Vegan

Peppers play a central role in this Calabrian version of potato salad. Fresh green peppers are fried as a main salad ingredient; and peperoncino, dried crushed red-pepper flakes, serves as an essential seasoning. The peppers you want for this are the slender, long ones with sweet, tender flesh, which I have always just called “Italian frying peppers.” These days, with the greater popularity of peppers and chilis here in America, markets sell a number of varieties that are suitable for frying, such as banana peppers, wax peppers, Hungarian peppers, and Cubanelle peppers. In addition to this delicious salad with potatoes, you’ll find many wonderful uses for fresh peppers, fried Italian-style. Season them with olive oil and slices of garlic, let them marinate, and enjoy them as part of an antipasto or layered in a sandwich. Or sprinkle a little wine vinegar on the peppers (with the olive oil and garlic) for a condiment-like salad that is just perfect with grilled fish or chicken.

Celery is plentiful and a wonderful vegetable, yet I see it mostly used in making stocks or salads. This way of braising celery is easy and flavorful, and makes a grand side dish for grilled fish or chicken. It can be cooked in advance and reheated when your guests come—or serve it at room temperature as an appetizer. I’ve also discovered that any leftovers make a very good chutney: chop coarsely and spread on a sandwich of cold cuts or cheese. Fantastic!

Here’s another fine winter salad, pairing one of my favorite, underappreciated vegetables—celery root—with fresh apples. The mellow, tender cubes of cooked celery root and the crisp apple slices provide a delightful, unexpected combination of flavor and texture. To turn the salad into a light lunch, add a few slices of prosciutto and serve it with some crusty bread. A firm, crisp apple is what you want for salad, and fortunately there are many varieties in the market that have that essential crunch, with flavors ranging from sweet to tangy to tart. I like to use a few different apples, rather than just one type, for greater complexity of flavor and vivid color in the salad. In addition to the reliably crisp Granny Smith apple, I look for some of the old-time firm and tart apples, such as Gravenstein, Jonathan, and Rome, and a few newer strains, like Cameo, Gala, and Fuji.

The key to this drink is fresh pineapple juice.

We'll happily make room on our condiment shelf for yuzu kosho, a blend of citrus zest, garlic, chile, and salt. It adds aromatic acidity (and some heat) to rice dishes, noodle soups, fish, and chicken. We substitute lemon, lime, and grapefruit zest for the hard-to-find yuzu, a Japanese citrus.

If you can only find regular coconut milk, buy 2 cans and use the thick cream that's floating at the top. The coconut cream will caramelize during cooking, leaving sweet brown flecks in the rice.

Our fresh take on the classic Moroccan salad pairs shaved fennel and red onion with assorted beets and oranges for color contrast.

Looking for a meaty, flavorful main without the meat? Cauliflower steak is the answer.

Use this dressing to add zip to broccolini, also sold as baby broccoli or Asparation.

These really do look and taste like their gluten- and dairy-laden counterparts. Just don't expect quite as many nooks and crannies.
It is extremely important to use masa harina for this recipe. Though it is a corn product, it is completely different from cornmeal and masarepa (produced specifically for arepas although I still find that the masa harina arepas are must tastier). Masa harina is traditionally used to make corn tortillas and tamales but can make arepas as well. The more coarsely ground cornmeal is used to make corn bread and corn mush.

This vegetarian take on a traditional Mexican red pozole—pozole being the name not only of a type of stew, often made with pork, but also of the large dried corn kernels (hominy) integral to the mixture—is rich and satisfying. The accompaniments are an essential and fun part of the dish, adding some fresh crunch to the toothsome bite of hominy, beans, and vegetables. It's the perfect meal to have waiting on the back of the stove for family and friends as they straggle in from near and far for a holiday weekend.

You can buy premade Chinese dumpling wrappers from any Asian grocery store, and in most cases they work as well and taste as good as homemade wrappers. However, Shanghai Soup Dumplings should be made with homemade wrappers or they will not hold their soup when steaming. If you are making wrappers for Shanghai Soup Dumplings, try to keep the center of the wrappers thicker than the edges when rolling the dough disks.

When you've got a native berry that's the foundation for a must-have sauce on every Thanksgiving dinner table across the country, you can count on lots of variations. Just check the Internet. This cranberry chutney is essentially a classic sauce, jazzed up with the more vibrant flavors of pineapple juice, pepper flakes, and clove. The good news is that while it's supermarket-friendly—not hard to find ingredients—it tastes remarkably more complex and nuanced than the short ingredient list would lead you to believe. Aim to make it several days ahead so that the flavors have time to mingle and mellow.

Carrots are my go-to snack. I eat about a pound a day around the kitchen, raw and crunchy. I don't know that my eyesight is any better, but who knows. This pickled version is great on a pickle plate or chopped up on a pork sandwich.

Since everyone has his or her version of this sauce, we spent a lot of time getting this one right. No surprise, the best results came from using the best ingredients. When it comes to tomato sauce, using poor quality canned tomatoes can leave an acidic or tinny taste in your mouth. So while it is a bit more expensive, we like to use Pomi brand chopped tomatoes (you know, the ones that come in a box). The sauce starts with a careful "sweating" of onions (cooking them slowly, until translucent but not brown, to extract as much flavor as possible), and the flavor continues to build from a nice, long, low-heat simmering after the tomatoes are added.

Roasted garlic adds a rich dimension to so many different dishes—and it's super easy to prepare. I usually roast about 2 heads of garlic at a time, but this recipe is easily halved.

Even the girl who has it all could use an energy boost. Walnuts' protein will keep her going strong.