A chef’s secrets shared
Nothing like his first cookbook, “Manresa,” which was an ode to the menu at his Michelin-starred Los Gatos restaurant, David Kinch’s latest book, due out on March 23, is more like strolling on the beach with a good friend, sharing what you’ve made for dinner over the last week.
“At Home in the Kitchen: Simple Recipes from a Chef’s Night Off,” is a leisurely but information-packed read that sprang from the many laughter- and music-filled Tuesday night dinners Kinch, who also owns Manresa Bread locations in Los Gatos and Campbell, has prepared for friends in the place he calls “the Pink Palace,” aka his beach home in Santa Cruz.
The 164-page book, co-authored by Devin Fuller, was conceived prepandemic, in the summer of 2019, but it makes him look like a prescient genius for coming up with a comfort food novel of recipes, food lore and culinary tips, while most of us are getting tired of our own cooking after long months of lockdown.
It’s filled with Kinch’s kitchen craft, from how to grate ginger to how not to toast nuts: don’t cook them in a pan on the stove, as the heat comes only from the bottom. Instead, bake them on a sheet in the oven at 350 until done. Kinch divulges how to properly shuck an oyster, peel a tomato, perfectly poach an egg and precisely dice vegetables. Crack eggs on the counter, not the edge of the bowl, he advises, so bits of eggshell don’t get into the dish. Salt your water after it boils: and use a lot of salt. Don’t use a food processor to chop vegetables, as they utterly pulverize the poor things.
“For this book, our mantra was no more than five or six ingredients per recipe,” says Kinch. “And they all had to be easily sourced,”
Recipes are specifically brand-agnostic and don’t have to be ordered from specialty markets. He says most ingredients are easily found at Whole Foods. Many have been made from memory hundreds of times, and it was sometimes a challenge to specify ingredient quantities, as he is a visual cook.
“Butter the size of a walnut,” for example, was one of his grandmother’s measurements that stuck with him. The ingredients and the dishes are simple: Each one is made from things that bring him joy.
Kinch shares the basics of a wellstocked pantry, including chicken stock, chickpea stock, parmesan stock, sardines, capers, pickles and garlicky herbed croutons. He reveals how to make all of the above — except the sardines, which he enjoys right out of the can.
“A starving line cook relies on cheap protein to survive,” he says.
Recipes featuring the oily fish include the beautifully simple bucatini with canned sardines and capers, as well as summer squash with sardines.
Most of the recipes have a backstory. One of the first dishes he served at Manresa over 15 years ago was a spin on the onion and brioche soup with poached egg and mango that Kinch features in the book. He makes a star of lettuce, sharing how to braise romaine with smoky bacon, and how to make lettuce vichyssoise, a twist on the typical chilled leek and potato soup.
Eggs are a big star, from frittatas to soufflés, in which you whisk the egg whites, cooking the mixture just until the outer edges are done, leaving it soft and almost runny in the middle. Vegetables, too, take center stage in Brussels sprouts with cider and goat cheese, Belgian endive gratin, ratatouille (served hot or cold), Catalan-style kale and whole roasted cauliflower with capers and egg.
Snacks of all kinds, cocktails (he’s especially fond of Negronis and margaritas), seafood dishes (cod with clams in a green sauce), main meats (lamb tartare and chicken thighs with olives and green beans) and desserts (lemon caramel, rich chocolate cake with sea salt) round out the book, which pairs dishes with music instead of wine.
Kinch is an audiophile who loves vinyl, and his tastes are diverse, from swing to jazz to rock.
Each dish is accompanied by a music recommendation, inspired by the ingredients, the outcome or just the mood he was in while cooking.
“At Home in the Kitchen: Simple Recipes from a Chef’s Night Off” will be available on Amazon.com starting March 23.