At this point in the summer, it feels as though the long, hot evenings will go on forever.

Reaching for a jacket as you head out the door seems unimaginable, while the thought of curling up in front of a fire with a hot drink feels even more remote, particularly here in Florence, the city I've called home for the past ten years.

The city of Dante and Brunelleschi is famously unforgiving in the height of summer. Nestled in a valley, surrounded by mountains and divided by the River Arno, Florence seems almost designed to trap the heat and humidity. Walking anywhere at this time of year can feel akin to making your way through the relentless blast of a giant hairdryer set permanently to hot.

And yet, knowing that autumn is only a few weeks away already has me looking ahead. As the first hint of cooler air approaches, I find myself longing for what are, to my mind, Florence's finest months: late autumn and winter. This is when the city truly comes into its own. The crowds begin to thin, mornings become crisp enough for a favourite coat and scarf, and afternoons are best spent wandering flea markets and antique shops before settling into a cosy trattoria for the rich, comforting dishes that define Florentine and Tuscan cooking at this time of year.

One of my favourite ways to pass a morning in November is to wander across the beautiful Ponte Santa Trinita and slowly make my way along Via Pandolfini, lined with wonderful antique shops, towards San Ambrogio. Here you'll find both my favourite covered food market, where I buy most of the ingredients for recipe testing, and Florence's covered flea market, the Mercato delle Pulci. The market is filled with plenty of tat, but there are always gems hidden amongst it all. A few years ago, I picked up a beautiful ornate nineteenth century side table there, which remains one of my favourite pieces at home. After a bit of shopping, I'll usually stop for a coffee or, if it's late enough in the day, lunch and a glass of crisp white wine at Cibrèo Caffè, the glamorous old world café created by the late chef Fabio Picchi.

South of the river, in my neighbourhood of Santo Spirito, the piazza is the heart of the area, with Brunelleschi's façade dominating the view as I sit with my morning coffee and brioche at PittaM'ingoli, accompanied by the sound of the church bells ringing at quarter hour intervals. Every second Sunday of the month, Piazza Santo Spirito hosts its antiques market, which is always worth a visit. My favourite stall sells beautiful antique linens dyed in an array of gorgeous reds, greens and yellows. It's always important to factor in lunch, so I'll usually wander over to Trattoria Camillo or Trattoria Casalinga for some delicious Tuscan fare.

One of my favourite Tuscan recipes from my latest book, Winter in Tuscany, is a celebration of one of the region's finest products, Chianti red wine. Spaghetti all'Ubriacona, or Drunkard's Spaghetti, is a wonderfully simple dish that captures the rich flavours of Tuscany in a single bowl. Its unusual yet delicious flavour and chic colour sum up everything I love about Florence in the cooler months. It is hearty, comforting and deeply satisfying, making it the perfect dish to look forward to cooking as we approach summer’s end and the evenings begin to draw in.

Spaghetti all’ubriacona

Drunkard’s Spaghetti

Chianti is one of Italy’s most emblematic wines, produced in the hills between Florence and Siena and protected by the symbol of the black cockerel that endorses every bottle of Chianti. Winemaking is a huge part of Tuscan rural life, and having had access to lots of scarti (leftover wine), the wives of vineyard employees devised this local traditional dish, also known as pasta alla Chiantigiana. What is particularly wonderful about this dish is that it works well with wine that has been sitting around for a few days and you’re desperate to get rid of. That wine that is no longer any good for drinking can be turned into a tasty meal by cooking it down with onions and pancetta and tossing it with pasta. Adding wine to the pasta cooking water also imparts some of its colour to the spaghetti. The recipe also works well with less wine if you only have half a bottle knocking around; the taste will just be more subtle.

PREPARATION: 5 minutes
COOKING: 15 minutes

1 white onion, finely chopped
100 g (31/2 oz) unsmoked ready-diced pancetta
2 tablespoons olive oil, plus extra to serve
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 bottle of Chianti or any full-bodied red wine
400 g (14 oz) spaghetti
grated parmesan, to serve
 
Put the onion, pancetta and olive oil in a wide frying pan, large enough to hold all the spaghetti later. Cook on a gentle sizzle over a medium heat for about 5 minutes, until the onion becomes translucent and the pancetta opaque. Add a generous pinch of salt, black pepper and 2 glasses of red wine and leave to gently bubble over a medium heat.

Bring a large saucepan of well-salted water to a rolling boil. Add a fistful of salt and 2–3 glasses of red wine to the water. (If you happen to have another glass of wine left, add it to the pan of pasta sauce.)

Once the water has come back to a rolling boil, add the spaghetti. Once it has fully wilted down into the water, stir the spaghetti around so that the strands don’t stick together. Halfway through the pasta cooking time (check the packet instructions), add a whole ladleful of the wine-stained pasta water to the sauce and turn up the heat – you want to keep the sauce quite liquid to be able to toss the spaghetti through it.

Once the spaghetti is al dente, use tongs to transfer the spaghetti to the frying pan and toss with the sauce, adding a little more of the reserved pasta cooking water if needed.

Serve immediately, sprinkled with parmesan and lots of black pepper.