There was a time in the late 90's when Lori and I made a stir fry once a week. But it's been over 10 years, and tonight we decided to follow a Bittman recipe from HTCE to refresh our memory. It was pretty great... Nothing to blow anyone out of the water, but a really welcomed addition to our BBQ-heavy repetoir! Looking forward to modifying it when leftover veggies can make up a meal... such a great last minute dinner option.

Also, here's a no brainer: follow the directions on a bag of rice! I haven't in years, and when I did so tonight it was the best rice I've ever made. Imagine that.

I won't write up my recipe for this one because its pulled from Bittman entirely and while the meal is pretty simple, the steps he takes you through would be longer than everything else i've already written about this meal. But if you don't have "How To Cook Everything" by Mark Bittman, you need to get it. Now!

After several attempts at Lahey's all-the-rage no-knead bread (all of which consistantly fell short of what I wanted), I turned to Bittman's recipe for basic French bread. And holy crap it was AMAZING.

I didn't take any pictures of making the dough, but you mix in a food processor for maybe 30 seconds. That's it. And it's crazy easy and crazy good. After making the dough (instant yeast, flour, salt, water), you let it rise for 2 hrs. Then shape it, and let rise 2 more hours. Here's a shot of three loaves rising in my homemade "couche"

And then 25 minutes of baking turned out this:

nice razor blade cuts (thanks to Tracy via her friend Adam)! I didn't have a spray bottle to mist the oven, so I just kept a tin of water in there the whole time.

Which worked well... Check out that crust!

And a great crumb.

This was the best baguette I've ever had. Honestly. I don't see how I could go back to Lahey's approach after this... This was way easier and much better!