New York Occasions cooking columnist Melissa Clark demonstrates one-pan dishes at Southern Meals and Beverage Museum | Food and drinks | Gambit Weekly

Brooklyn native Melissa Clark has written greater than 40 cookbooks, each of her personal wide-ranging recipes and changing cooks’ and restaurant recipes for dwelling cooks. She has contributed to The New York Occasions cooking part since 2007 and has gained two James Beard Basis awards. Through the pandemic, Clark created “Dinner in One: Distinctive and Straightforward One-Pan Meals.” She is going to do a cooking demonstration and signal books on the Southern Meals & Beverage Museum at 6 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 22, and Mason Hereford of Turkey and the Wolf will present snacks. Signed books additionally shall be accessible at Backyard District E-book Store. Discover tickets at natfab.org, and extra details about Clark’s cookbooks at melissaclark.internet.

Gambit: What impressed this cookbook?

Melissa Clark: This was born out of the pandemic. It’s one factor to prepare dinner dinner 4 or 5 nights per week, however through the pandemic, I used to be cooking three meals a day. It was like, whoa, there are loads of dishes. So, I used to be like, how can I make it simpler on myself? The one-pot, one-pan answer made loads of sense. A whole lot of the recipes have been virtually there. Perhaps it was a pot and a skillet or a pot and a pan whenever you’re making pasta. However I used to be like, let me impose this self-discipline on every part and actually make it one pot. I discovered that the meals tasted simply nearly as good, and my cleanup was simpler. But additionally, within the kitchen, it’s simpler if in case you have fewer pots and pans and bowls.

I at all times streamline, however on this one, I took a stand: Let me make these recipes with the least quantity of mess and least quantity of labor potential. This was making every part less complicated. A number of the taste combos I’ve labored on earlier than. I’ve a hen and potato dish that has harissa in it. It’s a sheet-pan dish that’s actually scrumptious from my final e-book, “Dinner: Altering the Sport.” For this one, I took out the hen solely. I used cauliflower, but it surely’s the identical flavors. Now it’s a vegetarian dish that cooks simpler.

Utilizing fewer substances and counting on the pantry have been a part of (coping with the pandemic). One other factor was substitution, since you couldn’t get every part you needed. An enormous a part of this e-book is with the ability to swap issues out. There’s not one recipe in your entire e-book that it’s worthwhile to follow. You’ll be able to adapt each single one in every of them indirectly. You’ll be able to adapt it to what pantry staples you’ve. You’ll be able to adapt it if you’re having a vegetarian meal or a vegan meal one night time. You’ll be able to enhance the greens in a dish. Would you like leftovers or not need leftovers? There are loads of methods to personalize them.

The center of my cooking is simplicity. I’ve realized a lot from making different folks’s recipes and making an attempt new flavors and substances.

Gambit: How do you simplify recipes?

Clark: Take roast hen and potatoes. You’ve a complete hen and also you’re roasting it together with your potatoes collectively. What I did was use hen elements and I sliced the potatoes on the skinny facet. So as an alternative of getting to prepare dinner your hen for an hour, hour and a half, I shortened the period of time. And it’s crispier, as a result of whenever you roast a hen, you get a few of the elements which might be crisp and a few which might be soggy as a result of it’s steamed on the underside. This fashion it’s crispy all through. You get a fast cooking dish and good pores and skin texture throughout. I not often prepare dinner a complete hen anymore.

There’s recipes for hen and dumplings and for a hen stew with gochujang. Usually whenever you’re making any sort of stew with any sort of meat, the recipe will inform it’s a must to brown all sides of it. However that takes a very long time standing over the pot. I simply do it midway. You get the identical caramelized taste. You desire a skinny layer of caramelized taste on the underside of the pan, as a result of that’s the coronary heart of your sauce. You will get that by browning half of the meat.

The desserts are humorous. They don’t actually belong on this e-book. However my editor is aware of I really like desserts, so she was like, why don’t you do one-bowl desserts? Thematically it’s comparable, since you are stripping down the standard approach you make desserts — you utilize at the very least two bowls, generally three bowls. I stripped that down to 1. I nipped and tucked on the methods to get these desserts. They’re tremendous straightforward weeknight desserts. You can also make them on any weeknight and eat all of them week lengthy.

Gambit: What are you doing to your subsequent e-book?

Clark: It’s going to be a fundamentals e-book. It’s going to be an enormous e-book that teaches folks easy methods to prepare dinner. The place in recipes are you able to make it your individual? What are the methods which might be riffable and what are the methods which might be nonnegotiable? I break them down by means of instructing folks easy methods to prepare dinner. It’s filled with the recipes that everyone wants. These are important recipes which you can then take and make it your individual.

All people is completely different. What’s onerous for one individual could also be straightforward for another person. I say, break it down, however don’t dumb it down. Persons are much more expert than they suppose they’re.