Dinner

You only need one bowl to mix this easy, cheesy, savory-and-sweet corn muffins.

Monte Cristo sandwiches usually have a sweet element, like powdered sugar sifted over the top, or raspberry jam served on the side for dipping. In this version, you’ll cook green apple and canned green chiles down into a sweet and spicy compote to slather on your bread.

This shepherd’s pie uses ground chicken and leans toward warming flavors, incorporating bright bursts of the tropics—ginger, habanero chile, lime—as well as aromatic Angostura bitters.

These crispy, golden brown crepes get slathered with an aromatic mushroom spread, then rolled and dredged in breadcrumbs before pan-frying.

Tagines are typical street food in Morocco, and this is the one that is most commonly found, except that street vendors cut the potatoes into small dice and I prefer to use new potatoes, which I leave whole if they are very small or halve if they are medium.

This omelet is flavored simply with nearly charred onions and fresh chives. To ensure the accompanying frites are soft and pillowy on the inside, they’re cooked in salted water before being fried.

This omelet, with its rich, comforting, fiery gravy, is enjoyed for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Of course, you could also whip it up deep into the night, the time when most Goan partygoers looking for something to fuel their endless dancing sessions seek it out on the lively Goan streets.

No chopping required for this weeknight dinner. Just blend spinach, kale, basil, and garlic with feta, cream cheese, and olive oil to make a fresh, rich sauce that wraps itself around pasta.

These chicken and mushroom spring rolls are spiced with the sweet and salty flavors of kecap manis, the syrupy soy sauce for which Indonesia is famous.

Serving whole fish during Chinese New Year symbolizes the wish for prosperity throughout the year and many happy returns. When you serve whole fish, it's traditional to point the head toward the most distinguished guest.

This mixed vegetable dish takes its inspiration from Buddhist vegetarian cooking and can include any combination of ingredients that represent good luck, prosperity, happiness, family wholeness, and longevity. 

Rice cakes are available sliced, marble-shaped, and in batons. There are dried versions, but the refrigerated version is widely available and easier to work with. You can use any combination of vegetables and seasonings here, so feel free to experiment with flavors.

One great thing about dumplings is that you can use practically anything in the filling—and you can pan-fry them, or boil them, or deep-fry them.

The collar is one of my favorite parts of the fish. Baste it with naturally sweet and salty flavor from briny kombu and dark sweet prunes. The briny and sweet sauce is easy to make ahead and store in the refrigerator. The collars of a large fish, such as cod, is the part between the head and the body; it has a (healthy omega-3) fatty richness that is ultra-satisfying. 

This recipe for salted salmon is excerpted from Maori Murota’s Tokyo Cult Recipes. The method, called shioyaki, can be adapted to fish collars as well.

I love to cook with ingredients that might otherwise be discarded, like fish collars. If you’re tempted to treat them as scraps, please don’t throw them away or use them merely for a stock. They’re delicious as the main focus of a dish—think of them as the spareribs of the sea. Here, croaker collars are marinated in citrus, chipotle, ginger, and fish sauce, and served with a mango salad full of funk, spice, and crunch.

This easy dinner is inspired by gomen, an Ethiopian dish in which greens are flavored with an aromatic spiced butter. Breaded tofu is a delightful counterpoint.

Make fast roast chicken by using a rarely used part of the oven: the floor. The intense heat under your skillet from the oven’s floor quickly cooks the chicken and allows its skin to become remarkably crispy.

Packed with greens, these boiled dumplings easily go vegetarian by switching out the ground pork for crumbled tofu.