Welcome to Extra Credit, a newsletter about giving people, places, and things their due. TINY REVIEWS are reserved for paid subscribers, but I thought I’d share them with all of you this week. It’s spring! It’s a time of abundance. Upgrade at extracredit.bulletin.com/subscribe.
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Hi!
I’m home alone because Jason is traveling for work, which means that I’ve been particularly self-indulgent and spontaneous when it comes to cooking and eating. It’s what I want, when I want it—no accommodations!*
I have been grazing. I have been noshing. I have been soaking dried chickpeas to braise them like a hunk of brisket. (A top-five use of $6.25.) I’ve craved a bowl of cereal but had no cereal to eat three times so far, which has crushed me. What cereal do we like now? Do not tell me to start whipping up mini croissants to soak in a bowl of milk, which is what this cool new cafe I follow on Instagram is doing. Also, do not tell me to eat keto cereal. I will never.
When I’m not agonizing over the dearth of Cheerios in this apartment, I seem to be brewing coffee. I have brewed so much coffee. I’ve been even more reliant on Deb Perelman than usual. I have made two kinds of quesadillas. I have refilled the Brita 14 thousand times, each time hoping it will undergo a spiritual transformation and become a Walter Filter—the $425 ceramic water purifier that I crave. No dice.
The point is! For this week’s TINY REVIEWS, a look at the kind of food I make when I have no one to please but myself.**
*I have eaten gobs of peanut butter for more than one meal.
**And my friend Estelle, who came over for dinner.
Let’s just get out of the way that three of these recipes in this newsletter come from Smitten Kitchen, and that is reduced from the actual number of Deb Perelman recipes I cooked last week. This woman is a genius. She is a god. She is a master of minimizing the number of bowls a person will ever have to wash. Some people have Melissa Clark, whom I like. I have Deb, to whom I would consider donating an organ if she asked.
This salad is a good example of Deb’s sorcery: Here is a dish that I have eaten at the excellent and chic restaurant she names in the headnote. And yet—with her instructions—I like it even better from my own pathetic kitchen. They said it couldn’t be done! It’s the ratios you love, none of the upcharge you resent! It’s the satisfaction of using your heaviest measuring cup to crush meaty, green olives. It’s all completely irresistible.
Your hands will smell mildly pickled, and you will be happy about it. My only note: I don’t bother layering my salad prettily, as Deb recommends. I just throw everything in a bowl and let it marinate.
Every time I make this, I worry that I need to serve something else with it. How could fennel and cheese and olives constitute an entire dinner? When Jason is around, I panic-make little cheese toasts at the last minute. But since he’s in France, I decided to trust the process. I ended up eating the entire bowl, leaning over the counter. Then I drank the juice at the bottom, and I know I’m a sicko because I thought, “What would I name this drink if I mixed it with some vodka?” I’m taking suggestions, if you have ideas.
My friend Estelle came over for dinner, and we went back and forth discussing which bean-based main dish I should prepare. I was considering pizza beans—another Deb specialty. But then I threw out the idea of these braised chickpeas that I usually make in the fall. Estelle voted for those, so that’s what we had. I love how these taste after sitting in the fridge—like something an Upper East Side mom would pass off to her kids while the grownups ate filet mignon. I fix a bowl and feel a deep level of satisfaction—like I’m some cross between a Jewish grandmother on Rosh Hashanah and Ina Garten. It’s an ideal state of mind.
I serve these with bread for sopping up the sauce and some kind of green vegetable. (For Estelle, I made Judi’s challah, of course. Plus, a raw-and-roasted kale salad that was just average, so I won’t bother linking to the recipe. They can’t all be winners!)
I hate when I toil in the kitchen for hours and the dish people like best is the one that took five minutes to prepare. I didn’t roll out that filo dough just to have you ooh and ahh over a cucumber salad! But it’s hard to hold that kind of admiration against this perfect dip. This divine accompaniment! What would I be accusing it of? What’s the crime? That it’s too delicious?
This dip tastes like ranch dressing that spent two weeks in Istanbul. It tastes like lunch at Ralph Lauren’s house. It tastes like summer and good pool weather and Natasha Richardson’s taste level in The Parent Trap. Make this dip. What else is there to say?
JACK’S WIFE FREDA’S TUNA SALAD
A few years ago, I made the chaotic decision to order tuna salad at a restaurant, which I instantly regretted. I was berating myself about the grain bowl I could have been eating (order regret—a potent topic for another time) when the salad in question arrived.
It was so good! Savory, salty, with a hint of umami-sweetness. I looked at the people eating their grain bowls, and I felt superior. Like I had made the better choice. Is there a better sensation in the world?
Jason is a true vegetarian, so I don’t make a lot of tuna salad while he’s around. But when the mood strikes, this is a perfect lunch. The recipe is from the Jack’s Wife Freda cookbook, which is available for purchase wherever books are sold. Or you can just search the Google book PDF, which is what I do. I leave out the tomatoes, but never skip the avocado. Also, I never have sweet soy sauce around, so I just whisk a little honey into the dressing.
Molten, melting cabbage in a spiced tomato sauce. I could eat the entire thing in a single setting and sometimes I do.
This dish has all these little components. It seems too arduous, until you start and then you realize it’s meditative. Preparing it for other people is an act of total love and devotion. But I like it to make it when I’m all alone and can eat a few crispy sweet potatoes right off the sheet pan. The vegetables are sweet. The garnishes pack heat and fragrance. L'Oréal told me I’m worth it!
One of my most toxic traits is that I think pasta is just okay. I like lasagna. Pesto is nice. But in the universe of carbohydrates, I much prefer bread. I simply love a potato. Your spaghetti al limone will never move me.
So I’m not tempted to make cacio e pepe at home. But I do make and love this exceedingly comforting dish, which tastes like someone else’s childhood in the Italian countryside. I serve it with a sharp arugula salad.
Surprise. It’s Deb! With the best spring produce recommendation: Blanched asparagus. I can’t believe I spent decades roasting this vegetable, watching it get all wilted and oil-slicked, when I could have been blanching it and living a life of sophistication and ease!
Ideal dinner for one: Preheat the oven to 425 F. Boil 4-6 fingerling potatoes in salted water for 10-12 minutes. You should be able to pierce them with a fork. Drain. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper. Tip the potatoes onto the parchment paper. Using a measuring cup or a meat cleaver or a giant spoon, smash the potatoes until some flesh bursts out of the skin. Drizzle with olive oil. Toss with salt, pepper. Roast for 25 minutes, flipping once if you remember. (I never do.)
While the potatoes are roasting, boil a new pot of water. Make one bunch of asparagus, per this recipe. Prepare the aforementioned labneh dip. Pile asparagus and fingerlings on a plate. Put a bowl of labneh on the table. Dip and repeat.
BRIEFLY NOTED
Heavenly mixing bowls. The only reliable serum. I would join an MLM for this floss—that’s how good it is. Have we all noticed how excellent Curbed has gotten? Read this and this and omfg this. And have we all seen Anne at Cannes!!!!????!!!!! I mean!
