Glorious One-Pot Meals (4 page)

Beware of overly ambitious vegetable preparation—a Dutch oven can hold only so much. Including entire vegetables in a two-quart pot may work against maximum color variation goals. Instead, consider using just half or one-third of a vegetable such as a green pepper. Store the rest in the fridge—or cut it up and freeze it—for your next meal.

Limp asparagus, bitter Brussels sprouts dripping with fat, and sticky-sweet candied yams are some of the vegetables Americans love to hate. Overcooking or overprocess-ing vegetables breaks down their flavor, texture, and nutritional benefits.

The beauty of infusion cooking is that vegetables emerge from the oven firm yet tender and perfectly cooked every time. Add vegetables with abandon. Toss in zucchini, carrots, potatoes, even turnips, spinach, and tomatoes—all at the same time. When the aroma of a finished meal wafts from your oven, all will be cooked perfectly.

Do you have painful childhood memories of swallowing beets whole to clear your plate? Beets in a Glorious One-Pot Meal are heavenly; they add extra heartiness and vibrant color to any recipe. No need to peel; just scrub them well and trim the ends. Then cut into one-inch cubes or strips and place close to the bottom of the pot (in the root vegetable layer). You’ll savor every mouthful.

Turnips, too, have a terrible reputation for bitterness. But in a Glorious One-Pot Meal, tender morsels infused with a mild, almost sweet, flavor emerge from the pot. Peeling is optional. Wash and trim the ends, then cut into small chunks, no larger than ¾ inch. Turnips also go in the root vegetable layer.

Oh, for an ode to the Brussels sprout. It forms a perfect miniature cabbage in imitation of its much larger cousins. I often crave the shot of iron from its jade leaves, so sweet and firm when cooked this way. You may surprise yourself and become a Brussels sprout convert once you try them prepared this way.

Spinach is a versatile ingredient that can add green to almost any infused one-pot meal recipe. The secret to enjoying spinach or its cousin, kale, is to be certain all the grit has been removed. Nothing ruins a good bite of spinach like biting down on sand. A simple spinach-washing technique is to drop the separated leaves into a large, wide-mouthed bowl and fill with cold water. Swish things around for a bit and then let settle for a few minutes. All of the dirt will sift to the bottom of the bowl. Lift the leaves from the bowl and gently shake to remove large drops. Trim the stems at the base and tear off any overmature spots.

Get ready. You’re going to love your vegetables in a Glorious One-Pot Meal.

A main benefit of infusion cooking lies in how easy and convenient healthy cooking and eating are with this technique. But Glorious One-Pot Meals are only as convenient as the ingredients you have on hand, and only as nutritious as the ingredients used. Our goal is to create a pantry that is Glorious One-Pot Meal–friendly and provides you with ready ammunition for creative one-pot-meal cooking.

Let’s face it, fresh meat/poultry/fish, vegetables, and herbs are preferred simply because fresh food tastes better than canned or frozen. But do you really want to hit the grocery store every few days? This requirement for healthy eating has been the bane of many an aspiring dieter or healthy eater. With a well-stocked pantry and freezer, you can avoid multiple trips to the store and still eat healthy, low-fat, and nutritious meals. And you won’t have half a week’s worth of vegetables rotting in the fridge to trigger guilt.

Glorious One-Pot Meal recipes begin with simple, unprocessed ingredients. By steering clear of prepackaged mixes or side dishes such as flavored rice, your food will taste better and you’ll avoid putting additives, preservatives, and sodium into your body as well as help the environment by discouraging the production of wasteful packaging.

A word about food quality: Many fresh foods sold in this country are grown from
genetically modified seeds with the assistance of regulated or unregulated pesticides and chemical fertilizers using unsustainable agricultural methods. The more organic foods you select, the more you minimize your intake of these toxic substances. Remember that in America we vote with our dollars, and how you spend your money directly affects the price and availability of natural foods.

Following are lists of staples and useful ingredients to have on hand in your pantry, refrigerator, or freezer. The quantities suggested supply enough for a few meals. Select a few items from each category to begin building your Glorious One-Pot Meal pantry. Refer back to the list occasionally for new ideas.

Invest in some kitchen canisters or plastic storage containers to store grains. You can also simply reuse mason jars by cleaning and sterilizing them in a hot water and white vinegar bath and then running them through the dishwasher. Storing grains in airtight containers helps keep freshness in and excess moisture or dryness out. Try shopping the bulk food bins in health food stores for low prices and organic options.

Keeping fresh vegetables around is always a good idea, but when you’re out of them it’s not a problem to resort to frozen or canned. Frozen vegetables contain fewer preservatives than canned and are usually the first-choice alternative to fresh. Some vegetables, however, like tomatoes, are best preserved by the canning process.

When buying canned or frozen vegetables, read the labels and try to purchase the least-processed brands with the lowest sodium levels and the fewest additives and
preservatives. Organic brands are typically the purest and most chemical-free. Consider rinsing the canned items to remove unwanted additives.

If you find yourself with too many fresh vegetables in one week, simply wash, chop, and freeze them in a plastic container or zip-top plastic bag for later use in a Glorious One-Pot Meal. Remember that this section is not intended to guide your weekly fresh vegetable purchasing, but rather to stock up for convenient cooking.

When purchasing poultry, meat, and fish to freeze for future Glorious One-Pot Meals, consider the size of the pieces and how they will fit into your Dutch oven, because you won’t be defrosting them before adding them to the pot. A large clump of several chicken breasts frozen together, for example, will not work well. In general, try to freeze in single-serving sizes (three to four
ounces). For larger appetites, apportion four-to five-ounce servings. Freeze items individually either in zip-top freezer bags with the least amount of air possible or with a vacuum sealer for maximum freshness retention.

Since the only time a frozen ingredient may affect the baking time of a Glorious One-Pot Meal is when it contains bones, consider sticking with boneless pieces for frozen use.

Choose lean cuts of beef, lamb, or pork cut into portions that will fit into the pot without defrosting. Be sure to trim meats and poultry well before freezing because, unlike other cooking methods such as pan-frying or grilling, infusion cooking will not melt away excess fat.

Shaping ground meat into patties or meatballs before freezing allows you to toss in as much meat as you want without defrosting or hacking through a frozen mass. For better shape retention, consider adding a beaten egg and dried bread crumbs to ground meat before forming into shapes. Be sure to freeze patties or balls individually, after which they can be stored together.

People who have never liked fish may want to start with the milder flavors of white, flaky fillets of flounder, tilapia, sole, or halibut and later progress to the wonderful tastes of snapper, roughy, and catfish. Eventually you may even enjoy the heavenly aromas and flavors of perfectly infused salmon, halibut, or tuna, brimming with omega-3 essential fatty acids. Bags of unadulterated frozen fish fillets (without breading or seasoning) are inexpensive and easily found at grocery or warehouse stores.

Here are some guidelines for a well-stocked freezer:

When adding prepared sauces to an infused one-pot meal, think vinaigrette rather than creamy. Not only are vinaigrettes lower in fat and calories, but both homemade and prepared vinaigrettes contain a balance of acid and alkaline that lends itself to tasty and explosive flavors.

Look for oil sprays that contain pure oil and the least amount of preservatives. Try to invest in oil sprays from the health food market or purchase your own refillable oil sprayer.

Use these suggestions as a basic format for weekly Glorious One-Pot Meal shopping. Be sure not to overshop for fresh items, but do try to purchase extra dry goods to build up your pantry stock. This list assumes you may prepare two or three Glorious One-Pot Meals in a week and that you will freeze what you don’t use quickly.

In truth, I believe if you stick to a diet of whole foods, you don’t need to examine nutritional data, as you can be sure that
what you’re eating is healthy and nutritious. Additionally, I don’t expect every reader to make each recipe exactly as written. A premise of this cooking method is its inherent flexibility: If a recipe calls for pork, you can alternatively make it with chicken, beef, fish, or even tofu.

Still, I know that many people routinely look at the nutritional analysis before making a dish, so as a courtesy to those of you who want it, the nutritional breakdown per serving is included for each recipe. Please consider the following disclaimer when viewing this information.

All nutritional information herein is based upon amounts designated in the recipe presented. Where items such as “chicken breasts or thighs” appear, calculations are based on an average four-ounce serving. All food calculations are derived from
The Complete Book of Food Counts
by Corinne T. Netzer (Dell Publishing, 2000). Some figures are approximate given the variation in such things as the size of vegetables, brand of broth used, and so forth. Additionally, the figures presented are rounded to the nearest whole numbers.