1. Don’t be afraid to over-roast

Roasting is kinda the opposite of cooking fish: There’s often little harm in letting things sit in the oven for a long, long time—just make sure you have a fat in there, like olive oil or butter, to keep them from drying out. Pretend your oven is a relaxing sauna for your produce. The longer you let it sit in there, the looser and more limber it gets. It’s a spa! The flavors concentrate, and often veg transforms into something far more jammy, a more essence-y version of what you originally put in. My favorites include cherry tomatoes, eggplant (needs LOTS more fat to not dry out), carrots, and fennel.

I like to leave produce nearly whole, or split in half, toss them with a fat, salt, black or crushed red pepper, and maybe a spice mix, and roast at 425 to 450ish for 30 minutes to an hour, depending on volume. Stir every 15 minutes or so, and add oil if things look dry. Pull ’em out when they look like they’re about to burn.

Notes

• I really love to roast in cast iron, instead of non-stick, baking sheets, or glassware. Cast iron is one of the most affordable types of pans you can buy, they last forever, and they produce beautifully roasted and browned delights.

• Don’t overcrowd the pan. Otherwise, you’re putting your veg in a steam room, not a sauna. Things will cook down, but try not to layer things on top of each other. You gotta let the steam escape.

2. Salads can always be a main meal if you give ’em some heft

San Francisco is pretty much always 60 degrees, especially around dinnertime. Not too hot, not too cold—perfect weather for a light jacket. I love a salad. Might get a salad tattoo.

Sometimes you want a main AND a salad, and lemme tell you if you put some protein and maybe a starch and maybe some cheese on your salad, you have a Main Salad.

Favorite (easy) things to add on top:

• Jammy eggs: Bring a pot of water that you have a tight-fitting lid for to a boil. You’re steaming, not boiling, here, so the water only needs to be about 2cm deep. Let it come to a boil. Then grab a spoon and slide each egg down the side of the pot, and gently let it come to rest in the bottom of the pot so that it doesn’t crack. A cracked egg is ok; it will just poach a bit and won’t photograph as well :(

  You can do as many eggs as you like (’cause you’re steaming). Put the lid on, and let the eggs steam for 7 minutes and 30 seconds. While that’s happening, fill a bowl with cold water and ice cubes. When your timer goes off (you set one, right?), take that same spoon and transfer the eggs to the cold water. This shocks them, stops them from cooking, and slightly shrinks them so they’re easy to peel. Peel the eggs, cut ’em in half, and put ’em on your salad. Take a photograph of your salad. Save the water and water your plants with it if you live in the West.

• Quick pickled red onion: Thinly slice a red onion. Take a deli container you’ve saved from takeout in quarantine, and put the onion in the container. Fill with 1/2 white vinegar and 1/2 water. Do like 1-2 tablespoons of salt and half as much sugar, maybe some fresh dill. Let sit at least half an hour, or just leave in your fridge. Put on everything. 

3. Pestos are easy, and you can make them out of anything

I am a frugal person. My relationship with pesto used to be “damn, this small-ass container of fresh pesto is really expensive—hard pass.” Then I bought a Vitamix (refurbished, off eBay, because why introduce new products into the world when there are perfectly good, functional ones that already exist), and from the moment I made my first quart of pesto, it became something I always have in my fridge, year round.

Pesto, as I know it: a blend of some type of greens, some nuts, oil, salt. I think of it as a hybrid sauce or dip, depending on how much liquid you add. Pesto does NOT have to be made of only basil. You can use arugula, carrot tops you were going to compost, spinach, kale—any green. You do not need to use expensive-ass pine nuts. I love to use much more economical nuts, particularly walnuts.

I love to start by taking a lemon—especially Meyer if you can find it—wash it, halve it, take the seeds out, and pop it in the Vitamix to pulverize it. Add washed greens (not soaking wet, but the residual water helps the pesto come together). Fill the Vitamix 1/2 to 2/3. Add 1/2-1 tablespoon of salt depending on your saltiness preferences and the same amount of black or red pepper flakes. And then close your eyes and put about a cup or almost 2 of olive oil into the mix.

Blend it, pushing the greens down till it all incorporates. The longer you blend, the more you end up with a paste. I recommend less blend time to keep it chunky. The whole thing takes 10 minutes, and you end up with $30 of store-bought pesto. Put on pasta or sandwiches, dip it, or just eat it with a spoon. 

4. Coconut milk is a forgiving backdrop for spice and flavors

I realllllly really dug deep into farmers markets during the pandemic, and my favorite one has tons of stalls devoted exclusively to herbs, roots, peppers, and spices. I started to go buck-wild with putting about 4-6x as much ginger and garlic into my meals as the recipes called for to get to the restaurant-level flavors I was hoping to achieve. I found nothing plays best supporting actor/actress to these sharp, kicking flavors than coconut milk.

All winter long, I’d cook down literally a half cup of rough chopped ginger and the same amount of garlic, throw some Thai chilis in there, add some tomatoes, toss in two cans of whole fat coconut milk, and have the most decadent, spice-enriched meals. Half the time, I served it over rice, but I also got pretty into rice noodle soups. I did learn you have to cook the rice noodles in water separately, though; they won’t get enough moisture in the curry broth. Play around, add some greens at the end, keep it loose and soupy if you want, or cook it down to a thick curry if your heart desires.

5. Granola is very easy. I promise.

Granola is similar to pickled onions: something that I thought was difficult and specialized, but after I made it once, I learned it’s easy, intuitive, and the gift that keeps on giving. I literally go to bed every night excited to eat this granola with fruit and yogurt the following morning. Like pesto, once you make it, you’ll realize how much of a racket store-bought granola is. You can also control the amount of sugar in it—most store-bought is basically a dessert.

Recipe

Preheat your oven to 375 and put the following things on your countertop: one cast iron pan (or baking sheet(s)), the biggest bowl you have, one big thing of rolled oats (not quick cook), 1-2 cups of a neutral oil (like canola) or olive oil, 1/2-1 cup of brown sugar (or maple syrup/honey if you’re feeling flush), 1 tablespoon of Maldon sea salt, 4-6 cups of some mixture of nuts (chopped almonds, hazelnuts, and walnuts are a favorite), 1 cup of black sesame seeds for color pops, and 1-3 cups of dried fruit.

Put all the foods EXCEPT for the dried fruit in your largest bowl. Mix with your hands, and get all your aggression out. Mix that shit, push the oil and salt and sugars into those oats with your bare hands. Put the mix in the pan, pop it in the oven, and clean the bowl. Stir the mix every 15 minutes or so.

Cook it for 30-45 minutes. You want it to look browned, but also keep it mind that it will cook a little more once out of the oven. Be careful in your final 10 minutes of baking, as the sugars are much more prone to burning in this stage. Let it cool, toss your fruit on top, and enjoy every day.