Recipes By David Tanis
759 recipes found
Cucumber-Cabbage Salad With Sesame
Taking cues from Vietnamese flavors, this colorful salad can be served on its own or be a fine accompaniment to roast chicken, grilled meat or fish. The dressing, a zippy mixture of garlic, ginger, sesame oil, fish sauce, lime juice and jalapeño, makes sure the vegetables shine. Ordinary cabbage will work fine, but if you can find napa cabbage, so much the better.
Pear-Almond Cake
This simple cake comes together with little fuss: It’s just sliced pears baked in an easy almond flour batter, but in flavor and texture, it’s so much more. Feel free to make it early in the day, or even the day before serving. It keeps well. Use firm, slightly underripe pears if possible.
Buttery Shrimp With Garlic and Paprika
For this flavorful, richly aromatic shrimp dinner, use large shrimp if possible (preferably from the Gulf of Mexico or the Mid-Atlantic). They are hefty at 16 to 20 pieces per pound, enough for a main course for four. Use fresh or frozen shrimp, extra points for peeling and de-veining your own. They are to be sizzled in a generous amount of spicy butter sauce. If you don’t have hot paprika, use 1 tablespoon sweet paprika plus ¼ teaspoon ground cayenne, or more to taste. Or use Spanish pimentón picante. Serve the shrimp with plain polenta, little roasted potatoes, or steamed rice. Or just have a warm baguette for sopping.
Arugula Salad With Radish, Fennel and Mustard
This zesty arugula salad is a bold beginning to a meal. Use a sharp knife or mandoline to cut the watermelon radish and fennel bulb so they’re just shy of paper thin. When dressing the salad, try to bring some of those bright, colorful slices to the top for an especially attractive result.
Beet Salad With Celery and Pomegranate
It’s nice to make this beet salad in winter when pomegranates are available. For the best result, cook your own beets — simply boil or roast them any time you have a free moment, even a day or two ahead. Then, slip off the skins while the beets are still slightly warm. Slice them just before you make the salad. Sumac, available in Middle Eastern grocery shops, adds tartness, as would a spoonful of pomegranate molasses. To serve, toss with chopped celery and mint, then garnish with pomegranate seeds. It’s a feast for the eyes.
Easy Apple Tart
For an easy, satisfying fruit dessert, phyllo dough is just the thing. You don’t have to make the pastry for a very flaky result. Here, it’s topped with spiced sliced apples and painted with extra-virgin olive oil instead of the usual melted butter. Still, use butter if you prefer, and feel free to experiment with cigar shapes or phyllo turnovers.
Herbed Rice in Chard Leaves
This savory dish echoes the flavors of stuffed grape leaves, but this large-format version is easier. (Of course, if you prefer to make smaller dolma-like packages, that’s fine, too.) It’s best served warm with a good dollop of tart yogurt on top, but if your yogurt isn’t sufficiently sour, add a little lemon juice or sumac. Though this is a happy main course side by side with a beet salad, it could also be an accompaniment to roast chicken or grilled fish.
Endive and Arugula Salad
This simple salad is meant to accompany a main course, served alongside a hearty stew like this lamb version with rosemary and olives. Toss the salad just before serving, and if you like — and arugula is less to your taste — you can use spinach, small mustard greens, watercress or more arugula, if you like.
Lamb Stew With Rosemary and Olives
This warming lamb stew is good any time of year, but especially great in winter. Best of all, it can be prepared well in advance, even a day before serving, and reheats beautifully. You can ask a butcher to cut the lamb shoulder into cubes; there will be less waste, but avoid precut lamb stew meat, which is made from leg and often too lean.
Orange Ricotta Crepes
Knowing how to make crepes is a great back-pocket trick, letting you whip together a lovely dessert (or breakfast, or even afternoon snack) in not very long at all. This orange-ricotta version is best prepared in advance, even the day before. (If you do, stack crepes, wrap and refrigerate.) Count on one or two crepes per person. Spread each with filling and fold into quarters well in advance of serving.
Chocolate Amaretti Cookies
A platter of cookies is always a welcome sight, and these chocolate amaretti, made with almond flour, cocoa, egg whites and a dash of almond extract, are so simple to prepare. These almost beg for an espresso as accompaniment, or a small glass of dessert wine. With their crisp exterior and chewy interior, what’s not to love?
Baked Polenta With Roasted Mushrooms
A hearty polenta casserole makes a wonderful meatless centerpiece. Here, it’s layered with mozzarella, Parmesan and Gorgonzola, and baked in a springform pan, then paired with roasted mushrooms brightened with a quick-to-make gremolata. Plan to prepare the polenta well in advance, at least several hours ahead of serving or preferably the day before, to allow it to firm up. And, better yet, to avoid any last-minute stress.
Radicchio Salad With Walnuts and Pears
Chicories, with their slightly bitter flavor, serve as a pleasant seasonal alternative to tender greens in this autumnal salad. Use a single kind — ruby-red radicchio, Belgian endive, curly endive (frisée) or escarole, or stick with one kind. All come together for a satisfying salad, whose bitterness is offset by the sweetness of pears and candied walnuts.
Spicy Cucumbers With Mint, Scallions and Crushed Peanuts
This fine accompaniment to any number of dishes is an (admittedly inauthentic) take on a Southeast Asian favorite, moderately spicy in Vietnam and far more fiery in Thailand. Choose chiles accordingly to match your preference: Thai chiles pack a lot of heat; serrano chiles are strong, but less so; red Fresno chiles have sweet undertones and are the mildest. Also, try to get the best cucumbers you can, with thin skins. The better the cucumber, the better the salad.
Coconut Tapioca Pudding
A little salt makes this dreamy concoction tastier, giving it another dimension. The pudding can be made several hours in advance but should be served at room temperature.
Peppered Sea Scallops With Spinach
An easy but elegant full-flavored main course, this dish is best made in fall or winter, when sea scallops are in season. The generously peppered scallops lay on a bed of puréed spinach. The spinach leans on Indian flavors, run through with heady garam masala, turmeric and ginger. Substitute pan-seared fish or shrimp if scallops aren’t your thing. If desired, serve with steamed rice.
Baked Fish With Slow-Cooked Peppers
Meaty fish like striped bass, swordfish and halibut make good choices for pairing with the late-season vegetable harvest, specifically sweet peppers. Whether you use standard bell peppers, Italian “frying” peppers or some wonderful shapely variety, like corno di toro, cut them in half vertically, right through the stem, then remove the veins and seeds (as opposed to cutting off the tops first). That way, you’ll be able to make long slices, without any oddly sized leftover bits.
Plum-Almond Crumble
Late-summer plums, especially the small dark purple, yellow-fleshed ones called Italian prunes, are a delight. They are handy for cakes and tarts, but here, they are baked with an almond-scented, streusel-like topping.
Tomato Carpaccio
Really not much more than a plate of sliced tomatoes, the key to this dish is truly ripe tomatoes, the kind you get at the farmers’ market at summer’s end. It doesn’t matter what color they are, though large red ones are ideal. Use your best extra-virgin oil for the dressing, which also features briny shallots and capers, a whiff of garlic and a touch of anchovy. Finish with a handful of basil leaves.
Gambas al Ajillo (Spanish Garlic Shrimp)
All over Spain, gambas al ajillo and its various versions (made with camarones, or shrimp, or mushrooms for a vegetarian twist) are beloved. And what’s not to love? Sweet, briny prawns (or larger shrimp in the United States) are sautéed with lots of garlic and olive oil, finished with a touch of hot pepper, and ready in less than half an hour. Don’t leave behind the flavorful extra-virgin olive oil, which is perfect for sopping up. Quick! Someone get a crusty loaf for just that purpose.
Creamy Peach Sorbet With Raspberries
This light, easy dessert blends a fresh peach purée and yogurt. No ice cream machines are necessary, just a touch of gelatin for structure, and a stint in your freezer. For that matter, it tastes wonderful even without freezing. Leave skins on the fruit for a peachy color.
Escalivada (Catalan Roasted Vegetables)
In Catalonia, escalivada is traditionally prepared in the fireplace, with raw vegetables nestled in the coals and ashes, cooked slowly until soft — typically eggplant, sweet bell peppers and onions, sometimes tomato. When cool, the charred skins are removed, and the vegetables are sliced or torn into strips, then dressed with olive oil, garlic and sherry vinegar. These days, the method has changed slightly, with modern cooks roasting the vegetables on a sheet pan in the oven or over indirect heat in a covered grill. The ingredients mingle, resulting in something much like a vegetable stew. Once assembled, it will keep a week and can be served cold or at room temperature. It tastes best when aged at least a day, so make it ahead for a party or picnic.
Nectarines in Lime Syrup
Fruit — whether a bowl of sweet berries or a wedge of watermelon — makes the best dessert, but stone fruits are a real treat, especially nectarines. Sliced and dressed in a lime syrup, served chilled as they are here, they’re a refreshing, sophisticated and shockingly simple end to a meal.
Marinated Cherry Tomatoes on Toast
Taking a cue from Italian bruschetta and Spanish pan con tomate, these easy marinated cherry tomatoes go with everything. Toss them over greens for a summery salad or spoon them over grilled fish. Or serve them as they are here, on toasted bread, a great vehicle for catching all the delicious juices.