One Good Dish

This Entertainment Weekly Top 10 Cookbook of the Year uses just a few inspired twists to turn relatively simple dishes into dazzlers (New York Daily News). In this, his first non-menu cookbook, the New York Times food columnist offers 100 utterly delicious recipes that epitomize comfort food, Tanis-style. Individually or in combination, they make perfect little meals that are elemental and accessible, yet totally surprising-and there's something to learn on every page. Among the chapter titles there's Bread Makes a Meal, which includes such alluring recipes as a ham and Gruyère bread pudding, spaghetti and bread crumbs, breaded eggplant cutlets, and David's version of egg-in-a-hole. A chapter called My Kind of Snack includes quail eggs with flavored salt; speckled sushi rice with toasted nori; polenta pizza with crumbled sage; raw beet tartare; and mackerel rillettes. The recipes in Vegetables to Envy range from a South Indian dish of cabbage with black mustard seeds to French grandmother-style vegetables. Strike While the Iron Is Hot is all about searing and quick cooking in a cast-iron skillet. Another chapter highlights dishes you can eat from a bowl with a spoon. And so it goes, with one irrepressible chapter after another, one perfect food moment after another: this is a book with recipes to crave. This is the book that I will pick up when I'm hungry but not quite sure for what, for these dishes are inspiring yet can be made without a lot of fuss . . . Who would enjoy this book? People who enjoy simple, delicious, no-fuss cooking and who appreciate well-written recipes. -Kitchn