Pan fried steak with dijon white wine sauce

While a grilled steak can be pretty good I'm not happy unless there's a sauce. For me, pan frying a steak is where it's at. A splash of wine, a bit of stock - in this case veal stock - and a couple of flavour highlights and you move into serious territory.

French Roast Chicken with Lemon, Rosemary and White Wine

In France they serve roast chicken with this unbelievable brown sauce. It's one of the great roast chicken recipes, up there with Zuni cafe and Marcella's chicken with lemons.

Lemon Thyme Chicken

Lemon, thyme, garlic and chicken. Some flavours just work together. You see them over and over. Nothing original here but it works. A bit of white wine and some crushed chili flakes round it out. Just tasty. 

Panzanella

Panzanella is a tuscan tomato salad from the land of endless summer. If you like tomatoes and you like bread you owe it to yourself to try it at least once.

Creole Chicken

Creole chicken. Spicy, creamy, a little bit rich. Satisfying. Maybe not what jumps to mind when you think comfort food but satisfying in a way only a fricassee can be. 

Simple Homestyle Indian Chicken Curry

This recipe is a simple homestyle curry. I did this to make a truly approachable curry recipe. It's still work - Indian cooking is not simple - but I made this on a Tuesday night in about an hour.

A twist on the chicken sandwich

A twist on a chicken sandwich. Hard to believe but true.

Montreal Smoked Meat

I love sandwiches. My absolute favourite sandwich is the Montreal smoked meat sandwich. Piled high on rye bread with ballpark yellow mustard and served up with a kosher dill. It's Canada's answer to pastrami and the only place you can get it done right is Montreal. 

Sous Vide Pork Carnita Tacos

Sometimes you screw up. If you don't you're not trying hard enough. That's exactly how I came up with this. I was trying to make these amazing pork carnitas cubes I saw Rick Bayless do. When they hit the frying pan the pork lard melted and they self destructed. Time to make tacos!

Killer Mac and Cheese

This is one of those recipes that you have to be careful with. It's very, very good. It's so good that it can outshine your lovingly prepared mains. I know. I've done it to myself. More than once. 

Texas BBQ Beef Ribs

Texas knows beef. Texas knows barbecue. Shouldn't be a big surprise to anyone that Texans make awesome barbecue beef. 

Reverse Sear Steak

If you already know about reverse sear steaks there's nothing new in this post. If you haven't yet jumped on the reverse sear bandwagon then please read on. 

Vietnamese Pork Bun

Sometimes it's just too hot to really want to eat. You know what I'm talking about. Simple cool rice noodle salads are a refreshing meal when the nights are hot and sticky and days are unbearable. 

Chicken Paprikash

Chicken paprikash with fried gnocchi

This isn't authentic. Paprikash is a braised dish. This is technique I came up with to try to get somewhere close to braised chicken flavour while keeping the skin nice and crisp. 

Hot and Fast Beef Brisket

If anyone is maintaining a list of phrases that just don't make sense please add "Hot and Fast Beef Brisket". That just goes against everything anyone ever suggested. In this context though hot means 300F and fast means around 7 or 8 hours so it's not as crazy as you might think.

Best Potato Salad

Best potato salad - that's a very big claim. Maybe it's not the best but it's up there. Something about the tang of the sour cream and the salty crunch of the pickles comes together beautifully. 

Roasted Brussel Sprouts

I like brussel sprouts. There. I said it. Now you know. This recipe intensifies the flavour of brussel sprouts so don't serve them with anything delicate.

Salmon Nicoise

Technically this isn't nicoise salad but you could use tuna - that would be closer. And you could add hard boiled eggs and anchovies and then it would be nicoise. But it's in the ballpark - riffing on the concept. And it's a dead easy, tasty weeknight meal.

Simple French Vinaigrette

A nicely balanced dijon based vinaigrette is a great alternative to bottled salad dressings.

Chicken with Calabrian Chili Sauce

Braised chicken with Calabrian chilies - and crispy skin. Keeping the skin above the surface of the liquid keeps it from softening.