Recipes

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

Flank steak braised with vegetables and aromatics until it shreds into strands is the national dish of Cuba, though the cooking process is popular throughout Central America and the Caribbean. In Cuba, it’s called ropa vieja, which translates to old clothes, a reference to the beef’s tattered appearance. In Venezuela and Colombia, you’d call it carne desmechada. This version starts with a sautéed base of peppers and onions, which is further enhanced with olives, capers, raisins and tomatoes. The flavorful mixture works equally well with flank steak, pork butt or even chicken thighs. Serve it with cooked black beans and rice. (Watch Kenji make it on YouTube.)

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

This simple salad calls for a specific set of ingredients, but it can also be considered a loose guideline. Thinly sliced leftover steak, shredded salmon or sliced dense tofu could easily take the place of the chicken — and that chicken can be left over from the night before, whether it's been poached, grilled, pan-seared or cooked on a rotisserie. Any crisp, crunchy lettuce will do. You could opt for shredded carrots and diced jicama instead of cucumber and radish, or add a handful of split cherry tomatoes and raw snap peas cut on a bias. As long as the basic balance of protein, dressing, greens, vegetables and herbs is maintained, the rest is up to you and your vegetable drawer.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

These stir-fried potatoes are inspired by a modern street snack served in Xi’an, China. They can be parboiled in advance, require only a few minutes of stir-frying in a wok before serving, and can be flavored with a wide range of spices and aromatics, making them an ideal side dish for any menu, simple or complex. In addition to the Xi’an-style original with hot and numbing spices, you can also make a curry-spiced version with crunchy, fried cumin and mustard seeds, or a rosemary and garlic version that would be at home on a traditional Thanksgiving table (see Tips). (Watch Kenji make this on YouTube.)

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

Flavored with warm spices, sugar and fermented broad bean chile paste, Taiwanese beef noodle soup is traditionally made with gelatinous beef shins and tendons, giving the broth a sticky richness. The flavors and technique suit meaty short ribs, which come out meltingly tender and moist. Adding a packet of powdered gelatin to the braising liquid gives it the same lip-sticking richness that braised tendons offer in the traditional version.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

Jeon are savory Korean vegetable, meat or seafood pancakes bound with the most basic batter: flour, cornstarch and water. Because the mixture is completely unleavened (no baking powder, yeast or even eggs), they run the risk of turning dense and gummy if you overwork the batter. This is good news for the lazy: The less work you put in, the better they come out. They can be made with virtually any meat or vegetable odds and ends, but they’re especially great with that crunchy sauerkraut languishing in the back of your fridge from that cookout you had last year.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

The most celebrated schnitzels in Vienna feature a crisp golden crust that puffs dramatically around a thinly pounded veal cutlet (pork loin cutlets are an easy, inexpensive alternative to veal), allowing the meat to cook gently within. Head over to Germany and you are more likely to find schnitzel with a crust that adheres to the meat. Both versions can be fantastic. For an extra-puffy crust, brush the cutlets with vodka before breading them. The volatility of the alcohol produces steam that inflates the schnitzel as it fries. (Water or white vinegar will also work if you want to avoid using alcohol.) If you prefer a crust that adheres more closely to the meat, whack the cutlets with the back of a knife a few times after pounding them in Step 3 to create an uneven surface texture; dry the meat well on paper towels, and skip the vodka coating in Step 5.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

This recipe produces a loaf of bread with significantly improved hole structure and flavor compared with this no-knead version (inspired by Jim Lahey’s original no-knead bread recipe), and requires not much extra work. Increasing the water content produces bread with a more custardy crumb and a more open, holey structure. Adding a few turns during the initial fermentation stage gives this wetter dough strength, letting it better retain its hole structure as it’s shaped. The low, slow fermentation in the fridge allows for lots of flexibility, as the dough can rest there for up to three days before you decide to shape and bake it. Dough flavor and texture will improve with time, though after three days the flour may start oxidizing, producing unattractive gray spots. (If you're looking to make sandwiches, we also have a recipe for low-knead sandwich bread.)

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

With a little extra shaping and a loaf pan, basic low-knead bread dough can make great sandwich bread. (The low-knead loaf is itself inspired by Jim Lahey's influential no-knead bread recipe.) For a softer, richer loaf, replace up to 100 grams of water with 100 grams of whole milk. For a glossy brown crust, whisk 1 egg with a couple tablespoons of water and brush it over the top of the proofed loaf with a pastry brush just before placing it in the oven. You can sprinkle the loaf with coarse sea salt, spices like caraway or cumin, or seeds, such as sunflower, sesame or pepitas, after brushing on the egg wash.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

This recipe is based on Jim Lahey’s recipe from 2006, with a few modifications for the sake of precision and a touch of acid to improve dough strength. Unlike Mr. Lahey’s recipe, this one does not require handling a hot Dutch oven. You’ll need one metal heatproof bowl (no rubberized bottoms) around 11 to 12 inches in diameter, a second bowl of any material around 8 to 9 inches in diameter, a scale with gram-accurate resolution, a baking sheet and a clean cotton dish towel. (Freshly washed is fine; it doesn’t need to be brand new.) If you prefer, you can still bake in a Dutch oven instead of using the overturned bowl method described in the steps; see this article on no-knead bread for full details. For a loaf of bread with significantly improved hole structure and flavor compared with this no-knead version, and without much extra work, take a look at our low-knead bread recipe.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

J. Kenji López-Alt first saw the pairing of oysters with sweet soy and sake sauce as a cook at Uni in Boston. It’s based on kabayaki, Japanese-style grilled freshwater eel. Eel is much richer than oysters, so adding a touch of butter to the sauce before spooning it over the grilled oysters helps balance the flavors. The sauce can be stored in the refrigerator for several weeks. If you’re interested in alternative flavor profiles for your grilled oysters, check out these Grilled Oysters With Lemony Garlic-Herb Butter or Grilled Oysters With Harissa-Parmesan Butter.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

Garlic, lemon, herbs and butter form a classic European pairing that is perfectly at home spooned into a hot grilled oyster, but if that’s not your style, try out these recipes for Buttery Soy-Sake Glaze or Harissa-Parmesan Butter — or, better yet, make all three. Any leftover flavored butter and sauces are excellent melted over grilled vegetables, such as asparagus or zucchini, or over grilled chicken, fish or even steak, and they can be stored in the refrigerator for several weeks or in the freezer for several months. When shopping for oysters, look for specimens with deeply cupped bottom shells in order to help retain their natural liquor and provide ample space for the flavored butter.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

At Cristiano Ristorante in Houma, La., the chef Lindsay Mason ladles a buttery mixture of roasted red peppers, garlic and Parmesan into grilled oysters. This version replaces the roasted peppers with North African harissa, offering the same sweet-savory combination, but with a bit more kick. For more grilled oyster flavor combinations, try this recipe for Grilled Oysters With Lemony Garlic-Herb Butter or this recipe for Grilled Oysters With Buttery Soy-Sake Glaze. The flavored butter can be stored in the refrigerator for several weeks or in the freezer for several months.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

The key to cooking a thin, modestly sized burger on the grill is to use the highest heat possible, and to cook the meat most of the way through on one side before flipping it and briefly cooking the second side. This technique allows you to get a nice dark crust on that first side without the risk of overcooking. To form thin patties that hold together on the grill, massage the ground beef briefly — which is a cardinal sin with many other styles of burgers, but a necessity here for cohesion. This allows you to flatten the patty out extra-thin and wide to account for shrinking as the meat cooks.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

Neapolitan-style pizza is typically baked in ovens heated past 900 degrees to achieve its signature crackly, thin, charred crust with a moist, stretchy crumb. But you can easily yield similar textures and flavors at home by baking pizza dough directly on the grates of a hot grill until it’s bubbly and crisp. Once the dough is baked, it can be topped and finished via indirect heat. Because grilled pizzas cook mainly from below, the cheese should be layered underneath dollops of hand-crushed tomatoes and toppings to get a good melt.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

Adding a small amount of a starchy slurry to scrambled eggs — a technique learned from Mandy Lee of the food blog Lady & Pups — prevents them from setting up too firmly, resulting in eggs that stay tender and moist, whether you like them soft-, medium- or hard-scrambled. Potato or tapioca starch is active at slightly lower temperatures than cornstarch and will produce a slightly more tender scramble, but cornstarch works just fine if it’s what you’ve got on hand. Make sure your skillet is at just the right temperature by heating a tablespoon of water in the skillet and waiting for it to evaporate. For creamier eggs, you can replace the water with milk or half-and-half.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

This warming stew starts with a mountain of lightly caramelized onions and leeks to combine the sweet-savory flavors of French onion soup with rich, red wine-braised lamb shanks. Onion soups can be delicious whether made with lightly caramelized onions or deep, dark, sweet onions, and achieving either is a simple matter of adjusting the cooking time on the onions. Barley and greens added toward the end of cooking make it a complete one-pot meal, though the stew would be equally delicious spooned over polenta or mashed potatoes. (If serving with potatoes or polenta, omit the barley and cook as directed.) Not into lamb (or can’t find shanks)? Try the exact same recipe with beef short ribs or oxtail.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

This hearty soup from the Colombian Andes uses a handful of ingredients and takes only a few minutes of active time to put together. It’s traditionally served for breakfast (especially after a night of dancing and drinking) along with hot chocolate and arepas, but it’s hearty enough to serve for any meal. Because of its relatively neutral flavor profile, it’s good to make in large batches (the beef broth can easily be doubled or tripled through Step 4) to be doctored into different dishes (see Tip).

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

A tuna salad and potato chip sandwich may not be quite as classic a pairing as peanut butter and jelly, but it is, anecdotally, many middle-schoolers’ first forays into experimenting with flavors and textures, and no less delicious. Beyond crunch, chips also add stability to the sandwich, holding the tuna salad in place as you eat. There’s no wrong way to make the sandwich, but seasoning tuna salad with red onion and celery, plenty of olive oil and little lemon juice, and using kettle-style salt and vinegar potato chips are especially alluring. There’s the word “optional” next to the most optional ingredients, but consider every ingredient other than the tuna, bread and chips to be adaptable according to your own taste (or how your mom made it). Watch Kenji make this recipe on YouTube.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

The dressing here is great on this salad, but it can find a second (and third, and fourth) life in so many other simple meals. Use it as a dip for grilled asparagus and broccolini; slather it on burgers and BLTs; or combine it 50-50 with Greek yogurt and add chopped dill and black pepper to make a fried shallot Ranch dressing for dipping crudités (or chicken wings). Add it to a roast beef sandwich (or just serve it with the roast beef). It’s a great party dip for chips (or anything you’d serve French onion dip with). This recipe calls for making the mayo from scratch, but you can use store-bought mayo as the base to make it even easier.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

Adding homemade or store-bought fried shallots to classic garlic spaghetti gives it extra caramelized sweetness and depth of flavor, along with crunch. Add the shallots in two stages so that some of them soften and give their flavor to the sauce, and the rest remain crispy. Cooking the spaghetti in a relatively small amount of water concentrates its starch, making it easier to form a creamy, emulsified sauce. If you can’t have your pasta without cheese, feel free to grate some Parm or pecorino on top at the table.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

Frying shallots can be time-consuming and finicky, but there are some steps you can take to improve your odds of success. This recipe, adapted from “The Wok: Recipes and Techniques” by J. Kenji López-Alt (W.W. Norton & Company, 2022), makes sure the shallots are sliced evenly, with a mandoline, for best results. Then, once the shallot rings start to sizzle in earnest, they’re fried gently over medium-high heat. What results is crisp and aromatic, and can be used as a finish for salads, pastas and more. The cup and a half that this recipe makes may seem like a lot, but it’s not. They’ll be sure to go quickly.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

This simple salad hinges on a classic Southeast Asian flavor combination: sweet-hot-savory. This recipe calls for watermelon, but you could also use pineapple, cantaloupe, green mango or pomelo, or even leftover grilled steak or poached shrimp, as the combination of dressing, herbs and fried shallots can enliven a wide range of flavors. But using a mortar and pestle instead of the food processor and seeking out palm sugar instead of substituting brown sugar is strongly suggested here. The recipe will make more dressing than you need, so feel free to experiment after getting used to it.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

This technique for grilling corn uses a side pan of honey butter to thoroughly drench the corn in flavor while keeping it hot and juicy until you’re ready to eat. If you are feeling creative, change the ingredients of the liquid bath: Add a couple of tablespoons of Korean gochujang and a few minced garlic cloves to the base mixture, then finish the corn with toasted sesame seeds for a sweet-hot version. Add a half-cup of sake, two tablespoons of light miso paste and two tablespoons of soy sauce for a sake-miso glaze. Blend a couple of canned chipotle chiles with a few tablespoons of lime juice, add it to the bath and finish the corn with freshly minced cilantro or mint. To complete this recipe, you’ll need a disposable aluminum 9-by-13-inch baking pan, or a similarly sized stovetop-safe vessel that you don’t mind getting a bit dirty.

J. Kenji López-Alt · NYT Cooking

Homer Davis and his son Ross invented what he called the Depression burger at the Hamburger Inn in El Reno, Okla., as a means to add inexpensive bulk to their burgers. Rather than toasting, the buns are steamed in onion-scented vapor. That the technique — cooking the patties smashed-style with a huge amount of thinly shaved onions and steaming the buns — and restaurant remain popular to this day is a testament to the burgers’ deliciousness. If you prefer, you can take the cooking (and the accompanying lingering onion aroma) completely out of the house by heating the skillet or griddle directly over a very hot grill and cooking outdoors (see Tip).