Roasted Potatoes, Leeks, and Bacon

Here is a very nice dish for a warm winter lunch or a simple, light supper, which I made from a recipe in chef/restaurateur Tom Colicchio’s book Think Like a Chef. I’ll have some things to say about the book later in this post; first, I want to show you how I made the dish.
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For a half recipe’s worth, I used the white part of one very large, fat leek, four small, unpeeled German butterball potatoes, and two ounces of slab bacon. Other than a little spicing, that’s all there is to it.
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Bravely eschewing the services of my bespoke knife man, I cut up all those ingredients myself. This entailed some decision making, as will be explained below.
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In a big cast-iron skillet, I heated extra-virgin olive oil. Though I very rarely use extra-virgin oil to cook in, I felt the few but significant flavors in the dish deserved it this time. Into the pan went the potatoes, leeks, bacon, salt, pepper, and a few sprigs of thyme.
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I cooked the mélange, turning everything frequently, for about 15 minutes, until the bacon began to render and the leeks began to brown. Then I transferred the pan to a 350° oven and roasted it, turning everything occasionally, until the potatoes were tender. The recipe said this was to take 15 minutes; mine took about 30.
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Those three simple flavors were a marriage made in heaven. In the mouth, they didn’t exactly blend, but they seemed to accentuate each other’s savoriness. (That’s umami, I guess?) Whatever, I could eat this dish every week! For a bit of lily gilding, next time I may top it with poached or fried eggs.

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Now, about Colicchio’s book. The man is a brilliant chef, and I’ve enjoyed many dishes at his restaurants, as well as from this book. His “think like a chef” concept urges you to consider different foods and cooking techniques, how they go together, and what can be made of them. Those parts of the book are interesting and thought-provoking. He also wants to free his readers from feeling that they must follow a recipe exactly.

But the book’s weakness is in the recipes it provides. The author often seems not to realize what amateurs need to have specified. For instance, the potatoes in this recipe: If he expects the dish to be ready after 15 minutes in the oven, how thick should I have sliced the potatoes? He doesn’t say.

And the leek: There are huge variations in leeks’ thickness and length, as well as in the proportion of green to white parts. When he says to prepare the leek whites by quartering them lengthwise, is he expecting them to be 6-inch lengths? 8-inches? Mine would have been closer to 10 inches – which I think would have been unpleasantly stringy when cooked. Not even thinking that I was thinking like a chef, I cut them quite a bit shorter.

It’s fine and fun to try to think like a chef, but it would be nice if Colicchio had thought a little more like a hopeful new cook. Many of us can figure things out on our own, but beginning cooks need complete, consistent instructions; and even experienced cooks appreciate them.

Furthermore, when I’m trying a new recipe, I like to learn the effect its creator originally intended, before I think about putting my own slant on it. Professional chefs, with years of experience, make such judgments easily and quickly. We home cooks have a tougher time of it.

End of gripe: Whew! I feel better for getting that off my chest.