Comfort Foods

What a great thing for the fall, a potato cookbook. -ae

Last week I went through a box of recipes I had clipped from the San Francisco Chronicle. I found recipes dating back to the late 90's! I wish I was as good at organizing as I am at hoarding. Reviewing all those clippings, I can safely say I had saved more recipes written by Marlena Spieler than from anyone else. Spieler has been a writer for the Chronicle for ages and has written tons of cookbooks to boot. 

So imagine my pleasure at receiving a review copy of Marlena Spieler's latest book, called Yummy Potatoes 65 Downright Delicious Recipes. And on the same day I posted one of my yummy potato recipes! Potatoes on the brain. I cannot tell you how delectable most of her recipes look! There are Breakfast Potatoes, Tapas, Meze and Antipasti, Soups, Salads, Mashes, Baked, Fried, Sides and a category called "Potatoes for Dinner!" I swear the exclamation point is hers, not mine, but it might as well be mine.

I just got an advanced copy of my friend, Lorraine Wallace’s newest cookbook, Mr. Sunday's Saturday Night Chicken, and I haven’t had this much fun with a chicken since Dionne Lucus taught me how to rip the bones out of one while leaving it’s flesh undisturbed. (Yeah, I’m dangerous!)

I got this advance copy because I shot the cover photograph, and while I also contributed a recipe, I had no idea what a friendly, loving and delicious cookbook she had created.

Besides the happy photos of family and friends, tips and a market guide to terminology, she has given us “keys” – ways to consider chicken: boneless/skinless, quick, supermarket rotisserie chickens (for pulled chicken recipes), company, potluck, stovetop, one pot and grilled recipes. She even has chicken recipes for chicken vegetarian dishes (huh? They have been designed so that one can eliminate the chicken in favor of vegetables instead…).

The recipes all appear to be utterly user friendly. And, I know for a fact, they are all recipes that she has prepared in her own kitchen for her husband, Mr. Sunday himself, Chris Wallace. (He LOVED my chicken in orange juice) I guess that tells us something else; they must be calorie conscious as he looks darn good on TV.

How do I love Nigella? Let me count the ways. Sometimes she’s bigger, and some times she’s smaller, but she’s always incredibly beautiful. She is incredible intelligent and well-educated, and has had some incredibly hard knocks (including the death of her first husband) and survived with consummate grace.

She is a mother over 40 who oozes sex appeal, admits to cooking pasta for herself to eat in bed while watching television, and deep fries candy bars in batter. Most important, in an age of molecular gastronomy and foodie preciousness, she cooks food that is simple, sensuous and exactly what you were yearning for but couldn’t name until you saw the recipe.

I taught myself to cook over 7 years ago and I imagined over those first culinary delights that I’d eventually become better at the art. Alas, it seems my initial joy at creating lovely meals for my man has never really progressed past the basics of following  a recipe and, over the last year, become something of a drag. For those of you whose job it is to get dinner on the table every night, I’m sure you share my pain in coming up with new and tasty ways to cook the same old ingredients. (Working at a food zine has only contributed to my malaise.) I used to enjoy the process of preparing a new dish, but now I find myself more and more disappointed with the results. Mostly because the ½ hour of eating rarely justifies the hours of cooking. Not that my food comes out bad, it just isn’t as extraordinary as I continually hope it will be.

My inherent laziness and current lack of enthusiasm compelled me to purchase The Best Casserole Cookbook Ever, a fairly large tome of over 500 recipes that require very little effort to convert everyday items into comfort food. My husband, who rarely comments on my cooking, has been loving dinner lately. Partly because the meals are simple and hearty (he's from the Mid-West, nuff said) and partly because the mess left behind – I cook, he cleans – has been quite minimal. A win-win situation for him. There’s just something about throwing a bunch of ingredients in a pot, walking away and returning a few hours later to a scrumptious, yummy meal that’s really working for me right now. Plus, it makes the house smell wonderful for hours.