imports both seed and fresh potatoes from the UK (king edward and arran banner have become quinegua and arambana). Once upon a time, ships would leave the islands laden with winter tomatoes for the British market, and return full of tubers. For this recipe, however, you’ll need new season potatoes with thin, delicate skins, and small enough to cook whole. Cooked in salty water until the salt crystals cling to them like frost, they’re served with a fiery dipping sauce that reflects the strong Portuguese and African influences on Canarian cuisine: an unusual but excellent way to celebrate our own early-summer crop.

There is plenty of sunshine in this seductive, Sri Lankan-style potato curry that’s chock-full of evocative smells and flavours

I stitch myself up sometimes by planning on cooking something that’s native to a country – a Sri Lankan potato curry, say – then embellish it with my own desires (lemongrass, leeks, ginger) to such an extent that it can no longer really be called as such. But taste and memory work in mysterious ways. This recipe still evokes Sri Lanka for me: sunshine, spiced earth, the smell of cinnamon bundles and dense forest, and also the sound of the bread vans (playing Beethoven, curiously) and the distinctive squawk of the myna bird. I hope, if you cook it, it might evoke a little Sri Lankan sunshine for you, too.

An intriguing, punchy fusion of Taiwanese and Italian noodle dishes

Last year, the comedian Nish Kumar accused me of being in the pocket of “big cabbage”, because I was waxing lyrical about it. But look here, Nish, everyone is cabbage obsessed. It’s not just the Guardian; the internet is awash with “best cabbage” recipes and there’s a lot to love: it’s cheap, generous and genuinely delicious cooked and wilted down with onions (or shallots), as in this spaghetti. The inspiration behind the dish was a jar of Taiwanese Bullshead shallot sauce, a sweet, smoky and savoury sauce that I love to dollop into and on to all things eggs, noodles, vegetables and rice, but that I ran out of recently, prompting me to make a simple, store-cupboard alternative.

A cheerful rice bowl fragrant with ginger, garlic and spring onion, and laced with a sprightly chilli bean sauce

With spring in the air, I want a dish that’s the equivalent of turning the key in the ignition, firing up the engine and riding off into the sun. In short: something with a bit of va-va-voom. That dish, for me, is these Sichuan aubergines, a take on the classic “fish fragrant aubergines” (so called because the same aromatics are often used to cook fish). Creamy to begin with, they’re layered with flavour by way of ginger, garlic, spring onion and, finally, laced with delight and good times owing to the bright chilli bean sauce and vinegar.

Lawmakers will outlaw use of 31 meat-related names as part of efforts to help livestock farmers in food supply markets

EU lawmakers have agreed to ban meaty names such as steak and bacon for vegetarian and vegan foods, but “veggie burgers” and “meat-free sausages” will remain on the table.

Negotiators from the European parliament and EU council of ministers found a recipe for compromise on rules for food names on Thursday, although critics said they were creating needless complexity.

Social media’s latest trend is a reminder that perfectionism isn’t always the best way forward. If we want to make change, maybe we need to give ourselves a bit of a break

You might at first be tempted to mark the date and write down the exact time, certain that this was the moment we really had heard it all. A new hypothesis is doing the rounds on social media, and it’s called Vegan but Bacon. Yeah, I thought flexitarian was annoying enough too, but apparently not.

Vegan but Bacon. Whatever next, eh? Virgin But Sex? Hang on though, because there might actually be something to this. A plant-based content creator called Liz kicked it off, replying to somebody who said they’d join her culinary crusade if it wasn’t for their relish for rashers. “So do it,” she told them, “Go vegan but bacon.” Three million views later, many had shared how they didn’t eat any animal products 95% of the time, or only at home, or allowed themselves a hall pass item. “Harm reduction is harm reduction,” said Liz (which is vegan for “it’s better than nowt”), before pointing out that most people make progress a step at a time rather than all at once.

The higher you toss it, the more luck you’ll have this new lunar year. Chopsticks at the ready …

This Tuesday marks the start of the lunar new year and the year of the fire horse, which represents fresh opportunities, personal growth and good fortune. I, for one, am keen to usher that horse in, and to celebrate I’ll be making this noodle salad, which is a variation on one I first ate at Mandy Yin’s restaurant, Sambal Shiok. It’s a dish that’s eaten across Malaysia and Singapore, and the idea is that everyone around the table tosses the salad high into the air at the same time: the superstition goes that the higher the salad is tossed, the more luck will ensue. Come on, Nelly.

Swedish company claims ruling is anti-competitive and ‘solely benefits Big Dairy’

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The Swedish-based drinks manufacturer Oatly has been banned from using the word “milk” to market its plant-based products, after a ruling by the UK supreme court.

The alt-milk manufacturer has been in a long-running legal battle with the trade association Dairy UK after Oatly trademarked phrases associated with the dairy sector.

Soft leeks and crisped tempeh drizzled in a sticky, spicy sweet soy sauce and liberally sprinkled with salted peanuts

Tempeh is a gift to all home cooks from Indonesia. Made from fermented compressed soy beans, it’s an intelligent ingredient equivalent to meat in terms of protein, subtle and nutty in flavour and chewy in texture. Happily, it is also now widely available in most large UK supermarkets. Here, the tempeh is cooked in a typical Indonesian way – that is, fried until crisp, then coated in a sticky, spicy sweet soy sauce and liberally sprinkled with salted peanuts. In fact, the only anomaly is the leeks, making this dish mostly Indonesian but via a field in Lincolnshire.

Vegan restaurants are closing, RFK Jr is sounding the drum for carnivores, and the protein cult is bigger than ever. But eschewing animal products helps me ward off a sense of impotence – and despair

Let’s get this out of the way, because I’m itching to tell you (again): I’m vegan, and this is our time, Veganuary! Imagine me doing a weak, vitamin B12-depleted dance. Unlike gym-goers, vegans are thrilled when newbies sign up each January, for planetary and animal welfare reasons, but also, shallowly, for the shopping. This is when we can gorge on the novelties retailers dream up: Peta’s round-up for this year includes the seductive Aldi pains au chocolat and M&S coconut kefir.

I need retail therapy, because Veganuary has become quite muted and that’s part of a wider inflection point in vegan eating that I’m sad about. “Where have all the vegans gone?” Dazed asked in November, and now New York Magazine has investigated, with the tagline: “Plant-based eating was supposed to be the future. Then meat came roaring back.” It details a wave of vegan restaurant closures (plus the high-profile reverse ferret performed by formerly vegan Michelin-three-starred Eleven Madison Park to serving “animal products for certain dishes”), declining sales of meat substitutes and a stubbornly static percentage of people identifying as vegan (around 1%). It’s not new (rumours of veganism’s demise have been swirling around since at least 2024) and it’s not just a US phenomenon; many UK vegan restaurants have closed this year, including my lovely local.

Earthy, sweet swede soaks up a curry sauce like a champion, and this ginger, tomato and coconut number is no exception

As a day-in-day-out home cook, there is no more welcome tool in my dinner toolbox than a bung-it-in-the-oven dish. A second necessary tool in the month of January is the ability to dispose of or transform a swede into an evening meal. For the uninitiated, when roasted, the swede, that pretty, purple-creamed, dense little ball, is part-creamy, part carrot-like in nature, and earthy and sweet in flavour. It also takes to big-flavoured sauces such as this tomato, ginger and coconut curry like a chip to vinegar and couples up well with its seasonal pal, fresh, crunchy purple sprouting broccoli.