Cheese
2190 recipes found
One-Pan Creamy Artichokes and Peas
This creamy stew, full of seasoned sweet leeks, lemon zest and Parmesan, is a celebration of spring that you can make all year long, thanks to the canned artichokes and frozen peas. The creaminess comes from dolloping fresh ricotta over the top, then swirling it into the warm stew as you eat so it melts a little. Serve this with crusty bread or over pasta, gnocchi or rice to soak up the fragrant, herby pan sauce.
Weeknight Spinach and Ricotta Lasagna
While it is hard to beat the perfection of a meticulously layered lasagna, this cheater’s version delivers all the comforting vibes with minimal effort. This weeknight dish requires no chopping; just mixing and baking. Choose ease, with oven-ready lasagna sheets, as they don’t require preboiling and will cook quicker than the regular ones. (Fresh lasagna sheets will certainly work, too, with the same cooking time.) Don’t drain the thawed spinach, as the extra moisture will help keep this dish moist and saucy. The easiest way to thaw spinach is to leave it overnight in the fridge; it can also be defrosted quickly in the microwave.
Pea and Ricotta Frittata
This frittata is a celebration of spring: Its color, flavor and tenderness capture the spirit of beginnings. A purée of mint and peas, as well as a sprinkling of both, give it its pastel green freshness. Heavy cream and a long cook time in a low oven give it a quivering, custardy texture that may remind you more of steamed eggs than most frittatas. To get this gentle wobble, undercook the frittata ever so slightly, and let the residual heat finish the job. Be brave and take it out of the oven right after you feel the middle go from swampy to jiggly, and allow it to cool slightly before slicing. As is always the case with frittatas, they are best at or right above room temperature, so do not refrigerate before serving.
Greens and Peas Salad With Bacon
This salad has all the snappy sweetness of spring, offset by the smoky saltiness of bacon and a bacon fat vinaigrette. Black pepper is a key ingredient, not an accent, so grind on. Bacon fat sets as it cools, so make the dressing when the bacon pan is still warm, and if you’re making it in advance, make sure it's just warmer than room temperature. If you store it in a jar, sit the jar in a hot water bath to melt the fat before dressing the salad. Also make sure that your salad ingredients are room temperature, rather than cold, when you dress. To make this salad vegetarian, leave out the bacon and replace the bacon fat in the dressing with olive oil.
Mortadella Carbonara
This pasta celebrates mortadella, the soft Italian cold cut made of pork seasoned with black pepper and nutmeg, and often dotted with pistachios. As ribbons of the tender, delicately spiced meat tangle with long noodles, its milky fat melts into the sauce of egg and cheese for an incredibly silky dish. By using mortadella instead of guanciale, as is traditional in carbonara, you don’t need to cook the meat first, so this dish can be made in one pot. Green peas add pops of freshness, but skip a pistachio, basil or mint garnish (tempting as it may be) to avoid detracting from the main attraction. Top the finished dish with more black pepper and Parmesan and savor all the richness mortadella has to offer.
Chopped Wedge Salad
About three-quarters of the way through eating a wedge salad, the toppings are gone and you’re often left with unseasoned, watery lettuce that you have little interest in finishing. If this sounds familiar, consider messing with tradition by skipping the wedge and chopping all of the ingredients. When the salad’s elements are the same size and tossed together in a bowl, the lettuce is thoroughly dressed, and every bite is an ideal one with a perfect mix of juicy tomatoes, smoky bacon, crunchy lettuce and creamy blue cheese. A chopped wedge salad can be a meal unto itself, or serve it alongside burgers, steak or garlic bread.
Pepperoni Baked Pasta
This cozy dish takes all of the flavors of your favorite pepperoni pizza and spins them into a family-friendly baked pasta that is quick and easy to make. Make sure to cook the pasta just shy of al dente to ensure that the finished pasta doesn’t get mushy. Pepperoni adds nice heat and spice, but feel free to add olives, sautéed mushrooms, or any of your favorite pizza toppings to the mix. If you don’t have time or inclination to make your own tomato sauce, crisp the pepperoni as directed in Step 3, skip the garlic and crushed red pepper, then add 48 ounces of your favorite marinara sauce to the pot used to crisp the pepperoni. Stir the sauce to scrape up any browned bits and warm it through, then turn off the heat and proceed to Step 6.
Homemade Pop-Tarts
These adorable D.I.Y. Pop-Tarts are a bit more work than the original toaster pastries, which were created by Kellogg in the 1960s as a sort of all-in-one, portable toast and jam, but making them at home means you can customize the fillings and toppings to suit your fancy. You can use two rounds (about 14 ounces) of store-bought pie dough for the pastry, but this cream cheese version is easy to put together and even easier to work with. If it starts to get too soft while you’re rolling and cutting it, pop it into the freezer for 10 to 15 minutes and try again. This recipe includes a quick berry jam for the filling, but you can use about 3/4 cup store-bought jam, too. Peanut butter and jelly would be pretty great, as would chocolate-hazelnut spread. These keep well stored in an airtight container for about a week. Wrapped tightly in plastic wrap, they also freeze like a dream for up to 3 months.
Skillet Pasta With Bacon and Eggs
Emulsifying creamy carbonara sauce can feel trickier than treading a tightrope, but this skillet pasta recipe fulfills those cravings with ease, and all in one pan. Start by searing some sliced bacon until crisp, toasting orzo in the rendered bacon fat, then simmering with stock until pasta is al dente. Next, you’ll stir in a few handfuls of Parmesan, then crack eggs right into the nearly cooked pasta. The whites will cook until creamy, but the yolks should remain runny, so that as you eat, the yolk mingles with the pasta for silky spoonfuls.
Four-Layer Surprise
Is there anything more evocative of childhood than chocolate pudding? When dressed up with a salty pecan crust and a fluffy cream cheese layer, that nostalgic lunchbox treat becomes the kind of dessert that is an absolute pleasure to eat and to share. It is great for a crowd, it is fun and easy in its presentation and it is absolutely delicious. Originally made with store-bought whipped cream and chocolate pudding mix, this dessert (sometimes called delight or four-layer delight) deserves to be resurrected from scratch, using freshly whipped cream, rich dark chocolate and toasty nuts, for a new generation to enjoy.
Cheddar-Roasted Broccoli
With frizzled florets and crisp-tender stems, roasted broccoli is pretty delicious on its own. Follow Step 1 if you need a go-to basic method, or keep going for broccoli all dressed up in lacy skirts of Cheddar. Store-bought grated cheese will work, but freshly grated cheese will have an easier time surrendering to the heat of the oven. Let the cheese go past melted to just golden brown, at which point it will crisp into chips on your florets. Serve the broccoli alongside chicken cutlets, sausage or refried beans — or eat it straight from the sheet pan with your fingers.
Ricotta Toast With Roasted Grapes
In this sophisticated take on ricotta toast, Raquel Villanueva Dang, the chef of Baby’s Kusina and Market in Philadelphia, roasts grapes with fresh thyme and salt until the skins pucker and the flesh grows slouchy, verging on collapse. Taste and texture become almost one: jammy and louche, with a tinge of dark wine. She tumbles the grapes over velvety whipped ricotta, with hunks of sourdough on the side. Deepening the contrast of flavors is a salty-sweet glaze of balsamic vinegar cooked down with honey and fish sauce, a nod to her Filipino heritage. If you like, add 1/4 teaspoon mushroom seasoning (an umami-rich blend of pulverized dried mushrooms and salt) to the grapes before roasting, to lend earthiness, and finish the ricotta with a flourish of flaky sea salt and scattered torn mint for a touch of freshness and color.
Monte Cristo
This American diner classic — a battered and grilled ham, turkey and cheese sandwich dusted with confectioners’ sugar — may, in fact, be a descendant of the French croque-monsieur. The two are quite similar, the main difference being that the croque-monsieur has a layer of béchamel on top, while the Monte Cristo is dipped in beaten egg before it’s griddled. The Monte Cristo became popular when a restaurant at Disneyland began serving it in the 1960s, and now, it lives on as a fixture on menus around the country. It's a delicious way to use leftover baked ham, but regular deli meat works well, too. (Feel free to omit the turkey and use twice as much ham, if you prefer.) As with most grilled sandwiches, thinner slices of cheese will melt more easily.
Macaroni and Peas
This recipe starts with a love of store-bought mac and cheese, amplified with frozen peas and diced ham. But then, it adds a few layers of flavor, increasing the peas, sautéing the cured pork and using a from-scratch garlicky Parmesan sauce inspired by classic pasta paglia e fieno (“straw and hay pasta,” so named because it’s typically made with a combination of plain and green fettuccine pastas that resembles fresh and dried grass). While pasta paglia e fieno typically uses reduced heavy cream as its sauce, this recipe keeps it a little lighter by decreasing the amount of cream and instead relying on eggs to give the sauce its clingy, glossy texture, like in a good carbonara. A finish of parsley and mint further lightens it.
Peanut Butter Noodles
This nutty midnight pasta is a dream to cook, as it requires just a handful of pantry staples and one pot. Peanut butter (the less fancy, the better) anchors a creamy sauce swathed in umami. Accentuated by a good, salty Parmesan, these noodles recall those cheesy peanut butter sandwich crackers. They make an ideal dinner for one, but the amounts can easily be doubled or quadrupled as needed. For an equally gripping vegan alternative, try swapping out the butter for olive oil and the cheese for nutritional yeast.
One-Pot Creamy Chicken and Noodles
Think of this warming dish as a relay race, each ingredient handing its flavor to the next. During the (almost!) hands-off cooking, a head of garlic and a whole chicken stuffed with a Parmesan rind roast, then give themselves to salted water, which in turn flavors the egg noodles that soften around the bird. Salt and water are your best tools here: Season the chicken, season the water and season both again. Don’t hesitate to add more water as the noodles are cooking to make sure they’re submerged. Every brand will absorb a slightly different amount of liquid, and you want a result that’s splashy enough to take on all the Parmesan you will grate at the table. Use your largest pot so everything fits. A 7- to 9-quart Dutch oven has ideal proportions with its wide base and chicken-height sides. You can substitute any short, quick-cooking pasta for egg noodles, and introduce sautéed mushrooms, spinach or herbs at the end, if that’s your mood.
Lasagna Soup
This simple, one-pot soup delivers all the comfort of a classic lasagna with very little of the work. A jar of marinara sauce is its secret to speedy flavor, along with a combination of ground beef and Italian sausage (though for ease, you can use one or the other), plus a pinch of ground nutmeg. Dried lasagna noodles are broken into small pieces and cooked directly in the soup, thickening the broth with their starches as they soften. Don’t skip the ricotta-Parmesan topping; it adds richness and the unmistakable essence of lasagna. This soup comes together quickly and is best served right away; the noodles will continue to absorb the broth as it sits.
Pistachio Cheesecake
This elegant cheesecake gets its complexity from store-bought sweetened pistachio paste, which gives it an especially perfumed flavor and an ultra-smooth texture, while chopped pistachios in the crust add crunch. Unlike many cheesecake recipes, this doesn’t require a water bath. A low oven temperature and long baking time will yield a silky, creamy texture without the anxiety of maneuvering a springform pan in and out of boiling water. You can make the cheesecake up to 5 days in advance and keep it in the fridge until ready to top with raspberries and serve.
Easy No-Bake Pistachio Cheesecake
Both cloudlike and rich, this no-bake cheesecake relies on cream cheese for structure and whipped cream for lightness. To keep the recipe as streamlined as possible, the pistachio flavor comes from melted ice cream, plus some chopped pistachios in the crust for a crunchy, nutty pop. The brand of ice cream you use makes a huge difference: The more like real pistachios it tastes, the better the cheesecake. (Some brands of pistachio use extracts and flavorings instead of actual pistachio nuts; check the ingredients before buying.) You can make the cheesecake up to 5 days in advance and keep it in the fridge until ready to top with raspberries and serve.
Detroit-Style Pizza
With charred and cheesy edges, a thick and chewy crust, and a reverse order of toppings, Detroit-style pizza has earned its place in the seemingly endless world of pizza. This hearty pie first appeared on the menu at Buddy’s Rendezvous Pizzeria in the Motor City, in 1946. Owner Gus Guerra baked his mother-in-law’s recipe for Sicilian-style pizza in the deep pans typically used to hold auto parts; the dark, industrial steel better distributed heat than traditional baking pans. Using plenty of sharp, aged Wisconsin brick cheese (see Tip) cut into cubes, with some touching the sides of the pan, helps create the pizza’s coveted burnished edges. You can find a Detroit-style pan online, but a 9-by-13-inch metal baking pan will also work. (You’ll just have to settle for slightly less crispy edges.) Inspired by J. Kenji López-Alt’s Detroit-style dough recipe, this version calls for bread flour, which creates a delightfully light and chewy crumb.
Cajun-Style Shrimp Alfredo
Fettuccine Alfredo is an Italian classic. Its luscious sauce is traditionally created using only two primary ingredients: butter and Parmesan. When stirring a large quantity of cheese into pasta, the key to achieving a fully emulsified sauce — a creamy consistency — is making sure to save and utilize some of the pasta cooking water. This recipe gives the dish a Cajun spin by adding spiced shrimp, celery, bell pepper, onion, garlic and jalapeño, finishing it with a sharp hit of Creole mustard. If you can’t find Creole mustard, a mix of Dijon and whole-grain mustards works well.
Cemitas
The cemita is a widely popular Mexican sandwich from the state of Puebla. It’s named for the bread it’s served on, an egg-rich, sesame seed bun. Also referred to as a cemita Poblana, the sandwich is frequently filled with a crispy fried cutlet, often pork or chicken. Traditional toppings are layered to create a symphony of textures and flavors, including creamy avocado, salty Oaxaca cheese, tangy pickled jalapeños or smoky chipotles en adobo, fresh raw onions and papalo (a fragrant Mexican herb similar to cilantro). If Oaxaca cheese is unavailable, string cheese delivers a similar texture and flavor.
Stromboli
Swirls of cured meats and cheeses, all wound up in pizza dough, this classic Italian-American party snack may appear more intimidating to make than it is in reality. Here, store-bought pizza dough makes this stromboli a beginner-friendly recipe: Simply roll it out thinly, add layers of deli meats and cheeses and roll it into a log. Customize the fillings however you’d like — swap the deli meats with prosciutto or salami, or even sautéed mushrooms for a vegetarian version (just make sure that both the dough and the fillings are thin so the stromboli bakes evenly). Serve warm, with marinara or pizza sauce on the side for dipping.
Bacon-Cheddar Dip
Bacon and Cheddar, that time-honored pairing, meet up once more in this easy, spicy skillet dip. Grated Cheddar, the sharper the better, and crisp bacon slivers are folded into a mix of cream cheese and sour cream that’s been zipped up with hot sauce. You can prepare the dip a few hours in advance, then broil it just before serving so that the Cheddar emerges melted, singed and bubbly on top. Marinated cherry tomatoes (or you can substitute prepared salsa), scallions and more bacon make for a colorful, juicy garnish. Serve it with anything you love to dip: Chips, veggies or crackers are all welcome.