I’m Samin Nosrat, Host and Executive Producer of Salt Fat Acid Heat, and This Is How I Eat

In the world of food, Samin Nosrat is a palate cleanser. While she’s a treasure trove of culinary knowledge and wisdom, neither her award-winning book nor her Netflix shows ever seem prescriptive. Instead, it invites the reader or viewer to learn, eat and enjoy the food while radiating joy and warmth. Keeping this spirit of generosity, she was kind enough to tell us how she drinks coffee, what Trader Joe’s favorite dish is, and why eating boiled vegetables can sometimes feel like a vacation. (She also let us look into her refrigerator.)

Location: Berkeley, California

Current performance: Cook, teacher and writer, and host and executive producer of the Netflix series Salt Fat Acid , based on my award-winning book of the same name.

One word that describes how you eat: joyful.

Could you walk me through a typical day in terms of food?

I don’t have many ordinary days, but when I am at home and working in the office, I think this is my most ordinary life. I take my thyroid medication in the morning, so I can’t eat for an hour after that, so I usually have a slow start to the day. Then I brew coffee from what I describe to people as “half enough to make it look like Haagen-Dazs coffee ice cream,” so much that other people would be embarrassed.

I’ve been in the funny oatmeal phase for the last, I don’t know, a few months. It was strangely soothing. I make this instant oatmeal with cinnamon. I chop three medjul dates and put them there, and then add some flaxseed. I have a whole little kit that I built for myself. I just mix everything together and then add a large spoonful of almond butter and frozen blueberries and then add the halves. My mom made us oatmeal when I was little, and I often went hungry, like an hour later. Therefore, I find slicing dates and adding sugar from fruits, which also contain fiber, are beneficial. A friend of mine called it a “powerful breakfast” and he made it for me, and I usually don’t like all the “super foods,” but it was so delicious and so good that I thought, “I’m going to make this. for myself. “I feel like I’m doing something to take care of myself because I’m eating this big, hearty dish. Then I can make it to lunchtime without feeling like I’m about to fall.

How do you eat lunch?

I have an office where I write with about two dozen local writers. We have some kind of rudimentary kitchen situation, so I usually take leftovers with me, if I have any, and just heat them up or eat them to room temperature. Monday is both the hardest day to work and my favorite day, because my friend Dominica Rice has opened a really amazing Mexican restaurant about 10 blocks from the office, and on Mondays she makes a green mole. I’m like, “Oh my God, the only reason I have to get out of bed on Monday is a big mole.” And the thing is, it relieves the pressure from me. Because most of the time on Sundays I am really exhausted, I worked hard and I did my shopping and stuff like that. This way I release the stress of having to cook a lot in order to have leftovers if I allow myself to have lunch once or twice a week. I realized early in my office life when I left the restaurant that if I dine out every day, it’s really bad news, and that often I can’t do anything in the afternoon because I’m just digesting.

I will say that by the time I started working in the office I was, I think, 31 years old, and this was the first time in my life that I was really a home cook and a person who commuted to work and got ready to work. Since I went straight from college to world-class cuisine, I always had a relatively complex idea of ​​what “lunch” is. In the restaurants where I worked, we always tried to dine with nice staff, and we had a lot of different things to choose from – salads and some main course and some pasta or rice or whatever. So it took me at least a year, when I went to work and was surrounded by everyday eaters and home cooks, to realize that, like, “Oh, people just bring meatballs from yesterday’s dinner and eat them with carrot sticks, and this is lunch.” and that I didn’t have to make such a big deal, and I could still be full and satisfied.

So it was really good, and in some of my most desperate times, you know, it’s just a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. If I really don’t have anything, I take two corn tortillas and a can of beans, and it’s a lot less pressure than I once had to cook my own meals. And at the same time, it’s really nice to be able to eat some homemade leftovers or – I don’t know – just some salad mixed with the bottled salad dressing we keep in the office. I keep my home and work freezer well stocked with frozen vegetables. At work, I love these Green Chili Tamale from Trader Joe’s; they are so good. This is my super emergency food.

This is the perfect answer to two questions that I was going to ask you later: “What do you think of frozen convenience foods?” and “what do you buy from Trader Joe’s?”

It’s so good. I live on my own, but still I am a professional chef, but it seems like a person can zoom out as much as possible and it is very difficult for me to cook for one, so I always have leftovers that I really learned to consider as a way to take care about yourself in the future. Often it will be just a little boiled rice, vegetables, or something else. So I bring this, and I have it at work. I always have snacks. I realized that I can’t have too tasty snacks. Me and sugar friends in my office, if we buy ice cream, we can eat it all in one day. But if they are also too virtuous, I will never eat them.

So is it about finding a balance?

Yes, exactly in that place. There is actually a blend from Trader Joe’s that has some chocolate in it. And the good thing [in office work], since I have a routine, I am really hungry for lunch, especially if I go to the gym, I really want to eat something when I go home. And usually by then – because I haven’t cooked very much and sit in front of the screen all day – often I’m really really happy to go home and cook something and use my hands.

When I travel I try to keep the fridge really full of both fruits and vegetables, and then when I go to the grocery store I always buy two, three or four vegetables, so I always have a lot to choose from. There is usually nothing too out of the ordinary; this is broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, cabbage, or something else. So, I’ll make a combination of fried, boiled, or steamed vegetables and herbs, followed by either eggs or tofu. I eat really easy when I’m at home – when I don’t have a reason to eat abundantly, because most of my social life and the social part of my work is spent on eating really heavy foods, or just eating really interesting things or thinking about food. So for me it’s almost like a vacation to eat boiled vegetables.

It’s not on the same scale, but I go through the same thing when I just want to make myself a hamburger and it’s just American cheese.

Fully. This is one of my favorites; I really love American cheese. Then I go through small phases like sausage phases are what I buy for myself – and I make sausage and sauerkraut or whatever, or I go through minced meat phases where I just buy minced turkey and make burgers from turkey or minced meat. lamb and make lamb meatballs. But I’m definitely a phase person.

One thing I liked about your last episode of Salt Fat Acid Heat was that you said your favorite meat is chicken. What do you think is the most common mistake home cooks make with chicken?

Well, usually it all starts with buying a breast without bones and skin, there is nothing wrong with that from the very beginning, but the skin is a kind of protective agent, and the bone is also often protective; they help protect you from digestion and drying out. And so if you’re going to buy boneless and skinless breasts, you really need to be on high alert to protect them from overcooking. The really sure way to actually do it – and sometimes I say, “I can’t handle it,” so I just buy boneless and skinless – so if I do that, a really great, quick and easy way to make a breast is rub it finely into the so-called ” paillard”. “I like to push them between two plastic bags with a little olive oil on top and bottom, and then if I have a hammer, I knock on it, or, as a last resort, I used the bottom of a bottle of olive oil. Grind it very finely to get a nice, thin and even piece.

In many ways, people digest their breasts due to their uneven shape. It has a large, thick top and then a thin bottom, so if you cook the lean bottom until the top is done, the bottom will be completely dry. So I suggest at least rubbing it in until the top is much thinner and even [bottom]. But if you get even thinner until you turn into a large thin pie, then you can turn on the cast iron skillet or any other skillet that you have very hot, and then add a little oil and the breasts will cook so quickly. – it will probably take 90 seconds on each side, maybe two minutes on each side. And you get that nice brown, thin, juicy thing, and you get a lot more browning because it has such a large surface, and that’s a good way to keep it from being overcooked .

But otherwise my favorite product: I usually buy chicken thighs. I find them so versatile. If you pull out the bone or buy boneless thighs, you can cook them skin side down in a cast iron skillet by placing another cast iron skillet on top. I have a recipe in my book that is so simple and cooks as quickly as a grilled chicken breast. But you get that amazing moisture from the thighs and the scent that comes from the skin. You get this incredibly fresh skin. The book calls it “chicken on the conveyor belt,” but it’s kind of a version of “chicken out of a brick” or “chicken under a brick.”

Do you have an order ready if you find yourself in the casual simple diner?

I am a minded person. I love melted tuna. If this is a breakfast situation – for example, if the potato brings pancakes with them – then I will order two eggs for a light breakfast to get the potato pancakes.

Do you have snacks at the cinema?

Ouch! I wish I was the person who went to the movies more. But, I mean, I would say very oily popcorn.

Do you have a special way of making popcorn at home?

Yes, I absolutely do; I’m so glad you asked. A friend of mine gave me an antique popcorn pen which is so good because not a single grain of corn is left. So, I have a multi-fat situation. I use coconut oil to pop the corn because it gets very hot and forms almost the same varnished crust on the outside of the popcorn. It becomes so clear. This is so amazing. Then I melt the butter, add salt and nutritional yeast, and put them on the popcorn. I love nutritional yeast. I kind of want to come up with a way … Can I make a savory granola out of it? I do not know. I’m trying to come up with a new way to take nutritional yeast to the next level.

I’d love to hear about it if you come up with something. Returning to the potatoes: do you have a favorite fries?

Unfortunately, it has been so many years since I regularly ate in places that usually serve fries. I can’t tell you the brand, but I believe in double-fried potatoes, which are very crispy on the outside – McDonald’s fries are double-fried. In most cases, fast food fries are fried twice. As a result, the double fry becomes completely starchy and creamy on the inside and crispy on the outside. There was once an example of fries at In-n-Out Burger, which I’m not a fan of. Since it is fried only once, the outside is too brown and the inside is not creamy enough. So I really like the pale golden potatoes, they are salty, crispy and creamy on the inside.

Do you have a preference for the shape?

Ouch! Good questions! I mean, I would go for the classic long skinny chips, but I would never go without waffles or kinky curls.

What I like best is when you order regular fries and then there is a waffle or figurine.

Oh, I like it. I like it.

You said you love melted tuna. Do you have a favorite sandwich that you make at home?

Houses? Well, BLT season has just ended. I eat a lot of turkey sandwiches at home. The grocery store near my house serves roasted turkey and it tastes good. I love getting the turkey where it is sliced ​​at the grocery store, not the prepackaged items I buy too, but usually the prepackaged foods kind of fill up with water, it’s just a different texture and a different taste. I believe there is a lot of mayonnaise on a sandwich, and if not mayonnaise, then some other moisturizing agent. Hummus is good.

I love mayonnaise and hummus as a combination. Tomatoes. I love the marinade. And I love crunchy things. And also my secret that I usually make is not even a “secret”, but probably my special feature of a cook: I like to add cilantro to my sandwiches. Or any herbs, but most of all I like cilantro. For me, as a chef, fresh herbs are what enlivens food. It’s just a way to make it a little better.

In the episode ” Acid,” I loved it when you said you used to grease everything with yogurt and I was wondering if you still do that sometimes, especially if you need something comforting?

I was at an event the other day doing interviews on stage and we talked about yogurt and I admitted that I always added it to everything, including pasta, when I was a kid. My brothers and I applied it to literally everything, both because of its acidity and creaminess, and because it was a way to cool hot food faster so that we could eat. I really love the taste of my mom’s meat sauce – spaghetti with meat sauce – with this yogurt. It was the taste of my childhood. But then, when I became a chef and went to Italy, I was horrified by the idea of ​​putting yogurt on pasta. So I confessed it in front of this whole crowd, and this Italian stood up and said, “It’s okay; pasta yogurt is okay. ” [Yotam] Ottolenghi wrote a recipe for yogurt pasta in his book. So I thought, “Oh my God, amazing.” And this Italian said, “Look: this is about what I want to stretch, but as soon as you add mayonnaise to the pasta, you’re done.”

I almost hate asking, but if you could only choose one source of fat, one source of acid, and one source of salt, which would you choose from each category?

I would pick lime as the acid, I think I would just pick salt – like Maldon’s salt. I think I would just pick olive oil, but it’s really tricky. But I had given myself the same challenge before, so I was prepared.

Coming back to salt: how many types of salt do you have in your kitchen?

I have two kinds that a friend sent me to test, then I have Diamond Crystal and fine sea salt that I use to test recipes, and then I have Jacobsen, a fine salt made in Oregon. I have Maldonian salt – six. I have sel gris – seven. I have a beautiful pink salt that I bought in Australia – eight. Oh shit, you know what? A butcher friend gave me one to nine. I bought both [from the show] in Japan – so this is eleven. Many of them have spilled over into the living room because my kitchen is small. I really only use Diamond Crystal and one of the flaked salts on a regular basis. And then when I’m testing sea salt recipes. So, I really only keep three on the counter or shelf.

Do you have your usual “sad lunch”?

One of the things I always buy at the grocery store is sweet potatoes. And if there really is nothing left in me, I will cut them in half and fry them with the meaty side down so they are really browned. Then I take them out and, depending on what I have at home, I mostly do the baked potato situation. I rub all the insides of the potatoes and grate a whole bunch of hot cheddar cheese and then [add] the hot sauce. I either use Valentina, a Mexican pepper that I really like with vinegar, or I love Calabrian chili. There is a bunch of Calabrian pepper paste in the Italian food section, so I’ll add some Calabrian chili in there and then add yogurt or sour cream in there and that’s definitely my dinner with sad TV on the couch .

Can we take a look at your refrigerator?

Yes.

Moving slightly, what is your position with the knife?

I have a really great knife situation. I have a beautiful magnetic wood strip on my wall. I cook for so long and collect knives for so long, so I have a lot of them. I give out a lot. My favorite, which I bought for six dollars from a thrift store. I took it to my cutter and thought, “Where do you think this is from?” It’s a huge carbon steel knife, a big, big chef’s knife. It’s probably twelve inches long and it’s just a thing that isn’t actually made anymore with a nice chipped wood handle. I’ve always wanted to try polishing the handle. But I don’t think you need fancy knives to cook well. I would recommend buying Victorinox knives – they have excellent all-round chef knives that can be purchased for $ 40.

In terms of gadgets, these are food processors, blenders, and then hand blenders. Do you have a favorite?

I inherited the old Vitamix from someone, so it was my thing that I really liked; I had this fancy blender even though it was very old. But I never took it out. While it’s amazing how well it grinds food, and when I cook for the job, it’s really enjoyable. It was just painful to pull it out from under the shelf where I kept it, washing and cleaning it every time. So, for a long time I didn’t have anything, and then when I was testing recipes for my book, I often wanted to recommend an immersion blender, but I didn’t have one. So I googled wazoo. I bought this one in Breville , and it’s not cheap – I think about a hundred dollars. This is an amazing immersion blender; it can get really, really, really pretty smooth, but it also has a mini food processor attachment. And honestly, for the amount I make for myself and then [for] the recipes I write for six or eight people maximum, I never needed more. Since I live in an apartment with such a small kitchen and such small storage space, I cannot justify buying a completely different tool. I mean when I was working in a restaurant it was definitely important to have both, but this little guy is so cool because he gives me the best of both worlds.

On that note: do you have any little kitchen tips?

Well, I created as large a surface as possible while cooking. I bought Costco – and I’m sure you can buy it on Amazon too – just like a stainless steel table. I think the kitchen – before I moved – people who have been there before used it as a small kitchen for eating, which could hardly be for two people. So I removed this eating area and turned it into a workspace. And honestly, whenever I know someone who is remodeling their kitchen and asks me for advice, I say, “You can never have too much counter space,” so all you can do for creating surfaces is really the best advice I think.

Who else would you like to see to answer these questions?

Michelle Obama, Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, Jonathan Van Ness, Terry Gross, Maggie Haberman, Mary Oliver and Wendy McNaughton.

This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

More…