INTRODUCTION

ONE PAN, MANY POSSIBILITIES

This book couldn’t come at a better time. With an increase in obligations and digital distractions that tempt us away from the kitchen, a healthy, home-cooked meal is one of the sacrifices many are making. Fortunately, there’s a satisfying solution to help home cooks make stress-free, mess-free, and tasty meals a reality: one-pot or one-pan cooking.

The roots of cooking, from both an anthropological point of view as well as a personal one, began in one pot. Although scientists continue to hotly debate which group of people first mastered fire, it only stands to reason that they cooked most of what they ate in one pot simply because so few other tools were available. In my own starter kitchen—a small and ill-equipped one at that—it never occurred to me to own multiple cooking vessels. My student budget was tight and supplies were limited, but that didn’t stop me from dishing up grub to tables full of friends and fellow housemates. Today, I rely heavily on one-pot cooking for its convenience in helping me feed my brood of boys. With a husband and three sons at my table, all of whom unquestion­ably eat more than three times a day, making a meal in just one pot is what saves my sanity, not to mention my time.

Of course, families aren’t the only ones in need of these simplified cook­ing methods. My mom is a single working woman with a ninety-minute com­mute each day. Her commitment to eating well is reinforced when she can get dinner on the table in a timely manner. Not to mention, one-pot cooking lends itself well to a speedy cleanup, as fewer dishes inevitably crowd the kitchen sink. My oldest son—soon to be a university student in charge of making most of his own meals—is a devout one-pot cook, because good­ness knows if he had to rely on multiple cooking vessels to get food into him, he’d likely be living off of PB&Js for the next four to eight years. And let’s not forget about newlyweds and empty nesters, two demographics potentially also in need of mealtime simplification. One group is likely busy building their careers and has limited time for complex daily cooking projects, while the other group could be ready to scale back the amount of time they spend in the kitchen after decades of nightly meal making.

Using one of six groups of cooking vessels—skillets, sheet pans, Dutch ovens, everyday baking pans, enamel roasting pans, and stoneware casserole dishes—my one-pot creations are designed to bring a complete dish to the table using easy-to-source ingredients and a variety of foolproof cooking techniques. From stir-fries to stews and cobblers to casseroles, this collection of down-to-earth recipes brings ease, comfort, and bold flavours to everyday home cooking. Flexible and endlessly adaptable, preparing food in one pot not only saves time, both in the prep and post-meal cleanup, but also allows for smart seasonal cooking. The dishes included in this book are prepared or served in a single pot, pan, skillet, or casserole dish and emphasize the versatility that can be created with just a few pieces of humble cookware.

Speaking of cookware, the good news here is that you probably have most of these items in your kitchen cabinets already. Oven-to-table pieces like Dutch ovens, sheet pans, skillets, and casserole dishes are essential when it comes to feeding a busy family or hosting a gathering. Roasting pans, while perhaps less common, should be considered essential, as they are practical for so much more than roasts. They can be used to bake French toast or roast a complete chicken dinner, and they lend themselves well to cooking a vari­ety of side dishes. Not only do most of us not have enough space to store the pots and pans we need for cooking plus an additional set of dishes for serving food, it can be a hassle to transfer everything just to make the table look fancy. Instead, these pieces are ready to leap from stove to centrepiece in an instant. Most of these items are just as comfortable on the daily dinner table as they are at a holiday feast, and these recipes will not only streamline the meals you make, but also satiate the people you share them with.

My hope is that Oven to Table will show less experienced cooks just how easy it is to create simple, wholesome meals, while inspiring more seasoned ones to try their hand at new recipes and simplified techniques. Uncomplicated food can be the best to eat, the most fun to share, and certainly the most enjoyable to cook.