James Kenji Lopez-Alt

Knife Skills: How to Cut Scallions

Depending on how you cut them, scallions can be used as a chunky vegetable in a stir fry or on the grill, or they can be used as a garnish for any number of dishes.

But slicing a scallion properly is more than just for looks. The way you slice a scallion and the sharpness of your knife can have just as big an impact on its flavor as it does on its appearance. This is because scallion cells, like the cells of all alliums (that is, vegetables in the onion family such as onions, sh...

These are the Best Eggs You’ve Never Tried

Omelet you in on a little secret: If you’ve got access to an espresso machine, the steam wand is one of the best egg-cooking tools in your kitchen. 

This is not one of those hacks that gets by on its hackiness alone. The eggs are legitimately good. Fantastic, even. And fantastic in a way that you cannot achieve through any other cooking method that I know of. Uniquely delicious. Enough to give your non-stick pan an eggs-istential crisis.

What makes them so good? Th...

What's the Best Way to Crack an Egg?

What’s the culinary task you’ve repeated more than anything else?

Depending on what you you like to cook, it may be dicing an onion, or perhaps squeezing a lemon. Maybe it’s breaking down a chicken or bringing dough together. 2024-11-07 20:45:04 +0000 UTC View Post

How I Cook a Big Meal (and get it all on the table)

Whenever I post a photograph or a video of a large meal I've cooked, I inevitably get some verion of the same question: How to you finish everything at the same time? How do you get it on the table hot?

The answer is... it takes planning! The first thing I do whenever I'm planning a large-format meal with multiple dishes is sit down with pencil and paper (or finger and notepad app) and start planning.

But first, a little background on the video above:

Last weekend I spent s...

Very Simple Clam Linguine (Linguine alla Vongole)

I never really make my clam linguine the exact same way twice, but I always follow a basic framework: sweat some alliums in butter and olive oil, add some wine and lemon, steam the clams open, then finish it off with pasta, pasta water, more butter and olive oil, and some fresh herbs. That’s it.

You can mix up the alliums (today I used leeks and garlic—often I’ll use garlic and shallot), you can use herbs other than parsley (oregano, basil, chives, tarragon all work for me), you c...

The Three Restaurant Red Flags that Make Me Reconsider Patronizing

Folks sometimes ask me how I pick what restaurants I want to go to. Part of it is based on the recommendation of friends, industry professionals, and written reviews. But the deciding factor for me is always going to be checking out the public information available about the place, and a close examination of their vibe. I especially like to check the history of the chef/owner, as well as how the restaurant presents itself on social media.

As an individual consumer, I try to a...

Sloppy Caesar Salads

Ingredients:

3 to 4 slices of sourdough bread, roughly torn into bite-sized pieces

2 teaspoons any cooking oil

Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper

4 to 6 eggs

2 heads romaine lettuce cores, root trimmed, leaves separated but left whole, carefully washed and dried

A jar of dijon mustard and a spoon

A tin or jar of anchovies and a knife

A lemon, a zester, and a juicer

A clove of garlic and a garlic press

A bottle of fish sauce 2024-09-25 15:50:30 +0000 UTC View Post

Grilled Bacon BLTs

Hey folks, the newest episode of The Recipe with Kenji and Deb is out, and it's about BLTs. I had a blast recording it with my Deb Perelman from Smitten Kitchen. BLTs are one of the few areas where we seem to be in pretty close alignment. Like a good Caprese salad or a Schubert melody, the trick is start with somethig nice and don't mess with it too much.

Here's my 2024-09-11 17:35:36 +0000 UTC View Post

Why Don't we Dress our Fruit Salads?

Fruit salad!

What are you picturing? If you're like me prior to around 6 months ago, you're imaging a big Lexan bowl in a cafeteria full of lightly-oxidized chunks of Granny Smith apple, split grapes, maybe some kiwi and pineapple, and a handful of blueberries, but it doesn't really matter because everything kind of smells and tastes like the mushy slices of bananas that were tossed in there anyway.

My friends Anne and Robert Moser run a bakery in San Mateo, CA called 2024-08-26 21:03:32 +0000 UTC View Post

Chive blossom carbonara

“You can eat this pansies,” says my daughter Alicia to her brother Wombat* as they poke their way down the dock to my floating home.

*not his real name.

A few months ago she discovered that many of the flowers she sees around town are edible, and as with anything new she learns, she is very eager to teach her littler brother. Pansies, nasturtium, daisy petals, ...

Egg Yolk Scrambled Eggs

Here is a video version of the Egg Yolk Scrambled Eggs I wrote about in this post, where you can also find a recipe!

Next Time you Grill, Slip Your Patty a Fat Slab of Onion

The other day I rooted through the fridge in my houseboat and found a pound of ground wagyu beef, half an onion, and some American cheese. I did as any red-blooded American would, checked that I had adequate salt, pepper, and fuel at home, then took my butt to the supermarket to pick up some burger buns. 

The beef was leftovers from a party I’d hosted. It was the first real party I’ve hosted since moving to Seattle in 2020, and it was a real treat to get a few different groups ...

Accidental Burnt Chili Salt

Folks sometimes ask me if I worry about making sure that the food I serve can live up to the standards that guests would expect of me. I have two responses to this. First is that if you’re the kind of person who’s likely to judge their dinner party host based on the quality of the food rather than the spirit of the company, you probably haven’t been invited to my dinner parties anyway. I maintain a judgment-free kitchen.

More importantly, the main reason I don’t stress is becaus...

Recipe: For Extra-Rich Scrambled Eggs, Reserve Your Yolks

Can we agree that, at least according to internet logic, your intrinsic value as a human being can be accurately pegged to exactly how creamy you like your scrambled eggs?

Good. Because today I wanted to share a technique that will prove your personal value using very minimal ingredients, giving your scrambled eggs a really unique richness, density, and creaminess. These are the kind of eggs that will show the world exactly what kind of person you are: An honorable one. (Or at least one...

Recipe: Spring Vegetable Gnocchi

Spring is like a cheat code for easy dinners, especially if you’re able to convince your brain that your body enjoys the repetitive work of trimming fresh green vegetables.

Because once that trimming work is done, most spring vegetable dishes fare best with minimal cooking. In this case, I very briefly blanch the vegetables in sequence in a pot of boiling salted water until they’re bright green (just a minute or so), then drop them into a bowl of ice water to halt their cooking and ...

Introducing Tasting Notes, my Live Stage Show!

GET TICKETS HERE.

I’m super excited (and a little nervous) about producing and hosting Tasting Notes, my upcoming live show in Seattle in partnership with the Seattle Chamber Music Society on July 19th.

I have two big passions in life: food and music. I grew up playing violin and...

Recipe: Japanese Egg Salad Sandos

Early in my career as a line cook at No. 9 Park in Boston, I was often tasked with preparing breakfast for special parties (typically politicians from the State House across the street). As such, I got an awful lot of practice with boiling and peeling eggs. Because I was making breakfast for fancy-pants people who only eat fancy-pants eggs, any eggs that weren't peeled perfectly ended up going into family meal for the kitchen and front-of-house crew later that day. This meant I also ma...

Recipe: Greek Watermelon and Feta Salad

Watermelon, feta, olive oil, and mint. This is a true four-ingredient salad—it doesn’t even need the addition of salt and pepper, the brine from the feta and a good pepper olive oil take care of that.

I first had this salad in college at cookouts hosted by my Greek and Cypriot friends. They’d grill big chunks of lamb souvlaki until crisp and charred and serve it alongside cucumbers, toma...

How to Make a French Omelette

I've written about French omelettes in the past, but it's been a while, and I don't know that I've ever written down an actual written recipe that is complete and accurate. The recipe in my first book, The Food Lab, ended up correct, but early printings have a typo that has you roll the omelette the wrong way (the photos make it clear).

That recipe also incorporated the use of tiny cubes of butter diced up and mixed in with the eggs to keep them moist and tender. It's sort of a cheat-y ...

The Potential Breakfast Chapter of my Next Book

Hey folks, as you probably know, I am working on a new book. I don’t wanna reveal too much yet, but part of the premise is that the individual recipes themselves need to be instantly appealing. Let me know what you think. I appreciate the input.

By the way, you may notice there are no eggs here. Eggs have their own entire chapter now.

Breakfast and Brunch

Sweet Breakfast

1. Vanilla Yogurt and Poppy Seed-Glazed Fruit Salad

• Kn...

Chili Crisp Wedge (with crispy shallots and yogurt)

This recipe was featured in the Iceberg episode of The Recipe with Kenji and Deb. You can listen to it here.

The flavor combination of yogurt and Sichuan Málà Chli Oil is one that I can’t get enough of. It’s great on everything from hamburgers to meatballs to roasted carrots to grilled vegetables. In my book, The Wok, I combine it with cucumbers that are very lightly...

Submit questions for my live AMA tomorrow!

Hey folks - I’ll be hosting a live AMA on my YouTube channel Monday May 13th at 4pm ET/1pm PT.

Submit your questions below to be considered for an answer, and time in to my channel tomorrow here: https://youtube.com/@jkenjilopezalt?si=VugAHCCNcC_oI7PL

This post will be accessible to $5 patrons only until noon EST tomorrow, after which it’ll be available for all visitors.

Ask Kenji: When Should I Salt My Eggs?

Hey folks! Here's a new video. It's based on the article I wrote recently for the New York Times about whether it makes a difference when you add salt to your eggs during a scramble. Does salting them before cooking them really turn then watery or "gray" as one shouty British chef frequently claimes? (hint: no.)

Here's the full article (paywall): https://www.nytimes....

Beef Massaman Curry

Serves 6

Active time: 30 minutes

Total time: 4 hours

Note: You can use  4 pounds (1800g) bone-in stew beef, such as short ribs or oxtails in place of the boneless stew beef in this recipe.

Server with plenty of steamed jasmine rice and eat with a spoon and a fork, using the fork to push rice and curry into the spoon, then lifting the spoon to your mouth.

1 (15 ounce; 445ml) can full fat coconut milk, unshaken

4 ounces (150g) massaman curr...

Hanger Steak, and One Good Way to Cook it

There are many ways to cook a steak, but this one works pretty well, especially for cuts with a definite grain, like hanger, flank, flap meat (steak tips if you're from Boston), or skirt.

The mushroom pan sauce is really just ad-libbed, so do with it what you will!

For the Marinade:

1 or 2 hanger steaks (about 8 ounces/225g each)

Kosher salt and whole black peppercorns

Handful of herb sprigs and stems, such as parsley, rosemary, or thyme (optional)...

How to Fry Smelts

I love smelts! They are traditionally prepared very, very simply with nothing but a flour dredge. This process will also work for small, thin fish filets (though for a crispier fish and chips-style coating, refer to the recipe for fried fish in my first book, The Food Lab).

Note: You can clean the guts out from the smelts (I like to), but some people prefer leaving them in. Even if leaving them whole, make a small puncture in the belly of each fish before frying to prevent de...

Two Seattle Food Maps

Here’s two different maps for folks wanting to see where I eat in Seattle.

The first is an ongoing list of the teriyaki spots I’ve visited and reviews (you can find the reviews on my secondary YouTube channel, J. Kenji Lopez-Main or through my Instagram or Tik Tok feeds).

The second is a slowly-updated map of my favorite restaurants in Seattle. (It’s based on my Apple Let’s Eat guide and will be updated with five new spots every month).

Old School Caesar Salad

OK, so not so old school. The original Caesar salad created in Tijuana by Caesar Cardini had not anchovies in it (outside the anchovies found in Worcestershire sauce), but I love anchovies and so do my kids, so we are keeping them. The old school element comes in how the dressing is formed (with a coddled egg in a mortar and pestle), and in the way the Romaine is served as whole spears, intended to be eaten with the fingers. It's an image that Julie Child described in detail in remembering a ...

Easy Roast Chicken Legs and Potatoes

with Lemon, Garlic, and Parsley

This is a super simple sheet pan dinner. You can skip the potato par-boiling step if you want to make it even faster, but the par-boiling to release starch that gets the potatoes and chicken extra-crispy is the real magic here.

Serves 4

Time: 15 minutes active, 1 1/2 hours total

Ingredients:

2 1/2 pounds (1.2kg) Yukon gold potatoes, cut into big chunks (cut in half ...

The Recipe: Caramelized Cream of Tomato Soup

I've been playing around a lot recently with the idea of roasting or frying things in heavy cream. Heavy cream is essentially all the same constituent parts as regular butter, just in different ratios. For a given amount of butterfat, cream has a much higher ratio of water and milk solids (proteins like casein and sugars like lactose). So once that water is cooked out of it, you wind up with pure butterfat and lots and lots of milk solids, which gives caramelized cream a really rich, nutty, s...