We don't rely on restaurant guides to find authentic flavours

Think about the tastiest three meals you've ever eaten. There's a good chance that two of them were not in what even the most charitable would call a top class restaurant. Maybe it was a bowl of pasta in some trattoria down a back alley, or a simple piece of grilled fish at an unpretentious seaside shack.

At Discovery, we're lucky enough to travel all over the world looking for inspiration, a lot of which ends up on the supermarket shelf for you to share the experience. Invariably, the best flavours come from eating with chefs, as they cook for each other, rather than what they cook for their customers which can be pale, over fussy imitations of their real food. For example, we came across the best ever Huevos Rancheros (a traditional Mexican breakfast of fried eggs with refried beans, salsa and corn tortillas) thanks to a Mexican chef, a friend of a friend, who was working behind the scenes at a not overly smart restaurant at the San Francisco airport. The wonderfully earthy flavour of the beans, combined so well with creamy just cooked eggs, cut through with a freshly made, really zingy salsa piled on top of warm fresh corn tortillas, still sticks in the mind to this day.

Repeated trips to New Orleans have revealed a succession of culinary gems. With as many different recipes for Gumbo (that classic Cajun soupy stew), as there are alligators in the bayou, finding your favourite can be an adventure of its own. Squirrel in Gumbo may not be to everyone's taste but there are plenty of other variants to thrill the taste buds.

We learnt all you need to know about Gumbo with our great friend and inspiration Chef Paul Prudhomme; not in his famous K-Paul's restaurant (fine restaurant that it is), but at his home on the edge of the French Quarter. It's a 'shotgun house', so called because the linear design allows the owner to see right from the back porch to the front, giving a clear line of fire on any unwanted visitors who think about entering.

As we discovered, the secret of a great Gumbo lies in the creation of the richly-flavoured dark roux at the beginning that gives the distinctive nutty, earthy flavours. Get that wrong and there's nothing you can do to rescue the dish. It was fascinating watching Chef Paul - when you're that famous you don't need a surname - heating the oil and flour mixture to a temperature in excess of 400°C, way beyond what any normal person would regard as reasonable (or advisable at home!). One careless flip of the spatula, and you'll know soon enough why the locals refer to it as Cajun Napalm.