What to Cook

Black Lentils with Crispy Garlic and Labne

They appear expensive and complicated, but are actually pretty cheap and can be cooked just like pasta.

Just-Cooked Cabbage with Butter, Anchovy, and Lemon

This is an excellent opportunity to use any leftover fat from something you may have just cooked in that same skillet (chicken thighs, pork chops, steak) to cook many vegetables.

Sticky Roasted Carrots with Citrus and Tahini

To keep things decidedly savory, the carrots are also roasted with red onion that’s taken a bath in lemon juice, because the only thing better than a roasted onion is a roasted pickled onion.

Mustardy Green Beans with Anchovyed Walnuts

The key is to have just-cooked green beans, lightly dressed and topped in a tangy, mustardy dressing, with toasted, garlicky, anchovyed walnuts.

Smashed Cucumbers with Sizzled Turmeric and Garlic

It’s hard to say how this salad-y number is best served—because the answer is “with everything and all the time.”

Celery and Fennel with Walnuts and Blue Cheese

Unfortunately for celery, the nicest thing most people can say about it is that they like to eat it with their buffalo wings; but the merits of this very good and underrated vegetable are plenty, and well . . . I LOVE CELERY.

Escarole with Mustard and Spicy Guanciale Bread Crumbs

The nutty, umami-y nutritional yeast acts as a lighter, brighter parmesan.

Creamy Sesame Turmeric Dip

My favorite thing to eat it with is a box of Ak-Mak crackers, but anything you like to dip, please dip away.

Pasta e Ceci Salad

Olives and parsley are great here, but in the spirit of this sort of fridge-clean-out, do-less-with-more, accidentally fabulous recipe, I kept them optional.

Bacon-Roasted Pork Tenderloin with Caraway’d Cabbage and Apples

While wildly versatile, and I shouldn’t pick favorites, cabbage when roasted in lots of garlicky pork fat until lightly charred around the edges might be my favorite way to eat it. Don’t tell kimchi.

Lamb Stew with Fennel, Preserved Lemon, and Crispy Fried Bread

Dollops of sour cream and sprinkles of herbs are great, but never underestimate the power of salty preserved lemons and spicy, crispy bread.

Slow-Roasted Pork Shoulder with Garlic, Citrus, and Cilantro

Because I don’t really love braised, shredded meat, I think this large, flavorful, fatty cut of meat is best slow cooked, then sliced when it’s just tender enough.