Mark Bittman - Mark Bittmans Quick and Easy Recipes from the New York times

HOW TO COOK EVERYTHING

FISH: THE COMPLETE GUIDE TO BUYING AND COOKING

THE MINIMALIST COOKS DINNER

THE MINIMALIST COOKS AT HOME

THE MINIMALIST ENTERTAINS

HOW TO COOK EVERYTHING: THE BASICS

HOW TO COOK EVERYTHING: BITTMAN TAKES ON AMERICAS CHEFS

THE BEST RECIPES IN THE WORLD

with Jean-Georges Vongerichten

JEAN-GEORGES: COOKING AT HOME WITH A FOUR-STAR CHEF

SIMPLE TO SPECTACULAR

For Emma, Kate, Murray, and Gertrude

PUBLISHED BY BROADWAY BOOKS

Copyright 2007 by Mark Bittman

All Rights Reserved

Published in the United States by
Broadway Books, an imprint of The
Doubleday Broadway Publishing
Group, a division of Random House,
Inc., New York.
www.broadwaybooks.com

BROADWAY BOOKS and its logo, a letter
B bisected on the diagonal, are
trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Book design by Elizabeth Rendfleisch

Library of Congress Cataloging-in
Publication Data
Bittman, Mark.
Mark Bittmans quick and easy
recipes from the New York Times / by
Mark Bittman.
p. cm.
1. Quick and easy cookery. 2. Cookery,
International. I. Title.
TX833.5.B556 2007
641.55dc22
eISBN: 978-0-307-88548-7
2006030529

v3.1

In 1995 Trish Hall, then editor of the New York Times Living section, asked me to develop a weekly column. Two years later, when the section was re-launched as Dining In/Dining Out, that column became The Minimalist. The column title, and indeed its theme, were the brainchildren of Rick Flaste, an inspired and inspiring editor and person. Though there are dozens of people Im grateful to for their help and support in my work at the Times and on my cookbooks, Trish and Rick were largely responsible for beginning a weekly relationship that as of this writing is going on eleven years, and Im eternally grateful.

During that period I have outlasted a slew of editors but have enjoyed none more than my current chief, Nick Fox. Ive happily worked with deputy Pat Gurosky from the beginning. Id also like to single out Sam Sifton, now a big honcho at the paper, who not only reinspired me during a rough patch but had the savvy to bring Nick on board.

Scores of chefs, fellow food writers, and home cooks, especially in the New York area but all over the world, have given me great ideas for the Minitrying to single them out would only offend those I miss. Special thanks go to Jennifer Josephy, my editor at Broadway, to Bill Shinker, who brought the Minimalist books there about ten years ago, and to Steve Rubin, my publisher and friend. Peter The Kid Meehan and Chris Benton also played key roles in pulling this book together.

Many of my close friends and colleagues have made my life easier and fuller over the years, but again to mention them individually would only get me in trouble. The exceptions are my closest confidants, companions, and spiritual advisers: Angela Miller, John H. Willoughby, Charlie Pinsky, and the indefatigable Reverend Dr. L. Serene Jones. My familyin all its formshas played a big role in inspiring and supporting me and in eating the food I cook, like it or not. Though the days of raising a young family have passed for me, they are a constant reminder of the importance of cooking in daily life. I wish I could talk about this with the first great cook I knew, Helen Art, who would probably love the Minimalistcritically, of course.

THIS COLLECTION OF RECIPES includes just about everything Ive published in the New York Times Dining section in the last ten years. The Minimalist, my weekly column, was launched then, with the idea of offering people a simple and easy recipe (sometimes three or four recipes) every week, recipes that more often than not could be put together quickly, on a weeknight. The idea is no longer novel, but it was fresh then, and its more valid now than ever.

Looking back on these recipes, Im happy about how useful they remain. Which is as it should be: good, simple recipes are not trendy but timeless, or nearly so. Simple, as a friend of mine said to me, need not mean simple-minded. As much thought and work may go into figuring out a great three-ingredient, thirty-minute recipe as one that includes thirty ingredients and takes three hours. The fact that the preparation and execution are faster and easier does not make the recipe less sophisticated, complex, or desirableindeed, it may make it more so.

Many of these are traditional recipes from around the world, updated. Almost all of them require a minimum of technique and/or a minimum number of ingredients; when theyre not fast, theyre largely unattended, a phrase I adore for describing the kind of cooking that lets you leave the kitchen for long stretches. In general, my approach is less-is-more, an attempt to produce recipes that are so sophisticated, savvy, and fresh that they will inspire even experienced cooks while being basic and simple enough to tempt novices.

As you look through these recipes, youll see that my style of cooking is more flexible than that of many other cookbook writers; its not the style of chefs but of traditional home cooks, whove always made do with what theyve had. Sometimes the success of a dish hinges on a single ingredient (obviously, you cant roast a chicken without a chicken), but more often it does notherbs and spices can be omitted and substituted for one another, chicken can pinch-hit for fish and pork for chicken (and vice versa), many fish are interchangeable, many vegetables can be treated the same. To a beginning or only slightly experienced cook, these recipes and variations can be followed step by step; eventually, these cooks will gain the confidence to begin creating their own variations. To a veteran cook, these recipeslike all othersare just descriptions of a general technique applied to a preferred set of ingredients, not to be taken too literally. But veterans will find plenty of good ideas here, too.

This way of thinking, that cooking is not a set of dogmas but a craft that can be learned and enjoyed, is no longer the most common approach. By the thousands, people go to cooking schools to learn standardized skills; this approach didnt exist a hundred years ago and barely had any traction at all until the 1980s. For people who want to go into cooking as a profession, I have no problem with this (though I always encourage young people to do things the old-fashioned way, by finding a chef who will work them to death for a couple of years). But when faced with the choice between ironclad recipes or those that encourage flexibility, I always opt for the latter.

Nor is this a theory; I learned it by cooking tens of thousands of meals at home, almost always for my family, almost always without adequate time or planning. The organized chef knows what he or she is going to cook and has all the ingredients at hand. But most of us decide what to prepare based on whats in the fridge, pantry, or shopping bag. Minimizing the required number of ingredients, then, is a top priority. Recognizing that some ingredients can almost always be switched or dispensed with is an important axiom.

Stripping recipes to their bare essentials and seeing ingredients as interchangeable are big parts of the Minimalist plan, but there is more. Home cooks in the United States are seeing the introduction of a new set of basic recipes, not the French classics revisited or the Italian staples revealedalthough these are certainly parts of the trendbut the informal, quick, everyday food of households from all over the world.