Cornmeal

When my mother made fried zucchini for us, she would slice the zucchini lengthwise into 1/ 4-inch slices. Sometimes she would flour them, dip them in egg batter, cover them well with bread crumbs, and fry them, as I do here. But sometimes she would just dip them in flour and eggs and fry them. I liked them both ways. The ones without bread crumbs I make often for a vegetable buffet or antipasto. After they are fried and drained, I roll them like a jelly roll and serve them just like that. The best zucchini to use for this—and most—recipes are small ones, about 6 inches long, with bright skins and a firm texture. Zucchini of this size are called “fancy” in the restaurant business. You’ll see them labeled like that in some markets as well. Fry the zucchini in batches for better results. Overcrowding the oil when frying zucchini, or for that matter anything, lowers the temperature of the oil drastically, and that causes a lot of problems. First, the food becomes poached and not fried, and absorbs much more oil. The zucchini pieces will stick to each other and cook unevenly, without the nice, crispy crust which is one of the reasons we fry in the first place.

Serve with steamed broccoli or cauliflower.

Algerian polenta fritters are soft and creamy inside and crisp and golden outside. They are eaten hot, but you can prepare them in advance and reheat them. They are delicious.

Corn pudding is deliciously simple to put together.

Our microwave polenta technique puts an end to nonstop stirring.

This corn bread stuffing is a stroke of genius. It's so easy, you'll be making it far more often than once a year for Thanksgiving! Shelley Wiseman, author of Just Tacos, knows a thing or two about corn—and not just in tortillas—and she decided to skip the process of drying the cubes of corn bread in the oven. That alone is a huge time-saver. To enliven the corn bread, she balances the flavor punch of chorizo with the sweetness of onions and corn kernels. When it comes time to bake it in a dish (not inside the turkey), she forgoes the old process of covering the stuffing—which allows steam to soften the dried bread—because the bread isn't dry. She simply bakes it uncovered, so that the top gets golden with crispy brown edges, while the interior stays moist.

An elegant twist on the pineapple classic. You can use any kind of pear you'd like.

Polenta is cornmeal and comes in yellow and white as well as in instant form. Served on soup plates and eaten with a spoon, this soft polenta is topped with a mushroom stew that is particularly delicious when it incorporates some wild varieties. A satisfying side, the polenta can also be served in larger portions as a vegetarian main course.

This is my cornbread, the one I offer up as what real cornbread ought to be: skillet-born, sugar-free, and bacon-blessed. Heating the bacon drippings in a cast-iron skillet is important. When the batter hits the hot fat, it sizzles and starts forming a deeply browned, crispy bottom crust that tastes like a good hushpuppy. Some people omit flour from their cornbread, but I find that it helps hold the cornbread together when it's cut, particularly when I use coarse stone-ground cornmeal. My sweet daddy and I grind our own cornmeal on a 1923 Meadows Mill that my great-grandfather, Papa Will Reece, bought new. The mill is considered portable, but it weighs several hundred pounds and must be hauled on a stout trailer. It's powered by a hit-or-miss engine, one of the first machines used in farming. Daddy hauls the mill and engine to heritage festivals and such all over the country. The whole operation is really something to see. For your cornbread, seek out the best whole-grain stone-ground cornmeal available in your community or order it from ansonmills.com. Fresh whole-grain meal is quite perishable, so store it in an airtight container in the refrigerator or freezer.

The use of countless aromatics to flavor bread lies at the center of Germany's rich whole grain baking culture. Breads are often prepared with different grains and grinds of flour to achieve distinctively textured loaves. In this 100 percent whole grain loaf, I use spelt for its pleasing mild flavor, but you can use regular whole wheat flour. Yes, this is a thick-crusted loaf, unlike any bread you will find in a U.S. supermarket or pretty much anywhere else, but the inside will be chewy and soft with seeds and spices. Give it a day, and the crust will soften from the humidity in the air. Enjoy this unusual aromatic bread with cheese and cold cuts as a simple supper, or use as a base for a nourishing sandwich. It's also delicious with a bowl of soup. This is an effortless no-knead bread made using an old technique, most recently revived by New York master baker Jim Lahey. I have taught students to make a slow-fermentation bread with minimal yeast for years, albeit in a plain old loaf pan — initially inspired by a recipe by German cookbook author Luise Brüggemann. I credit Lahey with introducing me to the use of a lidded heavy pot and a simple folding technique to get a truly spectacular artisinal bread — no wonder his method has won him cult status. If the lid of your Dutch oven has a plastic knob, be sure to wrap it in aluminum foil so it doesn't melt in the high heat of the oven.

This zucchini-flecked cornbread walks a delicious line between sweet and savory.

Buttermilk and honey makes these muffins remarkably tender and indescribably delicious. We love this recipe with raspberries, but you can also use any berries you have on hand.

Turnip, mustard, and collard greens star in this southern-style soup.

This thick soup has a texture almost like porridge.