# The Art of Simple Food by Alice Waters - Blinkist

What’s in it for me? A back-to-basics look at how to make food taste more like itself.

Alice Waters changed the way Americans think about food.

Her movement was so influential that, looking back now, it’s hard to imagine a time when local, organic, fresh, seasonal produce wasn’t readily available at farmers’ markets and in supermarkets throughout the country.

And she accomplished her revolution simply by preparing food to taste like what it is.

But the best part about Alice’s food is that it’s equally at home at Chez Panisse – her innovative and award-winning restaurant in Berkeley, California – as it is at your dinner table.

You’ll learn the basics for making good food, as well as essential cooking techniques.

These, along with the freshest, locally produced ingredients, are all you need to be a great cook.

In these blinks, you’ll learn  how making a vinaigrette will train your taste buds to recognize what you like; the foolproof way to poach an egg and serve it in a classic dinner salad; and what Alice does with seasonal fruit that’s already perfect.

Vinaigrette: the foundation sauce

Learning how to build a great sauce, like a vinaigrette or an aioli, will accomplish two things.

First, you’ll develop tasting, chopping, and flavor-balancing skills that will carry over to cooking other, more complicated preparations.

And second, you’ll always have a sauce on hand that will make everything else more delicious.

A well-balanced sauce instantly turns a simple plate of meat, vegetables, or salad greens into a finished dish.

Vinaigrette is the sauce Alice makes most often.

Not only does it transform the dishes she serves at the table, but she’s found that most kids love it, too.

When her daughter was growing up, Alice would prepare a vinaigrette and pack it into her school lunch box with some cut vegetables.

Alice always recommends buying the freshest seasonal ingredients you can find.

Nowhere will mediocre ingredients be easier to detect than in a vinaigrette, which, in its simplest form, has only four components.

Start with fruity, delicious olive oil and a wine vinegar with lots of character.

Black pepper should be ground immediately before using.

And finally, good quality sea salt, she says, is one of the simplest things you can buy to make your food taste better.

Learning to salt properly is probably the biggest secret to good cooking.

To make a great vinaigrette, first you should understand the theory behind the mixture.

A vinaigrette is one part vinegar to three or four parts oil.

For four servings of salad, you should need about a quarter cup of vinaigrette.

Start by measuring one tablespoon red wine vinegar into a bowl.

Then dissolve a pinch of salt in the vinegar, and taste.

When the salt and vinegar are balanced, the combination should taste neither acidic nor salty, but deliciously in harmony.

Add salt little by little, and figure out what tastes best to you.

When the combination is just right, grind in some black pepper and whisk in three or four tablespoons of olive oil.

Keep tasting as you go, and stop when it tastes right to you.

Once you’ve mastered a basic red wine vinaigrette, you can start to make it your own.

Add a little chopped shallot or puréed garlic to the vinegar.

Or use lemon juice instead of red wine vinegar.

You could also add some mustard before adding the oil, or some chopped fresh herbs at the end.

Salad days

In California, where Alice pioneered her approach to cooking, fresh, delicious ingredients are so readily available that sometimes the best way to showcase them is in a raw salad, dressed lightly with a vivacious vinaigrette.

For Alice, the best salads are a combination of whatever is in season and radiantly ripe; this is usually a combination of lettuces, vegetables, and fruits.

But don’t think you have to seek out the fanciest, most obscure heirloom varieties of lettuce – Alice also loves a simple salad of flat-leaf parsley, tossed with lemon juice, olive oil, and a little salt.

When preparing a garden lettuce salad, buy the best heads of lettuce you can find, from a local grower.

Alice avoids salad mixes, preferring to put together her favorite kinds of lettuce herself.

Once you’ve tried this often enough to develop a sense of what you like, you might prefer this method, too.

When dressing a garden lettuce salad, use only enough vinaigrette to lightly coat each leaf.

The leaves should glisten, not drip.

Toss with your hands to avoid crushing the delicate leaves, and taste as you go.

A salad of several ingredients together on a plate is called a composed salad.

Anything can be layered into a composed salad, but it’s important to arrange the ingredients carefully so the heavier ingredients don’t crush the tender lettuce.

Another important point for composed salads is that every ingredient should be delicious on its own.

Taste everything and season individually before layering ingredients together.

One of Alice’s favorite composed salads is a blood orange and olive salad, which is best in winter when citrus is in season.

To prepare the salad, first prepare the blood oranges.

You’ll need to use a small, sharp knife for this.

First, slice off the tops and bottoms of the oranges.

Then, put your knife at the top where the peel meets the fruit, and carefully cut the peel away along the contour of the fruit.

Finally, slice the oranges crosswise into pretty slices.

Layer on a platter with thin slices of red onion, then dress with a vinaigrette of orange juice, red wine vinegar, salt, pepper, and olive oil.

Garnish with small black olives, preferably the unpitted Niçoise variety – just make sure to tell your dining companions about the pits!

A taste of home

There’s nothing like a roast dinner to provide a homey, yet celebratory, atmosphere.

Meat and vegetables alike benefit from time in a hot oven, where they develop a brown, crunchy surface with concentrated flavors to surround a tender, velvety interior.

Luckily for cooks everywhere, a roast chicken in particular is a cinch to prepare.

As usual, the raw ingredients are the most important foundation for a successful meal.

Chicken is widely available and often very inexpensive.

For this reason, it’s easy to forget that chickens come from chicken farms and have to be raised, slaughtered, and prepped for cooking.

Most factory conditions on chicken farms are unhealthy for birds – as well as workers.

And besides, stressed birds just aren’t as delicious.

Always buy chickens that have been raised on organic grain and in conditions that leave them space to move around freely.

Starting with a healthy bird means you’ll end up with a better roast chicken.

When you come home from the market with your bird, take a few minutes to season it with salt and pepper, even if you don’t plan to roast it for a few days.

Seasoning it early gives the salt time to permeate the entire bird, making the meat taste better.

At this point, you can also push slices of garlic and herbs under the skin if you want.

An hour before putting the bird in the oven, take it out of the refrigerator and let it come to room temperature.

This will ensure more evenly cooked meat.

Put the chicken in a roasting pan.

For a four-pound bird, start by cooking it breast-up for 20 minutes in a 400°F oven, then flip it over and cook for another 20 minutes.

Finish it breast-up for a final 20 minutes.

You’ll ultimately learn to tell by sight if a roast bird is done, but at first you’ll have to wiggle the leg a little to see if it’s moving freely.

When the leg moves freely and the juices run clear from between the thigh and the body, the chicken is done.

Let it rest for 10 to 15 minutes before carving.

This gives the chicken some time to stabilize in temperature and makes the meat juicier.

Serve as is, or make a quick gravy with the juices left in the pan.

Or do as Alice does and swipe a crust of bread through the savory fat – cook’s treat!

Poaching to perfection

Poaching is a method of cooking delicate foods in a little liquid over very low heat – so low that it’s not even bubbling.

This perfectly preserves the subtle flavors of a high-quality ingredient.

Eggs are probably the most commonly poached ingredient.

They are delicious for breakfast on a slice of buttered toast, or for a simple lunch in a shimmering bowl of homemade chicken broth.

For dinner, one of Alice’s favorite salads is a poached egg on a bed of curly endive lettuce tossed in a warm vinaigrette with bacon.

When the poached egg is broken, the warm yolk enriches the vinaigrette, coating the bitter lettuce in the most satisfying way.

To make the salad, first fry two slices of bacon in a bit of olive oil.

Remove the bacon when it’s brown, and pour off the fat.

Crumble the bacon into pieces.

Next, make the dressing by mixing together a bit of red wine vinegar, some dijon mustard, one crushed garlic clove, salt, and pepper.

Whisk in some olive oil and a bit of the bacon fat.

Taste and make sure the flavors are balanced.

Now, poach your eggs.

Poached eggs have a reputation for being difficult, which is not entirely fair.

With a bit of practice, an egg is easy to poach.

As always, make sure you’re working with the freshest eggs.

You know an egg is fresh when the white is thick and gelatinous, and it clings to an orange yolk that stands tall and plump.

First, warm three inches of water and a large splash of good red wine vinegar in a heavy pan until it’s hot, but not bubbling.

Carefully crack each egg into an individual cup or bowl.

When the water is very hot, lower the cup just to the water level and carefully slide in each egg.

Be gentle – the slower you go, the more likely the eggs are to keep their shape.

After a minute or so, carefully stir the water to prevent the eggs from sticking to the bottom of the pan.

Cook until the whites are set, keeping a careful eye on the water; lower the temperature if it begins to simmer.

Remove the eggs from the water with a slotted spoon, and carefully blot them dry.

Dress the curly endive and bacon with the bacon-fat vinaigrette, tossing everything together in a bowl.

Top each portion with a poached egg, grind some pepper on top, and serve right away.

Meat and fire

According to Alice, you can ask any cook what her favorite cooking method is, and the answer will be the same: grilling over an open fire.

There’s something primal and satisfyingly immediate to grilling, as well as a thrilling unpredictability.

Plus, there’s the joy of tending to a fire.

It makes sense, then, that learning to grill is an incredibly rewarding process.

The first thing to know is how to set up a good bed of coals.

It’s actually not the fire that cooks the food, but heat radiating from the glowing coals.

Any grill you use should have immediate access to the coals and a heavy grate that can be lifted or lowered as needed.

You can use either lump charcoal or hardwood – or a combination of the two.

Lump charcoal takes about 20 minutes to produce embers, whereas hardwood takes up to 50 minutes to be ready to cook with.

Alice never uses lighter fluid to get coals started, as she finds it lends a chemical petroleum flavor to the food.

Start your coals in a chimney starter, igniting them by setting fire to some newspaper in the bottom of the chimney.

When the embers have turned gray, they’re ready to be raked under the grill.

Now they’ll stay hot for about 30 minutes.

Alice’s favorite thing to grill is a tender, well-marbled steak.

You can go for a classic cut like rib-eye or New York, or choose a more economical cut like a skirt or hanger steak.

Tell your butcher you’re planning on grilling, and they’ll cut the steak between one and two inches thick.

Once you get home, trim off any fat around the edges to prevent flare-ups when the fat hits the hot coals.

Seasoning a steak for the grill with just salt and pepper is delicious.

But Alice’s favorite way to grill a steak is with an herb crust.

First, chop lots of fresh herbs together.

Whatever you have on hand is fine, but be sure rosemary is in the mix.

Combine these with salt and freshly ground black pepper, then rub onto the steak with a bit of olive oil an hour before grilling.

When the coals are very hot, put the steak on the oiled grill.

You shouldn’t need more than two or three minutes per side for medium rare.

Just like your roast chicken, a steak should rest for a few minutes after it’s taken it off the grill to ensure juicy meat.

Fruit: a perfect finish

Seasonal fruit is not only delicately sweet, juicy, and delicious – it’s beautiful to bring to the table.

Plain, ripe fruit remains Alice’s favorite way to end a meal.

Visit your local farmers’ market to find fruit at peak ripeness.

Every farmers’ market will have slightly different fruit based on the season and location, so it’s up to you to personally get a sense of what’s available when.

When you’re at the farmers’ market, go with what looks and tastes best to you that day.

The fruit should smell amazing – that’s a reflection of its ripeness.

Then, ask the farmer for a taste.

If the fruit is perfect, take it home and eat it that day.

Only put it into the refrigerator if the fruit is at perfect ripeness but you can’t eat it that same day.

And definitely let it come to room temperature before serving.

If you want, cut up the fruit and serve with a little sugar, orange juice, or wine sprinkled over the top.

Sliced peaches in red wine are especially good, as are strawberries in orange juice.

Or try fresh figs cut in half, served with a few raspberries and drizzled with honey.

If you want to make something a little more special that still shows off perfectly ripe fruit, a crisp is a great idea.

A crisp is just perfect fruit baked under a crunchy topping made of flour, sugar, nuts, spices, and butter.

There’s a fruit crisp for every season – apple and pear in fall and winter, strawberry and rhubarb in the spring – but it’s hard to beat a crisp made from summer’s perfect peaches.

First, make your crisp topping.

Toast ⅔ of a cup of nuts – pecans, walnuts, or almonds.

Coarsely chop these once cool.

Put in a bowl with 1¼ cups flour, 6 tablespoons brown sugar, 1½ tablespoons granulated sugar, ¼ teaspoon salt, and ¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon, if you like.

Work 12 tablespoons butter into the mixture with your fingers, just until it comes together with a crumbly texture.

Then take four perfectly ripe peaches.

Dip them in boiling water for 10 seconds, then slip off the skins.

Cut the peaches into bite-size pieces, and toss them with a bit of sugar and 1½ tablespoons flour.

Pile the fruit high in a pretty dish, then top with 3 cups of your crisp topping.

Bake for 40 to 55 minutes in a 375°F oven, or until the crisp is golden brown.

Final summary

The key message in these blinks: Cooking isn’t rocket science.

All it takes is patience, experimentation, a few simple techniques, and amazing ingredients.

Once you’ve made the effort to seek out the best ingredients, all you have to do is make the food taste like what it is – and you’ll have a delicious meal!

Actionable advice: Shop strategically.

The best place to shop for produce is at a farmers’ market.

But even Alice can’t buy everything she needs there.

When she has to visit the supermarket, she usually sticks to the periphery; that way, she accesses all the fresh, unprocessed foods and avoids the aisles upon aisles of processed junk.

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