Recipes

Daniel Patterson · NYT Cooking

Daniel Patterson · NYT Cooking

In 2007, if you were looking for a sign of the culinary times, you could do no better than the one prominently displayed in San Francisco, in my local Übermarket for the conscientious shopper: “Organic Summer Squash, $3.99 a pound.” Our growing food fetishization created a new produce category: luxury squash. I was disturbed but also intrigued: perhaps familiarity had blinded me to squash’s delicate charms — at these prices it clearly deserved more than a typically bland sauté or a quick turn on the grill. Given its etymology (the word “squash” comes from a Native American word meaning “eaten raw”), maybe it shouldn’t be cooked at all. So I swallowed hard, bought some zucchini and shaved them into a salad with fennel, mint and pecorino, which made a delicious and interesting starter.

Daniel Patterson · NYT Cooking

Daniel Patterson · NYT Cooking

Daniel Patterson · NYT Cooking

Daniel Patterson · NYT Cooking

Daniel Patterson · NYT Cooking

Daniel Patterson · NYT Cooking

Daniel Patterson

Daniel Patterson · NYT Cooking

Molly O’Neill · NYT Cooking

Molly O'Neill

Dorie Greenspan · NYT Cooking

Dorie Greenspan

Julia Reed · NYT Cooking

Julia Reed

Jason Epstein · NYT Cooking

In this case do not add ginger to the parsnip purée since the halibut steamed with rosemary will have its own flavoring. Jason Epstein

Jonathan Reynolds · NYT Cooking

Jonathan Reynolds

Sam Sifton · NYT Cooking

This recipe for an elegant North African stew comes out of the kitchen of Boulud Sud, Daniel Boulud’s sophisticated Mediterranean French restaurant in New York. It is a dish steeped in the flavors of North Africa, but also of France. Chicken serves as the protein, bathed in a blend of North African spices — cinnamon and coriander, turmeric, ginger powder and cardamom — combined with tomatoes, saffron and a little stock. Preserved lemons and olives added at the end provide bite. Tagines are often cooked with root vegetables and dried fruits. Boulud, who famously grew up on a farm, in Lyon, uses cauliflower. ‘‘It is maybe a little more French approach to the tagine,’’ he said. Blanching the cauliflower and tomatoes before cooking them may cause some cooks to blanch themselves. But the effort is worth it. Sam Sifton

Dana Bowen · NYT Cooking

Dana Bowen

Dana Bowen · NYT Cooking

This recipe dresses up the chowder with chorizo and pan-fried hake, an inexpensive cousin to cod. Dana Bowen

Dana Bowen · NYT Cooking

Dana Bowen

Dana Bowen · NYT Cooking

Korean New Year, Solnal, is greeted with steaming bowls of rice cake soup called tteokguk - "comfort food," said Moon Sun Kwak, who serves it at Dok Suni and Do Hwa, her family's restaurants in Manhattan. Her mother, Myung Ja Kwak, who is the chef, slowly simmers beef bones into a marrow-rich broth as the base for the soup. "It's so healthy," the elder Ms. Kwak said as she dropped homemade dumplings into the soup in Do Hwa's kitchen. Not all versions of the soup have dumplings; it's the tteok, or rice cakes, that matter. "You eat it so you can turn a year older." Dana Bowen

Dana Bowen · NYT Cooking

Thit kho to – a sticky-sweet pork dish with funky undertones of nuoc mam – is often served on Tet Nguyen Dan, the Vietnamese New Year and the nation's most important holiday. This recipe is adapted from Michael Bao Huynh, a chef and restaurateur who came to the United States as a refugee in 1982. Thit kho to is traditionally made with pork belly, but it can also be made with pork shoulder butt (as shown in the photo) – a lighter though no less delicious alternative. Serve the meat over a pile of snowy white rice with a bottle of hot pepper sauce nearby. Dana Bowen

Dana Bowen · NYT Cooking

Dana Bowen · NYT Cooking

Dana Bowen

Dana Bowen · NYT Cooking

Frank Castronovo and Frank Falcinelli, who own the Frankies Spuntino restaurants in New York, prefer to keep it mellow. "I cooked on the line for 18 years," Mr. Falcinelli told The Times. Mr. Castronovo, equally low-key, said, "We like to take the easy approach." That means many of their dishes, like vegetable antipasti, grilled meats and wine-stewed prunes, are cooked well ahead and assembled to order or served at room temperature. In this version of braciola, the meat rolls are covered with canned tomatoes that become sauce as the meat cooks. "My grandfather calls it gravy," Mr. Falcinelli said. "For the Sunday sauce, you do spareribs, sausage, meatballs, braciola." The Franks’ version is lighter, meant to be eaten with salad and bread, not steaming pasta. Leftovers are good for sandwiches the following day. Dana Bowen

Dana Bowen · NYT Cooking

Dana Bowen