Buttermilk

A bold medley of cumin, cayenne, corn, and cilantro ups the flavor here. Great with: Grilled-fish tacos, steak fajitas, or chipotle-rubbed chicken.

This creamy chilled soup will make you hope for an abundance of zucchini in your garden this year. Thin-sliced zucchini blossoms, available at produce markets and specialty foods shops, add a beautiful hint of color while lending texture to the soup's smoothness.

This tangy dressing really livens up a plate of crisp salad greens. It's also great on a baked potato or as a dip.

The buttermilk in our recipe makes these airy rolls especially tender.

Corn bread sweetened with sugar must be a Yankee invention, because corn bread in the South is always a savory staple. We like to keep it simple, but don't stint on the fat, whether butter or bacon fat (or oil, if you must). Corn bread, corn muffins, and corn sticks should all be cooked to a dark shade of golden brown and turned out while hot, the steam rising fragrant with the aromas of corn and bacon, as you break into them.

Created during the '20s at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco, Green Goddess dressing goes modern here with the addition of goat cheese.

These delicious pancakes are light and moist; the texture is a cross between a crepe and a pancake. Avoid overmixing the batter (it's okay if there are lumps) to ensure that the pancakes will be airy.

These drop biscuits are as tender as they are easy; since the dough isn't rolled out, there's no chance of overworking it. <p> This recipe is an accompaniment for <epi:recipeLink id"230464">Turkey Sloppy Joes on Cheddar Buttermilk Biscuits</epi:recipeLink>.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Tangy buttermilk custards are a delicious foil for sweet tropical fruit.

Cream of coconut is added to the batter and the whipped cream frosting. You can make and chill the cake up to one day ahead.

"Moist and pretty in color when blackberry, currant, or some such jam was used, [jam cake] was a favorite with pioneer women, for it kept well," James Beard wrote in his American Cookery (Little Brown, 1972). The only thing more that might be said about jam cake is that it is delicious.

Although pure maple syrup is a tried-and-true accompaniment to waffles, we've come up with something a little different for the following recipe. Here you'll find a choice of a savory topping as well as a sweet one.