Melissa Clark - Food Writer

Cook This Now - OUT TODAY WHEE!

Hurray! It's finally here, my latest -- and possibly my greatest -- cookbook to date:  "Cook This Now: 120 Easy and Delectable Dishes You Can't Wait to Make."

I couldn't be prouder or more excited about this new baby because it's the first book I've written that documents the actual food I make for my family on a daily basis. It's the recipes we all love, the ones my small child will happily eat, the ones my husband asks for over and over.

The book came about as a kitchen diary, literally. After years of my family and friends asking me to make that amazing whatever-it-was again, and me having totally forgotten what the heck I put in whatever-it-was, I finally started keeping a small notebook in the kitchen and jotting down recipes. That way when my sister Amy asked me to cook up that savory golden skillet chicken with fresh herbs I once made for a spring dinner, I could just go look it up instead of faking it with another dish. Ditto when my mother asked for the recipe for the figgy snacking cake with crunchy demarara sugar. I wouldn't have to admit, with shame, that I couldn't remember what I put in that batter other than a little whole wheat flour to give it chewiness and depth of flavor (yup, both those recipes are in my book).

What started to emerge was a pattern of seasonally-inspired recipes (I love me my farmers' market). So I organzied the book around the seasons. Each chapter corresponds to a month, and each month has 10 recipes using ingredients that are at their prime.

So for example January is about dark leafy winter greens and slowly stewed beans. August is about tomatoes, corn, and eggplants (The Best Tomato Sandwich, Roasted Ratatouille with Fresh Corn Polenta and Ricotta). October showcases warming, hearty recipes such as Three Meat Chili and Carroty Mac and Cheese. And in December, I use parsnips in my Hanukkah latkes because they taste so sweet and fruity it's as if the applesauce was fried right into the pancake instead of being spooned on top.

Unlike many, more cheffy seasonal cookbooks with esoteric or annoying ingredients (fava beans anyone?), mine are the simple, easy recipes that I can throw together at the end of a long day without fuss. They are the quick, satisfying dishes that reflect the foods that are the freshest and most flavorful because they are in season.

If you've ever been intimidated by the farmers' market, unsure what to buy and what to do with it once you got it home, this book will be your best friend in the kitchen. Or if you've wondered what to cook right now, this book will tell you what ingredients are at their best, and give some innovative and unusal ideas for using, say, skinny green beans, that you might not have ever seen before (how about with toasted walnuts in a simple, succulent salad).

And if that doesn't sell you, the photographs are mouthwateringly stunning, all taken by the amazing Andrew Scrivani.

I know you will love the book as much as I do (or I hope so at least!). Order your copy today or pick one up at your local book store! And let me know what you end up making for your family meal.

Southeast Asian Tomato Salad

 ^{Photos by Olga Massov}

It's August, in fact we're halfway through August. And this means another sneak peek into my upcoming book, "Cook This Now" due out in October and is now available for pre-order!

 

***

I tossed this together one night to serve with the Thai-style ground turkey dish. It’s a departure from my usual tomato salad, which is comprised of little more than carved up tomatoes, torn basil, salt, and olive oil. Daniel and I eat this simple salad almost every night in tomato season since it takes about 20 seconds to assemble and has a juicy purity of tomato flavor that I can’t seem to get enough of this time of year.

            But with the fish sauce, limes, scallions, and jalapenos for the turkey already sitting out within arms’ reach, I decided to try something new.

It turned out to be insanely good, very tangy and a nice break from the more everyday, if tasty, tomato salads I usually make. I’ve since added it to our summer tomato rotation and find myself whipping it up even if I have to hunt in the cupboard for the fish sauce and sort through the vegetable bin for a jalapeno. It’s worth the chase every time.

 

Makes 4 servings

 

About 2 teaspoons Asian fish sauce such as nam pla or nuoc mam, or to taste

2 teaspoons freshly squeezed lime juice

1 teaspoon light brown sugar

2 scallions, finely chopped

1 fat garlic clove, minced (or use 2 small ones)

1/2 jalapeno pepper, seeded, if desired, and finely chopped

3 large or 4 medium tomatoes, sliced 1/4-inch thick

2 tablespoons chopped fresh Thai or regular basil

2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro

 

1. In a small bowl, whisk together the fish sauce, lime juice, sugar, scallion, garlic, and jalapeno. (If you think your fish sauce is very salty, start with 1 teaspoon; you can add more at the end).

2. Arrange the tomato slices on a plate. Spoon the dressing over the tomatoes. Let stand 10 minutes to allow the tomatoes time to release their juices. Sprinkle with basil and cilantro; serve.

 

What Else?

- Cucumbers, that’s what else. This salad is even better with some sliced cucumbers added to the mix. I didn’t have any when I first made this, but if I had, I would have replaced one of the tomatoes with a nice big Kirby cucumber, sliced thin.

- If you have access to a tender lemongrass stalk, use it here in place of the scallion, or alongside it.

- Different brands of fish sauce (otherwise known as nam pla or nuoc mam) have different degrees of saltiness. It’s less apparent when used in cooking, but when drizzled raw on salads you need to be careful. Start with a little and add more as you go. I used 2 teaspoons but trust your own palate.

- If you’d rather go for a bare-bones tomato salad, leave out all the ingredients except the tomatoes, salt, and basil. Add pepper to taste and toss well with a few drops of good olive oil. That’s all you need.

 

A Dish By Another Name

For a Southeast Asian Tomato Noodle Salad double all the ingredients except for the tomatoes, which you should dice instead of slice. Toss with about 6 ounces of cooked rice noodles, then adjust the seasonings to taste. It will probably need a bit more fish sauce, lime juice, and sugar.

 

Berry Summer Pudding

 
Well, we've left June and moved onto July, which can only mean one thing - new recipe sneak peek from my upcoming book, "Cook This Now" to be published in October. July is the peak of berry season and the farmers' market stalls are overflowing with them, including juicy currants, raspberries, blueberries and blackberries. A summer berry pudding is the perfect way to take advantage of the bounty.

 ~~~~

 It wouldn’t be the Fourth of July without a barbecue at my friends Karen and Dave’s house, a convivial event that includes an icy bowl of strong punch, a spirited reading of the declaration of independence, copious amounts of grilled leg of lamb, and for dessert, Karen’s opulently purple berry summer pudding, dripping with crème Anglaise.

            This version is pretty faithful to Karen’s recipe, with two tiny tweaks. I use soft whole-wheat bread in place of white bread for the pudding mold, and rose water in place of lavender flowers for the creamy sauce. Covered with all those luscious berries, you can’t really tell the difference between soft whole-wheat and plain white bread, so I figure I might as well add a few grams of fiber. And since I didn’t have any lavender flowers around when I made this, I reached for the most floral substitute I could find.

            It’s an ideal summer dessert because you can make it ahead, it doesn’t require turning on the oven, and it takes excellent advantage of all the berries of the season. And if those aren’t reasons enough to make it, here is one more: It’s absolutely fantastic.

 

Makes 8 servings

 

For the Pudding:

1 1/2 pounds mixed berries (about 5 cups)

1/2 cup sugar, or to taste

1 to 2 teaspoons freshly squeezed lemon juice, to taste

10 to 15 slices soft whole wheat Pullman loaf, crusts removed

 

For the Crème Anglaise (Makes about 2 1/2 cups):

1 cup whole milk

1 cup heavy cream

6 egg yolks

1/2 cup sugar

Pinch salt

2 teaspoons rosewater or vanilla extract (or to taste)

 

1. To make the pudding, combine the berries, sugar, and 1/3 cup water in a medium saucepan. Simmer over medium heat until the sugar is completely dissolved and berries release their juices, about 5 minutes. Stir in the lemon juice. The sauce should be sweet, with a hint of tartness. Adjust with more sugar or lemon juice as needed.

2. Spoon an even layer of berry syrup (not the berries themselves) in the bottom of an 8-inch loaf pan. Line the bottom and sides of the pan with a single layer of bread; cut the bread into pieces as necessary to fit. Spoon 1/3 of the fruit on top of the bread, making sure the bread is completely coated; top with a layer of bread. Spoon another 1/3 of the fruit over the bread; top with another layer of bread. Spoon the remaining 1/3 of the fruit over the bread. Let the mixture cool completely, then wrap the pan tightly with plastic wrap. Place a light weight (a thick and preferably trashy paperback novel is perfect) on top of the pudding. Refrigerate overnight.

3. To make the crème Anglaise, prepare a large ice water bath. Bring the milk and cream to barely a simmer in a heavy-bottomed saucepan (bubbles will just begin to form around the edges).

4. In a bowl slightly smaller than the ice water bath, whisk together the yolks, sugar, and salt. Slowly whisk in the hot milk until fully incorporated. Return the mixture to the pot. Cook, stirring constantly over medium-high heat, until the sauce is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon (170° F). Strain sauce through a fine-mesh sieve into a metal bowl. Stir in the rosewater. If it needs a bit more, go ahead and add it, but please have a light touch or it might wind up tasting like soap. Place the bowl into the water bath and stir occasionally until completely cool.

5. Run a knife around the sides of the summer pudding, then turn it over onto a plate to unmold. Serve in slices with the custard on the side.

 

What Else?

- You can skip the custard sauce and serve this with whipped cream or ice cream. Since there is no butter in the pudding itself, it greatly benefits from something rich on the side.

- A mix of as many different kinds of berries as you can find is ideal. I made it with a mix of raspberries, blueberries, and blackberries, and it was lovely.

- Karen goes out of her way to use fresh currants in the berry mix. Besides from adding great flavor, they also bleed lots of juice, which is what you want to help cover up all the pale bread. As she says, “it’s always so sad to see the white bread peeking through.” So do the same if you can find them.

- Don’t try to use anything but fluffy whole-wheat bread here, the soft crusted, kid-friendly, supermarket kind and not the crusty, seed-filled, fancy bakery/health food store kind. If you can’t get soft whole-wheat bread, use white.

Photo by Andrew Scrivani

That's Right. A Camping Cookbook. And I Love It.

  

I don't think I'll surprise anybody out there in internet-land by saying I am not an outdoorsy kind of woman. While I enjoy the occasional merguez sausage or beer-can chicken grilled in the backyard, I'm not going to be unfurling my sleeping bag (actually, I don't own a sleeping bag) next to that crackling fire anytime soon.

But, I confess. I just love the book Campfire Cookery: Adventuresome Recipes and Other Curiosities for the Great Outdoors (Stewart, Tabori, & Chang, 2011) by my two recipe testers and assistants Sarah Huck and Jaimee Young. I couldn't be more proud of the both of them. This book, their first, is well-written, hilariously funny, and the recipes are superb - and, believe me, I can vouch for those ladies' recipe testing skills.

Fortunately for us non-campers, most of their dishes can be easily adapted to the home oven, and they have a whole chapter on make-aheads such as homemade Honeyed Marshmallows, Strawberry-Champagne Jam, and Potted Spreads (their Potted Cheddar Huntsman Spread is a particular favorite of mine). And the rest of the book makes for a good read, full of fun and whimsy (love the section on how to read your tea leaves).

Scroll down to get their version of the British brunch classic Toad in the Hole (taken from their blog huckandyoung.com). Well done Sarah and Jaimee!

Toad-In-The-Hole

Provides four to six portions

 

2 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil, plus additional for coating

1 pound good-quality pork sausage, cut in half crosswise

3 large eggs

1 cup whole milk

3/4 cup all-purpose flour

1 generous pinch kosher salt

4 sprigs fresh thyme

1. Preheat the oven to 425° F. Coat the interior of a 2-quart soufflé pan or baking dish with the additional oil, taking care that the sides are not neglected. Place the pan in the oven to warm.

2. In a skillet set over medium-high heat, warm 2 teaspoons of the oil. Add the sausages and brown well on all sides, 7 to 10 minutes. Meanwhile, in a medium bowl, whisk together the eggs, milk, flour, and salt until few lumps remain.

3. When the sausages are ready, carefully remove the warm pan from the oven. Scrape the sausages and their meaty juices into the pan and scatter the thyme sprigs on top. Pour the batter over the sausage-thyme mixture and return the pan to the oven. Bake until the pudding has puffed and the edges are a crisp, golden brown, 20 to 25 minutes. Serve hot, in or out-of-doors!

 

It's Birthday for My Book!

After many months of anticipating its arrival In the Kitchen with A Good Appetite: 150 Recipes & Stories About the Food You Love is finally out there making its way in the world. Good luck little book! Play nice and make lots of friends! I'm a little more emotional than usual about this book because it is very special to me. It's 100 brand new recipe and stories that have NEVER been published before, plus some of my greatest hits from my NY Times column. And I'm so happy and a little anxious that it's finally out in the world. 

In this one I share a hodgepodge of some of my favorite recipes plus the (sometimes painfully) true stories behind each dish. So after this book is out everyone will know that my mother's philosophy of life is based on a sandwich, that I almost didn't go on a second date with my now-husband because I found out he doesn't eat cheese, and that I used to let my cat, Harry, eat the oatmeal straight out of the pot -  you know, all of my deepest, darkest secrets, at least food-wise.

And the recipes are some of my 150 favorites. Baked Camembert with Ginger Marmalade, My Mother's Lemony Pot Roast, Dahlia's Fragrant Chicken Fingers (named for my daughter - we make that one a lot), a whole chapter on deep-frying (because, why not?), and another one entitled "Things With Cheese."

Run free little book, and don't forget to call home, at least every once in a while!

The Perfect Finish - Finished!

This finish was a long time coming - Bill Yosses and I have been hard at work in this tome for the better part of a decade. But, believe me, I will be the first to say that helping Bill adapt his recipes for Warm Molten Vanilla Cakes, Chocolate Caramel Tart with Sea Salt, Candied Bacon Peach Cobbler, and (my personal favorite) Fresh Coconut Cupcakes with Orange and Rum, making them easily recreated by bakers of all skill levels, was a delightful way to spend the time. The book is chock full of insider tips and baking advice from the White House pastry chef (dubbed "The Crustmaster" by President Obama) which is sure to inspire all - whether you wish to create show-stopping desserts,  pick-me-up cookies, creamy puddings, or pies suitable to serve to the leader of the free world. A perfect finish, indeed. 

Buy the book

 

 

Better Home Cooking, Bromberg-style

 

 After over a year of testing the magnificent recipes of Bruce and Eric Bromberg (of Blue Ribbon restaurant fame) in my home kitchen, I'm pleased to announce that Bromberg Bros. Blue Ribbon Cookbook: Better Home Cooking is on the shelves. The Blue Ribbon Restaurants function as clubhouses for the best of the best New York City chefs, the kind of clientele that really keeps a restaurant menu on the cutting edge of culinary fashion while at the same time forces it to stay focused on producing the kind of good, solid food that chefs themselves yearn to eat after a long shift in the kitchen. Herb-Roasted Chicken with Lemon and Sage, Braised Beef Short Ribs with Succotash, Northern Fried Chicken, Beef Marrow Bones with Oxtail Marmalade, and the secret to a Blue Ribbon-worthy french fry are all contained within these pages. And the pictures are great, too. 

Buy the book

Food Writers Don't Get Fat

The Skinny: How to Fit into Your Little Black Dress Forever (Meredith Books, December 2006) 

Not a day goes by without someone asking me how I manage to stay so thin given the high calorie content of my job. Well, here's the answer. I wrote this book with my good friend Robin Aronson. She and I went to Barnard together, and have been great friends ever since. Anyway, the book was her idea. Desperate to lose the rest of the weight she'd gained having her (adorable) twins, she asked me, her skinniest friend, how I stay thin while eating foie gras at night and cookies for breakfast (she knows me well, that Robin). 

Now Robin knows me from college, when I weighed a whopping 35 pounds more, so she knew that I once lost a lot of weight and have since kept it off (which rules out any possibility of me being an ectomorph, though I wish!). Nope, I just exercise and attempt to limit my portions, and over the years I've developed a whole roster of tips and strategies for keeping the weight off. And we know they work. While writing the book, Robin not only lost the 20 pounds of baby weight should hadn't been able to shed, plus another 15 pounds. She's skinnier than ever. Trust us, this book will show you the way to Skinnydom. 

Here's an excerpt from the cover letter that's accompanying the galleys (to give you some more info): 

Can you eat food you love and still look fabulous in your little black dress? Absolutely! The Skinny: How to fit into your little black dress forever (Meredith) by Melissa Clark and Robin Aronson will show you how. Melissa and Robin believe that when we sit down to eat, we should celebrate the pleasure of food, not fear the fat (or the carbs or the calories) in it. The Skinny shows how you can balance eating rich and eating smart so you can look fabulous in that little black dress forever. (Here's a hint - eat more fruits and vegetables. Here's another - Eat what you love.) Melissa Clark is a sophisticated food writer who eats out nearly every night. She's a regular contributor to The New York Times, Food & Wine, Cookie, and Martha Stewart Weddings and Living, among many other publications. She's also the co-author of 17 cookbooks with some of the best chefs in the world, including David Bouley, Daniel Boulud, and pastry chef Claudia Fleming. The woman knows how to eat. And drink. And she wears a size 2. 

Robin Aronson is a health writer and mother of twins. She wrote The Whole Pregnancy Handbook: A doctor's guide to the wise use of conventional and alternative medicine before, during and after pregnancy with Joel Evans, MD. The former editor-in-chief of Parents.com, the web site for Parents magazine, she knows that losing baby weight isn’t always easy (she had 60 pounds of it to lose) - but then she went on The Skinny and lost all the weight and a little bit more. 

In The Skinny, Melissa and Robin combine insights from their different lifestyles and their friendship to make a book that any woman can relate to. There are tips for eating out, eating in, even for after-dinner snacking. And there are 75 simple, delicious recipes that show all you can do with fruits and vegetables, and shortcuts and tips for preparing them without fuss. The Skinny isn't about rules and it's not about denial. It's about loving what you eat and how you feel. --- Anyway, the book comes out in December, but even now you can pre-order it on Amazon...

Chef Interrupted

For anyone who aspires to restaurant-chef-type food but not the long ingredient lists and interminable cooking directions, here's the perfect book. Melissa Clark retains the spark of genius in the chefs original time-consuming recipes, but pares them down (interrupts the chefs) to their most essential, simple elements, allowing any cook to create four-star cuisine at home without a staff of sous-chefs, an unlimited budget, and an entire weekend to fritter away. Chef, Interrupted is like taking a cooking class from not one or two but more than fifty world-renowned chefs across a broad spectrum of expertise, including seafood with Eric Ripert and dessert with Claudia Fleming, American standouts like Tom Colicchio and Wylie Dufresne, and the international flavors of Norman Van Aken, Bobby Flay, and Marcus Samuelsson.

For the past decade, Melissa Clark has made a name for herself by doing one thing very adeptly: making chefs' recipes accessible to home cooks, whether through coauthoring books with the likes of David Bouley and Daniel Boulud or writing "The Chef" columns and other articles in The New York Times. Melissa is a genius at discovering what's really great about a chef's recipe, then simplifying it, keeping the part where the recipe is inventive and delicious, and then interrupting the chef when it gets out of hand.

The result this book is a remarkable combination of creative cuisine and real-life practicalities, and Chef, Interrupted offers a fantastic panoply of mouthwatering dishes. From salads like Suzanne Goin's Arugula-Mint Salad with Apricots and Cumin to fish like Christian Delouvrier's Roasted Cod with Brandade Potatoes, from Jonathan Waxman's Pollo al Forno with Panzanella to Tom Douglas's Citrus-Braised Pork Shank with Bread-Crumb Gremolata, from Bill Telepan's Heirloom Pea Pancakes with Smoked Salmon and Crme Fraiche to Claudia Fleming's Goat Cheese Cake with Thyme Macerated Raspberry Compote this is restaurant food that you can really and truly make at home.

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Cooking with Faith

You wouldn't know it by looking at her - either during her years as Corky Sherwood on CBS's Murphy Brown or now on her hit ABC comedy Hope & Faith - but actress Faith Ford loves to eat. And she comes from a long line of excellent Louisiana cooks who taught Faith as much about fried catfish and hush puppies as they did about fresh local peaches and homegrown tomatoes. The result is that Faith is an excellent cook whose style incorporates everything she loves about eating comforting down-home Southern favorites, and everything she loves about eating light, fresh foods that are as healthy as they are flavorful. After dreaming of a cookbook for years, Faith finally shared her updated Southern classics and traditional family favorites with me. I helped her write it all down and voila, here it is.




Recipes include: Old-Fashioned Smothered Chicken, Golden Crispy Oven-Fried Chicken, Mom's Smoky Beef Brisket, Southern-Style Fried Catfish, Broiled Red Snapper with Olives, Onions, and Tomatoes; Grilled Veggie Po' Boys; Cora's Skillet Candied Sweet Potatoes, Snap Beans and New Potatoes, Buttermilk Biscuits, Sweet Summer Melon-Mint Salad, Coconut Brownies, and Fluffy Lemon Icebox Pie.




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