The Minimalist Cooks Dinner: More Than 100 Recipes for Fast Weeknight Meals and Casual Entertaining
The Minimalist Cooks Dinnercollects two years of recipes from  Mark Bittman's popularNew York Timescolumn, "The Minimalist," which  cleverly caters to the modern gourmet whose expectations are high but time is  limited. In a hundred-odd recipes that cover the end-of-the-day meal gamut from  soups and sides to entrées, Bittman packs strong flavor into a few  ingredients so that food lovers can return home from a long day at work and make  a meal that's satisfying but not exhausting.With less introductory text but more side notes than Bittman's previous  cookbooks (The Minimalist Cooks  at Homeand the new classic,How to Cook Everything),The  Minimalist Cooks Dinnercommences with a section of 12 soups and  stews--ranging from a truly spare miso soup to the richer Black-Eyed Pea Soup  with Ham and Watercress--and then covers pasta, pizza, entrées (with  shellfish, fish, poultry, or meat), salads, and starchy sides. Easy dishes such  as Steak with Chimichurri Sauce (simply parsley, raw garlic, lemon juice,  crushed red pepper, and olive oil), Fish Simmered in Spicy Soy Sauce (soy,  sugar, scallions, and chile), or Scallops with Almonds (cayenne, almonds, white  wine, and butter) are startlingly delicious, especially considering they take at  most 30 minutes to prepare. But perhaps this cookbook's best asset, particularly  for less-experienced cooks, are the crucial "Keys to Success" and the  improvisational "With Minimal Effort" side bars, which respectively offer  additional instruction and suggestions for quick ways to enhance the original  dish. While not as comprehensive as Bittman's bestsellingHow to Cook  EverythingorThe Minimalist Cooks at Home, this is an expertly  refined collection that presents perfect, almost effortless meals for every  night of the week.--Rebecca Wright