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How to Cook a Whole Lot of Stuff Pretty Well

© Kimberly Skopitz

How to Cook Everything: Simple Recipes for Great Food (Mark Bittman)

Mark Bittman's huge volume is designed for the absolute novice, one who is most comfortable making popcorn in the microwave, and has no real desire to achieve a 'gourmet' level of cooking. ("Gourmet" is something of a dirty word to Bittman.) Bittman offers advice on how to set up your kitchen, the items you most need to buy. I disagree with some of his suggestions, which deoesn't mean either of us are wrong, but that there is more room that he allows for decisions. Bittman states rather uncategorically that a cheap knife will do. I realize that sometimes you can't avoid it, money's tight when you're first setting up a kitchen. But knives are too important to treat so lightly. Your fingers, not to mention your food, will thank you to buy a knife that really cuts, and cuts cleanly. My suggestion would be to buy the most expensive one you can possibly afford and that feels good in your hand. Likewise, he suggests pureeing hot soup in a blender. Take it from me, this is a bad idea. You run a strong liklihood of having a sit-com worthy explosion, not to mention some very unfunny burns.

Bittman strives to provide (and frequently succeds) uncomplicated instructions and fairly short cooking times. The food itself might not be memorable, but it's not supposed to be, according to him--this is food for family and weekday nights. Therefore, the word 'great' is a stretch--I'll go for good. Likewise, you won't find everything--like the classic American dessert Boston Cream Pie that I searched in vain for.

Trial by Fire

Friday nights are frequently spaghetti night around here--it's simple, makes use of various leftover bits of onion I have about, and always makes enough for unexpected company. This week, I decided to embellish a bit (mostly because I had some bacon and cream that needed to be used up), and made Meat Sauce Bolognese-Style. The recipe was straightforward, without requiring anything more complicated than mincing. I think the general richness of the dish could have been minimized a bit by draining the beef and bacon after browing, but that's just me. It was certainly tasty as it was, and perfect for those that sometimes think of spaghetti as 'spicy'. This most certainly isn't, but has a pleasing, substantial taste.

For dessert, brownies. (We were too full, but when does that stop anyone?) The recipe seemed intriguingly simple, with a scant 1/2 cup of flour, 2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, butter, eggs, sugar, vanilla. Bittman promised fudginess, which is a key criteria for me--if I wanted a cakey brownie, I'd make a chocolate cake. With high expectations, I melted, stirred, and baked. And upon eating, was disappointed. The texture was rather fudgy, it's true, but the chocolete flavor was too mild to be satisfying. Even this chocoholic threw away the remains.