"What's the best way to cook a potato?" ”: Yotam Ottolenghi and Noor Murad answer your pressing cooking questions

It's late and you're hungry... what's your favorite homemade snack?

Claire, Dublin

Yotam Ottolenghi If I don't want to cook, it would be hard cheese and pickles. If I do, I often make quick rice. There's always a sauce or a pickle in the fridge that I can put on it. Sometimes I just add cheese and eat it as is with black pepper and butter.

Noor Murad I have a piece of cheese with jam on it, because I can never decide if I want it sweet or salty. Usually it is a raspberry or strawberry jam with a hard goat cheese; they go great together.

Who makes the best hummus?

Sheila, York

NM The best I have ever had was in Lebanon. I spent many childhood summers there. If you have 400g of cooked chickpeas, you should have at least 150g to 200g of tahini. If it's a very yellow hummus, they didn't put enough tahini.

YO I'd like to say what is it who makes the best hummus: In Lebanon, Palestine and Israel, hummus is very smooth and quite loose. It's not heavy or grainy. It's light and airy. You want to get rid of at least some of the chickpea skin and make sure that at least a third of the total weight is tahini. The worst is the “beetroot hummus”. Or "sweet potato hummus".

NM In New York there is chocolate hummus.

What is the most versatile spice and what are the two secretly go well together?< p class="dcr-kpil6a">Melissa, Sydney

YO Cumin is the one who crosses cultures .

NM Allspice and cinnamon. Holy marriage. In rice or with lamb.

Ever crave beans on toast or instant noodles for tea?

Devon, Yorkshire< /em>

YO My kids [Max, nine, and Flynn, seven] love beans on toast, but I don't get it, so I'd opt for instant noodles every day.

NM I'm the opposite. When I was little and my mom wouldn't cook for us, she always made cheese beans on toast, so that has a bit of nostalgia for me.

YO The cheese goes over it, under the grill?

NM Yes. With ketchup.

What recipes do your family enjoy the most?

Kalinda, Cambridge

YO Children love rolled pavlova, with any seasonal fruit and cream. It's a killer dish. I do it all the time for them. My husband, Karl, doesn't eat sugar often, so he just inhales it. One thing they always want is sticky rice. I make a lot of these, sometimes very simple with soy sauce, sesame and chives, often with grilled chicken or whatever.

What's your funniest cooking disaster?

Edith, Berlin

YO The first time I cooked on camera I made frosting for a devil at chocolate that was rich, smooth and beautifully shiny. As soon as I said how good and wonderful it was, it totally turned into solid, pure fat. It was so embarrassing. I couldn't resuscitate him. We had to start again.

NM It was in Bahrain, I was 17, and it was one of my first jobs. I worked in a catering business on the Formula 1 circuit. There was an all Australian drivers race so the chef bought kangaroo and crocodile. They put me in the crocodile frying station. There was an open flame and I set fire to my tablecloth and the table. Everyone had to evacuate, then I hid in the bathroom and cried.

What are the three ingredients always in your kitchen?

Hardip, Kent

YO I...