Kiera Wright-Ruiz

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

There is macaroni and cheese, and then there is special occasion macaroni and cheese like this one. Discover more ideas for the big day at NYT Cooking.

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

Yuca, also known as cassava, is a root vegetable used around the world to make many beloved regional dishes as well as flour, tapioca and even laundry starch. It is similar to the potato, but it is harder, has a thicker brown skin and has a tough fiber running through its center. It often has a subtly floral, lightly sweet taste. Here, yuca is boiled, mixed with loads of mozzarella, then fried until golden brown to make bolitas de yuca y queso, a popular dish in Latin America that is also known as yuquitas rellenas or bollitos de yuca. The crunchy panko coating complements the creamy, melty center. For this particular recipe, fresh yuca works best. Frozen yuca retains too much water and could make the bolitas too mushy to hold their shape.

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

Horchata, a sweet cinnamon drink popular throughout Latin America, is typically made by soaking white rice in water, straining through a fine-mesh sieve to eliminate solids, if desired, then sweetening the liquid with sugar and cinnamon. But the horchata at Guisados, a chain of taco restaurants in Los Angeles, is different. It's made with whole milk and is served plain, or “dirty” with a shot of cold brew concentrate — and the chain sells up to 700 a day. This is an adaptation of its caffeinated version, and it serves a crowd. (You can leave out the coffee or halve the recipe, if you like.) Enjoy it with something spicy on a hot summer’s day. Kiera Wright-Ruiz

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

Now considered a classic Hawaiian dessert, guava cake was created at Dee Lite Bakery in Honolulu, where it became widely popular. This version is adapted from blogger Alana Kysar’s “Aloha Kitchen: Recipes From Hawai‘i,” a cookbook of traditional Hawaiian dishes. Outside of Hawaii and California, pink guava concentrate can be tough to find, but you can also use white guava concentrate or 100 percent guava juice. (If using juice, you’ll need to reduce it; see Tip below.) To mimic that lovely pink color, add a few drops of red food coloring. If you don’t, the cake will still taste like guava, but will look more like a vanilla cake. Kiera Wright-Ruiz

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

Horchata is a Latin American beverage that’s made by soaking nuts and grains in water then seasoning the mixture with sugar and spices. The drink originated in Spain over 1,000 years ago, but many countries have their own regional variations. This is an adaptation of a Mexican version, also known as agua de horchata, that’s made with rice, sugar, cinnamon and almonds, which provide rich flavor and texture, but leave them out if you like. Serve horchata over ice alongside a plate of spicy food — or try this dirty horchata recipe for a caffeine kick.

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

In Malay, kaya translates to rich, which perfectly describes this toasted bread spread with custardy kaya jam and cold salted butter. Kaya toast is popular throughout Malaysia, Singapore and other regions of Southeast Asia where pandan, the star ingredient, grows as a tropical plant with palm-like leaves. Kaya jam is made with fresh pandan, coconut milk, palm sugar and lots of eggs, which make it creamy. In this version, adapted from Kyo Pang, the founder and the executive chef of New York City’s Kopitiam, milk bread slices sandwiching kaya jam come with soy-seasoned half-boiled eggs for dipping. Kiera Wright-Ruiz

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

This classic Hawaiian dish is similar to Japanese hambagu, a ground beef patty topped with a ketchup-based sauce, but loco moco is heartier, served atop a pile of white rice, smothered with caramelized onion gravy and topped with a fried egg. People in Hawaii enjoy it for breakfast, lunch, dinner or any time in between. This version is adapted from “Aloha Kitchen: Recipes From Hawai‘i,” by Alana Kysar, a cookbook of Hawaiian classics. Kiera Wright-Ruiz

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

Tender in the middle and crisp at the edges, maduros, or sweet fried plantains, are served as a side dish throughout the Caribbean and Latin America. Plantains change color as they ripen: They are firm when green and unripe, then soften as they turn yellow, and eventually, black. Like bananas, plantains develop more sugar as time passes. For the sweetest maduros, use blackened plantains — they have the most sugar, and will yield a more caramelized result. If you can only find yellow ones at the store, buy them in advance and be prepared to wait over a week for them to fully ripen. They’re worth it.

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

Mesoamerican women are believed to be the first to ferment and roast cacao beans, a crucial step in chocolate making that is still used thousands of years later. Then, it was prepared as a frothy, unsweetened drink for rituals and medicinal purposes. Later, Spanish colonists brought the ingredient back to Spain, where sugar, cinnamon and vanilla were added, making it more similar to the spicy-sweet beverage we know today. This recipe is adapted from Churrería El Moro, a restaurant in Mexico City known for churros and hot chocolate. To get the signature foamy top, use a molinillo, a Mexican wooden whisk, or a wire whisk to make it light and frothy. And while it’s not traditional, you can also put the hot chocolate in a blender for about 2 minutes.

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

If you’ve ever walked through the streets of Los Angeles late at night, you may have been lucky enough to happen upon a street vendor selling bacon-wrapped hot dogs piled high with caramelized onions, sautéed peppers, pico de gallo, avocado, ketchup, mustard and mayonnaise. This version of Mexican hot dogs, also known as street dogs or Los Angeles hot dogs, is believed to be a riff on a similar recipe that originated in Sonora, Mexico. In Los Angeles, they’re sometimes fried on a mobile D.I.Y. griddle made with a wheeled cart, a large sheet pan and a heat source underneath, but we don’t recommend trying that at home. For this recipe, a standard sheet pan and an oven will do.

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

Atole, a hot, corn-based drink popular in Central America, provides warmth and comfort when the chilly weather hits. This Mexican-style version, from Veronica Ruiz, a home cook who grew up in Mexico City and immigrated to the United States in the 1990s, is made with milk, cinnamon, piloncillo (pure cane sugar) and masa harina, a finely ground corn flour also used to make tamales and tortillas. You can find strawberry, coconut, chocolate and many other flavor variations of atole, but this one is rich and satisfying, and allows the corn flavor to shine.

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

To find the best burritos in San Francisco, you have to go to the Mission District, a historic Latin American neighborhood known for its vibrant culture and food. There are many places there to get a good burrito, but La Taqueria, which won a James Beard Award in 2017, is a favorite. Miguel Jara, who emigrated to the United States from Mexico, opened the restaurant in 1973 because he missed the cuisine of his home country. Mission burritos are known for their giant size (about eight inches long), and are packed with a hearty serving of meat, beans, salsa verde, pico de gallo, cheese, avocado and sour cream. Most Mission burritos include rice as well, but Mr. Jara believes it takes away from the flavors of the meat. No garnish is necessary, but the aluminum foil wrapper is required: No real Mission burrito is served without it. Kiera Wright-Ruiz

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

Gyoza are plump, Japanese dumplings typically filled with a mixture of ground pork, cabbage, chives, ginger and garlic. They originated as a spin-off of Chinese jiaozi, but they differ in many ways, particularly in how they are wrapped: Gyoza have very thin wrappers sealed with signature pleats, while Chinese jiaozi have thick wrappers that vary in how they are sealed. Throughout Japan, you can find gyoza steamed, pan-fried and deep-fried, and in recent years, lattice-edged dumplings have become popular. Made by pouring a slurry of flour and water into the pan with the dumplings, the water evaporates and the batter creates a crisp, lacy net. This pan-fried version is adapted from “The Gaijin Cookbook: Japanese Recipes from a Chef, Father, Eater, and Lifelong Outsider,” a collection of Japanese recipes from the chef Ivan Orkin, an owner of two ramen shops in New York. (Instructions for creating a lattice are below the recipe.) Kiera Wright-Ruiz

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

Spam, the love-it-or-hate-it canned ham, was introduced in 1937 and gained popularity during World War II, when more than 150 million pounds were shipped to American troops overseas. Soldiers introduced it to locals, who used the product to create spin-offs of regional dishes like Japanese onigiri and Korean budae jjigae. According to Hormel Foods Corporation, residents of Hawaii eat more Spam than those of any other state. A popular way to eat it there is in the tradition of Japanese omusubi: Stack a pan-fried slice of Spam and a rice patty and wrap a piece of roasted nori around it. This version of the dish is adapted from “Aloha Kitchen: Recipes From Hawai‘i,” a cookbook of classic Hawaiian dishes by Alana Kysar. Kiera Wright-Ruiz

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

Tamagoyaki, a Japanese staple, is made by carefully rolling several thin layers of cooked egg into a rectangular omelet, which creates a soft and delicate texture. Traditionally, it’s made in a special tamagoyaki pan, but this version also works with an 8-inch nonstick skillet. There are sweet and savory variations, and this recipe falls somewhere in between the two: The soy sauce, mirin and dashi pack it with umami, while the sugar adds a subtle sweetness. The technique can be challenging at first, but do your best to keep each layer consistent in color and each fold parallel to the last. Don’t worry about little tears; they’ll be covered up with the next layer.

Kiera Wright-Ruiz · NYT Cooking

A staple dish throughout the Caribbean and Latin America, tostones are crisp, flattened plantains that are often served as appetizers and side dishes. Unlike sweet maduros, which are made with very ripe, almost black, yellow plantains, savory tostones are made with unripe green plantains. Tostones are fried twice: The first fry sears the cut sides of the plantains, establishing a base layer of color; the second fry ensures that every edge is golden and crunchy. Tostoneras, wooden tools designed to create the perfect tostone shape, come in handy here, but a flat-bottomed cup will do just fine in its place.