Sauce

This simple sauce is great with the roly-poly.

Simple to prepare but impressive when served, this is spring elegance at its best. The salad is shown with purple watercress, a beautiful, rare variety you might find at farmers' markets. Green watercress works great, too.

This barbecue sauce is delicious and can be made ahead and frozen. To save time, you also can use your favorite prepared barbecue sauce; if it's too thick, add a little cider vinegar.

The secret ingredient in this dish is a surprisingly modest one: grapefruit. Its tartness balances the unashamed, almost swaggering richness of scallops bathed in a butter sauce.

This filling meatless meal satisfies nearly a quarter of your daily fiber needs.

Food editor Lillian Chou, who is also gourmet's resident runner of marathons, swears by quinoa: "I have so much more energy if I eat it before a race!" And transforming this power grain into crisp cakes topped with a substantial rustic sauce and gooey softened mozzarella creates another compelling reason to love it—it just tastes so good.

A super-quick take on aioli, this garlicky sauce keeps the fish incredibly moist.

The French version of pesto, pistou is often stirred into soupe au pistou, Provence's vegetable and bean soup. In this dish, the vegetable soup ingredients and pistou are blended together into a flavorful puree that's topped with shrimp. To serve as a main course, add a side of orzo tossed with good-quality olive oil, salt, plenty of pepper, and some grated Asiago cheese.

Here's a great new way to roast beets: in a salt crust. The horseradish, thyme, and orange in the crust infuse the beets with bright flavor as they're cooking. Leftover beets make a great addition to salads. Lightly coat torn butter lettuce with a Sherry wine vinaigrette, top with the sliced beets and some sliced red onion, and drizzle with a bit of the horseradish crème fraîche.

Roasting the meat for almost seven hours makes it tender and succulent. The bright, fresh salsa verde is the perfect accent for the rich meat.

Serve with warm flatbread or pita bread.

Purchased mayo gets dressed up with garlic, Dijon, and lemon juice.

Chef Tracht likes an assertive sauce, so she uses extra-hot prepared horseradish. For a milder sauce, use less horseradish or the regular-strength variety.

Brown sugar and molasses are balanced by fresh ginger and jalapeños.

Tangerine juice plays two roles here: It stops the cooking of the sugar, and its bright perfume brings complexity to the sauce.

Is there a child in this world that doesn't love applesauce? This pink-hued, cinnamon-spiked version is just the right topping for the latkes.

Prepare the giblet gravy while the roasted turkey rests.

A glaze lacquers and flavors the bird.