Category Archives: Recipes (Savory)

Good Tasting, Good-For-You Freekeh With Broccolini and Apricots

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A quick and easy grain dish full of textures and flavors.
A quick and easy grain dish full of textures and flavors.

Michael Crupain has a unique background: He’s a board-certified preventive medicine physician, and former director of food and safety testing at Consumer Reports, who staged in the kitchen of the late-great David Bouley’s Danube restaurant in New York.

So when he writes a cookbook full of healthy recipes, you needn’t fear that they’ll be bland or boring.

In fact, the 75 recipes in his “The Power Five” (National Geographic, 2023), of which I received a review copy, are wonderfully tantalizing and nourishing.

The recipes spotlight the “Power Five,” the essential foods that he says we should all eat more of to optimize health. They are: fruits and vegetables; beans; grains; fish; and nuts and seeds.

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Spoon Up Sensational Shells with Miso Butter and Scallions

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An easy pasta recipe that's ever so creamy -- yet has no cream in it.
An easy pasta recipe that’s ever so creamy — yet has no cream in it.

Not that I need any excuse ever to eat more pasta, but “Anything’s Pastable” sure has me jonesing for it voraciously.

That’s because the new cookbook (William Morrow), of which I received a review copy, is full of creative and craveable pasta dishes, the kind that don’t take all day to put together but are so full of flavor that you’d swear that they did.

The book is by Dan Pashman, a two-time James Beard and Webby Award-winning creator and host of “The Sporkful” podcast, and the host of the Cooking Channel’s “You’re Eating It Wrong.”

This is a man so obsessed with pasta that he actually spent three years to create a brand-new shape, cascatelli, which he swears excels in the most crucial aspects of “forkability,” “sauceability,” and “toothsinkability.”

Named for the Italian word for “waterfalls,” its initial run of 3,700 boxes sold out in less than 2 hours. Not only that, it was named one of the “Best Inventions of 2021” by Time magazine. It’s now a runaway hit, sold online and at retailers that include Whole Foods.

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Epic Tarragon Roast Chicken That Lives Up To Its Name

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What makes this dish epic? A juicy roast chicken plus an addictive creamy sauce -- all made together in one pan.
What makes this dish epic? A juicy roast chicken plus an addictive creamy sauce — all made together in one pan.

Few dishes satisfy like a great roast chicken.

And this particular one is truly sensational.

It may not have the most shatteringly crisp skin, but I’ll forgive that because what it does possess is even better — a fabulous creamy sauce flavored with white wine and loads of tarragon that cooks up conveniently in the same roasting pan.

In short, “Epic Tarragon Roast Chicken” is indeed epic.

This straightforward recipe is from “The Farm Table” (Ten Speed Press), of which I received a review copy. It was written by Julius Roberts, a farmer and former chef of the acclaimed Noble Rot restaurant in London.

After growing disillusioned and burnt out from the stresses of cooking professionally, Roberts decided to leave the big city to return to the land. A first-time farmer, he writes evocatively about his journey to create a small, self-sufficient farm where he learned animal husbandry, foraging, and what it really means to live, breathe, and eat by the seasons.

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In Praise of Curtis Stone’s Spiced Barbecue Lamb Ribs with Labneh

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Sink your teeth into juicy lamb ribs flavored with warm spices.
Sink your teeth into juicy lamb ribs flavored with warm spices.

If you love pork ribs or beef ribs, you really ought to give lamb ones a go.

Because they boast even more flavor and tenderness, along with an incomparable juicy, fatty richness that’s a pure guilty pleasure.

“Spiced Barbecue Lamb Ribs with Labneh” is a sure-bet introduction to them. The fool-proof recipe is by celebrity chef Curtis Stone, and comes from his acclaimed Hollywood restaurant, Gwen, which he operates with his brother, the restaurateur Luke Stone.

And despite the recipe name, you don’t even really need a barbecue grill to make these. They can be made entirely in the oven, if you like.

It’s from the book, “Eater: 100 Essential Restaurant Recipes” (Abrams, 2023), of which I received a review copy, which was written by Eater’s restaurant editor, Hillary Dixler Canavan.

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Clarissa Wei’s Taiwanese Steamed Preserved Greens and Pork

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A dish that reminds me of childhood favorites my mom used to make.
A dish that reminds me of childhood favorites my mom used to make.

For many people, their idea of pure comfort food involves sinking their teeth into a juicy grilled meat patty.

Not me.

Instead, I find the ultimate contentment in a tender meat patty that’s steamed.

The kind that emerges from a bamboo steamer in its own deep pool of delectable juices and flavorings all beautifully co-mingled, and just begging to be spooned over a bowl of steamed white rice.

“Steamed Preserved Greens and Pork” is that kind of dish. It’s from “Made In Taiwan” (Simon Element, 2023) of which I received a review copy.

This beautiful, acclaimed book is the work of Clarissa Wei, a Taipei-based food journalist who has been writing about the cuisines and cultures of Taiwan and China for more than 10 years.

While Taiwanese cooking has often been lumped under the all-encompassing umbrella of “Chinese food,” Wei takes pains to give this fiercely independent island nation of 23.5 million people its culinary due. When she describes Taiwan as being shaped “like a sweet potato — curvy and fat in the middle, gently tapered off at the ends,” you know you are in for a mouthwatering time, as well as a captivating read.

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