Workman - Dinner Solved! : 100 Ingenious Recipes That Make the Whole Family Happy, Including You!

Katie Workman

Photographs by Todd Coleman

Ingenious recipes that make the whole family happy, including

you

Workman Publishing
New York

To my mom and my dad

Far and away, this is my favorite part of the book to write, mostly because it makes me feel inordinately warm and fuzzy as I think of all the people in my life who help make it all work.

First, my husband and kids. Guys, I love you so much. Gary, you are the most supportive husband around. I am so sorry I generate so many dishes, but I hope you think its worth it in the end. I will try to remember to line the pan with aluminum foil more often.

Jack, you are an amazing person, so smart, interesting, and insightful. When you like something I make, its one of my best seals of approval ever. Thanks for keeping me true to the goal of making family-friendly food with optimized kid appeal.

Charlie, being your mom is like going on a different amusement park ride every dayIm never quite sure whats going to happen, but I know its going to make me laugh, and inspire me, and keep me on my toes. Thanks for being such an entertaining person.

Cooper, I know we lived a perfectly happy life before we got you, but Im not sure how. Reaching out with my toes to find you at the end of the bed is the best way I know to start any day. When I am giving you a little piece of chicken or even a slice of carrot, the unbridled admiration and affection in your eyes makes me melt. (I surely hope that its clear by now that Cooper is a dog.)

My father died a couple of years back and I miss him every day. He was the smartest person Ive ever known, and while that wasnt always easy to live with, it certainly raised the bar in terms of what I believed could be achieved. What I know about the importance of hard work and honest quality started with him. Im forever happy that he was here for the first book.

My mom is one of the most unboring people around. And when she arranges some herbs on a platter, sets up a craft table for the kids on Thanksgiving, or wraps a present, you can bet that whatever extra touch she adds makes all the difference between something thats just fine, and something thats very special.

Much love to my sister, Lizzie, and all of my brothers- and sisters-in-law, parents-in-law, aunts and uncles, cousins, nieces, and nephews.

I count my blessings every single day to have so many amazing friends, who encourage and buttress me in so many ways. Some that need singling out, who really were a support to me as I wrote this book: Jennifer Baum, Jean Witter, David Erlanger, Pam Krauss, Dana Cowin, Catherine and Andy Skobe, Claire and Tim Radomisli, Kate and Chris Carr, Laura Agra, Charlie Masson, Abby Schneiderman, Chris Styler, Christopher Idone, and my entire extended family of friends. I am so grateful.

And without my other family at Workman Publishing, none of this exists. My editor Suzanne Rafer makes it all so much smoother and clearer, and is the kind of detail-oriented partner that authors yearn for. Art director Lisa Hollander for her smart and beautiful design, and the kind, super-conscientious photo director Anne Kerman, who both contributed so much to the look of the book. The sales team led by Walter Weintz is sine qua non (I had to look that up, but I knew there was a good Latin phrase for kicks ass): Michele Ackerman, Valerie Alfred, Marilyn Barnett, Angela Campbell, Liz DeBell, Adelia Kalyvas, Emily Krasner, Randy Lotowycz, Jenny Mandel, Steven Pace, Kristina Peterson, Michael Rockliff, Rebecca Schmidt, Jodi Weiss, and James Wehrle. The gracious John Jenkinson and Selena Meere in Publicity. Other brilliance at Workman comes in the form of Vaughn Andrews, Suzie Bolotin, Sarah Brady, Page Edmunds, Andrea Fleck-Nesbit, Moira Kerrigan, Beth Levy, Deborah McGovern, Claire McKean, Barbara Peragine, Julie Primavera, Dan Reynolds, David Schiller, Lauren Southard, Kate Travers, Janet Vicario, Jessica Wiener, and Doug Wolff.

Todd Coleman, you take a mean photo and you are a great friend. The team who worked on the interior photo shoot, led by Mira Evnine, was spectacular, as was Nora Singley, who styled the food on the front cover.

If this was an awards ceremony, the music would have swelled and I would have been forcibly removed from the microphone. I dont care, I would have finished yelling these names over the soaring score as I was being dragged from the stage.

Cooking without eaters is of little to no interest to me. There has to be someone at the other end of the fork or the table. Cooking for family and friends; making something comforting for a colleague having a hard time; surprising someone with a batch of birthday brownies, dropping off a container of fried chicken for a new momin short, having people happily eating something I made is my very definition of joy. It doesnt get any better than that.

This book is filled with 100-plus recipes designed to be doable, crowd-pleasing, comforting, flavorful, and family friendly. Its just a honking big batch of very flexible recipes (with some pretty dazzling photos) that I hope you will want to make over and over again, and that your family and friends will want to eat over and over again.

Fork in the Road

Adaptable recipes appeared throughout my first book, The Mom 100 Cookbook, but in Dinner Solved! they take a star turn. Almost all of the recipes in this book are open for adaptation. And all are modifiable so that everyone at the table can enjoy the version that works best for them. Picky eaters, vegetarians, the spice-aversethere are ways to make everyone at the table happy without feeling the need to turn into a short-order cook.

Buffalo wings can be made with traditional spicy buffalo sauce or in a sticky honey garlic version (or both!). A batch of Asian spareribs can be made sweet and tangy or with a nice dose of heat (or with both!). Fried chicken can be simple or spicy (or both!). The various components of couscous salad can be served separately, so everyone can put together the salad of their liking. A simple, perfectly cooked steak is great on its ownmaybe even greater with a flavorful chimichurri sauce. Pass it at the table and let everyone decide for themselves. You get the idea.

A lot of the recipes included have a vegetarian option, making it a helpful choice for those who have a vegetarian at the table on a regular, or an occasional, basis. A well-seasoned spicy sloppy joe sauce can be stirred into ground beef or crumbled tempeh... (orwait for itboth!). An orangey stir-fry can be made half with tofu, half with chicken. Lo mein can be made vegetarian or with cubes of chicken or pork.

The Fork in the Road concept is something you can embrace and incorporate into your everyday cooking. The idea is that at some point in its preparation, a dish can be divided with part of it going one way, part of it going another way, so that everyone ends up happy and eating basically the same thing. Appealing, right?

Left: Lo Mein with Chicken