Recipes By Mark Bittman
974 recipes found
Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s Fried Sushi Cakes
Jean-Georges Vongerichten's recipe here, for fried cakes of sushi-style rice topped with chipotle mayonnaise and raw scallop, then painted with a thin glaze of a soy-honey mixture, is just irresistible. (If I were an award committee, I’d give it “best of the year.”)
Baked Eggs With Onions and Cheese
Eggs can be baked on a bed of almost anything -- cooked spinach and sliced tomatoes come to mind immediately -- but the trick in every case is to avoid overcooking. The consistency of baked eggs should be like that of fried eggs, with a barely cooked white and a soft, runny yolk.
Grilled Steak and Vegetables With Tortillas
Here's an idea: Spend the same $30, or $50 or $100 or $300 on meat that you now spend each week or month, but buy less and buy better. You might compare this to an annual purchase of 20 $5 T-shirts made by child labor versus one of five $20 T-shirts made by better-paid and better-treated workers from organic cotton. Expensive meat from real farms is a more extreme example of this less-is-better policy. Then cook the meat differently than you used to. Take this vague interpretation of fajitas, one that focuses on grilled vegetables and makes beef a supporting player. A pound or so of tender, fatty rib-eye or sirloin goes a long way with this recipe. And it makes a lovely impression if you present it whole before slicing or chopping. You can cook everything in a cast-iron skillet (you will most likely need more than one, or you will have to cook in batches) instead of on a grill.
Rice With Poached Eggs
Polpettone Stuffed With Eggplant And Provolone
Polpettone might be thought of as meatloaf, but the vegetable stuffing transforms it into something much juicier and more complex.
Grilled Lobster
Kale, Sausage And Mushroom Stew
Chile Garlic Paste
If you’re looking for more heat without the characteristic smokiness of the chipotle, just add a few ordinary dried red chiles. For Mexican-style chile paste, add a bit of cumin, and some oregano or epazote. With good curry powder or garam masala you’d produce the kind of paste you see in northern India. You can make a blend similar to harissa, the classic paste from North Africa, by adding coriander and cumin. If you use fresh herbs or aromatics (including garlic), refrigerate the finished paste and use it within a day or so for maximum freshness and oomph. If all your seasonings are dried, the paste will last a couple of weeks at least. Remember this, though: Chiles can burn. If you have rubber gloves, use them. If not, every time you touch a chile, wash your hands with warm soapy water several times and be careful not to touch your eyes. The heat belongs on the table.
Latkes
These crisp potato pancakes are the ultimate in holiday comfort food. (Don’t skip the sour cream and applesauce!) Get them sizzling away in a heavy-bottomed skillet until beautifully browned, and arrange them on a plate lined with paper towels as they finish. They won’t last long.
Green Mashed Potatoes
These addictive mashed potatoes are equal parts potatoes and greens, lending texture and fresh flavor to the classic side dish. The amount of oil here is significant, but we all know that what makes mashed potatoes really good is fat. Use the best olive oil you have. (For everything you need to know to make perfect potatoes, visit our potato guide.)
Braised Turkey
Whole-Duck Cassoulet
There is a clear order of operations to this cassoulet. Cut up the duck; remove the skin from the legs and refrigerate them overnight. At this point, you can make the stock or pick up the recipe the next day. But you’ll need the fat from the stock in order to make the confit. And you’ll use the fat from the confit to brown the meat. But this recipe isn’t that demanding; it just takes time. You can do it.
Mark Bittman's Rouille
Cassoulet With Lots of Vegetables
Cassoulet is one of the best of the myriad of traditional European dishes that combine beans and meat to produce wonderful rich, robust stews. This recipe maintains that spirit, but is much faster, easier, less expensive, and more contemporary, emphasizing the beans and vegetables over meat. (That probably makes it more, not less, traditional, since meat was always hard to come by before the mid-20th century.)
Charred Peppers
Corn Flan
Bisque
Beef Stew With Prunes
Braised dishes like this beef stew may feature green, orange, yellow or red vegetables but their most appetizing color is brown, the shade of brown whose glossy darkness shouts intensity and richness. The key to achieving that glorious color and flavor is sufficient browning of the meat. Don't rush. The good thing is, this savory-sweet stew can almost be ignored while it is cooking and can be made in advance, the night – or even two – before you serve it. Couscous makes a great accompaniment, as does saffron rice, because those bring out the color of the stew. Plain crusty bread is another great option. This is simple cold weather food at its most appealing.
Tortilla
Dried Mushroom Puree
Warm Pickled Peppers
Mark Bittman’s Bouillabaisse
You can make any soup with water instead of stock, but the soups that drive you wild usually have a beautiful stock as their base. This is doubly true of bouillabaisse, which should start with a stock so delicious that you can barely imagine improving on it. There are a few ways to do this: Grab fish bones when you see them, and make the stock incrementally. Another is to use shrimp shells. A third is to accumulate lobster bodies, which make fantastic stock. In any case, you combine whatever you have with some aromatics (thyme branches, onion, celery, carrot, garlic, peppercorns) add water and simmer for 15 to 30 minutes. Cool, strain and freeze if you like. When you're ready to make the soup, procure your seafood – pretty much any combination of fish and shellfish will do, but avoid dark-fleshed fish – and go forth. From there, it's no more difficult than making a pot of vegetable soup.
Soba Noodle Soup
A bowl of soba is a beautiful, exotic and delicious centerpiece for a Japanese meal: the not-too-soft, nutty buckwheat noodles sitting in a mahogany broth — dashi — that’s as clear and glossy as beef consommé, not only salty and umami-complex but sweet as well. My favorite variety, tamago toji, is egg-topped. When it’s made right, the egg is almost foamy, soft-scrambled and tender, deliciously flavored by the dashi, a bit of which it absorbs.
Provençal Fish Stew
This dish turns the proportion of fish to vegetables on its head -- more vegetables, less fish. There's enough shrimp and squid to let you know you're eating a fish stew, but enough chickpeas and spinach to let you know it is something different. A puttanesca-like seasoning of garlic, olives, capers, anchovies and tomato paste flavors the braise.