Easy

We use this stock for Pumpkin Soup (page 29) but you can use it for any vegetable-based soup of your liking. The addition of canela in the stock works well with the pumpkin and adds a slightly warm, spicy note to the base.

The counterpart to Green Chile Sauce (opposite) and a darn good sauce on its own served with meat and fish. Brick red New Mexico chiles give this sauce great color and a deep roasted earthy flavor.

Bland and mushy are forever banished; this is oatmeal for grown-ups. Steel-cut oatmeal (also referred to as Irish oatmeal) has a wonderfully nutty taste and a texture that is at once creamy and chewy. As a kid I always loaded my oatmeal with raisins and brown sugar; now I cook tart apple slices with the same ingredients for an unexpected yet familiar treat to layer with the oatmeal. A sprinkling of turbinado sugar and a quick hit from the broiler create a sweet brûléed crust and an extra touch of decadence. Crack the crust with your spoon and pour in the cinnamon-scented cream . . . oh yeah, you’ll be in love with oatmeal after this.

This is an egg sandwich I could eat for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Tangy sourdough bread is grilled to crusty perfection and topped with a meaty slice of griddled country ham, blistered sweet tomatoes, and a perfectly fried egg. A lightly dressed mound of slightly bitter, feathery frisée crowns this fork-and-knife sandwich.

This corn bread has an unusual twist. In many ways, it is a very traditional recipe made with stone-ground yellow cornmeal, tangy buttermilk for moisture, and just a touch of sugar so that it is savory rather than sweet. Cooked in a cast-iron skillet, the inner crumb is tender and crumbly while the bottom crust is beautifully crisp. What elevates this corn bread beyond the norm is that mystery ingredient—tomato powder. I can’t imagine how many tomatoes it takes to make even a couple tablespoons of the powder, but the flavor and scent are unadulterated, concentrated tomato essence. The powder mixes evenly into the batter, and each bite is laced with its pure taste.

These are everything a good buttermilk biscuit should be: light, flaky, and exceedingly tender. They make appearances all over the menu at Bar Americain; they’re a fought-over item in our bread basket, the basis of Miss Stephanie’s Biscuits and Cream Gravy (page 223), and when I’m not feeling the waffles, the perfect accompaniment for fried chicken (page 131). A liberal dusting of black pepper gives the biscuits a subtle flush of heat that distinguishes them from the rest. The purists among you can leave out this last step if you prefer your biscuits free of adornment—they’re still melt-in-your-mouth good.

Those of you who love steak tartare—and there seems to be very little middle ground between those who do and those who don’t—will be positively enamored of this dish. This is a time when the quality of your ingredients is paramount—purchase the filet from a butcher whom you trust to give you the best selection as opposed to something prewrapped in the market. The egg for the mustard sauce must also be as fresh as possible as it is used raw. Savory anchovies add an extra layer of flavor to the creamy sauce, which pops with whole grain mustard. Crunchy, acidic cornichons, fresh jalapeño—an American touch—and shallots inject the lush tartare with flavor and texture.