Parsley

There's enough garlic butter here to drench every morsel of lobster meat—you'll want to serve crusty bread on the side to soak it all up.

Roasting the meat for almost seven hours makes it tender and succulent. The bright, fresh salsa verde is the perfect accent for the rich meat.

The intensity of the garlic is balanced by the freshness of the parsley.

When a meat is "potted," it's usually preserved beneath a layer of fat or made into a paste such as shrimp paste or deviled ham. Miss Lewis, however, merely cooked the birds in an iron pot on the stove. She gives the option of roasting in the oven, and that's what we did because it plays up the contrast between the rich, tender, moist dark meat and the crisp skin. Miss Lewis would never waste any part of such a luxurious bird, so she chops up the livers and adds them to the bread stuffing, which may look unprepossessing but is actually delicious. This is a simple, elegant meal, so treat yourself to a wonderful Bordeaux.

If you read Edna Lewis's cookbooks, you will come to understand that southerners do not boil their vegetables to death. They cook them until they are perfectly, magnificently tender—and there's a big difference. Try this versatile side and see: It's absurdly easy and full of deep, sweet flavor.

Editor's note: The recipe and introductory text below are from Rick Tramonto's book Fantastico! I unabashedly love beef tartare and yes, this is my favorite crostini, particularly because I gild the lily with a drizzle of truffle oil! Steak tartare has been around for a good long time, and according to legend, its name refers to the Tartars, the nomads who roamed eastern Europe, for a time under the leadership of Attila the Hun. Fierce and bloodthirsty, the Tartars purportedly ate raw meat for strength. Tartars were Huns, but "beef hun" just doesn't have the panache of beef, or steak, tartare. If you've never had beef tartare, try it my way; then make it your way by omitting what you may not like such as capers, Worcestershire sauce, or anchovies. But don't fool with the beef. Buy the best you can from a reputable butcher. I use prime beef when possible, but because it is sometimes hard to find, I may turn to high-quality choice beef instead.

Thanks to Simon and Garfunkel, the fresh herbs in this dish are forever linked. But the folk duo probably never knew how good they are on top of al dente bucatini, a thicker-than-spaghetti hollow noodle.

Editor's note: The recipe and introductory text below are from Jamie Oliver's book Cook with Jamie.

Start with a large platter.

You can slice and dice the ingredients for these no-cook pizzas in advance, but serve them right after assembly so the flatbreads don't get soggy.

This pretty side dish (the onions open up like flowers) would be great alongside steak or roast chicken.

Make the vibrant lemon, tarragon, and parsley butter up to three days ahead and then toss with hot blanched green beans for an easy last-second side.

Floating on the surface of this pale, silky soup, which tastes of the essence of parsley, is a trompe l'oeil surprise: What looks like shaved truffles is actually thinly sliced chestnuts, adding a nutty sweetness.

You've encountered a million potato-bacon-cheese combos in your lifetime, but in retrospect they all seem to be rehearsals for this one, a classic of Miraglia Eriquez's Calabrian grandmother Mary Pacella, who immigrated to Brooklyn in 1934. Crispness abounds, from the bacon to the slight crust on the roasted potatoes, yielding to creamy, very potatoey interiors.

A bit of soppressata and cheese stuffed ingeniously between each leaf gives these artichokes a heartiness worthy of a special course. (Eat them as you normally would, scraping the leaf with your teeth—but in this case you'll get a mouthful of flavor-packed filling, too.) Using a pressure cooker speeds up cooking time and also results in incredibly tender artichokes.

This gets a delicious lift from lemon in the butter, in the gravy, and under the skin, plus a shortcut for "preserved" lemons.