Main Course
8665 recipes found
Risotto With Green Beans
This is a luxurious risotto, enriched with pesto at the end of cooking. This time I used pumpkin seeds for the pesto, with terrific results. They contributed not only great flavor but a rich green color to the pesto.
Creamy Butternut Squash Pasta With Sage and Walnuts
Butternut squash gets roasted, puréed, then tossed with Parmesan to make this nutty, creamy pasta sauce. Each serving is topped with crispy fried sage leaves, a hint of lemon zest, and toasted walnuts, adding a crunchy contrast to the squash. Feel free to forgo wrestling with a giant squash and use a package of cubed precut squash instead.
One-Pan Tuna-White Bean Casserole
This is not the classic, cream-of-something soup tuna casserole you may be familiar with. It’s based on a recipe for a Breton tuna and white bean gratin from the food writer Diana Henry’s cookbook, “Simple” (Mitchell Beazley, 2016). Several steps were eliminated, and an essential potato chip topping was added, which may put it squarely into tuna casserole territory. But you can call it whatever you like. (This recipe is part of the From the Pantry series, started in the days after the coronavirus lockdown.)
Omelets With Roasted Vegetables and Feta
If you have roasted vegetables on hand an omelet is a wonderful vehicle for them. Omelets are so quick to make, and so satisfying, whether you make them for breakfast, lunch, or dinner. You can cut up your roasted vegetables into slightly smaller pieces if you want a less chunky omelet.
Pork Gyros
This lemon-bright and paprika-dusted pita filling is based on memories of the gyros served at Kalimera Souvlaki Art in Melbourne, Australia, one of the best Greek restaurants in a city that supports a great number of them. I've cooked it here in the oven, but the preparation would take well to the grill. However you prepare it, serve the crisped meat with warm pita, cucumbers, tomatoes and onion, tzatziki sauce, hot sauce, French fries, mint leaves, really whatever you like.
Hortopita
This terrific recipe for a massive pile of mixed greens, herbs, leek and winter squash, all encased in homemade phyllo dough, came to The Times from the noted Greek-born food writer and cooking instructor Diane Kochilas, with whom Mark Bittman cooked in her Athens apartment. It’s a bit of work, to be sure, but Kochilas has codified the process so that it’s straightforward, and the results are both delicious and impressive. It's important to note that the phyllo dough created here need not be the extremely thin version we see in pastries, but rather a reasonably thin and easily worked dough rich in olive oil. It seems daunting. It is not.
Malcolm and Kelley McDowell's Pink Rigatoni
Chinese Steak With Asparagus and Rice
Kalpudding (Meatloaf With Caramelized Cabbage)
This Swedish version of a dish with roots in the Ottoman Empire is served here with lingonberry preserves cut with vinegar and Worcestershire sauce, and made velvet with butter. The dish goes beautifully with boiled potatoes. In Sweden, you’d use golden syrup to caramelize the cabbage, but molasses works just as well. The Swedish chef Magnus Nilsson told me the result is no less Nordic for the substitution. “Cabbage smells in a very special way when it almost burns,” he said. “It gets savory, almost like a beef stock. It tastes almost brown and umami yummy.” You’ll want to eat it right away, but the leftovers make for a fine sandwich in coming days.
Sous-Vide Turkey Breast With Maple and Rosemary
Cooking a turkey breast using sous vide makes for especially tender meat that’s never dried out. You’ll want to bring the meat to 145 degrees, which leaves it delicately pink, very juicy and perfectly safe because the long, steady heat of the sous vide machine pasteurizes the meat. That said, if you like your turkey slightly firmer and well done — more like a traditional roast bird — cook it to 152 degrees. Lastly, make sure to take the skin off the meat before cooking; the moist environment of the sous-vide bag makes it irreversibly soggy. Fans of crisp, golden skin can bake it separately instead.
Simple Trahana Soup With Lemon and Olive Oil
This is just about the simplest dish to make with trahana, yet I find it incredibly satisfying and refreshing. I like it both hot and cold; it is cooling on a hot summer day and comforting on a cool one (we were in the middle of a bad heat wave when I was testing this week’s recipes). The soup is adapted from a recipe in Diane Kochilas’s new cookbook: “Ikaria: Lessons on Food, Life, and Longevity From the Greek Island Where People Forget to Die.” My favorite herb to use with the soup is fresh dill. If you want to add more ingredients, simmer vegetables of your choice in the broth, or add blanched or steamed vegetables to the soup when you serve it. Broccoli would be great, as would peas, beans, or sugar snap peas.
Stir-Fried Quinoa With Vegetables and Tofu
I’ve substituted cooked quinoa here for rice. You can use either regular or royal red quinoa for this dish. As with all stir-fries, once all the ingredients for this one are prepped, the cooking takes less than five minutes.
Chicken Curry Potpie
Seared Sea Scallops With Ginger-Lime Butter
Day-boat scallops, the kind that are dry-packed (never frozen or dosed with preservatives), are what you want for this decadent but very simple dish. The scallops are seared on cast iron, but gradually, for a crisp, well-browned surface that intensifies their natural sweetness. Ginger, lime and hot pepper enhance the rich meatiness of all fresh seafood, and here especially so. A roasted sweet potato and a pile of blanched bok choy complete this quintessentially elegant, fast-food meal.
Stuffed Capon Breast With Corn And Pea Risotto
Mushroom and Dried Porcini Soup
This has such an intense flavor for such a simple soup. With virtually no fat in the soup, it has a tonic quality, and not only makes a great starter or light supper, but a delicious and effective between meal pick-me-up.
Khao Soi Gai (Northern Thai Coconut-Curry Noodles With Chicken)
You’ll find khao soi, a deeply fragrant, coconut milk-based stew, throughout Southeast Asia, but the dish is a specialty of Chiang Mai, a city in Northern Thailand. Chicken is simmered in a creamy, spicy-sweet broth, then served over boiled egg noodles and garnished with crunchy fried noodles. (When made with beef, the dish is called khao soi nuea.) This version is adapted from Noree Thai, a restaurant in Los Angeles, which Noree Pla owns with her partner, the chef Fern Kaewtathip. Ms. Pla serves the khao soi she learned from her mother, which requires more than a dozen ingredients, but once you have the ingredients prepared, the dish comes together in less than an hour. For a lighter broth, use about half of the curry paste; for a more pungent khao soi, use it all.
Corn Empanadas
Back in 2013, David Tanis learned to make several versions of empanadas from his friend Fernando Trocca, an Argentine chef, including one filled with sweet corn. Here, Mr. Tanis uses potatoes, peppers and ham, in addition to corn, to fill the handmade dough. It’s not a quick project, but it yields dividends and the satisfaction of pulling dozens of the small pies out of the oven.
Asparagus and Parmesan Omelet
This is a favorite omelet of mine. I make folded French omelets for one or two, and larger frittatas for a crowd.
Charred Cauliflower With Anchovies, Capers and Olives
This deeply versatile recipe is essentially a robust baked cauliflower salad. You can serve it room temperature as an antipasto, as part of a buffet or warm as a nearly vegetarian main course with rice pilaf, roasted sweet potatoes or pasta. It is also a perfect make-ahead side dish to accompany nearly everything from roasted chicken or fish fillets to steaks and chops.
Roasted Cauliflower Gratin With Tomatoes and Goat Cheese
Roasting is one of my favorite ways to prepare cauliflower, and I have always loved preparations that pair the vegetable with coriander seeds. I use coriander seeds and cinnamon to season the tomato sauce that I toss with the roasted cauliflower and sautéed red onions, then add a couple of eggs beaten with goat cheese.
Endive Salad With Egg and Anchovy
For a cool-weather salad, pale green Belgian endive dressed with an assertive anchovy vinaigrette is a refreshing beginning to a meal — or a nice light lunch. For more color, try adding other endive relatives: the red-leafed variety, frisée, different types of radicchio or speckled Castelfranco chicory. All of these winter salad greens have sweetness and a pleasant hint of bitterness. Belgian endive is the mildest of the bunch. As for anchovies, look for good fat meaty ones. Rinse and blot, then coat with a little good extra-virgin olive oil.
Refried Bean, Zucchini and Corn Gratin
This is my own interpretation of a traditional Southwestern dish (that has many interpretations) called Three Sisters Casserole. Three Sisters refers to the Native American practice of growing corn, beans and squash in the same field. I’ve seen many different recipes for Three Sisters Casserole and Three Sisters Gratin, some using winter squash, more using summer squash. Sometimes the vegetables are combined and topped with a layer of polenta. In this version, each element gets its own flavorful layer. Although you can use canned beans for the dish, I urge you to use simmered beans because the refried beans will taste best if you reduce them in their flavorful broth.
Vegetarian Mushroom Meatballs With Honey-Ginger Glaze
These tender, aromatic meatballs are packed with almost a pound of vegetables and a healthy dose of fresh ginger. Rice noodles are the secret to these tender meatballs, keeping them moist while they bake. The shiitake mushrooms provide rich, meaty umami flavor, while the baby bok choy keeps the meatballs delicate and light. These meatballs make a great snack for entertaining, or can form the foundation of dinner when served over brown rice with more steamed bok choy on the side. Leftover meatballs can be frozen and reheated in a 425-degree oven until warmed through, about 15 minutes.