Make Ahead

The most tremendous veggie casserole in the history of veggie casseroles! I started making it around Thanksgiving as an alternative to broccoli-rice casserole, but it has slowly crept into other meals throughout the year. It's irresistible.

Puffy Tacos: The Pride of San Antonio!

Have yolks left from a recipe? Get curing. Don't want to wait? Cure the yolks and freeze the whites in ice cube trays.

In Argentina, this mix of herbs and spices is combined with oil and vinegar and used as a sauce for grilled meats. For best results, use dried herb leaves—not powdered or ground.

This dough is remarkably easy to work with and is a striking shade of mahogany.

Earthy and sweet with molasses, rich with cream, and bittersweet with dark chocolate, this sophisticated pie is a breeze to make.

Don't let the humble name fool you. These little cookies are bursting with flavor. They're reminiscent of those fig cookies you had as a kid-raised to the third power. The cream pastry is tender and flaky, and the honey-kissed filling, just sweet enough, is deepened by plump Medjool dates. They're also bite-size and adorable.

Earthy and rich without being heavy or filling, this creamy vegetable dip is just the thing to whet the appetite without ruining it before a big holiday meal.

Nutty caraway adds a pop of flavor to this sweet combination of apples, beets, and carrots.

When I traveled to Sicily, I must have eaten no fewer than ten versions of eggplant caponata, and I never got sick of it! I also learned about the agrodolce—or sweet and sour—flavor profile that's so predominant in this dish, and in lots of Sicilian cuisine. My version of caponata is really flexible—serve it with crostini as a make-ahead appetizer, or even as a side dish. The addition of the briny capers, anchovies, and acidic vinegar help cure the eggplant and other veggies, so this dish only gets better in a tightly sealed container in the fridge, where it will last for up to a week.

Appalachian apple stack cake is communal cooking at its finest. Originally, each layer was baked at home by individual cooks, likely in cast-iron skillets, then brought together and assembled for church suppers and gatherings. Instead of the spongy cakes we're used to today, these layers are more like cookies—firmer, so they slowly soften beneath liberal applications of apple butter and cooked apples. This recipe stays mostly true to those principles. Instead of individually baking the layers one skillet at a time, though, use a cake pan to trace a pattern on parchment paper and trim circles of rolled dough to fit it. Bake two layers simultaneously (more if you have a convection oven). The edges of the cake layers won't be as perfectly neat as if you'd baked them in skillets or cake pans, but that's all right. This is a rustic cake.

This pizza dough recipe can be made with storebought active dry yeast or fresh yeast. It makes enough for two 12-inch pizzas. For the best flavor and texture, be sure to stash the the dough in your refrigerator for at least 24 and up to 48 hours before using.

If you don't have both spices, it's okay to omit one or the other.

Almost any fresh fruit (pears, apples, berries) can replace the figs.

The low oven temp and long bake time allow these nuts to take on rich flavor without burning.

Whole wheat flour gives this brown sugar–oat topping a nutty flavor that perfectly complements the sweet-tart apples beneath.