Every Day? We Say Nay.
Everywhere I look, I'm seeing new "Every Day" cookbooks, promising simple weeknight recipes that use whole foods and taste great. But I'm still saying "Not so fast!" At least, that's what I said when one "every day" casserole came out past my kids' bedtimes the other night, starting off by boiling brown rice (45 minutes) and finishing with an hour-long oven bake.
The boys do affect my definition of "every day" meals, with a too-narrow window between the end of my workday and the start of their baths. But from what I remember of the pre-child days, two hours to prepare an "every day" dinner would have stretched my patience even then. Besides, the worst offender is a book aimed at working parents, the new River Cottage Every Day by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall.
I hate to say a negative word about any volume in the amazing River Cottage series. The meat book is on the shelf of every serious chef I know, not to mention my own. The family cookbook is one of my all-time favorites. As NPR put it, "There is more cooking know-how in Fearnley-Whittingstall’s little finger than you will find in the graduating class of any cooking school in the country."
That said, the book's deviled lamb hearts still don't strike me as an everyday lunch, because most readers won't be home to chop the vegetables, clean the hearts, simmer them for up to two hours, and devil them. It's not a do-ahead recipe; they're supposed to be served immediately on buttered, toasted bread. Sadly, my last few offices haven't even had a toaster, let alone a spare burner for simmering.
Stewed venison with juniper and bay sounds lovely for a Sunday supper, but 2-3 hours cooking time doesn't work for me every day. The lamb shoulder? It takes six hours to roast -- once the spices are toasted and ground and the meat's completed an initial half-hour turn in the oven.
Lest you think I'm just picking on the meat dishes, I also can't see walking in with the kids after work and preparing the pastry for the poached leek and blue cheese tart, which then needs to be chilled for a half-hour, then blind-baked for 25 minutes, then filled with the leek-custard mixture, then baked another 30 minutes. Elderflower panna cotta does indeed sound stunning, but it requires four hours to set in the fridge after infusing the elderflower and letting it cool.
Let's not even get into the logistics of the shopping and advance prep work involved in many of these.
With most cookbooks, I wouldn't feel so annoyed. Two working parents with crazy lives and three small children probably shouldn't attempt such recipes on anything short of a lazy Sunday. But it's grating to have the book presented as the actual everyday recipes of two working parents with crazy lives and three small children, offered as a useful guide for other harried moms and dads.
I love River Cottage, and I'd love to make this sort of food every day. Right now, the only people I know who do are the ones who do it in restaurants -- every day, sure, but before their shifts are at an end.
-- Rebekah Denn
vb on April 09, 2011 at 03:38 AM
I can't believe the average kid would eat a lamb heart. I'd plan an extra hour for this meal to accomodate the tears, fights or whatever and the delivery time for the pizza you're going to have to order.
The book sounds incredibly pretentious, and the recipes sound very expensive. The people who eat like this with their kids probably have a cook.
VE on April 09, 2011 at 06:45 AM
Def. doesn't sound like these are recipes most people can put together on a weeknight. Anything that takes more than an hour is too long. Weekends are another story- but that hardly qualifies as "Every Day" - it sounds like a standard cookbook, with "every day" tagged on as a marketing gimmick. (It may still be a very good cookbook- but that isn't what it's advertised as)
Dani on April 10, 2011 at 05:29 AM
As someone with a 2 year old, I can sympathize. It's shenanigans like this book that make me glance darkly at some of the foodie movement. I rarely have lamb in my kitchen (though I do buy a leg for lamb stew every few months), let alone a lamb heart. Where would I buy such a thing, assuming I wanted to eat it in the first place?
I was really wondering why there wasn't a cooking show that wasn't "Cooking for real humans with children" where there were kids running around the kitchen and you were constantly getting interrupted and realizing you didn't have X or what have you.
Admittedly it would probably be more of a parody than a real cooking show, but might be fun watching.