Cooking, fast and slow
When I cook dinner at home, I look for the fastest path to the table. Can I slice fewer vegetables for stir-fry, put just two ingredients on a pizza, or open a can of something and make it taste amazing? Can I turn to sandwiches and breakfast foods and lots of snacks? For all of the above, the answer’s definitely yes.
I recently started asking questions like this when developing recipes for publication. How can I create recipes with the shortest possible ingredient list and the simplest techniques that will send people to the kitchen without hesitation to produce something delicious 30 minutes later (even that’s too long for some people, I know). It’s harder than it seems.
It takes skill and confidence to build flavor and impact through subtracting, not adding, time or ingredients. So does deciding that a recipe is good enough, even when it’s pared way down. The chef Rozanne Gold did this gorgeously in her 2010 cookbook, Radically Simple Cooking, and in her line of books featuring 3-ingredient recipes.
Lately the Times has been preaching the radically simple gospel, too - and they have a slew of talented recipe developers working toward that end. I’m into it, especially for weeknight cooking (or even weekend cooking for an indifferent audience, in my case, my kids).
But I also don’t want to forget the pleasure of working in the kitchen. Not on a standard-issue Tuesday night, but on a day when the afternoon is open and the light is dimming. I found myself thinking about this sentiment from a cheesemaker I know - the idea of surrendering to the work that food presents.
On the latest episode of Made Fresh, we talk about how much we enjoy sinking back into cooking this time of year. I think the itch to get into the kitchen is one of the gifts of October. So if you get that itch, maybe just surrender to it. Put 30 minute meals on the back burner (HA) and make something that asks you for your time.
Yours in weekend bean soaking,
Leigh