American Recipes
2885 recipes found
Blueberry-Banana Pancakes
Pumpkin Bread With Chocolate Chip Streusel
This pumpkin quick bread is everything you love about the traditional version, but with a ribbon of spiced-chocolate-nut streusel running through the center and topped with more of the same. We like ours served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.
Jeweled Grains With Broccoli, Peas and Red Onion
Inspired by Persian jeweled rice and grain bowls, this dish combines brown rice, farro and black sticky rice with a jumble of shaved broccoli, pickled red onion, pistachios, sunflower seeds and dried cranberries. When cooking multiple grains, pick ones that more or less require the same grain-to-water ratio and cook time so you can cook them all together in the same pot. This dish can be served warm, cold or at room temperature, served over salad greens or topped with flaky fish. It is endlessly adaptable based on the season or the contents of your fridge.
The Silver Palate’s Chocolate Cake
This recipe is adapted from “The Silver Palate Cookbook,” written by Sheila Lukins and Julee Rosso, who through their store in Manhattan, the Silver Palate, introduced bisteeya and poppy-seed dressing to the Upper West Side. For many, their cookbook, originally published in 1982, was a book of revelations: even if you hadn’t mastered the art of French cooking, a meal of chicken Marbella and an indulgent dessert, cooked with confidence, was not beyond your grasp. Enter this decadent chocolate cake, whose title belies its incredible simplicity. The ingredients take hardly any time to whip together, and it bakes in a tube pan for under an hour. Gild it with a gooey chocolate frosting, and feed it to those you love with good cheer.
Lemon Cream Cheese Cookies
Chewy and sweet, these simple cookies are heavenly with a cup of tea — and a lavish dose of fresh lemon zest provides some pluck. Cream cheese is the star ingredient in both the cookie and its glaze, and performs two tasks: It imparts tanginess and contributes to the soft texture. These cookies are simple but delicate, so you’ll want to pull them from the oven as soon as they begin to turn golden, then let them cool directly on the baking sheets until they firm up. The glaze is optional, but it’s easy to whip together while the cookies cool.
The Simplest Corn Pudding
This recipe is deliberately, exquisitely simple, with pure sweet corn flavor. Grate corn kernels directly into a cast-iron pan and place in the oven, without any seasonings. The corn releases its milk, which thickens, and the kernels turn golden and lightly caramelized around the edges. Only then do you season it, and only lightly: A bit of butter, a sprinkle of salt and cayenne, and the juice of half a lime. Mix. Serve. Adding the seasoning at the end allows you to better control the taste of the finished dish.
Potato Chip-Chocolate Chip Cookies
A mix of salty potato chips and chocolate chips gives these shortbread cookies a playful, sweet and savory appeal. Adapted from Shauna Sever’s cookbook, “Midwest Made,” these cookies taste best one day after baking, when the flavors have had a chance to meld. They will last for 3 to 4 days stored airtight at room temperature. Bring them to your next bake sale and watch them sell out in a flash. If you don’t have European-style cultured butter on hand, regular unsalted butter will also work.
Chocolate-Flake Raspberry Ice Cream
A few years back, I made a delicious discovery: I could get the luxurious texture of French-style, custard-based ice cream with a recipe for eggless, Philadelphia-style ice cream. My ice cream has the usual cream, milk and sugar, but it’s also got powdered milk for richness, honey for smoothness, and alcohol for scoopability. The vodka keeps the ice cream soft and creamy, desirable in any ice cream and vital when there are berries, which have a tendency to go from juicy to rock-hard in the freezer. Any berries will work in this recipe, but I use raspberries, fresh or frozen, and bolster their flavor and color with a little freeze-dried raspberry powder (optional, but nice). The chocolate flakes are made with melted dark chocolate and coconut oil. Drizzled into the ice cream at the end of churning, the chocolate spins into flakes; drizzled over the ice cream before serving, it hardens on contact.
Ice Cream Sandwiches
These ice cream sandwiches make a perfect summertime treat. The thin brownie cake layer bakes quickly, which is a bonus on hot days, and the filling need not be homemade. Freezing time can vary so be sure to plan ahead. Give the assembled cake plenty of time before trying to cut and wrap individual sandwiches and make sure the finished sandwiches are well-frozen before serving.
Ruth Reichl’s Giant Chocolate Cake
In her new book, "My Kitchen Year: 136 Recipes That Saved My Life," Ruth Reichl calls this the cake that cures everything. The recipe produces a large stacked rectangular layer cake with whipped cream cheese in the frosting to add lightness and stability. The cake is very tender, based on a technique she first started using when she was a cook at the Swallow, a restaurant collective in Berkeley, Calif.
Classic Coconut Cake
One of the beauties of layer cake is that you can do much of the work in advance. The cake layers can be baked one day ahead, wrapped tightly and kept at room temperature. The frosting can be made up to a week ahead, wrapped tightly and refrigerated (bring it back to room temperature before using). You could even assemble and frost the whole glorious thing a day ahead; store it at room temperature, covered loosely with plastic wrap or a cake cover.
Alabama Lemon ‘Cheese’ Cake
This Southern delicacy contains no cheese, but a buttery filling with a hint of cheese-like curd adds color and luscious flavor.
Frosted Holiday Sugar Cookies
Whether you're making Santas or dreidls, shamrocks or bunnies, this foolproof cookie and royal icing recipe is the only one you need. Don't skip chilling the dough after rolling it out. It really helps the cookies keep their shape while baking. And if you'd like to frost the cookies very generously, consider doubling the icing amounts below.
Moka Dupont: A French Icebox Cake
When my Paris friend, Bernard Collet, told me about this cake, a favorite for over 60 years in his family, I was expecting something tall, soft, frosted and fit for candles. I expected a gâteau but got an icebox cake: four layers of cookies held together with four layers of frosting. The cake, originally a back-of-the-box recipe, was created for a French tea biscuit called Thé Brun, but I could never find them, so I used Petit Beurre cookies. Lately I can’t find them either, so I use old-fashioned Nabisco Social Teas. You can use whatever cookies you’d like, but they should be plain, flat, square or rectangular. Depending on the size of your cookies, you might need fewer of them; depending on how big or small you make the cake, you might need to juggle the number of layers or the amount of frosting. It’s a recipe made for improvisation.
Doris’s Salty Hot Fudge
This recipe came to The Times from Doris Muramatsu, a musician with the band Girlyman. It takes about 15 minutes to make and is particularly terrific over ice cream with some spicy pecans chopped on top. It is also an easily made token of true friendship and cheer: pour some into small jars and give it to friends.
Raspberry Swirl No-Bake Cheesecake
This stunning magenta-swirled dessert uses fresh or frozen raspberries to dress up a light and creamy no-bake cheesecake, making it a treat you can enjoy year-round. The recipe calls for straining the raspberry sauce to remove the seeds, but adding a small spoonful of the seeds back to the purée for texture and crunch is a nice touch. Make sure to allow plenty of time (at least 8 hours) for the cheesecake to chill and set before slicing. Even then, this silky dessert will be softer and more pudding-like than a traditional baked cheesecake. That’s the beauty of it.
Chewy Peanut Butter-Marshmallow Bars
Classic cereal treats for the peanut butter fanatic, these marshmallow bars call for cornflakes instead of Rice Krispies, making for a wonderfully chewy-crunchy contrast. Cornflakes are delicate, so the key here is to avoid crushing the cereal too much when mixing the ingredients. The end result should be airy and chewy, but not dense, with visible chunks of marshmallow throughout. This recipe comes together quickly, so have your ingredients measured and ready to add to the pot when you begin. Once the chocolate topping has set, these bars pack well for picnics or potlucks, but if you’re concerned about the chocolate melting, you can skip it altogether and finish the bars with a sprinkle of sea salt.
Cinnamon Crunch Banana Bread
This easy cake — no mixer required — is a popular staple at Bakesale Betty in Oakland, Calif. Pie, cake, cookies and a legendary fried chicken sandwich are the only things on the menu, but locals start lining up long before opening time. They’re that good. Betty herself, the baker Alison Barkat, adds a cinnamon-sugar topping and honey to the classic banana bread formula for a deeply caramelized, moist result.
Steamed Clams
The recipe that follows is for a mess of clams, which on the eastern end of Long Island translates as a cool 100 littleneck hard-shell clams. You can certainly cook fewer of them, particularly if all you can find is the larger cherrystone clam, but a reasonable human can eat two dozen clams at a sitting, mopping up the broth with crusty bread. You can add herbs or other aromatics to the steaming liquid (thyme or garlic, say, or cilantro, parsley, tarragon). You can add chorizo or bacon. The point is just to create steam, and to allow the clams to open within it. Eat the clams with the liquid from the interior of their shells, and perhaps some melted butter. A fiery jalapeño brown butter is currently a favorite dip.
Lemon Sweet Rolls With Cream Cheese Icing
These sweet, lemony rolls are a fresh alternative to classic cinnamon rolls. A little cardamom in the dough and filling enhances the bright citrus flavor without overtaking it. This dough is adaptable: You can let the dough rise in the refrigerator, instead of at room temperature, so you can serve fresh, warm rolls for breakfast without getting up at the crack of dawn to make them.
Garlicky Caesar Dip
This dip is inspired by classic Caesar dressing, with plenty of garlic and anchovy to wake things up. (You can even make it dairy-free, if you like, by using vegan cream cheese, substituting 1/3 cup nutritional yeast for the Parmesan, and adding an additional 1/4 teaspoon salt.) Serve it with a platter of raw or lightly blanched vegetables sprinkled with sea salt and dig in. Leftovers make a killer spread on a turkey sandwich, or a stellar accompaniment to grilled steak.
Boston Cream Pie
An American classic, Boston cream pie isn't a pie at all. Its base is an old-fashioned hot milk cake, a downy-soft, buttery yellow cake. How you whip the eggs and the sugar is critical, as the tiny air bubbles they produce add lift to the finished product. This traditional version is best the day it's made, but will hold up in the fridge for a couple of days. You may just notice a slight change in texture. Slathered with homemade vanilla custard and a chocolate glaze, it hits all the right notes, but it would be just as lovely served with in-season berries or layered with chocolate or coffee custard instead of vanilla. Make it as is, or go rogue. Either way, it’s sure to please.
Blue Butter
Blue butter – obviously fat on fat – is blue cheese for people who think they don’t like blue cheese: The butter tames the sharpness, and the cheese makes the butter lively and intense. Serve this sauce alongside a grilled rib-eye for a contemporary take on a classic steakhouse cut.
S’Mores Pie
This showstopper of a dessert is everything traditional s'mores are – chocolatey, gooey, crunchy – in grown-up, travel-friendly pie form. It is not difficult to make, but it does take some time, so set aside a few hours to make and assemble all of the worthy parts. Ultimately, what you end up with is a chocolate pudding pie in a graham cracker crust, topped with a blanket of homemade marshmallow that's browned to perfection.