90 MARCH 2020
became cookware. Early earthenware pots allowed food to be
easily cooked over fire, with the effect of reducing bacteria and
releasing digestible nutrients. Even today, clay plays an enor-
mous, if quiet, civilizing role in human advancements. (You,
reader, are reading this story on clay. The paper industry uses
more kaolin, a type of clay, than the pottery industry to create
these glossy pages, and clay is mined to access rare earth ele-
ments for the cell phone you undoubtedly have within reach.)
Clay pots fell out of favor as metal became cheap and plenti-
ful, but the two materials are not equivalent. Clay cookware
heats up more slowly and more evenly than metal, and it holds
and distributes heat more diffusely. Those qualities are what
make it ideal for simmered soups and curries, for braises or
tender baked meats where the juices create self-basting steam,
and for evenly and perfectly cooked rice or beans. Around the
world, clay is still used for specific dishes whose qualities can-
not be replicated with metal cookware: for biryani and fish
curries in India; mole, beans, and birria in Mexico (and mezcal,
too); cassoulet and beef daube in the South of France; tagine
in North Africa; fish sauce caramel–glazed pork in Vietnam;
crispy-bottomed rice in Hong Kong (see p. 95 for a recipe);
jollof rice in Ghana; spicy chicken stew (kedjenou) in the Côte
d’Ivoire; one-pot soups in Korea; Sri Lankan feasts cooked in
huge pots outdoors; Spanish cazuelas filled with sizzling shrimp
and slowly cooked fish and vegetables; Boston baked beans;
and Brazilian barreado.
While the general thermal properties of clay are universal,
individual clay beds have specific characteristics that confer
unique properties to the cooking vessels made with their clays.
For those micaceous clay pots, for example, the high levels of
mica in the clay from the Taos Pueblo of New Mexico yield
vessels that are both thin and very strong and transmit heat very
well. Cooked food will stay hot in one of these pots for hours
after it’s been removed from the heat.
The dried bed of ancient Lake Biwa in the Iga region of Japan
is home to a special type of clay containing trapped fossilized
sea creatures. When kiln-fired, they burn up and create tiny air
pockets in the clay that hold heat very efficiently. Iga clay is the
preferred medium for making donabe, a low-slung, lidded pot
for cooking rice, fresh tofu, and soups.
Chef Kyle Connaughton uses donabe to
cook most dishes at his three-Michelin-
star restaurant, SingleThread Farms in
Healdsburg, California. “Donabe is about
the terroir of the clay,” he says. “Iga clay
is unique; the way it heats allows for
precise flavor extraction of ingredients.”
That property also makes it the ideal
serving dish to keep food warm at the
table, so at SingleThread, Connaughton
brings many dishes to guests in their
beautiful vessels.
Naoko Takei Moore, Connaughton’s
friend and co-author of the cookbook
Donabe, imports Iga donabe to her Los
Angeles shop, Toiro Kitchen and Supply,
where she also hosts donabe cooking
classes. One of her favorite dishes to
teach is yosenabe, a casual, mixed hot
pot. “For busy parents, donabe will change your life because
you gather the family at the table and cook together,” she says.
The photos under her Instagram hashtag #happydonabelife
radiate a passion and enthusiasm so common among modern
clay-pot cooks.
Clay is even good for cooking in its raw, unfired state. Last fall,
Connie Matisse and her team at East Fork, an innovative tabletop
company in Asheville, North Carolina, with a cult following,
threw a special dinner where clay took the form of a more rustic
cooking medium. Taking cues from traditional Indus Valley and
Chinese cooking techniques, they partnered with local chef
Matt Dawes, who invited guests to wrap sheets of raw clay and
fig leaves around seasoned, buttered quail before setting them
in a charcoal fire. The clay quickly heated and dried, creating a
crust in which the birds steamed. Cracked open, ash brushed
aside, the clay packets revealed perfectly cooked, lightly smoky
quail. “Everything tasted more of itself and had melded with
the fig leaf and spice aromas,” says Dawes.
AFTER MONTHS OF SEEKING OUT clay-pot restaurant dishes—from
the biryani at Adda Indian Canteen in Queens, New York, to
the mole at Masala y Maíz in Mexico City, to the beef tagine at
Bavel in Los Angeles—I grew increasingly convinced that clay
pots deserved a place in my kitchen. But even though I am a
professionally trained cook, I still felt intimidated by the idea of
cooking with clay at home. I went down a rabbit hole of research,
poring over science and history books and religious texts and
talking to chefs and other experts about the lofty intangibles of
cooking with clay pots. All of it was enlightening, but it didn’t
help my confidence. I still struggled with how to translate all
of it to my own home cooking.
So it might come as a surprise that, of all people, it was inter-
national superstar, model, and legit home cook Chrissy Teigen
DONABE
Donabe are made
from a coarse, porous
clay that holds heat
well and distributes it
gently. The slow, even
heat extracts flavors
of meats and veg-
etables into the broth,
coaxing their essence
into the pot while pre-
serving the flavor of
each item, resulting in
richly flavored, clean
(rather than murky)
tasting dishes.
BRING IT HOME:
Kofuku Donabe
(From $270, toiro
kitc h e n.co m)
SOURCE SAFELY
If clay isn’t handled properly by the potter, the presence of heavy
metals and other toxins in some clay bodies and glazes can
cause lead poisoning, exposure to radiation, and a host of other
health problems. Using clay from a reputable source and firing it
to the appropriate temperature are key. Compliance with Califor-
nia Proposition 65 is currently the best measure for determining
whether clay cookware and tabletop items are food-safe. Before
purchasing, speak with your local potters to ensure their prac-
tices are in line with industry standards.
