My devotion to asparagus is no secret to anyone who reads these missives. But I don’t think I’ve spilled quite as much ink on my other favorite spring fling: fresh green peas. True, the frozen ones are easy to find and even easier to use; just pour them in the pan, no shucking required. Fresh green peas, however, eaten straight from the pod or gently stewed in butter until they just soften, are peerlessly crisp-tender, earthy and sugar sweet. I’m counting the days until the first ones appear at my local greenmarket in about a month.
For now, though, I’ll happily break out a bag of the frozen ones to make Cybelle Tondu’s chicken with tender lettuce, peas and prosciutto. Cybelle sears chicken cutlets on one side only, giving them a nicely caramelized crust, then flips them briefly to finish the cooking, keeping the meat juicy inside. While the cutlets rest, she adds a little butter to the pan drippings to sauté shallots, lettuce, prosciutto and peas to serve alongside. It’s a vivacious springtime take on the usual chicken breast dinner.
Featured Recipe
Chicken With Tender Lettuce, Peas and Prosciutto
More food for thought:
Pesce all’acqua pazza (fish in crazy water): Ali Slagle adapts Marcella Hazan’s traditional Neapolitan recipe for fish fillets lightly poached in a tomato broth spiked with chile flakes, fennel and garlic. And speaking of Marcella, check out Pete Wells on the new documentary about her. Pete writes that for him, as with many Americans who love to cook Italian food, her distinctive (and somewhat bossy) tone has left a permanent impression: “That voice — brusque, solidly accented, cured in cigarette smoke, marinated in Jack Daniels — comes to me all the time. Seeing cold pasta at a deli, I’ll hear her saying, ‘If I had invented pasta salads I would hide.’”
Spicy miso lentil soup: Also from Ali, this savory, bright green soup strikes a balance between hearty and light. To keep the color and flavor vibrant, Ali purées raw spinach, miso, lime juice and ginger, then adds it to the cooked lentils and rice right at the end, just to warm the mixture through without cooking it too much (which would dull it down). A garnish of sliced shiitakes fried in sesame oil adds a forthright crunch.
Skillet greens with runny eggs, peas and pancetta: You’ll find even more green peas in this ebullient one-skillet meal. It’s a bit like shakshuka, but instead of the usual tomato-onion sauce, I poach the eggs in a soft mound of wilted spring alliums and greens, a bracing combination of ramps or scallions plus a big bunch of ruffled chard, using both the leaves and stems. Serve it with a baguette or some rice to catch every golden drop of yolk.
Tofu larb: Hetty Lui McKinnon’s meatless take on this Thai classic includes toasted rice powder, a traditional larb ingredient that adds a ton of texture and nutty depth to the chile-spiked, lime-lashed sauce. Serve it wrapped in lettuce leaves or over sticky rice for a bright and pungent meal.
Baked red bean nian gao: The secret to the chewy, bouncy texture of butter mochi is the mix of (mochiko) sweet rice flour, melted butter and sweetened condensed milk, which bakes up into a tender, springy cake with a gentle flavor and golden edges. This version, adapted by Eleanore Park from a recipe by Peggy and Jessica Wang from Gu Grocery in L.A., is dotted with scoops of sweet red bean paste (either homemade or store bought), which make wonderfully rich, fudgy little pockets.
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That’s all for now. I’ll be back on Monday.
Melissa Clark has been writing her column, A Good Appetite, for The Times’s Food section since 2007. She creates recipes for New York Times Cooking, makes videos and reports on food trends. She is the author of 45 cookbooks, and counting.
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