Over the past 50 years, chef Alice Waters, owner and leader ideologue at Chez Panisse in Berkeley, California, has played a pivotal role in popularizing nearby seasonal cooking. In her 2017 memoir, Coming to My Senses, Waters boiled her motive down to its essence, almost actually. Her preferred recipe, she wrote, is: “Go cut some mint from the lawn, boil water, pour it over the mint. Wait. And then drink.” Can wonderful flavors honestly be that easy? To find out, G2 asked a selection of top cooks for their favorite easy recipes, where, at the least, cooking transforms some components into a killer dish.
Seasonal strawberry slushie
Bindu Patel, chef-owner, Sanctuary, Leicester.
“As a baby, my biggest loves were strawberries and Slush Puppies. In the summertime, we’d cross fruit-picking and collect a glut of juicy strawberries, and Mum could blend them with sugar and ice to create the most super slushies. Being Asian, you’re added to chilies and heat early, and mum would grind black pepper on the pinnacle, which brings out the flavor in strawberries.”
Tuna salad
Joe Wright, chef and co-proprietor, Porta, Chester
“Hot weather encourages simplicity; accurate produce prepared with the little faff—the Spanish excel at this. I regularly recreate a dish I first served at the seaside in Almería: more or less chopped tomatoes, good olive oil, and fresh oregano with tinned ventresca tuna. No cooking in any way. The Spanish love desirable tinned seafood, and ventresca is the prized tuna stomach, line-stuck, cooked in seawater, filleted, and tinned by hand. It’s the food of the gods.”
Michelin-starred Rice Krispie desserts
Simon Hulstone, chef-proprietor, the Elephant, Torquay
“I love gently softening marshmallows in a bain-marie to blood temperature and mixing through Rice Krispies. Set it in a tray, cut it into pieces, dip them in melted chocolate, and those bloody love them. This is Michelin cooking: we best use a pinnacle-quit Kellogg’s and right Flumps.”
Khatta kheer
Irfan Khan, head chef, Lucknow forty-nine, London
“This is a street snack in India. However, I love it as an easy summertime salad, too. Chop a cucumber into cubes, sprinkle chaat masala, cumin powder, and black salt, and finish with lime juice. On hot days, there’s no better manner to settle down.”
Labneh with za’atar
Stuart Ralston, chef-owner, Aizle, Edinburgh
“In New York, I labored with an Israeli chef, Shlomo Kashy, who introduced me to labneh, basically a Middle Eastern yogurt. You can discover it inside the UK now. He might spoon it into jars, pinnacle with excellent-pleasant olive oil and a warm za’atar spice mix of dried marjoram, sesame, and sumac, then dip heated bread into it. It becomes a revelation.”
Burnt-butter cabbage salad
Mary-Ellen McTague, chef-proprietor, the Creameries, Manchester
“The nutty, caramel flavor of burnt butter – beurre noisette in French – lifts everything. You put butter in a pan, observe warmth till it turns a nice golden brown, take it off the heat, allow it to cool, and stress it. It will keep for months in the refrigerator. It’s an exquisite dressing for fish, especially meaty roast fish, including turbot, and it’s truely high-quality on cabbage and celeriac. You could produce an exact lunch with four ingredients – grilled cabbage, burnt butter, salt, and lemon juice.”
Caldo Verde
Elaine Mason, ‘chief soup-burger and owner of Union of Genius soup bar, Edinburgh
“It’s the only soup I do: five ingredients, forty minutes, and amazing at any time. It’s savory and warming in iciness, nourishing and tangy in summer. Dice and fry onion, potatoes, and four garlic cloves in olive oil. Add a liter of ham stock and simmer for 30 minutes. Fry approximately 15cm of true cooking chorizo in a dry pan. Tip the chorizo and its oil into the stock, with a big handful of shredded kale and a teaspoon of paprika and smoked paprika. Give it 10 mins to get itself together, grind black pepper over, and experience.”
