In praise of braising

WILLISTON, Vt. -- In pink clogs, Molly Stevens glides around her kitchen gathering herbs and vegetables for a pot roast. She pauses to admire a 4-pound slab of top round tied with butcher string.

''They try to sell you the bottom round," Stevens says, wrapping a white apron snugly around her, ''but it's just not as flavorful or well marbled." In this town near Burlington, her kitchen -- with flowers, baskets of fruits and vegetables, and a wall hanging that declares, ''Food should be cooked with lots of love and lots of butter" -- embodies charm. And so does the home-style pot roast, one of the recipes in ''All About Braising: The Art of Uncomplicated Cooking" (W.W. Norton), published last month.

The book may tap into a trend. Braising hadn't found a major forum in the cookbook world until now, partly because it lacked the glamour and instant gratification of techniques such as grilling, sauteing, and stir-frying. Once considered a standby of French bistro chefs, braised dishes run counter to highly stylized creations, what Stevens calls ''architectural food."

Now dishes such as braised short ribs are standard fare at high-end restaurants. And home cooks have gained a new appreciation for this quintessential slow technique, prizing its simplicity. At its core, ''All About Braising" is everything you need to know about comfort food. ''Braising is relaxing both for the cook and the people eating it," Stevens says as she reduces liquid in the red Le Creuset pot she used to brown the meat. ''There's nothing fussy or contrived about braised dishes. All you're doing is putting out a big pot of delicious food."

Later in the afternoon, after Stevens's kitchen has filled with the enticing meaty smells that can only come from long-simmered dishes, she pulls the pot from the oven, lifts the lid, and releases plumes of sweet and savory steam. She slices the rich, tender pot roast and garnishes it with sage-flecked carrots.

''All About Braising" includes meat, poultry, game, fish, and vegetables dishes, many culled from around the world: Vietnamese braised scallops, Roman-style braised artichoke bottoms, Moroccan chicken with green olives and preserved lemons, and Caribbean pork shoulder. Not content with a mere collection of recipes, Stevens included sections and sidebars with advice on shopping for ingredients, using the right equipment, and, of course, technique. Her commentaries celebrate Grade B maple syrup, exonerate anchovies, and demystify deglazing.

''Beyond the recipes and techniques, I love that she goes into the 'why' of things," says chef Michael Haimowitz of Bambara in Cambridge.

In fact, she's been answering questions for students and family members, which is one way she knows when something isn't clear. Her brother may be the perfect example. One day last month, he called about the zinfandel pot roast. The problem was that he didn't have any zinfandel.

''He said he only had white wine," she recalls, laughing. ''I told him it'd be fine. Braising is such a forgiving way to cook."

Stevens is a natural teacher, which is the compliment the tough-minded cookbook editor Maria Guarnaschelli gave her when they met. In the book industry, Guarnaschelli is known to hand out few compliments. In 1996 she gave one to Stevens.

The author was writing articles for Fine Cooking magazine and one of her book reviews caught Guarnaschelli's attention. ''Maria called me after reading it and said, 'Should I know you?' " Stevens recalls.

On the phone from Norton's offices in New York, Guarnaschelli picks up the story. ''What I meant was, 'Why don't I know you?' " the editor recalls thinking. ''She's one of the most skilled cook-teachers I know." Guarnaschelli enlisted Stevens to edit parts of ''The All New Joy of Cooking." In time, Stevens coauthored the cookbook ''One Potato, Two Potato" with Roy Finamore and contributed to the Williams-Sonoma cookbook series. But when she started ''All About Braising," her first solo project (edited by Guarnaschelli), Stevens says she suffered ''a crisis of confidence." It took a while for her to settle into the project, encouraged by her husband, Mark.

A Buffalo native, Stevens first came to Vermont to attend Middlebury College; she became obsessed with the crusty baguettes from a local bakery. ''I asked the baker where he learned to make this bread, and he said France," Stevens says. ''That planted the seed." After graduating, she bought a one-way ticket to France and entered a nine-month program at L'Ecole de Cuisine La Varenne, the bilingual cooking school in Burgundy. ''I discovered there was this whole world out there that was all about food," she says.

She spent nearly three years in France, returned to the United States to work at New York's French Culinary Institute, and then began teaching food theory and science at the New England Culinary Institute in Montpelier. ''She's a remarkably intelligent person," says NECI dean of students and faculty Howard Fisher.

Still, none of that prepared Stevens for the grueling job of testing 600 dishes to get 125 recipes. ''The vegetable chapter kept getting bigger, partly because I had to balance our diets," she says.

Stevens can now calmly reflect on the experience. ''I cooked 13 pork roasts in one week." Four carpenters were working on her house at the time, so she knew whom to feed.

''It turns out that three of them were vegetarians," she says, then adds, ''Only in Vermont."