Main Course
8665 recipes found
Simple Steamed Clams or Mussels
This straightforward method of cooking mussels or clams produces an excellent dinner in 30 minutes. You can build in extra flavors by varying the aromatic vegetables, the liquid and the last-minute stir-ins. All you need is some bread or simply cooked rice, grain or potatoes to sop up the broth.
Sancocho
Sancocho, a word often used as slang by Puerto Ricans to mean a big old mix of things, is a rustic stew eaten across the Caribbean and made with every imaginable combination of proteins and vegetables. My father cooked his with beef, corn and noodles; my mom with chicken breasts, lean pork and sweet plantains; my grandmother with beef, pork on the bone and yautia. As such, I’ve rarely used a recipe, so this one is based largely on observation, taste memory and what I like. Pretty much every ingredient can be swapped out, and it also makes for a sumptuous vegetarian dish without meat. Sancocho epitomizes the resilience of Puerto Rican people, as it is often prepared in times of crisis — such as after a hurricane — and made with whatever you have on hand.
Beef Suya
Suya is a popular Nigerian street food made of thin strips of meat that are seasoned, skewered and grilled. The term “suya” can refer to the preparation technique or the resulting dish, and can apply to other meats, such as goat and chicken. This recipe is similar in style to the suya made from a fattier cut of beef called tozo, which comes from the hump of the zebu cattle, found in northern Nigeria. A well-marbled piece of boneless short rib is a great substitute. Ask your butcher to thinly slice the meat into strips, or pop it into your freezer for 30 minutes and use a sharp knife to slice. Suya spice, or yaji, is available online or at African groceries, or you can make your own (see Tip).
Gratinee of Cauliflower
Creamy, cheesy but not too thick or heavy, this is a good side for a pork loin.
Warm Rice Salad With Smoked Duck
Khoresh Morgh Nardooni (Pomegranate Chicken Stew)
Khoresh morgh nardooni (also called anar mosama) is a deeply flavorful dish from the northern provinces of Iran. It is wonderful for Shab-e Yalda, the Iranian celebration of the winter solstice, or for any holiday celebration. Pomegranates on Yalda symbolize a red dawn: the emergence of light and brighter days ahead. Here, the combination of pomegranate molasses and pomegranate seeds showcase the various ways the fruit is used in Iranian cuisine. While not traditional, some preparations, such as this one, use tomato paste for added depth and vibrancy. Serve this with Persian rice, a side of fresh herbs, radishes and scallions.
Sweet Potato and Butternut Squash Soup with Ginger
This silky fall/winter puree tastes rich, though there is no cream or butter in it.
Jamaican Oxtail Stew
Here is a midwinter cook-up of deep fragrance and lingering heat, a trade-wind stew that emerged in Jamaica and made its way north. It is oxtail stew, brown and steaming, light with ginger and thyme, pungent with allspice and soy, a taste of the Caribbean to warm winter’s heart. You could make and eat it today while reading Derek Walcott poems as the afternoon vagues into indigo — or allow it to cure into greater magnificence overnight, and stretch out its gravy for the course of a week. Paired with bowls of coconut-scented rice and peas, a staple of the Caribbean diet, it makes for an excellent family dinner or a transporting lunch, as if the flavors within it were a spur to memories of better times, in warmer climes, with soft sand on your feet and a kiss of sun upon your shoulders.
Smoky Cheese Grits with Summer Succotash
This recipe, adapted from “Sara Moulton’s Everyday Family Dinners,” came to The Times in 2010 as part of a Pete Wells column on redefining the mise en place. Ms. Moulton uses downtime in the cooking process to an advantage: She instructs you to chop the onion and shuck the corn as the edamame cooks. The recipe comes together in about 40 minutes, making it a good one for a busy weeknight -- succotash without suffering.
Roquefort, Leek and Walnut Tart
The open-face Alsatian tarte flambée can be as versatile as a quiche. Most often it’s given classic treatment, with bacon and onions on a pastry-lined bed of crème fraîche and fromage blanc. But why stick to tradition? You can make it with mushrooms, omit the bacon and dot it with caviar, add smoked salmon, pave it with zucchini slices, and explore other cheeses, including Taleggio and chèvre. Here’s an assertive version that keeps the bacon but opts for Roquefort cheese, leeks and walnuts. And instead of pizza dough, which is a typical underpinning, for a more expedient result, you can make it with pie pastry.
Flank Steak With Zucchini
Marinate the meat at leisure, allow enough time to salt the zucchini to extract excess moisture and you are ready for speed-dial cooking. Once cooked, the dish can also bide its time, to anchor a summer buffet at room temperature.
Linguine With Smoked Bacon, Leeks and Clams
Briny clams come together with smoky bacon and sautéed leeks in this showstopper. Quick to prepare, this weeknight recipe is decidedly sophisticated. First, sauté the bacon, add the garlic and leeks and add some good white wine and tomatoes. Toss with al dente linguine and top with clams and lemon juice. Finish with it with parsley and pine nuts, and pour yourself a glass of that wine. With this simple, elegant meal, you’ve earned it.
Porgy Fillets With Pickled Jalapeño-Herb Sauce
Dane Sayles, the chef of East Hampton Point in New York, believes porgies can take strong flavorings, so he adds spicy pickled peppers and their pickling liquid to his herb marinade. He also whizzes in some tahini, which smooths the emulsified mixture. At his restaurant, he blanches the herbs (drops them in boiling water for 10 seconds, then plunges them into ice water before draining) to help fix their color. It's something you can do as well and should remember the next time you make pesto.
Grilled Lamb With Scallion Pancakes
Here is a recipe for grilled lamb inspired by Northern China. It’s treated to a five-spice and soy sauce rub, and served, in a nod to Peking duck, with cucumbers, hoisin sauce and pancakes. The pancakes are not the typically thin crepes served for wrapping slices of Peking duck. Instead they are classic scallion pancakes, a dim sum item usually eaten alone. Here they’re spread with hoisin sauce and topped with slices of lamb and cucumber. Alternatively, you could serve the pancakes like tortillas, to wrap around the lamb, taco-style. Either way, it’s party food.
Braised Beef With Eggplant
The food of Provence usually evokes summer, with lovely vegetables, salads, seafood and a whiff of lavender. But there’s a wintry side to it as well. When a fierce mistral wind blows, it’s time to crank out beef stews and roasted meats. This braised beef dish, a pot roast, keeps a Provençal flavor profile, with eggplant, garlic, fennel, rosemary, orange, black olives and tomatoes. It’s prepared to allow the eggplant to maintain its character and not disintegrate. I like to braise a nice piece of tri-tip sirloin, but this recipe will suit any cut of beef you prefer for braising. Serve the dish with plain broad egg noodles dressed with a splash of good olive oil.
Chicken With Orange and Onion
In this recipe, adapted from my mother, Annette Gertner, an orange, pith, skin and all, provides a bittersweet counterpoint for tangy onion to season and dress a whole, broken-down chicken that’s browned on one side, then baked. Worcestershire sauce binds the flavors with a good amount of umami, while some bits of orange and onion paving the chicken skin caramelize in the oven and enrich the pan sauce.
Hake With Clams in Salsa Verde
This Basque classic from Marti Buckley's cookbook “Basque Country: A Culinary Journey Through a Food Lover's Paradise,” requires a bit of quick stove work once the clams start to open. You must be sure there is a nice amount of liquid in the bottom of the pan, enough to swirl around so the flour coating on the fish and the olive oil can thicken and emulsify the sauce. And though it's called salsa verde, it's not a dense herbal purée as in Italian cooking but a fresh, rather sheer parsley-based mixture.
Wild Salmon With Fennel and Pistachios
Assertively flavorful, lush-textured wild Pacific salmon — notably king, but also sockeye — are seasonal treasures. Unlike farmed Atlantic salmon, which is of a different genus entirely and available year-round, Pacific salmon is a late spring through summer catch. Its richness makes a fairly modest portion satisfying. In this recipe I paired it with fennel, pistachios and lemon. I started the fish fillet in a very hot oven (not quite volcanic, but about as hot as a home oven can get) then immediately cut the temperature down and let the salmon cook for another 15 to 20 minutes. It’s a fail-safe technique that guarantees against overcooking.
Venison Chops With Shallots and Cumin
Wintry weather and holiday get-togethers require celebratory food to share. Try venison instead of the more common roasts. A rub of cumin and pepper gives these chops warmth, while bacon adds a whiff of smoke and some fat with which to baste the lean meat. This recipe avoids the usual tart-fruit component, so the spices have less competition. Instead, seared shallots go alongside. For venison, the rack is the easiest cut to prepare. and in a hot oven it is quickly done and cut into chops. The meat is hearty and succulent, with the merest hint of gaminess. Be sure to cook it only to medium rare or it will toughen. Since most venison that’s available (unless you know a hunter) is ranch-raised in America or New Zealand and carries a hefty price tag, you do not want disappointment.
Alaskan Salmon
Tim Stark's Favorite Tomato Recipe
Oven-Steamed Salmon
This simple way to roast salmon brings spectacular results with hardly any worry on the cook's part. The Mediterranean cookbook author Paula Wolfert learned it from the French chef Michel Bras, and it rises and falls on the thinness of the sheet pan. A pan of water delivers enough moisture to steam the fish briefly at a low temperature, producing a final product that is soft and deliciously juicy. It adapts easily to almost any salmon fillet. Emily Kaiser Thelin, who includes it in her biography of Ms. Wolfert, "Unforgettable," says a center-cut of wild-caught Alaska king works best and suggests pairing it with a salad or cracked green olive relish.
Pozole With Duck and Mezcal
The giant white hominy used to make pozole are a blank canvas. The hominy — soaked, then simmered using a quick-boil shortcut that skips the need for overnight soaking — welcome chiles and a good dose of cumin. This pozole includes prepared duck confit instead of the more usual pork or chicken. Some diced fresh pineapple in the thick stew balances the spicy heat. A small glass of mezcal is a fine partner, especially as a finishing touch. Save a little of the drink for when you and guests are almost finished eating, to pour into the bowl for the last soupy spoonfuls. It’s what the French do in Gascony with their red wine when they enjoy a soup called garbure.
