Almost 20 years after French Odyssey, which sold 280,000 copies, Stein discovers real, simple cooking, distilled into Secret France, with 120 brand-new delicious recipes.

And rather than go all the way to France with Stein, there's an opportunity to join him, and his wife Sarah, in person at Bannisters Mollymook for two days of signature seafood and champagne.

On March 23-24, guests will enjoy a four-course seaside dinner based on recipes from Secret France, where they will have the opportunity to dine on fresh, locally sourced seafood in the company of Rick and Sarah. The meal will be accentuated with champagne pairings from Laurent-Perrier.

The television series based on the book is currently screening on Foxtel's Lifestyle channel.

Enjoy these three recipes from the book. Bon appetit!

Many versions of this leek tart or pie from Picardy exist, some with a top of puff pastry or brioche or with added ingredients like cheese or lardons. Being something of a purist I prefer just a case of really short shortcrust pastry, my mother's recipe, with plenty of leeks sweated down in butter, then bound with an egg and cream mixture and baked. Delicious.

Ingredients

Shortcrust pastry:

200g plain white flour, plus extra for rolling

1/2 tsp salt

60g cold unsalted butter, cubed

40g cold lard or vegetable shortening, cubed

2 tbsp ice-cold water

Filling:

75g butter

1.25kg leeks, cut in half lengthways, washed and cut into 1cm slices

300g full-fat crème fraiche

2 large eggs, lightly beaten

a few rasps freshly grated nutmeg

Salt and black pepper

Method

1. First make the pastry. Put the flour, salt, butter and lard in a food processor and process until the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs. Transfer it to a bowl and add enough of the water to make a smooth but not sticky dough.

2. Put the dough on a floured work surface and roll it out to a circle about 28cm in diameter. Place the pastry in a 25cm loose-bottomed fluted tart tin, then trim the edges and prick the base with a fork. Cover with cling film and refrigerate or freeze for at least 30 minutes.

3. For the filling, melt the butter in a large shallow pan, add the leeks and leave them to sweat, uncovered, over a medium to low heat for 20-30 minutes until soft, stirring occasionally.

4. If the leeks seem very watery after this time, cook until the liquid has reduced. Stir in the crème fraiche and beaten eggs, then season well with salt, pepper and nutmeg.

5. Preheat the oven to 200C. Remove the pastry case from the fridge or freezer, line it with baking parchment and fill with baking beans. Bake it for about 10 minutes, then remove the paper and beans and continue to cook for another 4-5 minutes to allow the pastry base to dry out a little. Turn the oven down to 190C.

6. Fill the pastry case with the leek mixture and season with a little black pepper. Bake the tart for 25-30 minutes, then serve warm or at room temperature.

Serves 6.

I wrote this recipe as a result of some irritation at being given such delicacies as perfectly fresh sardines in the fishing village of Port-Vendres that had been fried within an inch of their lives. It was almost like eating sticks. I'd noticed the same phenomenon after a morning's freshwater fishing on the Dordogne River. We had a lunch of hard-fried gudgeons, minnows, crayfish and eels, all overcooked in the same way; the saving grace was the mayonnaise. Granted a lot of river fish are quite tasteless but not sardines. No excuse there. Here's a better way.

Ingredients

12 sardines, cleaned

1 tbsp olive oil

Dressing:

juice and zest of 1/2 lemon

2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

1/2 large clove garlic, grated or very finely chopped

a pinch of chilli flakes

1 medium tomato, skinned and cut into small dice

1 small shallot, finely chopped

1 thyme sprig, leaves chopped

1 tsp chopped flat leaf parsley

salt and black pepper

Method

1. Mix the ingredients for the dressing in a small bowl and season with salt and plenty of pepper.

2. Brush the sardines all over with the oil and sprinkle them with a pinch of salt. Grill them on a hot barbecue or under a hot grill for about two to four minutes on each side, depending on size.

3. Spoon the dressing over and around the sardines and serve with a green salad.

Serves 4.

This is a celebration of the apricots I saw in Périgueux market in early September. There can't be a better time to visit such a market. Peaches were still in abundance, as well as boxes of ripe plums, reines claudes, which we know as greengages, misshapen apples with their leaves still on the stalks, and boxes of pale golden muscat grapes, but the apricots were particularly glorious in their orange skins sometimes blushed with red. Ever since reading Webster's The Duchess of Malfi for O-Level, I've associated apricots with sensuousness. The duchess is secretly pregnant and greedy for them. "...her tetchiness, and most vulturous eating of the apricocks, are apparent signs of breeding", says the malcontent Bosola. I do a lot of tarts like this one because of the ease of ready-made all-butter puff pastry. Here, I have just put some ground almonds in the base to absorb the juice which will come out of the fruits when baking, then dusted the apricots with icing sugar before they go in the oven to caramelise. The tart is finished with a glaze of warm sieved apricot jam. Cold crème fraiche is the only accompaniment to this.

Ingredients

275g all-butter puff pastry

4 tbsp ground almonds

450g fresh ripe apricots, stoned and cut in halves or quarters, depending on size (or use tinned apricots)

2 tbsp icing sugar

6-8 tbsp apricot jam

To serve:

crème fraiche

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 200C. Roll out the pastry into a long bar shape measuring about 15 x 35-40cm and transfer it to a baking sheet. With a sharp knife, score all around the pastry about 1.5cm in from the edge, but take care not to cut all the way through to the base. You just want to allow a border to rise around the fruit.

2. Sprinkle the ground almonds over the pastry within the score lines. Arrange the apricots, cut side up, over the ground almonds, keeping them tightly packed. Dust the apricots with the icing sugar.

3. Bake the tart for 25-30 minutes until the apricots are tender and caramelised and the pastry is risen and golden. Allow to cool to room temperature.

4. Warm the apricot jam over a low heat, then pass it through a sieve before brushing it liberally over the tart to glaze. Serve with crème fraiche.

Recipes from Rick Stein's Secret France, by Rick Stein. BBC Books $49.99. Pictures: James Murphy