Recipes

Amanda Hesser · NYT Cooking

Amanda Hesser

Melissa Clark · NYT Cooking

This grilled and smoked salmon recipe by the food writer Betty Fussell calls for curing the fish for several hours with salt, brown sugar and spices before smoking it over indirect heat on your grill. While the fatty fish absorbs the smoke beautifully, the fish can also be successfully cooked in a grill pan, or under the broiler. The salt and sugar cure, laced with sweet spices, both flavors the fish and firms up its flesh, giving it a meaty, silky texture. Serve it with a crisp salad for a light supper, or with rice for something more substantial. Melissa Clark

Becky Hughes · NYT Cooking

There are many ways to mimic the rich, creamy texture of emulsified, egg-based Caesar dressing: Tofu, vegan mayonnaise, aquafaba whipped with oil, the list goes on. Blended raw cashews prove themselves the best base in this version, which is fortified with garlic, mustard, miso paste and caper brine to achieve the tangy-salty-punchy balance found in the real deal. Crisp chickpeas and hand-torn croutons add a crunchiness that plays well with the velvety dressing.

Becky Hughes · NYT Cooking

This beloved kids’ drink was named after the late child star Shirley Temple Black, although she had no involvement in its invention in the 1930s. Saccharine to many adult palates, the grenadine-and-soda mocktail feels grown-up to kids, who delight at its bright red color, cherry garnish and hefty sugar content. (An adult version named the Dirty Shirley tempers its sweetness with the addition of vodka.) There’s no right answer to the debate surrounding lemon-lime soda (like Sprite or 7Up) versus ginger ale. Haley Traub, the general manager of the cocktail bar Attaboy on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, suspects the divergence is regional. Growing up in Minnesota, she says “it was always Sprite. It wasn’t until I moved to the East Coast that I’d ever heard it being made with ginger ale.” Soda options vary, but there is one nonnegotiable here: a cherry on top.

Becky Hughes · NYT Cooking

The Dirty Shirley, a vodka-spiked variation on the classic, kid-friendly Shirley Temple, is a syrupy-sweet nostalgia trip for adults. Topped with a cheeky maraschino cherry, the cocktail is evocative of a time before drinks had to be balanced or nuanced, a time when a bright red glass of sugary bubbles was the pinnacle of festivity. While a classic Shirley Temple is made with either lemon-lime soda or ginger ale, the “dirty” version is commonly made with the former (Sprite or 7Up).

Barbara Lynch · NYT Cooking

Barbara Lynch

Julia Moskin · NYT Cooking

Like chicken potpie and chicken noodle soup, this dish is all about the traditional flavors of home cooking, but concentrated to the nth degree. The chef Barbara Lynch based this easy one-pan dinner on a French dish called poulet en pain — chicken in bread — but she uses a buttery pie crust instead of bread dough. The crisp crust with juicy chicken and a fragrant vegetable stuffing is indescribably good and surprisingly easy to pull off. You can finish baking it up to two hours before serving — or even longer, as it’s also good at room temperature. Ms. Lynch recommends it as picnic fare. This stuffing is a familiar one, but any combination of sautéed vegetables and aromatics could be used, like mushrooms, winter squash or fennel; garlic, ginger or leeks; tarragon and parsley. Julia Moskin

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking

Barbara Kafka · NYT Cooking