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Mina Stone, author of Cooking for Artists, opens her first restaurant, Mina’s, at MoMA PS1 in Long Island City, Queens, this November. Here, she talks about her affinity for top-quality olive oil.
How would you describe your approach to cooking?
I feel like I’m a home cook. I like to give people simple recipes, oftentimes [ones] that are important to me and relate directly to my [Greek-American] heritage.
Is there a lesser-known ingredient that you like to use in your dishes, and if so, why?
I’ve got to say, I don’t use any lesser-known ingredients. I can’t think of one. I use a lot more olive oil than most people in America. It’s not a lesser-known ingredient—I just use it in quantity.
Why so much olive oil?
With good-quality olive oil across the board, you really can’t lose. I wrote this in Cooking for Artists—I think that when you ask people to use a lot of olive oil in their cooking, you have to give them the source for where to get good-quality olive oil that doesn’t break the bank. There are shops throughout the U.S. where you can get a liter of olive oil for $20, and it’s olive oil from Greece, so it’s not mixed from a few different countries, which is usually the case of poor-quality olive oil, like Bertoli. When you have good-quality olive oil, to me, it tastes like heavy cream, and it’s fruity and fresh. I bake all my baked goods with olive oil, too. I know a little bit about wine—I can tell good and bad—but I’m never the kind of person who can sit there and smell wine and talk about the different flavor notes, though I can do that with olive oil.
What’s a food related-memory you’ll never forget?
I was seven years old when my grandma in Greece made me two Greek fried eggs and french fries—which is my favorite nighttime meal. I licked the plate clean, and I was like, “Look, now you don’t have to wash it!” Out of the corner of my eye, I caught her washing it. For some reason, that has always stuck with me.
