Dairy

Use a cherry pitter to remove the pits before cutting the cherries in half.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Sliced leftover cooked pork makes this quick pizza even quicker.

Yogurt curdles easily when heated, but mixing it with egg white and cornstarch, and then simmering it, makes the yogurt more heat-stable without changing the flavor significantly. Active time: 15 min Start to finish: 15 min

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Wong uses Fontina cheese and includes a slice of foie gras in each of these improbably luxurious grilled cheese sandwiches. At the restaurant, they are served with a Martini glass filled with swirled, chilled red and yellow tomato soups that the waiter instructs you to down in one gulp. Salud!

Active time: 20 min Start to finish: 50 min Pasta wasn't always the carbohydrate vehicle of choice — in the '40s, lots of saucy things were spooned onto toast. These mushrooms appeared in one of our stories about Katish — the Russian cook immortalized by Gourmet's Wanda E. Ivanoff — who liked their versatility as a side dish or main course, and who often made a big batch to keep on hand for impromptu snacks.

This recipe makes plenty of extra salsa to serve on tacos or with chips.

"While in Greenville, South Carolina, we dined at The Palms, located in the Phoenix Inn," writes Marilyn J. Smith of Bradford, Pennsylvania. "All their food is outstanding, but I would particularly like the recipe for the Roquefort terrine. It was delicious!"

Sound familiar? OK, we admit it —when we're on the road we're partial to this well-known breakfast sandwich. But at home we like to prepare it this way.

Soupe au Pistou During Marion Cunningham’s last visit with Richard Olney, he made a version of this recipe, which comes from Simple French Food. As he made it, he told her that he thought the trick to cooking is tasting — in the case of the soup that day, adding the right amount of salt and pepper, then cheese, then a little olive oil, and finally some macaroni. After making the soup in our own kitchens, following the recipe from the book (it's highly adaptable to seasonal produce or the contents of your larder), we can understand why this recipe is so loved among Olney’s fans.

At her restaurant, Lynch includes black truffle in the vinaigrette for this salad, but it's so flavorful as it is that we didn't feel the truffle was necessary.

These lamb chops—an easier version of recipes you may have made before—go nicely with sugar snap peas with ginger and garlic and couscous with apricots .

Russian cheesecakes, like this one served at The Kaleenka in Seattle, are lighter and drier than most American versions. The texture comes from a dry-curd cheese (known here a hoop cheese) common to Russian cooking.

While the birth of the Brandy Alexander cocktail may be obscured in the history of mixology, the creation of the like-named pie can be traced to right around December 1933, when Prohibition was repealed. Americans could once again enjoy a legal drink. That apparently inspired some creative cooks to flavor recipes once again with wines and liqueurs, and the forerunner of this pie was born. We've replaced the traditional graham cracker crust with one made of chocolate wafer cookies, and we've added white chocolate to the rich brandy and crème de cacao filling.

(Egg, Pickle, and Caper Mayonnaise) Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.