Bangkok Post

KITCHEN CONFIDENTI­AL

Put your sheet pan to good use with these recipes

- By Melissa Clark

The humble and versatile sheet pan is a relatively recent piece of kit, but has proven an indispensa­ble ally.

Once upon a time, way back in the annals of home cooking, there was an era before sheet-pan suppers. In that dark age, even well-equipped kitchens did not have so much as a single profession­al sheet pan, let alone the two or three deemed indispensa­ble today. Sure, there were deep-sided roasting pans, cookie sheets, and narrow, thin-gauge jellyroll pans — all perfect for their designated purposes.

But none has the same functional­ity and convenienc­e as the humble, heavy-duty, 33x45cm rimmed sheet pan. Not only can you use it to cook an entire meal for four in your oven all at once, it can also help you heat up a dozen bagels simultaneo­usly. It has enough room to cradle your bossam or Thanksgivi­ng turkey, and, in a pinch, it can double as a cookie sheet.

However, as useful as regular sheet pans are, their capaciousn­ess can be unwieldy when you’re dealing with just a halved acorn squash or that quartet of trout fillets you’re planning for dinner tonight. Even worse, sheet pans can also be too big to fit into the dishwasher, especially if you’ve used more than one.

And this is why I’ve made room for yet one more tool in my already overstuffe­d kitchen cabinets. For home cooks everywhere, it’s time to get acquainted with the adorable and versatile quarter-sheet pan.

Measuring approximat­ely 22x30cm, it’s the helpful little sibling of your standard-size sheet pans.

I can fit four in my oven all at once, which makes them highly flexible when you want to cook several things at the same time. Then I can toss them into the dishwasher, where they scarcely take up more room than my plates.

For example, what if you wanted to cook up a wintry dish of paprikarub­bed chicken legs, potatoes and turnips in the oven all at the same time? If you arranged all those ingredient­s together on one large pan, you’d be hard pressed to get the timing just right so the vegetables and chicken all come out evenly cooked and gorgeously caramelise­d.

Separating the chicken and vegetables on to two small pans, however, gives you a lot more control. You can remove each pan from the oven exactly when its contents are perfectly done, without worrying about over- or undercooki­ng.

Here, it means pulling out the chicken and letting it rest while cranking up the oven to crisp the potatoes and turnips. You’ll have juicy chicken, crunchy potatoes, and a lot less stress getting them there.

The same logic can be applied to a sheet-pan supper of sausage parmesan and garlicky broccoli. Using two pans prevents the sausage juices and tomato sauce from seeping all over the broccoli, making it soggy.

Or, in the case of cumin-rubbed pork chops with Brussels sprouts and crispy sage leaves, while the ingredient­s would all taste great cooked together on one large sheet pan — the rendering pork fat mingling gorgeously with the sprouts and sage — it would automatica­lly make the vegetables unfit for any vegetarian­s at your table. And keeping the meat away from the vegetables encourages the porky edges to crisp, which is always a good thing in a chop.

If you can find the space to store a few of these quarter-sheet pans (maybe stacked inside your larger sheet pans), buying them isn’t at all expensive. They cost less than 400 baht each.

Whether you use big pans or small, once you immerse yourself in the tasty, convenient world of sheet-pan suppers, you won’t want to stop.

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