‘With Love, Meghan’: A most lovely lifestyle show

There is an easy and casual elegance to Meghan, who cooks and moves around barefoot most of the time. It helps that we like so many of the same things—cooking with a lot of fruit and veggies, making flower arrangements and using edible blooms, handwritten notes. The crafts were practical—bath salts to delight a house guest, candles made from the beeswax from her beehives, wrapping gifts and making gift baskets. Edible flowers go on everything, from ice cubes to salads to cookies.

There is no other show like this, with a focus on little everyday joys or social connections with friends. She focuses on creating moments that maximize joy with little details, like an herb tucked into the bow of a bag of cookies or writing out a menu with her rather beautiful script. She also expresses her thoughtfulness by making sure to research and serve her guest’s favorite tea, coffee or drink. 

But at the end of the day, it was the food that I thought was particularly beguiling. From the very first episode, where Meghan cooks a one-pot pasta dish for her friend and longtime makeup artist Daniel Martin, I was hooked. Everything goes into this heavy skillet—tomatoes, garlic, lemon zest, uncooked pasta, boiling water—nothing is sauteed ahead of time. After the water has reduced, cheeses, herbs and greens like kale are thrown in. 

“The only thing better than eating food is making food for someone else and watching them eat it with delight,” says Meghan, who clearly enjoys cooking with and for her friends. A bottle of bubbly often accompanies these kitchen collaborations. 

Apart from the pasta, the dish I knew I was going to recreate at home was chicken tinga tacos, which Meghan learns from chef Ramon Velasquez. The chili-accented tomato sauce, which he picked up from one of his cooks at a staff meal, is combined with poached chicken and served as part of a taco bar for easy entertaining. 

It was a joy to see my idol, an older Alice Waters, wash and wrap up lettuce leaves in towels for a salad, then make a vinaigrette. Alice Waters revolutionized food in America in the ‘70s when she opened Chez Panisse, which makes fantastic produce the star of her restaurant meals. 

In the last episode, Meghan’s husband Prince Harry finally makes an appearance, as does her mom and the friends who appear throughout the series. From this, my takeaway is the cookies topped with—what else? Edible flowers, fresh and dried.

You can get most of the recipes from the Netflix site though the one-pot pasta dish and the cookies were not included. Here, I’ve quantified those and simplified the others even further. I started off with the pasta, the chicken tinga, the salad with vinaigrette and the cookies because they complement each other in one meal. My next projects? Vicky Tsai’s potstickers and Roy Choi’s milk-brined Korean fried chicken with watermelon and strawberry kimchis.

One-Pot Pasta

Place in a heavy skillet with a lid:

• 2 Tbsps. olive oil
• ½ kilo cherry tomatoes or ordinary ripe tomatoes, cubed
• 3 cloves of garlic, peeled and sliced
• Zest of one lemon
• ¼ tsp. each salt and pepper

Lay on top:

• 250 grams uncooked spaghetti

Set over medium heat and cover with:
Boiling water

Cover the saucepan and cook for half the prescribed time on the box. Remove the lid to let the pasta finish cooking while the excess liquid evaporates.

Add:

• A handful of sliced dark greens like kale or spinach
• 2 cups grated assorted cheeses like parmesan

Check for seasoning.

Chicken Tinga Tacos

Process in a blender:

• 10 quartered ripe tomatoes
• 1 onion, quartered
• 4 peeled garlic cloves
• 2 cups chicken stock
• 1 tsp. oregano
• 1 tsp. chili powder (preferably using a Mexican chili like ancho or chipotle)
• 1-2 pieces chipotle in adobo sauce (you can order this online)

Heat in a frying pan:

• 2 Tbsps. olive oil 

Add: 1 sliced onion

• Pour in the blended sauce plus: Cooked, shredded chicken

Serve with:

• Tortillas or taco shells
• Sour cream
• Chopped cilantro
• Crumbled white cheese

Salad Greens with Alice Water’s Vinaigrette

For Alice Waters, the oil in a vinaigrette is about double that of the acidic element, which can be a nice wine vinegar or lemon juice. Taste and adjust along the way.

Wash well:

Assorted salad greens

Place them between kitchen towels, roll up and set aside until you need them.

For the vinaigrette, crush in a large mortar:

• 3 cloves garlic

Add:

• ½ cup olive oil
• ¼ cup wine vinegar or lemon juice
• Salt and pepper

Rich Butter Cookies With Edible Flowers

Cream together:

• 1/2 cup butter
• 2/3 cup sugar

Add:

• 3 egg yolks
• Blend in:
• 1 ½ cups flour
• ½ tsp. baking powder
• ¼ tsp. salt
• Shape the dough into a log with a 2-inch diameter. Wrap in parchment and chill until firm.

Cut the dough into ½-inch slices and place on a baking sheet. Top with bits of:

• Edible flowers

Bake at 350F about 12 minutes or till the bottom is lightly browned.