Ottolenghi: trend of the year for home cooks

Devotees aspire to do as the good cookbooks say

My first Ottolenghi cookbook was “Plenty,” and I credit the hipper-than-I person who gave it to me for leading me beyond the velvet rope and into a whole new culinary club.

Once I worshiped “The Joy of Cooking” (the pages with suggested food substitutions are pretty much glued shut from sticky-fingered mid-cooking consultations). Then I moved to “Moosewood” (wheat germ was the fairy dust I sprinkled on everything); by the time I got to the age of “Julie and Julia,” I felt only a bit guilty admitting to myself that I wasn’t even tempted to master the art of French cooking.

But now we are in the age of Ottolenghi. You go to a friend’s house for dinner — there are some people, bless them, who still give dinner parties — and there’s sure to be at least one Ottolenghi thing on the menu. Slaw with nuts. Cucumber salad with ginger. Cherry tomatoes and new potatoes in some kind of tart (I did it! I did it!).

The man — and his four cookbooks — are everywhere. If you haven’t seen them, these cookbooks by Israeli Yotam Ottolenghi, two of them co-authored with Palestinian Sami Tamimi (see, the idea of those two cultures collaborating makes you feel good already, doesn’t it?), combine photographs of mouthwatering meals with photographs of the various food-mongers and marketplaces whence the ingredients were purchased.

So, even if you employ a chef and you’re merely leafing through the books in order to select something for Mrs. Bridges to prepare when King Albert comes to dinner, you approach the menu with that handson feeling of having been to the market. You are — at least on paper, in glorious color images — first-person shopping; your organic cucumber has nestled cozily with the bunch of coriander in the bottom of your canvas tote.

You can pretend — even to yourself — that you bellied up to a counter in an outdoor stall and asked a bearded man in an apron for a pinch of this or that.

Ferreting out the proper herbs, as specified by Ottolenghi, is a noble task. When the greengrocer told me a few weeks ago that chives were out of season, the letdown — I substituted green onions — made me feel as if I had abandoned any sense of idealism. Yes, I was pretending to follow Ottolenghi, but it would be an imitation Ottolenghi, something like a knockoff Louis Vuitton purse. Honestly, it wasn’t my fault. Chives were nowhere to be found.

In the age of Ottolenghi, however, every kitchen has a bottle of za’atar on the shelf. And every cook is exclaiming to other cooks about the joys of studying the text, anticipating the meal and then sharing the meal ... with someone who probably — maybe three or four days before — shared a pretty similar meal from elsewhere in one of the books with someone else.

Ottolenghi is a pro, owner of London restaurants, where he has staff to peel his peppers. The uber-Ottolenghi-ites have actually made pilgrimages to his London restaurants. “We lucked into it,” said some friends over dinner a few nights ago. Because they are polite, they managed to keep a tone of triumph from their description. Nyah, nyah would have been a more realistic reflection of the emotion behind their account of the meal.

Meanwhile, in a home kitchen, chefs are finding the recipes complicated but not impossible. “Aspirational” is the word. A few weeks ago, we had company and I cooked from the first three volumes. The kitchen counter was covered with open books, their pages affixed with jaunty colored Post-its.

One guest who likes to cook came into the kitchen and casually lifted the lid on one pot. Although this was contrary to the directions I was following slavishly, I took it well (that is, I didn’t punch him), and told him he was, from that moment on, responsible for the rice.

I prided myself on accepting his deviation from the recipe. The guest is always right. But in the 2014 kitchen, wresting control from Ottolenghi is no easy task.

Ferreting out the proper herbs, as specified by Yotam Ottolenghi, is a noble task.