Good morning. The sun was up in the bluest of skies, the air soft and atmospheric pressure high, and all I wanted to do was loll on the grass in picnic repose, eating fried chicken sandwiches and a lemony potato salad with mint (above). That salad’s a new thrill for me, the antithesis of the mayo-lashed potatoes I generally make for outdoor eating, light and refreshing, excellent alongside the crisp chicken and pillowy biscuits.
You could set up that very meal for yourself right now, and deliver it to a blanket in late afternoon, when the sea breeze kicks in to ruffle the treetops in the park or garden. You can sit beneath them (or above them on a fire escape or roof!) in quiet satisfaction, knowing you’ve made something delicious, that it will provide pleasure and sustenance in equal measure, and that — if you’re lucky — there’s no work in the morning, only another day of rest and reflection.
Featured Recipe
Lemon Potato Salad With Mint
Would you like an Arnold Palmer with your meal? I would, and a rhubarb pound cake for dessert. This is American exceptionalism in flavor form.
As for the rest of the week. …
Monday
It’s Memorial Day. Beneath the bunting I’ll serve, among other things, Bert Greene’s recipe for the green dip he sold at his store in Amagansett, on Long Island, in the early 1970s, with a ton of iced vegetables. In his cookbook, he wrote that someone once half-jokingly offered him a thousand dollars for the recipe. “Nobly, I refused the stunning stipend,” he wrote, “and now, with open heart, I pass it on to you — absolutely gratis!”
Tuesday
Ham El-Waylly’s recipe for kung pao tofu is on regular rotation in my house because it is so shockingly delicious that it demands to be cooked again and again. (This is no burden.) Sometimes I use cashews in place of the peanuts, to make it a little more luxe. Five stars!
Wednesday
I enjoy Farideh Sadeghin’s recipe for smash burgers because it’s simple enough to make on a weeknight when a smash burger seems like the height of indulgence, though I must confess I don’t serve two patties per serving. One’s sufficient for a Wednesday, with oven-roasted sweet potato fries.
Thursday
Ali Slagle’s recipe for lemon-garlic linguine is a simple weeknight delight that you might embellish with seared scallops or shrimp. But you don’t have to: The bright creaminess of the sauce holds its own nicely.
Friday
And then you can head into the weekend with another recipe from Melissa, for pork bulgogi with spring vegetables, marinated tenderloin seared in a hot pan, and then served with white rice and kimchi on the side. The marinade is remarkable — soy sauce, gochujang, brown sugar, sesame seeds and oil, mixed with ginger, garlic and scallions — but attend to the brown sugar carefully. You don’t want this too sweet.
There are many thousands more recipes to cook this week waiting for you on New York Times Cooking. Go explore the offerings. See what you find! (You’ll need a subscription to do that. Subscriptions are the wind in our sails. Please, if you haven’t taken one out yet, would you consider doing so today? Thanks.)
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Now, it’s some considerable distance from anything to do with tempering chocolate or spatchcocking chickens, but Vinson Cunningham, in The New Yorker, is very good on the enduring, complicated appeal of The New York Post.
The opera house in Kharkiv, Ukraine, has been badly damaged by Russian rockets. But as Ann-Dorit Boy reports for Der Spiegel, performances continue in the basement. They are generally sold out.
The new pandas at the National Zoo are flirting, The Washington Post reports. “It does not mean the zoo can soon anticipate the patter of little panda paws,” Martin Weil reported. “The two are young and still growing.” But staffers at the zoo are hopeful.
Finally, it’s Paul Weller’s birthday. He’s 67. Here he is with the Jam, playing “The Eton Rifles” in 1977. “What chance do you have against a tie and a crest?” I’ll be back next week.
Sam Sifton is an assistant managing editor, responsible for culture and lifestyle coverage, and the founding editor of New York Times Cooking.
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