Recipes from New Kitchen Basics

New Kitchen Basics Cookbook

Most of us buy the same ingredients week in, week out, and cook the same old recipes. Cookery writer Claire Thomson wants to encourage people to ditch the boring chicken stir-fry and the all-too-predictable spaghetti, and enliven their cooking and eating.

Claire takes our 10 favorite ingredients and reinvents them as modern classics. With sections on chicken, tomatoes, eggs, ground meat, pasta, potatoes, salad, lemon and chocolate, each chapter covers the basics about that ingredient, then offers 12 recipes using each in ways that will brighten up mealtimes. Claire’s cooking is simple yet imaginative, and her kitchen expertise and knowledge of flavor combinations means that these dishes will become your new standby meals.

A white oval platter topped with fresh mozzarella with roasted stone fruit and toasted bread pieces.

Mozzarella with Roasted Stone Fruit

Sensual. Sumptuousity. Sexy. Just a few of the lovely words we’re hearing in conjunction with this stunner of a summer supper. Can’t quite be described. Just experienced.

An apple rose tart, shaped to look like a rose with a scoop of ice cream beside it on a white plate.

Apple Rose Tarts

Stunning to behold. And actually remarkably simple to make. Allow us to introduce you to your latest dessert obsession.

Two halves of grilled cheddar jalapeno popper sandwich stacked on top of each other

Grilled Cheddar-Jalapeño Popper Sandwich

A big fat sandwich of deliciousness. That’s how one person referred to this brilliant riff on the classic grilled cheese that’s salty, tangy, spicy, melty, and mood-lifting as heck.