New Years

The bright green of the fried asparagus with the yellow egg sauce and the orange salmon roe topping makes a colorful display.

Savor raw oysters served with three spicy, slightly sweet, and fiery salsas.

This was one of those invented-while-walking-up-and-down-the-aisles-of-the-supermarket dishes; the thought process in it is a good example of how one uses taste elements to design a dish. It was a cold day and the idea of a hearty pork roast conjured up some equally substantial lentils. Then the hard salami and figs suggested themselves for salt and balancing sweetness. We figured the bulbiness of the onions would pull up all of the strong tastes in the wild palate of this recipe. Serve with lentil stew.

It's important to note that the pumpernickel used in this tart should be very dense. Although we prefer the light-brown Danish pumpernickel, the dark German-style variety works just as well. For the filling we've suggested lumpfish caviar, which is readily available in the States; in Sweden, the fish roe called lojrom would probably be used. It comes from bleak, an ocean fish from the Baltic Sea.

The creation of chef Monique Barbeau of Fullers at the Sheraton Seattle Hotel & Towers. Serve the terrine as an appetizer with toasted bread, or as a cheese course accompanied with a glass of Port.

These crackers are wonderful with figs and a big hunk of Stilton

This is quick, easy and delicious - the perfect addition to a holiday buffet.

Also known as a Champagne Cocktail.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Ciro Verde of Da Ciro restaurant in New York makes great thin, crispy-crust pizzas. One Saturday at i Trulli restaurant Ciro gave us a pizzamaking lesson. He told us how he had learned to make pizza in Naples and gave us pointers on how best to use a wood-burning oven and how to improve our technique. A highlight of this session was Ciro's recipe for this tasty pie stuffed with robiola cheese and drizzled with truffle oil, which he claims to have invented. First, the dough is flattened with a rolling pin to elminate air pockets. Then the dough is pierced with a docker, an instrument that punctures the dough and helps to prevent it from puffing up too much in the oven. The flattened disk of dough is baked without any topping. When it is partially done, it is removed from the oven, split in half, and spread with cheese, then baked a second time until brown. Just before serving, the pie is drizzled with truffle oil. Since it is so rich, we like it best cut into wedges as an appetizer. Robiola is creamy cow's milk cheese. Soft fresh goat cheese is a good substitute. If you don't have truffle oil, which is available at many gourmet shops, the pizza will taste great anyway.

Celebrate with a bottle of Champagne.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

This dish is also known as Texas caviar.

Hoppin' John is a traditional southern dish of black-eyed peas and salt pork served with rice. Here, it's a risotto dotted with black-eyed peas and flavored with bacon and pancetta. This is an unconventional method for making risotto — rather than slowly adding hot stock to the rice, Rollins adds it, unheated, in just 2 batches. This will allow you more time for preparing the chops that go along with it.