101 10-Minute Meals

Go beyond the Joy of Cooking with Slate's recommendations

(NEWSER) - What to get the foodie or chef who already has all the classic cookbooks? Slate compiles offbeat favorites recommended by Mollie Katzen, James Oseland and other standout chefs, food editors, and more.

1. Ethan Becker: Cookwise—Less a cookbook than a bible of general cooking knowledge.
2. Dan Barber: The River Cottage Meat Book—"A carnivore's manifesto."
3. Melissa Clark: The Mensch Chef —Traditional Jewish recipe perfection.

Sporks, wine stoppers serve no discernible purpose

(NEWSER) - Have you ever truly benefited from a spork? Do you face a pressing need to bake muffin tops, not actual muffins? The Daily Meal rounds up the most useless food-related inventions:

• Quesadilla maker: Don’t you already have a pan?
• Spork: Use a fork or use a spoon. End of story.

From 'grilled to perfection' to 'garden fresh'

(NEWSER) - Tired of menus that use the same old phrases over and over? So are the food critics at the Chicago Tribune. They nominated nine menu clichés for the compost pile:

• "Grilled to perfection": Subjective to the point of meaninglessness. And why always grilled, and not “boiled” or “baked”? Can only grilling reach perfection?
• "World famous": Almost always an empty boast.
• "Kobe burger": “Kobe” is becoming a general synonym for “high quality”; it doesn't apply unless the beef actually came from Japan.

Putting toxin on salad not so good after all

(NEWSER) - A British celebrity chef has dished out a heartfelt apology for recommending in a magazine interview that readers use a poisonous plant that's "great on salads." He intended to push the wild herb fat hen, not henbane, which is a "very toxic plant and should never be eaten," the magazine has since warned. More»

Perhaps not so health-conscious, but surely cost-conscious—not to mention yummy

(NEWSER) - Faced with a heaping pile of chicken skin and fat after using the rest of the bird in some healthy dish? Those squishy, sallow leftovers, Francis Lam writes in Gourmet, present the perfect opportunity to cook up "the noblest form of chicken byproduct": cracklins. With that extra skin and fat all crisped up, Lam drools, "imagine … sneaking the best part of fried chicken into everything." More»