I’ve been a fan of Mark Bittman since I read his How to Cook Everything years ago. Bittman is a columnist for the New York Times. His column, “The Minimalist,” presents a common-sense approach to preparing food. In his new book, Food Matters, Bittman applies the concepts that Michael Polian presented in last year’s In Defense of Food. Of Bittman’s 77 recipes in this book, I made copies of 12. I’ll let you know how the easy whole grain bread recipe turns out.