Sauce

This is the best cheese fondue I’ve ever had—Megan got the recipe when she was in France. You can use most kinds of hard white French or Swiss cheese, but be sure not to use store-bought grated cheese. Those cheeses are tossed in cornstarch so the pieces don’t stick together. If you use them in cheese fondue, the cornstarch forms a hard lump in the pan. Note that this recipe uses a cup of wine—it’s very French to cook with wine—which is one of the things that makes this fondue classic.

The first time I had gnocchi—sort of a cross between pasta and a dumpling— was in Venice, and it was great! So of course I had to try to make my own. Mine weren’t as spectacular, but after a few more tries, I got it. The key is to only add enough flour for the dough not to be sticky anymore; otherwise, they’ll be too heavy. When you boil them, you can tell whether the dough is okay. If the gnocchi start to feather and fall apart when you boil them, you need more flour. If they don’t float after 2 minutes, they have too much flour. This is another dish that works well with a nice green salad.

Satay is an Indonesian dish where, typically, foods are skewered and then grilled or broiled. But to me satay is all about the peanut sauce that’s served alongside the skewers. I love peanut sauce! I made a stovetop version with just broccoli and cauliflower accompanied with that amazing peanut dipping sauce, so it would be a really easy meal for one. The sauce would also be great with some baked tofu.

This recipe is one of my personal favorites. Using milk instead of cream and cutting down on the Parmesan cheese makes a waistline-friendly alternative to alfredo sauce. I love lemon in just about anything, and together with the asparagus it makes for a light and refreshing pasta dish. The best part is how easy it is. You can do all of the other preparation in the time it takes to cook the pasta.

Make this for your friends. They won’t believe that it didn’t come from that little Mediterranean place around the corner. This is a great recipe to partially prepare in advance and refrigerate until you’re ready to cook and eat, but once you cook the falafel, it’s best to eat it right away. This sauce is good on anything from veggies to bread. I like to make extra just for snacking on.

This pasta dish is pretty spectacular. It’s just a few ingredients that combine to make something fabulous—and that, in a nutshell, is the secret of Italian cooking. The roasted tomatoes and roasted garlic are rich and delicious, the beans add protein and texture, and the basil brings a fresh flavor.

Of all the dishes in this book, this was probably the favorite when we were testing recipes. Everyone we tried it on loved it. Although it takes a little time to caramelize the onions, it’s easy (they pretty much just sit in the pan and cook themselves), and you will not believe how sweet and delicious they end up.

I love all pesto, but when it’s homemade you absolutely can’t beat it. It’s so fresh and delicious that you really don’t need to mess with it. This pasta is fabulous hot, but—bonus—it’s also great cold. So you can have it for dinner one night and then take the leftovers for lunch the next day.

This is probably one of the easiest things you will ever make; plus, it gives you an opportunity to try new vegetables. If there are certain vegetables in season or on sale, just substitute those or include them along with the vegetables in the recipe.

This is a cornerstone of Vietnamese cooking. The term nuoc mau was originally coined in southern Vietnam. Northerners know this same ingredient as nuoc hang (merchandising water), probably because it was so often used by food hawkers to enhance the appearance of their wares. Its ability to impart incredibly savory-sweet flavors is the key to simmering meats, seafood, eggs, and/or tofu for everyday kho dishes. Some cooks substitute brown sugar, but the results tend to be too sweet. The inky sauce also lends rich brown color to grilled meats, much as molasses does in American barbecue. Traditionally, the sauce is made by pouring boiling water into the caramelized sugar, a somewhat dangerous step that causes the mixture to bubble and spew dramatically. This method immediately arrests the cooking, so that the sugar doesn’t burn to a bitter black stage. I find it easier to place the pan in a sink partially filled with water, which cools the caramelized sugar, halting the cooking, and then add the water to dilute the sugar. The result with both approaches is the same bittersweet, inky sauce that is a staple in every Vietnamese kitchen.

This simple garnish is great way to finish dishes with a little richness and some bright green color. Small steamed rice pancakes (page 268), sticky rice with roast chicken (page 246), and trout hand rolls (page 110) are only a few of the dishes that benefit from scallion oil.

Slightly sweet, this simple, creamy sauce is used to finish various sweets in the Viet repertoire. Use it cold, warm, or at room temperature, depending on the preparation.

The unusually tart flavor and slightly thick texture of this sauce is great with a simple grilled fish or boiled green vegetable. It is easy to make when you have frozen cubes of tamarind liquid on hand, and can be prepared hours in advance of the meal and left at room temperature.

Our family’s Viet recipe for sweet-and-sour sauce is lighter and more nuanced than traditional Chinese versions. There is no pineapple or tomato ketchup to give it heavy-duty weight and color. Instead, finely chopped vegetables are added at the end, delivering a delicate finish and a colorful confetti-like appearance. Use fish sauce for a lighter color and a slightly briny flavor. Use soy sauce for a darker color and a bolder flavor.

Every time I make this easy dipping sauce, I am amazed at how good it is, especially when paired with such simple dishes as grilled chicken, fish, squid, shrimp, or summer squash or with Poached Chicken with Lime Leaves (page 84). Depending on how you tilt its balance, the sauce may hit your palate with pungency, saltiness, tartness, and/or heat. Kosher salt is the best type to use for this recipe. It is coarse, less assertive than iodized salt, and a little sweet. Assembling this sauce is fun, fast, and up to each individual. As the cook, all you have to do is set out individual dishes filled with the ingredients.

This sauce is intensely flavored by lots of lime juice, which rounds out the edges of the shrimp sauce (mam tom), a salty, pungent fermented staple of the Viet kitchen. The fish sauce lends savoriness, the chiles add heat, and the sugar softens everything. Although the rice vinegar is optional, it helps smooth out all the flavors. This sauce is the traditional condiment with turmeric catfish with rice noodles (page 226).

In the Viet kitchen, tuong refers to various heady sauces made from fermented beans. It might be thin like soy sauce, which some folks call nuoc tuong (tuong water), or thick like this sauce, which accompanies Southern Salad Rolls (page 32), Beef and Jicama Hand Rolls (page 30), chicken meatballs (page 86), and Delightful Crepes (page 277). There are several ways to prepare this sauce, and my family’s version is based on nuoc leo, a sweet and earthy sauce from central Vietnam made with pork liver. We substitute lighter-tasting chicken livers, which are saved from whole chickens used for other dishes. Sweet hoisin sauce tempers the chile and garlic, while tomato paste brightens the sauce, which otherwise would be dull brown. At Vietnamese restaurants, this sauce is often called peanut sauce and made with peanut butter, a nontraditional ingredient. It is convenient and tasty, but not as complex and deeply flavored as this liver version. If you do not like liver or are a vegetarian, make the version in the Note that follows.

Not every meal requires assembling a nuanced tart-sweet-salty-spicy dipping sauce. Sometimes, the food just needs a light dip in something straightforward. This sauce is basically diluted fish sauce emboldened by thin rings of fiery chiles. With only three ingredients, it is important to use high-quality fish sauce and chiles with fragrance and heat.

Used sparingly to coat food lightly, this sublime sauce goes well with seafood, chicken, and even boiled green vegetables. If you are portioning it for your guests, serve it in small, shallow dishes, as a little of it goes a long way. This sauce is so good that a family friend drank his serving. While an electric mini-chopper makes quick work of mincing ginger (cut it into 1/2-inch chunks and use a little lime juice to move things along), a sharp knife will allow you to hone your knife skills. For the best flavor, select a heavy knob of ginger with smooth, thin skin.