Cooking
Mark Bittman is a genius when it comes to combining a few ingredients to create a great dish. In his Minimalist column in the New York Times, he simplifies recipes down to the bare bones and yet they retain all the appeal of more complicated dishes. I have several of his cookbooks, including the dog-eared How to Cook Everything Vegetarian and have given several of his books as gifts. I eagerly look forward to his columns in the New York Times, his Bitten blog posts, and especially his popular "101 lists."
Here they are in case you missed any:
* Summer Express: 101 Simple Meals Ready in 10 Minutes or Less
* 101 20-Minute Dishes for Inspired Picnics
* 101 Simple Appetizers in 20 Minutes or Less
* 101 Simple Salads for the Season
The loose format of these recipes works. Sometimes you don't need the typical list of ingredients and measurements, you just need good ideas and Bittman delivers plenty of them. So I was excited to check out Mark Bittman's Kitchen Express which consists of, 404 seasonal recipes that you can make in 20 minutes or less. Similar to the New York Times lists, they are written in paragraph form, though with a bit more detail. The flexibility of the measurements assumes a certain level of knowledge, but makes for a free and easy style of cooking I particularly like. The recipes themselves are intriguing though some more than others. Melon soup with pancetta, simplified sesame shrimp toasts, deconstructed raspberry souffles, and broiled eggplant with miso walnut vinaigrette are all flagged in my book. Other ideas feel too simple and obvious such as steak with gorgonzola or miso soup with tofu.
Unfortunately what works online, on Twitter and in a newspaper article is not the same as what works in a book. I find that hundreds of recipes in paragraph format organized primarily by season, make the book difficult to actually use. The recipes follow a progression from breakfast-oriented dishes to soups, salads, main dishes and desserts, but it's still unwieldy and frankly, many ingredients are not really all that seasonal. Recipes featuring ingredients such as boy choy, bacon, frozen peas, canned beans, eggplant, shrimp, raisins and olives could easily fit in more than one season.
The "More Ways to Navigate" section provides lists of recipes under headings such as Brown Bag Lunches, Desserts You Can Eat Any Time of the Year and Recipes to Toss with Pasta. I would have preferred if the book had been organized using those categories instead of just the seasons or the more typical headings--breakfast, soups, salads, desserts, etc. You can find what you are looking for fairly easily in the index if push comes to shove. Bottom line, if you are a seasoned cook looking for inspiration, this may be a good book for you, but a much more accessible book, in my opinion, is Mark Bittman's Quick and Easy Recipes from the New York Times.
Note: Still curious about Mark Bittman's Kitchen Express? You can browse inside the book here.
- Vegetarian Cookbooks For Omnivores
The reason cookbooks continue to sell when you can find plenty of recipes online is beautiful photos, illustrations and inventive recipes. The Forest Feast has it all. The pretty and very visual format of recipes with tons of photos as well...
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- More Cookbooks For Giving Or Keeping
There were a lot of important restaurant cookbooks that came out this year A Day at El Bulli, Alinea and Thomas Keller's Under Pressure: Cooking Sous Vide come to mind. I am not opposed to serious books, but the books I turn to again and again tend...
- Bits And Bites
Culinate is a terrific new food site. It's about food but also about where food comes from and the decisions we make about what to buy and what to eat. It manages to be credible but never preachy. Articles and reviews are often thought-provoking...
- Easy Is Good
I'd had Mark Bittman's Quick & Easy Recipes from The New York Times on my Amazon wish list for some time, and finally bought it a couple of weeks ago (it nicely padded out an order to get free shipping...yay Amazon!). During the summer, I got...
Cooking
Mark Bittman's Kitchen Express
Mark Bittman is a genius when it comes to combining a few ingredients to create a great dish. In his Minimalist column in the New York Times, he simplifies recipes down to the bare bones and yet they retain all the appeal of more complicated dishes. I have several of his cookbooks, including the dog-eared How to Cook Everything Vegetarian and have given several of his books as gifts. I eagerly look forward to his columns in the New York Times, his Bitten blog posts, and especially his popular "101 lists."
Here they are in case you missed any:
* Summer Express: 101 Simple Meals Ready in 10 Minutes or Less
* 101 20-Minute Dishes for Inspired Picnics
* 101 Simple Appetizers in 20 Minutes or Less
* 101 Simple Salads for the Season
The loose format of these recipes works. Sometimes you don't need the typical list of ingredients and measurements, you just need good ideas and Bittman delivers plenty of them. So I was excited to check out Mark Bittman's Kitchen Express which consists of, 404 seasonal recipes that you can make in 20 minutes or less. Similar to the New York Times lists, they are written in paragraph form, though with a bit more detail. The flexibility of the measurements assumes a certain level of knowledge, but makes for a free and easy style of cooking I particularly like. The recipes themselves are intriguing though some more than others. Melon soup with pancetta, simplified sesame shrimp toasts, deconstructed raspberry souffles, and broiled eggplant with miso walnut vinaigrette are all flagged in my book. Other ideas feel too simple and obvious such as steak with gorgonzola or miso soup with tofu.
Unfortunately what works online, on Twitter and in a newspaper article is not the same as what works in a book. I find that hundreds of recipes in paragraph format organized primarily by season, make the book difficult to actually use. The recipes follow a progression from breakfast-oriented dishes to soups, salads, main dishes and desserts, but it's still unwieldy and frankly, many ingredients are not really all that seasonal. Recipes featuring ingredients such as boy choy, bacon, frozen peas, canned beans, eggplant, shrimp, raisins and olives could easily fit in more than one season.
The "More Ways to Navigate" section provides lists of recipes under headings such as Brown Bag Lunches, Desserts You Can Eat Any Time of the Year and Recipes to Toss with Pasta. I would have preferred if the book had been organized using those categories instead of just the seasons or the more typical headings--breakfast, soups, salads, desserts, etc. You can find what you are looking for fairly easily in the index if push comes to shove. Bottom line, if you are a seasoned cook looking for inspiration, this may be a good book for you, but a much more accessible book, in my opinion, is Mark Bittman's Quick and Easy Recipes from the New York Times.
Note: Still curious about Mark Bittman's Kitchen Express? You can browse inside the book here.
- Vegetarian Cookbooks For Omnivores
The reason cookbooks continue to sell when you can find plenty of recipes online is beautiful photos, illustrations and inventive recipes. The Forest Feast has it all. The pretty and very visual format of recipes with tons of photos as well...
- Un Diet Cookbooks
When is a diet book, not a diet book? Diets are often considered temporary, just until you lose weight, or get a medical condition under control. But if you are celiac, then gluten free is more than just a diet, but a a way of life. Some dietary changes...
- More Cookbooks For Giving Or Keeping
There were a lot of important restaurant cookbooks that came out this year A Day at El Bulli, Alinea and Thomas Keller's Under Pressure: Cooking Sous Vide come to mind. I am not opposed to serious books, but the books I turn to again and again tend...
- Bits And Bites
Culinate is a terrific new food site. It's about food but also about where food comes from and the decisions we make about what to buy and what to eat. It manages to be credible but never preachy. Articles and reviews are often thought-provoking...
- Easy Is Good
I'd had Mark Bittman's Quick & Easy Recipes from The New York Times on my Amazon wish list for some time, and finally bought it a couple of weeks ago (it nicely padded out an order to get free shipping...yay Amazon!). During the summer, I got...