AN ELEMENTAL DISH
This taco recipe proves that less is more
You can stuff all manner of ingredients into a taco. Read enough modern cookbooks, in fact, and you’ll see far too many taco recipes that involve multiple sub-recipes (in different sections of the book, no doubt) for sauces, pickles and fillings. By the time you’re ready to assemble the tacos, you’re also ready for a nap.
I think it’s particularly common with vegetarian or vegan tacos. Perhaps in an attempt to prove that plant-based dishes can be as complex as those with animal products, authors can go a little overboard. I’ve done it myself.
But the more often you make tacos (and I make them so often I find myself apologizing to my fiance about it), the more you realize: They don’t need all that. Pick the right combination — which can be just two elements, besides the corn tortillas — and they’re plenty satisfying. It’s a stripped-down, even sophisticated way to approach what I consider an elemental dish.
That’s what I appreciate about Danielle and Laura Kosann’s taco recipes in “Great Tastes” (Clarkson Potter, 2018). As co-creators of the online magazine the New Potato, the sisters display an appealingly breezy approach to cooking and entertaining, and they devote a short chapter to tacos — because what could be breezier?
Their Eggplant Tacos With Pico de Gallo are almost self-explanatory: You broil (or grill) heavily seasoned eggplant slices, chop them up and serve them on warmed corn tortillas along with a simple pico de gallo. The salsa has builtin crunch and spice, while the already-meaty eggplant becomes even more so with the addition of coriander and cumin. I wouldn’t object if you added pumpkin seeds or scallions, queso fresco or feta.
None of that would be wrong, but these are already right.