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Thursday, January 23, 2020

A Michelin-star chef shares 9 classic recipes every home cook should know how to make

[Spaghetti alla carbonara]Natasha Breen/Shutterstock * Michelin-starred chef Josh Emett curated and recreated 300 classic recipes around the world for his new cookbook "The Recipe." * Speaking to Insider, the New Zealand-based chef shared nine essential dishes that he believes every home cook should know how to make. * The list includes some classic staples like eggs and chicken pot pie.  * But it also includes international recipes like Ireland's colcannon dish, China's wonton soup, and England's banoffee pie.  * Visit Insider's homepage for more stories. When Michelin-starred chef Josh Emett began working on his new cookbook "The Recipe," he first made a list of hundreds of dishes that he considered to be classic.  "They had to be a thing," Emett told Insider. "They had to be something that was completely embedded in people's culture or way of life."  Having compiled over 300 recipes from 150 chefs from around the world for his book, it's safe to say that Emett knows a thing or two when it comes to essential recipes, which is why Insider asked the New Zealand-based chef to share the dishes that he believes every home cook should learn to make.  While some are beloved staples like eggs and chicken pot pie, there are also a number of dishes from around the world that Emett believes are easy enough for anyone to add to their repertoire. WHEN INSIDER ASKED MICHELIN-STAR CHEF JOSH EMETT TO SHARE ESSENTIAL RECIPES FOR EVERY HOME COOK, THE FIRST WORD THAT CAME OUT OF HIS MOUTH WAS "EGGS." Lenasirena/Shutterstock "They definitely should know how to make decent eggs because I think that's a staple," Emett said. "Whether they're scrambled eggs, or a really good boiled egg."  There are nearly a dozen different ways to cook an egg, and they all depend on your preferences. Do you like hard-boiled or soft-boiled? Hard-scrambled or soft-scrambled? Over-easy or sunny-side-up? And don't forget poached eggs or omelettes!  However you like your eggs, just make sure to keep practicing with them.  "Practice makes perfect," Emett said. "The first time you make something you're going to cock it up, it's not going to go well for anyone. The second time you'll figure it out, the third time you'll get pretty good, and the fourth time you'll probably really start to enjoy it and really start to figure out what you can do." _You can find multiple egg recipes in Emett's book, "The Recipe."_ EMETT BELIEVES EVERY HOME CHEF SHOULD MASTER A CHICKEN POT PIE. Africa Studio/Shutterstock The origins of chicken pot pie are said to date as far back as the ancient Greeks, who served a mixture of chicken and vegetables on an open pastry shell in a dish that they called Artocreas.  Chicken pot pies were also popular in the Roman Empire, where they were served at lavish banquets and were said to sometimes have "live birds under the crust," according to the Los Angeles Times.  Meat pies of all sorts have since become staples around the world, and in America it's especially common to find chicken pot pies in our supermarket freezers.  But Emett believes chicken pot pies can be "very satisfying to make" at home, and has some tips for turning the recipe into a "quick midweek option." "We all love a pie with a flaky pastry top, which makes this the perfect family-friendly dish that will win hearts every time," he said. "Just buy a cooked chicken and stock, both the best quality you can get your hands on — free range and organic is my preference." _You can find chef Bruce Poole's chicken pot pie recipe on pages 206 - 208 of Emett's book._ SPAGHETTI ALLA CARBONARA CAN EASILY BE MADE IN 10 MINUTES, ACCORDING TO EMETT. Natasha Breen/Shutterstock There are two main theories as to how spaghetti alla carbonara — an Italian dish of eggs, guanciale (Italian cured meat from pork cheek), black pepper, and pecorino Romano cheese — came about.  The first known reference of the dish can be found in the 1957 American guidebook "Eating in Italy," according to The Houston Chronicle. Many believe that the recipe was created in World War II, when Italian cooks combined the rations of bacon and eggs given to them by American soldiers with their own local cheese and pasta.  But others say that the dish was actually invented by the "carbonari," an Italian word for workers who made charcoal by burning wood. They say that as these workers mixed pasta, cheese, and cured meat for their meals, specks of ash from the charcoal would fall into the dish — black pepper was said to have been introduced to the dish later to pay homage to this. However spaghetti alla carbonara came about, Emett loves that the classic Italian dish "can be knocked up in 10 minutes."  "This is a dish you could make when in a hurry or to impress friends," he said. "And it's a must-have in any cook's repertoire."  _You can find chef Giorgio Locatelli's recipe for spaghetti alla carbonara on page 50 of Emett's book._ SEE THE REST OF THE STORY AT BUSINESS INSIDER SEE ALSO: * I tried all 16 items on Chick-fil-A's breakfast menu and ranked them * 13 cliché travel photos tourists need to stop taking * I kept track of how much sugar I ate in a week, and my home-cooked meals were the worst culprits


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