Italian Recipes
1418 recipes found

Penne With Mushroom Ragout and Spinach
Mushrooms and spinach together is always a match made in heaven. I use a mix of wild and regular white or cremini mushrooms for this, but don’t hesitate to make it if regular mushrooms are all that is available.

Penne With Roasted Cherry Tomatoes
This exquisitely simple recipe came to The Times in a 2001 article about Paola di Mauro, an Italian winemaker in Marina, a small town southeast of Rome. She was one of a band of cooks who helped distinguish "cucina casalinga," roughly translated as "housewives' cooking." From her humble kitchen, Ms. di Mauro mentored some of the best Italian chefs and restaurateurs in the United States, including Mario Batali, Lidia Bastianich, Piero Selvaggio and Tony May. Her recipe is easy and calls for just five ingredients – cherry tomatoes, olive oil, pecorino romano and penne pasta – but get your hands on the best ingredients you can afford. Ms. di Mauro intended this to serve four as a first course, but if you're making this for dinner, double the recipe.

Arancini With Brandy-Soaked Raisins
These Italian fried rice balls have a surprise filling of brandy-soaked raisins, which gives them a gentle sweetness that contrasts with the savory fontina and mozzarella cheeses. You can make the rice mixture up to a day ahead, and form the balls up to four hours ahead. Then fry just before serving so the cheese is warm enough to gush when you bite in.

Penne With Spicy Cauliflower Sauce

Taralli
Taralli are delicious ring shaped rusk-like Italian snacks from Apulia and Campania. Now that I know how easy they are to make I could be in big trouble, as whenever I’ve bought them from one of my favorite Italian delis I have a hard time resisting them. It’s the olive oil, I now know, that makes them special and different from other twice-baked breads. They are crisp but not hard, and this whole wheat version is as good as any traditional taralli I’ve tasted. I particularly like the version with black pepper. But I like them plain, without any embellishment, as well. The olive oil gives them so much flavor on its own. This recipe is based on a recipe in Carol Field’s “Italy In Small Bites.”

Penne Strascinata

Penne With Swiss Chard and Cauliflower

Braised Endives With Blood Oranges, Pistachios, and Ricotta Salata

Ribollita (Tuscan Bread Soup)

Italian Meat Sauce With Half the Meat
It’s been a long time since I have made tomato sauce with meat, and this one transported me back to the first recipe I learned to make. I called it spaghetti sauce, and it was a simple tomato sauce with ground beef. It didn’t taste that much different from this sauce, which has only a quarter pound of meat in it – but that is all it needs to have a rich flavor and a meaty texture. The mushroom base is a perfect stand-in for half the meat; you could double the amount for a vegetarian sauce.

Penne With Ricotta and Asparagus

Marinara Sauce

Silvano Marchetto's Penne All'Arrabiata

Penne Alla Vodka
Penne alla vodka is the perfect recipe for easy entertaining: short pasta is easier to cook in quantity than long strands and the sauce is amusingly retro -- think 1960s Rome, where the dish originated. But it is seriously good.

Egg White Frittata With Leeks

Pappa al Pomodoro

Pasta With Herbed Ricotta, Tomatoes and Spinach

Celery Risotto With Dandelion Greens or Kale
Celery is both vegetable and aromatic in this risotto. It retains some texture as it cooks, contrasting nicely with the rice. Dandelion greens are very nice here, but you can usually only find them in a farmers’ market; kale, especially dark green cavolo nero, is a fine substitute.

Penne With Peas, Pea Greens and Parmesan
Many farmers who sell peas also sell the shoots and tendrils that grow with them. They’re sweet, light and nourishing, especially when you serve them along with peas.

Risotto With Kale and Red Beans
I’m always on the lookout for vegetables with red pigments, a good sign of anthocyanins, those beneficial flavonoids that are known for antioxidant properties and are present in purple and red vegetables. When you cook the kale with the rice, the red in the kale dyes the rice pale pink (the kale goes to a kind of drab green). The first time I made it, without the red beans, the finished product reminded me of the way the rice looks when I make red beans with rice. So I decided to add red beans to the mix, which provide a healthy dose of protein and fiber, as well as color.

Florence Fabricant's Penne With Artichokes And Mushrooms

Penne with Tomatoes And Basil

Risotto With Chard and Pancetta
This satiny risotto uses an entire bunch of chard, both stems and leaves, which gives texture and color to the tender grains of rice. Pancetta, crisped up in the pan, adds a savory, brawny crunch that contrasts with the sweetness of the shallots or onion. Red chard turns the rice a subtle shade of pink, but Swiss or rainbow chard will work equally well. And don’t neglect that squeeze of fresh lemon juice right at the end; it brightens everything up.
