Pecorino

Wild salmon tops the list of fish that are high in omega-3 and low in mercury. So swap out farmed salmon, which contains food dyes, for the real thing. Frozen sides of wild salmon offer the best value. Garlic scapes are the young, soft stems and unopened flower buds of hardneck garlic. This variety of garlic tends to be prevalent at farmer's markets. The season for scapes is short, so if you can't find them you can substitute scallions or baby leeks.

This classic pasta has only a few ingredients, but they transform into a surprisingly velvety, flavorful dish.

If using different types of beets, separate them when roasting and tossing to keep the colors from bleeding.

For Super Bowl 50, go all-out with our epic 50-ingredient nachos, or choose just one of the (much-simpler) five “zones” to make for game day.

Rather than being cooked in salted water, the pasta is treated like risotto—simmered in stock and stirred until cooked and creamy—which gives it plenty of time to pick up meaty flavors.

It's hard not to love this classic Italian pasta—it's just the right mix of spicy and sweet.

Roman cauliflower (also known as Romanesco) grows as a peculiar spiky, conical head, and instead of florets as in regular cauliflower, it projects cones with tiny cones upon cones—a kind of fractal of nature's making. It comes in various hues of white, purple, and green and has a nutty, more intense flavor compared with regular cauliflower. Unfortunately it's not always easy to find in many stores in the US, though sources like farmers' markets often carry it, as do Italian specialty shops. You can substitute standard cauliflower for this if you can't find the Roman variety. It breaks into florets and cooks the same way.

I get a lot of inspiration from staring at the supermarket shelves, and seeing what items are grouped together. I made this recipe because I found the smoked oysters next to the anchovies in the canned fish section and decided to try them out instead in my Caesar dressing. Once I did that, I decided to riff on the croutons a bit too. In this recipe, the smoky oysters complement the rich egg yolks, which in turn get cut by a healthy dose of lemon juice. Do you like other canned fishies? All are good Caesar salad material, providing they are packed in oil, which amps up their flavor almost to a condiment level of oomph. If you want to get real crazy, find the canned seafood section in an ethnic market.

Some say using a blender rather than a food processor results in a smoother puree. When combining pesto with pasta, Ligurians mix a small ladle of the cooking water into the pesto just before adding the noodles; this dilutes the concentrated sauce and helps it adhere to the pasta.

You know those heirloom tomatoes you bought over the weekend and didn’t use that are now looking a little too soft? They’re exactly the tomatoes you want for this easy, end-of-summer soup.

Both guanciale and Pecorino are quite salty; Leonardo Vignoli, the chef at Da Cesare al Casaletto, recommends undersalting the pasta water to give you more control.

Thin, crisp toast has never let me down. Making a batch while I mull over what’s for dinner always saves me, later, when kids are circling or a guest arrives early. It must be made from stale bread—a fresh loaf is difficult to slice very thin, which is what you must do for crunchy, tender, non mouth-injuring toast. A 350°F oven will help make toast for a crowd without much risk of burning (as long as you use a timer and stand by vigilantly!).

Why is it that in the dead of winter, everything seems to need a little help? Anchovy butter delivers bold flavor to this back-pocket pasta

Mmm. Fried dough. On a trip to Rimini, a resort town on Italy's Adriatic coast, I had a memorable fried pizza topped with cheese and ham. To re-create it, I came up with this shallow-fry method in which you fry the dough, then flip it, top it with mozzarella, and cover it with a lid to melt the cheese. In honor of Rimini, I've topped this one with the region's famous squacquerone cheese, which is as deliciously soft and runny as it is difficult to pronounce. If you can't find it, you can use crescenza (also known as stracchino). It goes on after frying and quickly melts on the hot crust. I also add thin slices of the cooked ham sold in Italian delis as prosciutto cotto. Not to be confused with prosciutto, which is cured but not cooked, this is what we know as ham, but it's a bit paler, less smoky, and more delicate than typical American deli ham. For this method, it's really helpful to roll your dough out as close to the stove top as possible and to have everything set up before you start cooking: your skillet on the stove top, a lid within easy reach, your cheeses and toppings measured out, and a plate lined with paper towels right next to the stove. Keep a close eye on the heat as you fry and adjust it as needed so the dough cooks all the way through without burning on the outside.

You'll have extra butternut squash left over after making the ribbons; cut into cubes, toss with olive oil, salt and pepper, and roast for an easy side dish.

Toss earthy kale with a bright citrus dressing and finish with a crunch of toasted walnuts. Use baby kale, if possible, for its tender leaves.

Pasta, lush tomatoes, and a pool of ricotta lend this dish all the flavor of a lasagne—without the heaviness.

Think of this as a carbonara, but with tomatoes in place of the eggs.

A version of this recipe helped Danny Bowien win the Pesto World Championship in Italy in 2008. He was kind enough to let us adapt it a bit.

The key to this sauce is a creamy emulsion of the oil, cheese, and pasta water. Toss and stir—and stir and toss—adding liquid freely, until it comes together.