Bittman's "How to Cook Everything Vegetarian" is a good cookbook. I think he's wrong upthread about "buy cheap knives, who gives a shit" but I rather like his "throw in this ingredient or that ingredient, it'll be cool" approach - I'm cooking from Ottolenghi's cookbook a lot lately which is the exact opposite (" add 1/8 tsp pink himayalan salt + 1/18 tsp kosher salt. stir one minute, then add white from one duck egg"). however I can't lie Ottolenghi's recipes are ridiculously delicious if you have the time to make them
― not feeling those lighters (underrated aerosmith bootlegs I have owned), Monday, 29 April 2013 17:30 (eleven years ago) link
How to Cook Everything is indeed a good cookbook, one that I have given as gifts to people who want to cook but don't really know where to start; I also liked his Minimalist column in the NYT. But dude has jumped a shark.
I'm on board with cheap paring knives that you throw away when they get dull, but gtfo with a cheap chef's knife. Get a good one, keep it sharp, profit. Skimp on crap like nonstick cookwear imo.
― quincie, Monday, 29 April 2013 17:35 (eleven years ago) link
I like Bittman's original How to Cook Everything approach because it frees the cook from the recipe -- you have the power to make it however you want, you're not gonna fuck it up, go ahead, try different things. That's not ego-oriented food advice. I guess I really dislike ego-oriented food writing -- make my recipe my way, etc. It's like insisting on a brand name -- I just find it gross.
― free your spirit pig (La Lechera), Monday, 29 April 2013 17:37 (eleven years ago) link
i turn to "how to cook everything" when i need proportions for a pancake recipe or something--he's good at sort of calmly delineating the basic shit that needs to get done to realize a given dish.
it's when bittman tries to go ottolenghi that it all goes wrong.
― adam, Monday, 29 April 2013 17:40 (eleven years ago) link
bon appetit is the worst
at least you can get the occasional good recipe out of Cooking Light. Bon Appetit's not even a decent bin liner.
― set the controls for the heart of the sun (VegemiteGrrl), Tuesday, 30 April 2013 20:48 (eleven years ago) link
maybe it's yelp fallout but even good food writers i'm starting to find faintly obnoxious
― christmas candy bar (al leong), Tuesday, 30 April 2013 20:58 (eleven years ago) link
otm
― set the controls for the heart of the sun (VegemiteGrrl), Tuesday, 30 April 2013 20:58 (eleven years ago) link
i can't even really roll/w beloved ol jonathan gold much anymore, idk why.
but can you bun?
― 乒乓, Tuesday, 30 April 2013 21:00 (eleven years ago) link
That's why I liked Old Bittman -- he was like "you can do this!", the end. No weight loss/"health" bs, no rhapsodizing over olives from an old Lebanese woman's backyard, just unfussy food-making and -eating.
― free your spirit pig (La Lechera), Tuesday, 30 April 2013 21:02 (eleven years ago) link
rhapsodizing over olives from an old Lebanese woman's backyard
irl lols @ this
― set the controls for the heart of the sun (VegemiteGrrl), Tuesday, 30 April 2013 21:03 (eleven years ago) link
i think bittman is coming to terms with his own mortality; he's spent a lifetime eating well and eating richly. he's worried. he's trying to unwind the odometer.
― 乒乓, Tuesday, 30 April 2013 21:05 (eleven years ago) link
I just wish he would keep it to himself. Proselytizing is gross even if his recipes are good. As I said before, imo naming and selling your own diet is what assholes do (among other things).
― free your spirit pig (La Lechera), Tuesday, 30 April 2013 21:08 (eleven years ago) link
i've got a new diet i'm calling "the leong game", which involves kale, spinach, and tomato juice smoothies at every meal. $19.99 for the recipe and a free diet calendar.
― christmas candy bar (al leong), Tuesday, 30 April 2013 21:12 (eleven years ago) link
the vegemite solution: eat healthy snacks during the day and then pig out on icecream because you had a crappy day at work
― set the controls for the heart of the sun (VegemiteGrrl), Tuesday, 30 April 2013 21:14 (eleven years ago) link
Leong Gamers gather fortnightly to exchange algae cultures and shame each other for eating > 6 almonds.
― free your spirit pig (La Lechera), Tuesday, 30 April 2013 21:16 (eleven years ago) link
almond unen-joy
― Philip Nunez, Tuesday, 30 April 2013 21:21 (eleven years ago) link
oh hey like every issue bon appetit has a feature on some restaurant in some stupidly far-flung part of the world (well, far-flung if you are american). like, some place in darkest fucking sweden or, this month, some dude cooking with flowers in a strip mall outside of melbourne. every one of these articles is a hilarious and transparently desperate bid to "discover" the next rene redzepi or adria or whoever.
i read this and then i go lie down and read elizabeth david until sanity returns.
― adam, Tuesday, 30 April 2013 22:14 (eleven years ago) link
mark bittman sayswho the hell cares what mark bittman says anymore? that's what i want to know at this point
i bought some ocean perch at the store yesterday with the intention of doing something lemon-buttery with garlic and dill, and i consulted his book Fish (that's the kind of book title I appreciate), which confirmed what i thought i should do and gave me a few other ideas for next time i want to eat this (very delicious, inexpensive, and tender) fish. It didn't have a stupid name and claim to elongate my life. It just told me how to make the fish in a variety of ways. RIP that mark bittman :(
― free your spirit pig (La Lechera), Monday, 13 May 2013 13:33 (eleven years ago) link
can you give me an example of the new bittman article
― 乒乓, Monday, 13 May 2013 13:36 (eleven years ago) link
i mean, an article written by the new bittman
he is selling a diet book with a special name that he claims is "his" diet -- isn't that enough?
― free your spirit pig (La Lechera), Monday, 13 May 2013 14:05 (eleven years ago) link
doesn't really raise any red flags for me
― 乒乓, Monday, 13 May 2013 14:06 (eleven years ago) link
yeah see i guess i feel that's gross -- i can stand personal branding! it grosses me out.
― free your spirit pig (La Lechera), Monday, 13 May 2013 14:10 (eleven years ago) link
UGHi meant can'tmy outrage (i'm not really that outraged) has made me typo crazy
― free your spirit pig (La Lechera), Monday, 13 May 2013 14:12 (eleven years ago) link
i guess because i believe in his general philosophies w/r/t food i don't mind that he's building his personal brand
― 乒乓, Monday, 13 May 2013 14:28 (eleven years ago) link
i agree with him and i still think it's grosshe has become a pontificator, and i preferred him as an educator. i realize it's a fine line, but still somehow in my mind he has crossed it
― free your spirit pig (La Lechera), Monday, 13 May 2013 14:34 (eleven years ago) link
that's probably true but i think the enemies on the other side of the line (corporate food laboratories and taste labs and advertising and etc. etc. etc.) are so numerous, that....
― 乒乓, Monday, 13 May 2013 14:36 (eleven years ago) link
you're totally right -- i realize not everyone would feel the same waycooking is a basic life skill, imo, and treating it like a program/commodifying it is kind of antithetical to thatagain, imowhat could a businessman ever want more, etc. i'm a product of my times! it's inescapable.
― free your spirit pig (La Lechera), Monday, 13 May 2013 14:39 (eleven years ago) link
How to Cook Everything was the first cookbook that made me feel like I could actually succeed at cooking, and it opened me up to a lot of foods -- it's like the ipad/iphone of cooking in terms of user-friendliness compared to most of the other available stuff, at least when it came out.
― THIS IS NOT A BENGHAZI T-SHIRT (Hurting 2), Monday, 13 May 2013 16:41 (eleven years ago) link
I mean, it's not like Julia Child wasn't heavy into personal branding, there just wasn't that term for it yet.
― THIS IS NOT A BENGHAZI T-SHIRT (Hurting 2), Monday, 13 May 2013 16:42 (eleven years ago) link
Oh hell no you are not equating MB and JC!
― quincie, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 03:07 (eleven years ago) link
Rachel Ray or Paula Deen, yes. But not Julia Child.
― Jaq, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 03:15 (eleven years ago) link
I hate Bittman too.
― Jeff, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 03:19 (eleven years ago) link
I'm trying to imagine Julia Child or James Beard "branding" stuff and failing. Links required for proof. The only similar thing I recall from that era is Graham Kerr's spurtle.
― Jaq, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 03:20 (eleven years ago) link
i do kind of avoid reading bittman's stuff now that he's less of a cooking writer. not having those weekly minimalist columns let him wander too far into dr. oz land. i still like his videos when he does them.
― circles, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 03:40 (eleven years ago) link
His minimalist stuff is great; the title of his new "work" has made him my enemy 4evah
― quincie, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 03:53 (eleven years ago) link
Like I will not even type it out here because it makes me spit.
― Jaq, Monday, May 13, 2013 11:20 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
it seems kind of naive to think that a chef with a long-running television series and a number of bestselling cookbooks with her name directly in the title is not engaging in branding
― THIS IS NOT A BENGHAZI T-SHIRT (Hurting 2), Tuesday, 14 May 2013 03:56 (eleven years ago) link
A cookbook or tv show is not a line of cookware, patented spices, tableware, appliances, or "must-have" utensils.
― Jaq, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 03:59 (eleven years ago) link
Yeah but the ". . . lose weight in X days" uuuuuuugh fuck that dude.
― quincie, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 04:02 (eleven years ago) link
― Jaq, Monday, May 13, 2013 11:59 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
Bittman has these things?
― THIS IS NOT A BENGHAZI T-SHIRT (Hurting 2), Tuesday, 14 May 2013 04:04 (eleven years ago) link
The Dr. Oz relationship is omg u dead to me dood
― quincie, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 04:05 (eleven years ago) link
Telling me how to cook something is so very different from telling me what to eat. I'll stick with Harold McGee for now.
― Jaq, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 04:28 (eleven years ago) link
It's only a matter of time before Bittman has a line of supplements.
― Jaq, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 04:31 (eleven years ago) link
Or he jumps on to homeopathy.
― Jeff, Tuesday, 14 May 2013 11:40 (eleven years ago) link
i'd like to know why no one (no public figure at least) seems to be satisfied/gratified by simply teaching people how to cookthat's what he used to do really well, and in a way that wasn't insultingi no longer care what he says about anything because he's a pontificating weight loss salesman instead of a teacher
― free your spirit pig (La Lechera), Tuesday, 14 May 2013 12:20 (eleven years ago) link
Mark Bittman's fearmongering is starting to remind me of Glenn Beck -- what's wrong with this guy?
― sweat pea (La Lechera), Thursday, 17 October 2013 19:55 (ten years ago) link
He's the worst and I hate myself every time I'm baited into clicking one of his articles.
― Jeff, Thursday, 17 October 2013 19:58 (ten years ago) link
What now? I haven't been paying attention.
― Jaq, Thursday, 17 October 2013 20:00 (ten years ago) link