Almond

If you want to impress at a dinner party, this is the dish to make. The secret ingredient? Jordan almonds, those impossibly hard candies handed out at weddings. They turn into a gorgeous caramelized crust on the roasted duck breast. Simply cooked baby turnips make an elegant accompaniment.

It’s the surprising combination of sweet, tart, creamy, and crunchy additions that makes me crave this summery soup. This gazpacho is all about the garnishes.

This colorful salad dresses up a plate, especially if the central dish is monochromatic. With spinach and oranges, it packs a lot of valuable vitamins. I recommend this salad frequently throughout the book.

This crisp salad is a delightful accompaniment to many Asian-style grain, noodle, tofu, or seitan dishes. I recommend it quite often throughout the book.

One of my favorite things about Paris—after the museums, the streetscapes, the Seine, the style, the beauty, and so on—is the green beans. Yes, you read that right. Parisian green beans are ubiquitous, and always served perfectly ripe and tender-crisp. Here at home, perfect green beans seem to be available only for a month or so in the summer. This dish is a nice way to highlight them during that brief window; however, I’m so fond of it that I use frozen green beans so I can make this regularly. I highly recommend using organic whole baby green beans, if you can find them; otherwise, French-cut beans will do.

Slender green beans, slivered tempeh, and colorful bell pepper make for a tasty trio. The time-saver here is the use of frozen organic baby green beans, available in most any natural foods store and many supermarkets. If you have more time, do use fresh slender green beans, by all means, when they make their rare appearance at your local market.

We use a very similar crumb mixture to make the Torta Sbrisolona (page 99) and the Jam Crumb Bars (page 122).

This recipe is a perfect way to use day-old or store-bought croissants.

This torte is best eaten the day it is baked, when the crust is still crisp. You will need a nine-inch bottomless tart ring; a springform pan will also work. Instead of making the jam, you can use 1 1/4 cups store-bought raspberry jam.

These traditional French cakes, usually baked in rectangular tartlet pans, are named for their resemblance to bankers’ bars of gold.

The almond crumb crust is mixed by hand and doesn’t require any rolling, which makes this a great pie for beginning bakers.

This tart can be made with store-bought or homemade puff pastry. If using store-bought, you will need one 17 1/4-ounce package, which includes two sheets; divide the filling and the cherries in half, and bake two galettes instead of one.

This classic tart has a filling of frangipane (an almond-flavored cream) and caramelized pears enclosed between two layers of puff pastry. The tart is named for the French town in which it was created. It is best eaten the day it is baked.

These elegant cookies, found in nearly every pastry shop in Paris, have a crisp exterior and a slightly chewy center.

Nonstick baking mats will help these crunchy cookies bake evenly and hold their shape. Once the batter is made, it can be kept in the refrigerator, covered with plastic, for up to five days. Bring it to room temperature before using.

The traditional Italian flavors of almond and anise are delicate enough for teatime yet equally good with strong coffee or espresso.

These bars provide the perfect contrast of crisp and gooey. For a chocolate variation, omit the jam and evenly scatter fourteen ounces of finely chopped semisweet chocolate over the cooled crust before proceeding.

This giant round of crisp cookie topped with large clumps of streusel is a specialty of Mantua, Italy. It’s perfect served with a bunch of grapes at the end of a dinner party. Set it in the center of the table and let guests break off pieces.