Welcome! We're Bruce Weinstein & Mark Scarbrough, veteran cookbook authors with over three dozen books to our names (not counting knitting books from Bruce and a memoir from Mark) and near 1.5 million copies sold. We love to talk about food and cooking. We're glad you've joined us.

We're also happy to have Nik Sharma on the podcast this week. He's got a great new book: VEG-TABLE, all about vegetable-focused meals. And it's a gorgeous book, to boot. If you'd like to know more, check it out at this link.

We've also got a one-minute cooking tip that's really important for the holidays ahead. And we'll tell you what's making us happy in food this week.

Here are the segments for this episode of COOKING WITH BRUCE & MARK:

[01:19] Our one-minute cooking tip: Be patient with yourself.

[03:59] Bruce's interview with Nik Sharma, author Of VEG-TABLE.

[24:41] What’s making us happy in food this week? Two great restaurants in Albany, NY: one for home-style tofu and one for ramen!

Hey, I'm Bruce podcast cooking with Bruce and Mark.

And I'm Mark Scarborough.

And together with Bruce, we have written three dozen cookbooks, including the

latest, the Look and Cook Air Fryer Bible.

It is out now and ready for your Christmas gift giving needs and Hanukkah.

gift giving needs and Kwanzaa gift giving needs and Solstice gift giving needs.

And the I just love you gift giving needs.

Are you getting a theme here?

The Look and Cook Air Fryer Bible.

It comes with 125 fairly easy recipes.

And I'll talk more about those recipes at the end of the podcast, uh, and,

uh, easy recipes and 700 photographs.

That's the big thing.

Every step of every recipe is shot by a professional photographer.

It was a Herculean.

There's a word for you.

A Herc.

Kill you an effort.

We are so proud of that book, and it is now out and ready to be given with an

air fryer as the perfect holiday gift.

Oh, I sound like Ron Bo Peel, but we're not going to speak

about any of that this week.

We've got a one minute cooking tip.

Bruce is going to interview Nik Sharma.

He's the author of veg table, and we'll tell you what's making

us happy and food this week.

So let's get going.

Today's one minute cooking tip is all about how you feel

or should feel about cooking.

Do not be discouraged if things don't seem as easy for you as they

do for the folks you see on TikTok or if you're old like me on TV.

I love that.

Oh my gosh.

Okay.

Go on.

Cooking is a skill, right?

And you learn, and you get better as you go.

You get more nimble with knives.

You get better at folding doughs and wrapping dumplings.

I think this is the most important thing that you just said, is it's a skill.

Takes time and practice.

That's right.

It's not an innate talent to cook.

And there's nothing that is necessarily innate.

You may have a better sense of it.

taste or flavor than other people.

But then the end, the skill set of cooking is still just like playing the piano.

You may have an aptitude and some people have a lot of aptitude and some

people have a little aptitude, but you've got to learn how to do it or

woodworking or throwing pots or any of the number of things you do gardening.

It's not natural.

You have to learn how to do it.

And then the same with cooking.

So the tip is be.

patient with yourself.

Don't beat yourself up.

And plus, half that stuff you see on TikTok is faked anyway.

So don't worry about it.

Can I, can I expand this one?

Oh, sure.

So Bruce and I, you probably know, are in a lot of the Instant Pot groups

online and You know, because we wrote all these big Instant Pot books, like

the Instant Pot Bible and all this stuff, and the Instant Pot Bible Next

Generation, so we're in all these groups, and I see people pull stuff out of an

Instant Pot in their professionally made videos, and I'm like, stop it.

You didn't make that in there?

There is no way that that completely and perfectly browned roast

came out of your Instant Pot.

I know it didn't.

I have worked with These machines for years and I love them.

I make chilies a plenty in instant pots and I make soups and

stews a plenty in instant pots.

But come on, your perfectly seared and rare beef tenderloin did not

come out of your instant pot.

I know it didn't.

I know you're lying.

So, you know, despite what people show online, remember, that's all heavily

produced and edited and scripted.

The kids who are influencers these days are essentially talent and

producers all in one, and editors too.

So there's my diatribe.

Okay, enough with my diatribe.

Let's turn to a kid these days.

Nick Sharma.

He's the author of the brand new book, Vegtable.

sitting right between us downstairs when we watch TV.

It's been sitting there for a while because Bruce was kind

of fascinated by this book.

So Bruce has got an interview with Nik and it's going to be

all about his new cookbook.

Today, we've got Nick Sharma here.

He's the creative force behind the award winning blog, A Brown Table.

He's had a regular cooking column in the San Francisco Chronicle, and he is now

living in Southern California, where he grows much of what he cooks and eats.

And he's got a brand new book out called VegTable, Recipes,

Techniques, and Plant Science for Big Flavored Vegetable Focused Meals.

Hey Nick, how are you?

I'm good.

How are you?

I'm good.

Thanks.

So your new book is based on your experience as a scientist

using plant science to create the most flavorful dishes.

What is that plant science and how does it affect taste and recipe development?

So my background in science is in molecular biology and a lot of what

I started out studying was either bacteria or things in the plant kingdom.

And, um, surprisingly, and for many of those who are familiar with science

will kind of attest to this, a lot of that gets repeated in cooking.

And it's fascinating because cooking just like, you know, working in a lab,

which is what I did for the longest time is like running experiments.

You're Trying out new ideas, testing things to see if

things work and don't work.

In the case of the kitchen, it's flavor or texture, maybe a meal that,

um, you know, you want to put out quickly, uh, perfecting the texture

of a vegetable that's too tough.

Those are all actually inherently based in science.

A lot of us sometimes forget about that.

And I think in cooking, a lot of people always quickly assume that pastry, um,

because it's such an exacting method.

Is more scientific but actually all cooking is scientific in its approach

Yeah, and your book is packaged as vegetable forward

as opposed to plant based.

What's the difference and why did you approach it that way?

so funny enough when people you have vegetables Well, they think diet

and that's not the focus of my work.

Let's, let's leave it at that.

So my thing is I want people to eat more vegetables.

That's why the book is called plant forward as to a post plant based

because plant based implies that you could have Meat products that are

actually created from vegetables, so they're not really meat, but they

mimic the texture and the flavors.

So that's not what this book is about.

This book is about putting the vegetables, uh, that we come across in our day to day

lives, putting them on the center stage and then building dishes around them.

Some of them use dairy products.

Some of these recipes use meat.

Um, but.

In this book, predominantly most of the recipes are vegetarian,

and some are vegan, and a very small handful are meat based.

And what's your take on processed, canned, and frozen vegetables?

Do they offer the same flavor profiles, and by and large, do

you find them interchangeable with their fresh counterparts?

Yes and no.

I think one of the things why canned food and frozen food get such a bad

rap these days is because there's still this notion that, oh my gosh,

it's what food, it was how food was preserved during World War II, you know,

rationing, all those memories come up.

And then it's also often associated with, um, Economic, uh, how do you say

the socioeconomic status in the country?

So poorer people eat canned food and frozen food, whereas people who have

more money, they can go and buy fresh.

Part of that is true.

I'm not going to downplay that, but I think it's really important

not to shame people or people who have to go and use canned food.

I do it all the time, uh, for convenience.

And technology and food is constantly improving and we're

not at that age where, you know, the beans were processed to death.

So everything was mush.

You can open a can of beans right now and they'll still be cooked just right.

and perky and they don't fall apart.

So I think like figuring out what brands are really good using the correct

processing technologies is so important.

And another thing to remember, fresh food doesn't always have the best nutrients.

One of the things that's constantly measured in the food processing

industry to check how, um, and also monitor how food storage takes place

over time, how effective it is, is to measure the vitamin C content.

Vitamin C is, um, a vitamin that is present in fruits,

fresh fruits and vegetables.

And over time it starts to decrease.

So the longer your fresh vegetables spend moving, say from a farm to

production, to packaging, to coming to the store or even to the farmer's

market, there is a significant loss in that vitamin C content.

And that's how quality is often monitored by, uh, these companies.

Frozen food, on the other hand, they pack it immediately as soon as it comes.

Sometimes it's minimal.

the process by being cut or whatever, but it's frozen immediately.

So vitamin C doesn't degrade as much when it's frozen.

And that is an estimate of how good or nutritive a vegetable might be.

Now, of course, like textures might change.

So you can, if you don't care about texture and you're making something

like a stew or a dish where the vegetable has to be soft and fall

apart, you can use that over there.

So There's no harm in using frozen, canned, or fresh.

It just, I think people just need to reframe that conversation and think

about what's happened over the last century in terms of technology, what's

happening down the road, and also, uh, we shouldn't shame people for their choices.

It's so helpful that in the front of your book, you offer refrigerator

and pantry vegetable cheat sheets.

Give me a quick summary of how they work.

So one of the things with this book is I wanted to make it really casual,

fun and friendly, and I might talk all about the science on pages and

pages and paragraphs, but what's the quickest way to deliver something to

people that I think would be useful?

And so for this reason, I created the refrigerator and pantry vegetable sheet

cheat sheet so people can know how to store their vegetables most effectively.

What kind of vegetables can go next to other vegetables and what shouldn't be

next to other vegetables and fruits?

Because the destiny of a lot of fruits is dead in order to reproduce.

So something has to die in order to come to, to be born again.

And fruits do this by producing certain hormones that encourage cell death.

Those hormones, a lot of them are gases like ethylene and ethylene

will travel in its vicinity.

And if it comes across broccoli or lettuce.

Within a day, those leaves and those flower buds turn yellow.

So you're compromising the quality of what started out fine.

So those are the kind of things I want people to keep in mind.

I wanted to make it fun, and so this cheat sheet hopefully kind of delivers

that in a much more, uh, consumable way for people to apply that knowledge.

Hey Nick, all the recipes in VegTable are presented as narrative.

You're telling me how to make the recipes.

You're over my shoulder.

Instead of the more traditional Ingredient list followed by a method.

Why'd you opt for this style?

So I wrote this book during the pandemic and one of the things during

the pandemic I noticed everybody wanted flavorful quick meals.

They didn't have the time and sometimes the budget So how do I economize on

that and get the most out of things?

So a lot of the recipes are actually route, uh centered on pantry staples

that I think most people use today.

So kind of brought those in the recipes are much shorter.

Um, I'm also encouraging people to use less dishes to wash.

When you're prepping stuff, let's just do all of this in the same bowl if we can.

So there's a lot of convenience and for that reason alone, I decided that the

style of recipe writing should also be very casual and convenient and friendly.

I don't want it to feel formal.

Because my last cookbook was a science cookbook, it was a little more formal.

Uh, this I just wanted to have a casual, fun flow of conversation.

And when I create recipes, I think in terms of flowcharts.

This is what I'm adding right now.

This is what's happening.

Let's move to the next step.

So we built on that.

The font size is bigger.

So, uh, you feel you don't feel pressed and tight.

visually claustrophobic when you look at the recipe, the ingredients are bolded.

So, you know, when, what goes in and it makes it much more convenient.

The first batch of recipes in your book, all based on the Amaryllis family

of aromatics, onions, chives, leeks.

First recipe out of the gate, my mouth was watering, Golden's Attar Onion Rings.

They look gorgeous and you pair them with a cold buttermilk caraway dipping sauce.

Tell me what makes this recipe so special for you.

Okay, so first of all, I love anything deep fried and crunchy.

So I definitely needed onion rings in the book.

And with My recipes, I really love playing with flavor, but also with temperature

and showing people how temperature and food affects our perception

of flavor, especially with taste.

It becomes very obvious and the golden za'atar rings, you serve them hot.

And they've got za'atar in there, which gives it a really nice tanginess.

You've got the sesame seeds for that crunch trapped inside.

And za'atar is basically made from dried herbs.

And depending on where you buy it, if it's made in America, it's usually oregano.

If it comes from the Middle East, then they use the herb za'atar, which is

where the name for this blend comes from.

And it pairs really well with the onion rings.

chilled cold buttermilk sauce that's infused with fresh herbs and caraway.

So you can start to notice how heat and temperature just play with the

saltiness, the sweetness of the onions inside, even the textures.

And if you pair it up with the veggie burger, then again, you'll

notice how the heat from the veggie burger, the spices kind of.

Just mold along their way with every bite with the buttermilk sauce.

So for me, that was really like a fun recipe to develop.

And Nick, your combinations of flavors and textures is unique.

And I want to ask you about a pairing you offer up, artichokes and yams with lemon.

What is it about those two vegetables, artichokes and yams, that make

them work so well together for you?

So artichokes, definitely like a Mediterranean vegetable.

Yams, definitely.

They come from, um, Africa.

And, uh, lemons, again, Mediterranean ingredients.

So living in California, one of the things, especially in Southern now in L.

A., I've noticed that there are so many cultures that are

living next to each other.

And a lot of my recipes kind of drop borders, national borders.

And I try to play with vegetables or even flavors in general.

What if there were no borders?

How would this look?

What if I was here?

a person on this earth, no one was there, and I came across these ingredients.

Would I put them together?

Do they work?

And often, I think having that mindset has helped me kind of develop

recipes that are out of my comfort zone, so I'm challenging myself.

Not everything works the first time, but with artichokes, yams, and lemon.

Lemons are something that just takes so well to so many vegetables

and proteins that with the artichokes, it's a combination.

With the yams, Not so much.

And it just works so well because you've got the starchy softness of

And the creaminess of the yams with this tangy, uh, fragrant lemon.

And then it's also got, um, capers.

There are capers in there.

Um, and then you've got the artichokes.

And artichokes are one of those vegetables that really don't need too much.

So the flavors, yeah, are much milder compared to my other recipes.

They're much more tamer.

Growing up...

I was the only person in my family that liked creamed corn.

I mean, it was sweet.

It came out of a can.

Tell me about your creamed corn and why it's so different and more delicious than

any creamed corn I probably ever had.

Okay.

So I didn't grow up eating creamed corn.

I did grow up eating corn from a can, but, um, with creamed corn, it's one

of those dishes that I do like it.

at Thanksgiving, but I'm also anxious around it because it gets so heavy

and it's one of the things I feel more than, at least for me, more than Turkey.

That's what like knocks me out.

And I wanted to do something that was fresh, bright, and flavorful.

And that's where this recipe came in, where I'm using the liquid from kimchi.

We've got chopped cabbage, the chopped kimchi in there, which adds this

brightness, also this umami, because it's fermented, you get the strong,

rich umami flavor running through it.

And it works with the sweetness of the corn.

And this recipe, instead of using regular cream, it's vegan, it uses,

um, a can of whole coconut milk to build on that creamy texture.

And it works so well.

It's, it's probably one of my favorite dishes that I specifically created

for Thanksgiving for this book.

Can you explain what a kishti is?

And what is your version of it in the book?

So

kishti is a dish that when a child is born and they can start to eat, that's

the first dish that they eat in India.

And it's a really simple dish made from lentils and rice.

that are boiled together.

So it's really soft.

It provides the protein and carbohydrate necessary for a really

young child, uh, for the development.

Now, when you're sick in India, people offer you kichidi and of course, there

are different iterations of kichidi as you get older, people start to add

vegetables, spices, and layer it, you know, as, because your flavors expand.

And one of the things I followed the same approach in this

cookbook, I said, you know what?

I want to do kichidi in this book, but I want to do it in a very different way.

The Italians use arborio rice to make risotto.

It's quite similar in terms of the texture except that with risotto the

rice still retains its texture kind of like pasta it still has a little bit

of a bite but the sauce comes from the starchiness of the rice and I said,

why not just throw lentils in here?

Let's see if this works.

It worked really well because the creaminess is a boon to the kichadi.

And then what I did was I added similar spices like turmeric, and

then I used, um, beet greens to add a little bit more of like, make it

a little more substantial and add more flavorful interest to the dish.

There are toasted pine nuts in there.

So it's a lot of playing on.

like Italian and Indian traditional dishes coming together, and it works so well.

It's one of the best comfort food dishes that I can vouch for in the book.

Nik, your recipes aren't vegan, and you use dairy in your cooking.

But you have a recipe for a roasted head of cauliflower with

an almond based cream sauce.

Tell me about this dish and why you chose to go with a dairy alternative.

I wanted something that would be extremely dramatic in the book.

I wanted a, I'm a dramatic person, so I always like my books having a

couple of recipes that can stand on their own when you walk into the room.

Everyone's looking at that.

For this reason, I create this recipe for the roasted cauliflower.

So it's a whole cauliflower.

You blanch it in a little bit of water to help the roasting

process speed up in the oven.

And then you put the cauliflower, it's seasoned really well

with a combination of Spicy.

It's like mustard and chili powder and it uses olive oil and you

roast it and then you bring it out.

And again, I love that combination of hot and cold.

So this almond cream comes in.

And in India, almonds are almonds and pistachios are a popular choice of nuts,

not only to add crunch to dishes, but we also use them to make creamy based sauces.

In India, almonds are also ground into milk to create drinks.

And I kind of wanted to kind of bring that same concept here, but

I'm using the almonds to make the sauce that is served on the side.

So again, you have something cool to temper the heat from the cauliflower.

And it's such a beautiful dish.

It's a dish that you can serve, especially if you're a vegetarian

or looking to eat less meat.

in place of a large standout meat dish.

This is something that's simple to prepare.

Bring it to the table at Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter.

Because cauliflower is available year round.

Let's keep talking about cauliflower.

What is cauliflower bolognese?

So you need to tell me how I can make bolognese without beef and veal.

So one of the things I decided to do with this book was include my

first ever set of pasta recipes.

Because people keep saying, Nick, you never do any pasta recipes.

Don't you eat pasta at home?

And I said, okay, let me think about the dishes.

That people commonly cook at home.

And bolognese is one of the most common sauces that people make

for pasta and it's so convenient.

You make a big part of it.

You've got your veal or you've got beef, and some people even use pork,

uh, depending on what you have at home.

So it's a really convenient dish that stretches.

a mile and you can feed many mouths with it.

So I wanted to do something similar but make it vegetarian for the folks.

So cauliflower provides that really nice texture when it's grated and it

stands up to sauces that are cooked.

One of the challenges that I knew that I would come across if I put

cauliflower and cooked it in for hours it would literally just fall apart.

There wouldn't be any of that crumbly meat texture.

So what do I do?

So I went to canned tomatoes and canned tomatoes are really great.

at adding better flavor for tomato based sauces, it cuts down

your cooking time because you really don't have to cook them.

They're pre cooked and you get this rich tomato flavor.

So it worked really well.

I didn't have to simmer my sauce for hours.

I have my riced cauliflower that I grated.

You can also just buy it pre packaged, toss it in there

and then serve it with pasta.

It also grows great without pasta and it's so good.

It was one of those dishes that I felt, okay, this is something

I feel people can make at home.

Really fast, really quickly without too much fuss.

You just need to have.

a can of tomatoes at home and a cauliflower.

Okay.

One final question about a vegetable that not many Americans are familiar with.

Cassava.

Can you talk about what it is and what's your favorite way to use it?

So with this book, I decided to include vegetables that I was.

very familiar with.

I also wanted to challenge myself and include vegetables that I

hadn't really cooked until the book.

Cassava was one of them, cactus, paddles, the nopalitos were also one

of them, african yams, and yucca.

Now these are vegetables that I used quite commonly by the hispanic population.

It's easily available.

I live in L.

A.

You go to a mexican grocery store, you can find them.

Um, arouse grocery store carries it.

And I said, you know what, let me see what I can do with it.

So I got the vegetable over, kind of just cooked it first plane.

First, I learned how to cook it, uh, because it requires some prep work.

You have to boil it and then you can prep it in whatever way you want to.

And then I spoke to people who were Hispanic and asked them,

Hey, how do you cook this dish?

I mean, this vegetable.

And then they said, okay, they usually cook it like a starch.

And sometimes instead, some of them were even eating it without rice.

Or with rice.

It goes really well with seafood.

So, listening to them and kind of understanding how they use these

vegetables, I then brought that knowledge and applied it to my recipes in the book.

And it turns out to be, it's such a convenient source of nutrients,

that also stores really long, because the skin is so thick.

It's a beautiful vegetable, so I said, let me just do a few recipes for people

who really want to try something new.

This was fun for me, so I'm going to share it with them.

Nick Sharma, I think people are going to find new things to

cook in your book, Veg Table.

Your understanding the science behind the plants and knowing how to store

them and how to cook them is fabulous.

Thank you for this book.

Thank you for sharing some time with me and talking about it this morning.

Thank you so much.

It's so beautiful book.

A nice interview, but beautiful book.

Really.

It's a beautiful book.

The photography's gorgeous and his flavor combinations, and I told him they're

unique and they look just so delicious.

Yeah, it, it's a really nice book.

Um, it's up for a couple of awards.

We, we are actually sitting on a committee that that book is up for

an award on and, um, it deserves to be nominated for awards.

So interesting though, the way he chose not to do.

an ingredient list in each recipe, just to sort of incorporate it as a narrative.

Yeah, it's really wild to see a book.

I've always dreamed of writing a completely narrative cookbook

and no ingredient list.

So it's not traditional.

It's much more about, let's say, a readerly cookbook than Uh,

than anything, but of course the recipes are completely makeable.

All right.

So before we get to our last segment of the podcast, let me say it would be great

if you could subscribe to our newsletter.

It's available on our website, Bruce at mark.

com.

You can go right there.

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Aren't we clever?

Very, very clever.

And of course, you can find us on all sorts of social media feeds,

including our Tik Tok channel, cooking with Bruce and Mark.

We'd be glad to find you there.

So let's go on to the traditional last.

Segment of our podcast.

What's making us happy in food this week?

Last week, mark and I, were on WAMC.

You're gonna steal mine.

Public radio.

You're

stealing mine.

I bet not we,

I bet not always do this, and we don't know what we're gonna say.

What's happening food this week?

And we always say, one of these days, one of us is gonna steal the others.

No, no,

no.

I bet.

I bet I'm not.

Okay.

So we go up to Albany to go on the radio and we talked about our new book.

And then from there, we went on traveling for the weekend, and on the

way back, we went through Albany again.

All right, then.

And we had...

Home style tofu at Hugh's house, H U apostrophe S.

It's a Shanghainese restaurant in Albany.

Way out on Central Avenue, way out from downtown.

This home style tofu was so delicious.

It was little triangles of deep fried tofu puffs stir fried in a very spicy, salty...

It was, I have never had...

home style tofu that was actually quite that delicious.

So thank you, Hughes House.

That was yummy.

And Bruce

makes tofu dishes all the time because I like them and especially

uh, Korean and Chinese tofu dishes.

But this was really pretty fantastic.

Okay.

So what's made me happy in food is because the same thing, it has Bruce Hughes House.

No, um, as Bruce said, we often go to Albany because we're on WAMC, which

is the NPR affiliate out of upstate New York and across New England.

We're on there three times a year, maybe.

I don't know.

We go on with Ray Graf and have a great time.

We're old friends with Ray and basically we laugh for an hour and go off air.

But anyway, before we go on air, we have this tradition of going

to this ramen place in Albany.

Tanpopo.

Tanpopo.

Tanpopo.

Ramen in Albany and I'm gonna put two words together that haven't been put

together since 1680 and that is hip Albany It's a hip ramen place in an

old diner in Albany So and they make a brisket lemongrass ramen that Bruce

is like, I don't know He just got he the car points straight to this

I would drive the hour and a half from our house to Albany just to eat this

if you wanted to go there for dinner.

Oh, well,

okay.

I'm not that crazy about it, but it did make me really happy when

we were there, and it always makes me happy to see Ray Graf and Bea

on WAMC on their Food Fridays.

But, uh, getting ramen is a really spectacular thing.

That's the podcast for this week.

Ask that you look us up on social media.

As I say, we've got a TikTok channel cooking with Bruce and Mark.

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also love for you to come to our Facebook group, also called cooking with Bruce and

Mark because we're very clever every week.

We tell you what's making us happy in food.

So please go to our Facebook group, cooking with Bruce and Mark.

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We're very, very clever.

Super super.

And every week we tell you what's making us happy in food.

So.

Tell us what's making you happy in food this week and next week.

We'll see you for another episode of cooking with Bruce and Mark.