The easiest -- by far the easiest -- way to cook is without recipes. Any cookbook that purports to be about easy cooking and then proceeds to dole out some recipes is shucking you. Easy cooking consists of slots, not recipes.

Here's a set of slots for "braised vegetable":

fat

covered pan

vegetable

salt flavoring

optional flavoring

You put the fat in the pan.

If the vegetable is too big, you get it into chunks with a knife or a cleaver or a scissors.

You put the vegetable (chunks) in the pan,put the cover on the pan, and shake it

once or twice to distribute the fat.

You put the covered pan over a low flame and go on to some other task.

15 minutes later you check the vegetable to see whether it's done. If so, you keep the flame low; if not, you turn it up.

Time to serve, you add your optional flavoring plus salt flavoring.

If the optional flavoring is alcoholic, you keep the lid off and turn the flame up for 30-40 secnds to cook off the alcohol and keep the vegetable from tasting jacky.

oven ... optional flavoring from start, salt flavoring from start ...

1. olive oil, covered pan, celery, garlic, sage leaves, white wine salt

2. peanut oil, covered pan, celery, soy sauce

3. canola oil, covered pan, celery, scallions, salt

4. grapeseed oil, covered pan, celery, salami slivers

5. walnut oil, covered pan, celery, pine nuts, salt

Now grade these in order of easiness. #2, with the soy sauce, has flavoring and saltiness combined in one ingredient and requires no extra prep. #4, with the salami, also combines saltiness and flavoring, but the salami slivers have to be cut. #5 has two ingredients where #4 has only one. #3 has two ingredients, but neither of the two (pinenuts, salt) requires any prep.