Simple Cooking

Smoky, subtly sweet grilled broccoli feels luxurious served on a bed of creamy egg salad, turning this dish into a satisfying, comforting main meal.

Layers of nutty pistachio ice cream and bright jam-flavored whipped cream make for a lovely pastel duo in this riff on a classic summer dessert.

A few tweaks to the standard icebox cake formula make this version stand out: jam (in this case, peach) folded into half of the whipped cream for a fruity element, Ritz crackers that go delightfully soft in the freezer but still make a case for belonging in dessert with their salty, buttery flavor, and a layer of butter pecan ice cream right through the middle.

These pickled iceberg leaves are a good reminder that meat isn’t always required to make a sandwich substantial and well-spiced.

Masa is the essence of Mexico. It is the foundation of Mexican cooking. In Oaxaca, a lot of families still make their own nixtamal at home to supply their daily masa consumption. Nixtamal is the process of treating dried corn with an alkaline solution to make it more nutritious. Slaking lime—also known as pickling lime, a naturally occurring mineral compound—has been used for thousands of years for this process. After a night of soaking, the nixtamalized corn is ground and transformed into masa. This technique has been passed from generation to generation, especially in Oaxaca. Every night before my mom goes to bed, she nixtamalizes a batch of corn so she can make fresh masa the next morning. It’s part of her nightly routine.    The trickiest part of making masa might be grinding it, and for that I recommend a tabletop wet stone mill or a hand-cranked wet grinder. I like Premier’s Small Wonder 1.5-liter tabletop wet grinder.    Believe me, there is nothing more fulfilling than making your own masa at home.

Though the amount of salt may seem excessive, a lot of the salt will be lost when the mixture is steamed inside the tamal wrapping. You can reduce the amount somewhat, but remember that the particular flavor of masa in tamales is complemented by salt.

This smoky chipotle and tomatillo salsa is an excellent dipping sauce for crudités or tortilla chips, or you can spoon it on top of tamales. You can use more chiles for a spicier sauce.

The double-flip method makes the tortillas puff beautifully once you get the rhythm.

Barley flour, cornmeal, and a hint of grapefruit juice make this easy pie crust extra flavorful. Try it with this Blueberry-Nectarine Lattice Pie.

The Thai-inspired dressing—tart and spicy and salty—plays up the sweetness of watermelon and berries while keeping the fruit salad firmly in savory territory.

The underlying notes of vanilla and nutmeg—found in Coca-Cola—are layered with piquant aromatics and tangy tomato ketchup to produce a barbecue sauce that's remarkably dynamic. 

This barbecue sauce recipe combines bright ginger and sharp Dijon mustard.

Requesón is a salty, spreadable Mexican cheese that tastes like a creamier, more acidic version of ricotta. Making it from scratch is easy: You curdle milk with vinegar or another acid such as lime juice, and then warm it and watch the curds form. Most street vendors use it as a tlacoyo filling, but you can use requesón for all sorts of things—stirred into scrambled eggs and tomatoes, smeared into a corn tortilla with salsa, or spread onto a piece of toast with honey or mixed in a dip of fresh herbs and olive oil.

Avocado leaves are the aroma of Oaxaca, and they are the main flavor in this indispensable staple. So many things can be created out of this little bean paste flavored with anise-y avocado tree leaves. It is the base for memelas, tlayudas, molletes, enfrijoladas, and so much more. Growing up, we stopped at the market in Tlacolula—a small village located near Oaxaca City—just to buy the paste, already made, in little plastic bags. You buy some tasajo, you grill it, you get some fresh tlayudas, some salsa, and then you spread some of this paste all over your tortilla like it is a savory cake frosting.

Chances are, if you're not Oaxaqueño and grew up in this last generation in Mexico or the United States, you’ve probably been taught to think that pork fat like aciento—Oaxacan-style chicharrón paste—is not good for you, and that you should always cook and eat things made with a plant-based oil instead. It’s normal to think this way. That is, until you go to Oaxaca and see that aciento is a way of life and that a lot of elders live to be more than one hundred years old eating the stuff on a daily basis. You’ll also realize that it is amazingly flavorful and really completes a lot of masa-based Oaxacan dishes such as tlayudas, memelas, empanadas, and chochoyotes. Think of it as a Oaxacan brown butter. If you do it right, it should taste nutty and toasty, not like lard or like fat. I also understand that a lot of people may not have the time to properly render chicharrón into a paste, so this shortcut version using olive oil is much quicker and tastes almost as good. If you can’t find or don’t have access to fresh chicharrón, American-style pork rinds also work well.

Instant potatoes turn gnocchi-making into a breezy, 15-minute affair rather than an hours-long commitment.

The two imperatives are that the tomatoes must be truly ripe and sweet and that the sauce should be eaten at once. If you must, you can hold it for up to two hours refrigerated and tightly covered, but it loses its magic fast. For the right slightly coarse texture, the ingredients should be chopped separately by hand. The only thing I sometimes do with the food processor is the chiles. Try to find fresh ones—canned jalapeños will work, but aren't ideal in a sauce supposed to be sparkling fresh.

Make coconut sticky rice in the microwave for creamy, perfectly tender results in under 10 minutes. Serve it with shredded coconut, toasted sesame seeds, and of course, ripe mango slices.

Ripe nectarines roast until they're tender and caramelized before they’re placed on a bed of tangy Greek yogurt. Everything gets topped with a drizzle of olive oil and honey—and a sprinkle of nuts and herbs.