Recipes By Genevieve Ko
159 recipes found
Rice Krispies Treats With Chocolate and Pretzels
Marshmallow treats can skew saccharine, but this slightly more sophisticated version embraces the salty as much as it does the sugary. Sweet marshmallows and chocolate are balanced by plenty of salt: in the butter, on the pretzels and in the flaky sea salt finish. Butter-flavored pretzels (“butter snaps”) have a delicate crunch and a creamy note that work well in this recipe, but any small, thin pretzels are also good. You'll want to use chopped chocolate here instead of chips: They melt faster, so you end up with smeared chocolate bits instead of distinctive chunks.
Cranberry Lemon Bars
Cranberries that are quick-cooked into jam add a striking magenta color and complex tartness to these two-toned lemon bars. A thin layer of the classic lemon filling coats the cranberry mix like icing, and lemon zest boiled with the berries echoes the citrus taste of the lemony top. (Its pectin also thickens the jam.) To achieve a sturdy crust that isn’t tough, melted butter is stirred into a flour blend and simply patted into the pan. That vanilla cookie base, generously salted to balance the tangy sweetness on top, comes out crisp and holds up well even as the bars keep in the refrigerator for up to five days.
Easy Kung Pao Chicken
Sweet, sour and a little spicy, this meal tastes like home — specifically the home of Pearl Han, a talented Taiwanese American cook who naturally streamlined dishes while raising three kids and managing a busy career. Her younger daughter, Grace Han, shared this recipe: “quick, easy and my mom’s favorite.” Dried chiles sizzle in oil first to impart heat to the whole dish, then chicken browns in a single layer — no high-heat stir-frying necessary — to create a tasty caramelized crust before the pieces are flipped together. Coated in a dead-simple kung pao sauce that delivers the dish’s signature salty tang, the chicken begs to be spooned over steamed rice. Serve with stir-fried vegetables as well for a complete meal.
Dumplings With Chile Crisp
Great dumplings are as much about texture as taste, and these double the welcome contrast of tenderness and crunch. Simultaneously fried and steamed in a covered skillet, the wrappers develop crackling brown bases, while the tops become delicately chewy. Inside, the crunch of spicy chile crisp punctuates soft tofu and greens. Wringing water out of both fillings first allows them to soak in the soy sauce and chile crisp and ensures the filling doesn’t end up watery or bland. Another benefit to this vegan filling is the ability to taste it raw and adjust the seasonings before wrapping.
Green Bean and Tofu Salad With Peanut Dressing
Inspired by the combination of peanut sauce with vegetables in southeast Asia, found in dishes such as gado gado in Indonesia and summer rolls in Vietnam, this streamlined salad would work just as well as a vegetarian main dish to eat with rice or noodles. The green beans are cooked for only a short while so that they stay crunchy. If you prefer floppy beans, you can cook them longer. And if you want something more refreshing and don’t want to turn on the stove, you can skip the beans altogether and use cut-up cucumbers and tomatoes instead.
Toasted Coconut Rice With Bok Choy and Fried Eggs
Coconut oil toasts rice grains, lightly coats vegetables, and sizzles eggs in this dish, lending its unique tropical taste and richness. You get an extra dose of richness if you leave the egg yolks runny and cut and swirl them into the rice and greens mixture. If you’re vegan, you can fry tofu or tempeh in the coconut oil instead. If you’re gluten-free, you can use tamari in place of the soy sauce. Here, too, feel free to use prepackaged, trimmed haricots verts if you're short on time, or wax beans, in place of the green beans.
Flourless Chocolate Cake
Crackly on top and fudgy yet tender in the center, this cake tastes like a complex restaurant dessert, but comes together effortlessly in one bowl. Chocolate chips save you the messy step of chopping chocolate bars and deliver deep flavor along with cocoa powder. If you don’t have a springform pan, a regular cake pan lined with foil all around makes it easy to lift out the delicate cake, which melts in your mouth when served warm or at room temperature. Refrigerated or frozen leftovers take on a candylike chewiness, but a quick zap in the microwave will return it to just-baked softness. Slices are delicious on their own or with any creamy toppings.
One-Bowl Carrot Cake
The tangy, rich cream cheese topping on this cake can travel — even on a hot day. Silky with sour cream, it bakes right over the batter and develops a caramelized flavor reminiscent of Basque cheesecake. As it cools, the deeply browned surface ripples, and the custardy cream cheese layer sets. The carrot cake beneath packs more carrots than most classic versions for a more complex natural sweetness and fine, sturdy crumb. Both batters are mixed by hand in the same bowl, making prep and clean up especially easy.
Crispy Rice With Shrimp, Bacon and Corn
This one-pan recipe is a great use of leftover rice, though you can also use freshly cooked rice as long as it’s no longer hot. The starch in sticky short-grain rice, together with the corn’s starch, caramelize into a nice crust that you can remove in big pieces. Long-grain rice will brown as well, but stay loose when served. Try to get a little of everything in each bite: crisp yet tender rice and corn, savory shrimp, crunchy bacon, juicy tomatoes. This recipe was developed with 16/20-count shrimp in mind, but you can use whatever shrimp you find aside from fancy super-jumbo ones. Serve with hot sauce if you’d like.
Tea Eggs
In the 18th century, the Qing dynasty scholar Yuan Mei wrote about cooking eggs in a solution of tea leaves and salt in “The Way of Eating.” Now, tea eggs are prepared throughout China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Southeast Asia and in diaspora communities the world over. Known for their marbled design and savory soy flavor, the eggs are boiled, then cracked and soaked in tea blended with spices. The liquid seeps beneath the cracks to form fine lines all over the eggs while seasoning them. You can also simply marinate them without their shells and end up with a more robust taste. Adjust the seasonings below to your taste, if you like, and then enjoy the eggs on their own with a cup of tea or any way you would enjoy boiled eggs — in rice bowls, noodles, salads and other vegetable dishes.
Pumpkin-Ginger Oat Scones
Pumpkin purée softens oats in this hearty mix. Together, they give scones a lasting richness that doesn’t dry out, while more oats sprinkled on top give the crust a nutty crunch. Bits of candied ginger dot the scones, each delivering a hit of chewy heat that livens up pumpkin’s mild sweetness.
Granola Bites
These chewy-crunchy, salty-sweet breakfast balls are great for eating on the go because they don’t crumble and leave a mess. They take minutes to blend and a few more to roll, but if you make them a friends-and-family cooking project, the process can go even faster. Feel free to experiment here. You can swap out the almonds for cashews, the cherries for other dried fruits, and the sunflower seeds for shelled pumpkin seeds. Just keep the dates and make sure they're Medjool, which are softer and more thin-skinned than other varieties. The dates are the glue that hold the other ingredients together.
Cheesy Eggs on Toast
You don’t even need a toaster to make perfect toast. Crisping bread in a skillet — in melted butter, of course — gives it a tasty brown crunch and leaves you with a hot pan ready to scramble eggs. Be sure to swipe up all the butter and crumbs with the toasted bread when you take it out to keep the eggs nice and golden. Because more butter is added to the pan at the same time as the eggs, it melts slowly into the eggs while you stir them, leaving you with a creamy mix that ends up even creamier when cheese is melted in at the very end.
Loaded Baked Frittata
Sautéed onion, pepper and spinach lace this sturdy frittata that’s as good warm out of the pan as it is cold. Bacon and goat cheese enrich the mix, which can be eaten alone or put in a sandwich (see tip below). This recipe is, of course, delicious as is, but you can also take a cue from one of our commenters, Joan, who made this with leftover peppers and onions, adding sliced roasted baby potatoes. Ready in 45 minutes, it lasts for up to three days in the refrigerator, so you can enjoy it as long as it lasts — which may not be very long.
Crunchy Kale Salad With Plums and Dates
Kale salad has passed whatever nebulous test there is of food fads and become a mainstay, especially in the fall, but it’s ideal for summer, too, because it doesn’t wilt in the heat. If anything, you want to be sure to crush the finely sliced greens until they’re droopy. Kale salad can feel like a chore to chew if the greens aren’t softened sufficiently, so massage them into submission. To add a welcome, easy crunch to the tender leaves, this salad is littered with roasted, salted sunflower seeds. They’re a savory contrast to tangy wedges of juicy plums and chewy, sweet dates in the lemony mix that holds up well on any picnic table and for up to 3 days in the fridge.
Tuna Salad With Hot and Sweet Peppers
Inspired by the oil-and-vinegar tuna salads of the Mediterranean, this version includes new-world peppers. Letting thin slices of hot and sweet peppers sit with vinegar and salt for a few minutes gives them a pickled taste without taking away their crispness. It also makes for a sharp dressing when mixed with the olive oil from oil-packed tuna. Celery and parsley bring freshness to this blend, which is wonderful on its own and versatile enough to be spooned over toast or tossed with lettuce or pasta.
Ham Omelet Sandwich
This breakfast sandwich is sold in bakeries, convenience stores and train stations in Japan, Hong Kong and throughout Asia. A thin, flat omelet layered with even thinner slices of ham is stacked between slices of buttered soft white bread, then cut into triangles. You can, of course, add cheese, but its beauty is in its simplicity. And, besides, going without cheese makes the sandwich as tasty at room temperature as it is when warm.
Vegetables-and-Dip Pita Pocket
Children can enjoy the fun combination in these pita pocket sandwiches. Each bite delivers the crunch of vegetables and the creaminess of dip. Sweet pickles add a little excitement to each bite. You can swap the standard pairing of carrots and celery for other crunchy vegetables you enjoy raw, like fennel, cucumber or peppers.
Black Sesame Shortbread
Snappy and crumbly, these not-too-sweet cookies are the sort of treats that make you take a deep breath and slow down. Immediately loveable and layered with complex nutty, toasty and savory notes from black sesame, they’re great with tea. The slice-and-bake dough comes together entirely in a food processor (only one bowl to wash!) and can be refrigerated as a wrapped log for a few days before baking.
Fluffy Mashed Potatoes
For the silkiest fluffy mashed potatoes, start with firm, cool Russet Burbank spuds, also known as baking potatoes. They’re the easiest to mash without becoming pasty and are even tastier steamed instead of boiled. Boiling potatoes can leave them waterlogged, diluting their earthy subtle sweetness, but steaming them preserves their inherent flavor. As the potatoes soften, they absorb just the right amount of moisture. Seasoning the dish only at the very end heightens their intrinsic subtle sweetness. If you have a ricer, use it for an exceptionally smooth texture: Press the steamed potatoes through the ricer back into the pot, then gently fold in the butter and milk with a wooden spoon or flexible spatula.
Stir-Fried Brussels Sprouts
Brussels sprouts caramelize to a deep, delicious brown while retaining a fresh bite in minutes when cooked on the stovetop. In this adaptation of wok stir-frying, the sprouts quickly sear in a single layer in a skillet, then steam through with a splash of water to tenderize their tough cores. Crushed garlic cloves release their aroma into the hot oil, but are in chunks big enough to not burn and get bitter. A final sprinkle of sugar, soy sauce and red-pepper flakes give the sprouts a nice balance of sweet, salty and spicy. You can eat this with other stir-fries and steamed rice or alongside any main dish. Leftovers, reheated or cold, can be tossed into grain bowls and salads.
Creamy Vegan Hot Chocolate
For a vegan hot chocolate that rivals even the creamiest dairy-laden variety, add a few tablespoons of nut butter like almond, sunflower or peanut to the nondairy milk, chocolate chips and cocoa powder. Whisking is also essential here; nondairy products tend to contain stabilizers that keep them emulsified, so they can separate when boiled. If you keep whisking the mix as it heats and remove it from the stove when it’s nice and steaming, but before it boils, you’ll end up with perfectly smooth hot chocolate. Don’t worry if it breaks: You can simply blend it with a whisk or immersion blender over low heat to bring it back together.
Carne Asada
Nothing beats carne asada tacos, the smoky richness of charred sliced steak stuffed into tortillas. Carne asada translates to “grilled meat” and refers to the many variations on this dish, as well as parties that center around grilling the marinated meat. Esteban Castillo, the author of the cookbook and blog “Chicano Eats,” combines the intensity of a dry spice rub with a citrus juice marinade in his recipe. Sometimes, he pours some beer into the mix too, but this version, fresh with cilantro, garlic and scallions, already gives the steak big, aromatic flavors.
Crispy Oven Bacon and Eggs
Bacon browns and crisps evenly in the oven without the hassle of flipping slices on the stovetop, while eggs can oven-fry alongside for perfect sunny-side-up runny yolks and tender whites. The oven’s encompassing heat helps egg whites set on top before the yolks start to stiffen. Make sure to have the eggs sit at room temperature before cracking them into the hot pan: It ensures they’ll cook quickly and evenly.