Ten Pieces of Advice from Deborah Madison’s Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone

1. Learn to use a knife. Basic knife skills are essential to making cooking pleasant and quick. Use the right knife, keep it sharp, and give yourself plenty of room to work.
2. Learn to work in a nonlinear fashion. Cooking doesn’t progress in a straight line but meanders from here to there. For example, you always put the pasta water on boil first, even though cooking the pasta is the last step. If the onions for a soup are going to cook for 15 minutes, use that time to prepare the rest of the ingredients or another dish. This is one reason it’s important to read your recipes through before starting. If you can see the whole picture, you have an enormous advantage, because several things are always going on simultaneously when you cook. Like tying a shoe, it’s one of those things that is hopelessly complicated to describe but crucial to learn and once you do, it becomes second nature.
3. Learn to make a few things well. Learning too many new dishes at once makes cooking trying. It’s better to build your cooking vocabulary dish by dish, since the foods that are the easiest to make are invariably the ones you already know how to cook. So decide what you like to eat, then practice cooking that type of dish - stir-fries or braises, for example - until you feel confident. Once you understand the basics, you’ll be able to cook creatively and easily, for most types of dishes follow the same pattern. Then go on to something new. Or do as a friend does: Cook the same three meals as long as your friends and family will let you.
4. Simplify the menu. Consider making one- or two-dish meals standard. They’re less taxing, and there are fewer dishes to wash. The popularity of the stir-fry speaks to exactly this. Other simple meals might be a baked potato and a salad; soup and toast; an omelet; or a salad that’s filled with vegetables. Fruit for dessert isn’t just healthy; it’s easy. In winter, try dried fruits and a few nuts.
5. Develop a routine. In spite of the overwhelming choices we have of what to eat, having something of a routine saves time spent thinking about what to make for dinner. Besides, as eaters we enjoy repetition, both in restaurants and at home. It’s reassuring and involving: “I liked last week’s version better. What about you?” or “We’re having my favorite dish!”
6. Have do-aheads. Working days in advance of a meal can become confusing, but doing a few easy things ahead does pay off later. For example, having prewashed salad greens often makes the difference between eating a salad and not. Or having some steamed beets, boiled potatoes, or cooked beans on hand and a few chopped onions ready to go makes getting a meal started much easier.
7. Plan on leftovers. Certain foods can return to the table in another form, and often it takes little extra time to double a recipe. Leftover polenta can be fixed in all kinds of ways; beans, lentils, and chickpeas can go into salads, soups, stews, purees; whole grains can be frozen and later added to soups. Leftover rice, quinoa, and couscous can be shaped into croquettes or made into salads. Soups usually taste better on the second or third day.
8. Use a few machines. These can helpfully speed things up or usefully slow things down. A pressure cooker makes short work of long-cooking foods, cooking them in about one-third the time. Slow cookers slow everything down enough that food can cook while you’re at work or asleep.
9. Use a few good-quality convenience foods. Maybe your region has a specialty food, like tamales, that can be bought frozen and set aside for those nights when you just can’t cook. Good organic canned tomatoes make a fast sauce, or you can improve a commercial sauce by adding fennel seeds, rosemary, mushrooms, olives. Canned chickpeas and black beans are a good resource, as are a few frozen vegetables-lima beans, blake-eyed peas, okra, and peas. Condiments like capers, olives, Thai curry pastes, coconut milk, and roasted peppers can accomplish a lot in the kitchen. Tofu is not only a staple for many; it couldn’t be easier to cook. A spoonful of extra virgin olive oil adds a splendid finish to plain foods of good quality, such as a plate of asparagus. And when it comes to ordering in that pizza, then, if you’re up to it, dress it up with cilantro and diced chile, olives, and so on.
10. Enlist help. About the time you think your children are able, get them started on some simple kitchen tasks. Eventually a child can be put in charge of the whole dinner once a week, from planning the menu to cooking it. Having kids work in the kitchen is undoubtedly a struggle at first, but later in can be a great gift, for the parent will get some relief and the child can take pride in making a meaningful contribution-and will leave home with a truly practical skill.