The recipe I use for my "old family recipe" fried chicken. Shhhh... don't tell anyone! Although with some crowds, I up the garlic and hot sauce in the marinade, it's just about perfect - flavorful, with a serious, crispy crust. It looks darker than the Colonel's - you might even think it's overcooked - but don't worry, it's delicious. This is the recipe that taught me I like making fried chicken just as much as eating it.

A dish which my wife and Nora Ephron both call "reason enough to own this cookbook." A delicious stew of lamb with spring vegetables like peas and green beans, and of course the usual cast of root vegetable characters.

I had no idea that soft cheese was either so easy to make or so delicious. This recipe takes you from having cold milk to a delectable, rich, salty-tangy ricotta-like cheese in under half an hour. I'm just stunned, and looking for opportunities to show this off. (And no one will judge you if you scrape the cheesecloth clean as a cook's treat...)

I tried the lemon zest variant, which smelled outstanding, and married well with the pecan-crusted treatment. A drizzle of honey really brought out the zing of the lemon; it was a hit on a dessert buffet.

A few notes - the Lee brothers think this recipe takes 8 minutes of cooking; I think either their definition of "medium" heat is higher than mine, or my fridge is colder than theirs, because it definitely took longer than that for curds to develop for me. That said, I also feel sure I cooked it longer than necessary, hoping to see cottage-cheese size curds which never developed. The curds will be fine, but the cheesecloth will catch them.

I also have to admit that I didn't have whole milk on hand as called for, but I did have whipping cream. I don't know if 1 cup cream + 3 cups of 1% milk = 1 quart of whole milk or not - but it works fine for this recipe.

One of my go-to desserts for parties. It's tremendously easy to make, and to make ahead. It takes well to virtually any flavor that goes with chocolate - the recipe calls for coffee liqueur, but straight coffee, hazelnut liqueur, and berry schnapps all work well. Plus, the tofu is 100% hidden, so there are wonderful elements of a prank in it. Bring it to a barbecue or other festival of cooked meat, just to watch your friends' faces.

These are amazing cookies. Make me rethink what a 5-star rating should mean cookies. Lie to your wife and tell her they're too burnt to eat cookies.

How to describe them? Imagine a pecan pie in truffle form. Small, chewy balls of pecans and sweetness, with the perfectly addictive balance of salt.

The only problem with the recipe is that Shirley says they're "better made several weeks ahead." I don't doubt this is true for a minute. I do doubt that there are more than 10 people on earth who could let 40 of these survive in their house for a week.

(I'll also point out that they were so good warm, crunchy on the outside and still a bit gooey in the middle, that I seriously thought about devouring the whole batch then and there, pancreas bedamned.)

This is my absolute favorite party recipe. It's invariably a hit, and it has a classy French name and comes from a famous chef. Little does anyone suspect that the whole recipe is "throw all the dairy in your fridge into the food processor, with a splash of wine and some garlic." Voila, cheese dip - simple and bulletproof.

The recipe will change slightly every time you make it, based on the combination of cheese you have on hand. If it seems too sharp, you can add butter or sour cream to gain sweetness without sharpness. And someday, I will remember that my food processor takes ages to break down a solid brick of old Parmesan cheese, and anything that hard should be grated first.

I first saw Jacques Pepin do this recipe years ago on PBS - I remember it as the series with Julia Child, but perhaps it was the one with his daughter Claudine. Either way, I'm thrilled to have a copy in his cookbook.

This was a big hit in my house! I had to do a fair bit of improvising due to the lack of ingredients like tamarind sauce and plum vinegar at my local mega-mart, but the overall flavor worked as a not-too-thick barbecue sauce with a distinct fruity note. It was good on ribs, but I bet it would be terrific with poultry (or a larger cut of pork).

I'm still trying to decide what I think about the fact that this is a sauce which requires a lot of ingredients and a lot of chopping. It makes a lot of sauce - I'll probably make it in a pot, not a pan, next time - so perhaps the work pays off in volume.

You know what's wrong with American hamburgers? Not enough butter. Well, Saint Julia knows the solution to that!

This opulent burger was a big hit in our house. I think of thyme as more of a friend to beans and pork than beef, but it lends these burgers an interesting depth of flavor. And oh, the butter... onions sauteed in butter, butter added to the meat, fry the burgers in butter. (In retrospect, I wish I'd read Julia's notes closer and gotten 90% lean ground beef instead of 80%.) The wine reduction (finished with butter, natch) made an interesting condiment - not exactly like steak sauce, but more like that than anything else I can think of.

Serve on a hearty bun with a lettuce leaf and pickles.

This is a very refined, light and custardy sweet potato pie. It has good sweet potato flavor, with a strong hit of bourbon and an eggy-milky sweetness which reminds me of egg nog. I'm partial to the rustic, dense version of sweet potato pie, but this uptown version is definitely a recipe I'll make again. A friend suggested it was lacking pecans, and we agree - a layer at the bottom of the pie would be a fantastic surprise.

(Disclaimer: this is not a review of the pie crust, because I used store-bought.)

Lamb shoulder is rubbed, smoked, braised, and then shredded for tacos. The time is paid off perfectly with flavorful lamb which just falls apart.

A few tips:

The recipe says to reduce the braising liquid "skimming off any excess fat." I sent mine through our gravy separator and removed 2/3rds of a cup. Glad I wasn't trying to skim it off.

The recipe calls for tomatillo salsa. We also tried it with red salsa; tomatillo was distinctly better.

This is a fun take on chili - relatively mildly spiced, so that the flavors of lamb and black bean shine through. I've made it with both ground lamb and stew meat; stew meat is better but, to me, it's less chili-like. (That might just mean I need to cut the stew meat smaller.) I find it benefits from significantly longer cooking than the recipe calls for to reduce the broth. In another printing (in the Washington Post ages ago), I found the suggestion that it should be garnished with lime, which is a terrific suggestion. A little acid really wakes this dish up.

I think this just became my house margarita recipe. It's just a hair sweet; I'll probably go with 1 and 1/2 tablespoons of sugar in future instead of 2. I also left off the cilantro. But the cucumber is delightfully refreshing, and it's dead simple (compared to many of the cucumber margarita recipes which start with making cucumber juice in your blender).

It says this makes one, and hey, if you're not driving, who am I to judge? But you could split it and still have a respectable drink.

Most of the recipes I've seen for fresh cheese call for a mix of buttermilk and whole milk. This one calls for straight buttermilk, with half-and-half added at the end to moisten the curds. Simple and delicious.

I've tried to make sorbets before, and consistently come out with a granita at best and a frozen block of flavored ice at worst. But the instruction earlier in the book is spot on - churn to the consistency of a thick smoothie. With this recipe and that instruction, I got a nice soft scoopable sorbet. And a delicious flavor - primarily watermelon with some refreshing lemon acidity.

Solid advice on how to make a good burger. I think my burgers have been too thick, not wide enough, and overworked, and following these steps may be helping.

Nice approach; went over well with my family. Very similar to a paprikash, but I've not had pork served that way. I also like the more rustic sauce you get with the thinly sliced peppers, though I think the recipe's call for 4 green peppers would be overkill if you're using American supermarket bell peppers. I used 2 sweet peppers the size of Hungarian wax peppers, and that was plenty.

Terrific recipe. Should go into my frequent rotation. I didn't let my roux go quite long enough, and I would have liked a little more of that deep dark flavor, but I bring this up because even with a roux that was more milk chocolate-colored than brick, it was in the right neighborhood. The flour on the chicken also lightens the roux and adds thickening - I found it took ~7 cups of stock, not 6, to get the desired consistency and even then it got gloppy when cold.

Similarly, I think there's room to be more aggressive in the seasonings. As written it was fine, but I noticed people adding hot sauce and salt and black pepper at the table. Again, that depends on a lot - the stock, the degree to which you season the chicken, personal preference.

There are lots of different recipes out there for tasso, but here's one you can make in a day. It's just a 4-6 hour cure and a 2-hour smoke. (I did an overnight cure, which turned into more like 14 hours before I got the pork on the smoke. It came out pretty salty; if I were going to do that again I'd probably shift the cure to equal amounts of sugar and salt.)

Anyway, this was a huge hit. Salty and spicy, meaty with a tender chew. I'm impressed that we had the self-control to not chow down on it before we got it in the freezer. But we're having all kinds of ideas for things we can use it in. I see jambalaya and etouffee and red beans and rice in my future. We're even thinking about how to use it on pizza (with all that salt it'll take a light hand and maybe some sweet ingredients as counterparts...)

I've been making an ersatz Asian-ish salmon for a long time, with a doctored Hoisin/vaguely teriyaki-ish glaze. This recipe doesn't have that level of sweetness in it, but my family reports that's a good tradeoff. The meaty flavor of a nice piece of salmon can shine through the reduced sweetness, and since it's a sous vide preparation, the salmon is perfectly done. This is going in the frequent rotation.

This is a remarkably simple technique for a delicious fiery pepper puree. You can make it with green hot peppers (poblanos and jalepenos are more available to me than fresnos); the color gets muted but the flavor is still delightful. I'm considering draining my next batch in cheesecloth to get a pastier consistency, but honestly, the looser texture is fine with me.

Don't let the title fool you - this "pancake" is practically a souffle. Don't let the word "souffle" scare you - it's easy enough to make in the morning (although I do need at least one cup of coffee for strength). Sweet enough for dessert, but eggy enough to call it breakfast.

A good example of the double-cooking method of mashing potatoes. It's never let me down, and it's easy enough to mess with the recipe if you want to.

A terrific, simple breakfast course. Kind of an upscale egg mcmuffin, with goat cheese standing in for the saltiness of bacon. My wife hates olives, so we omit the olive paste and frequently use anchovy paste instead.

A staple of our holiday table. Not that it's anything that special - just potatoes, carrots, and Brussels sprouts, boiled and served in a butter-mustard sauce - but it's tasty, it's hearty, and it manages to combine a vegetable dish with a starch dish - which, considering that we like sweet potatoes, white potatoes, _and_ stuffing, is no mean feat.

Seems like a promising recipe, even if I had something of a cooking fail. (I forgot to mix the brown sugar and spices with the lemon juice before pouring the whole mess over the sweet potatoes - so mine were kind of sweeter on one side and lemony on the other. Weird, but good enough.)

Sweet potatoes in my world are usually either baked in their jackets, or mashed, so this recipe of baked slices minimally spiced was a revelation. They maintain some structure and texture, and a good amount of clear sweet potato flavor.

They did hold pretty well overnight - I made these the night before Thanksgiving and served them on the day.

Another revelation from the pressure cooker manual. A quick recipe that turns out tender beef and fully-flavored sauce. Since cooking this one, I've tried a couple of "quick stroganoff" recipes - and all were more work than this way.

Also the recipe that taught me to watch the heat in a pressure cooker like a hawk. The first time I tried this recipe, I scorched the beef a bit but chose not to wash out the pot. Wrong choice. The bitter flavor of burnt meat smoke was infused into every tender bite. Since then, I've been careful that any error gets completely washed out of the pot before the recipe continues.

I think of gnocchi as a rich, hearty dish, and this is one. But with the fresh flavors of lemon and thyme, it's also light and fresh. I don't quite get how that's possible, other than with a fabulous balance of kinds of flavors. It's very important to give the dish a few minutes at the end to "allow flavors to blend" - this is a dish that actually improved markedly over a couple of minutes, basically as the lemon got less aggressive.

I only made the mushroom chutney; the chops look like a pretty basic preparation so there seems like no reason to doubt it. I really enjoyed the chutney, although I find the prunes are really the dominant flavor, with the earthiness of the mushrooms a distant second. It would be an excellent compliment for pork or chicken (or maybe even fish) - unfortunately, I served it with beef, and the flavors seemed to fight. I'm wondering if cutting the prunes way, way back would let the mushrooms and beef pairing work better.

One warning - the recipe says to use a 12" skillet, and I tried this in my 10", and just barely did everything fit. I also needed to cook it a lot longer than the recipe says to get the sauce to reduce. Seriously, use a 12" or bigger pan.

A nice take on crab salad - mild and not too mayonnaise-y. The addition of diced hard-boiled eggs is interesting. The filling repurposes nicely - we served it as a dip with slices of baguette, and then again as a topping for a cheese omelet.

I don't think my attempt went quite right, but I'm giving this a good rating for promise. I initially thought the sauce was a little too minty - 8 springs of mint, at least from my garden, is powerful. But it's a pleasantly delicate sauce, not heavy like it looks.

I've found that steelhead trout can almost always stand in for salmon, so that's what I used for this recipe. It didn't quite work, and I don't know if that's because of the fish itself, or because I didn't char the skin hard enough, or what. It was good - what's wrong with a recipe that boils down to "salt, pepper, broil" - but not great. But I'm going to cheat my rating up because maybe that's cook's error.

My wife and I had the same reaction to this burger - it's a kick-ass mini-meatloaf. It's heady with parsley, capers, and onion, and had a great burger char on the outside. The recommendation to use a coarse grind for burger meat is a good one - it makes the meat distinctly more beefy, although I feel like I lost some classic American "burger-ness". I found it could do with a little more salt and spice - but a squeeze of lemon juice and a shot of hot sauce definitely makes it a recipe to return to.

Nice recipe for a corn cake that's hearty and rich, but also light. A drizzle of maple syrup really brings out the vanilla flavor. I like to drop in some cooked corn niblets for an extra sweetness and texture.

I've been reluctant to try the "roasts" in the pressure cooker cookbook - but since my favorite pork roast recipe is really a braise, I thought this one was worth a shot.

And it's well worth it. The pork came out perfectly moist and tender. The herbs added intense and complimentary flavor. I used small sweet potatoes, which came out pretty mushy but were still a hit.

If I have a quibble with the recipe, it's that it makes a very small amount of very tasty gravy (which ended up as sauce on the potatoes). I'm wondering if upping the liquid would make enough sauce for the meat.

Very nice way to use up the end of a roast, sweet and savory. It's easy enough to be a weeknight dinner, especially if you let the food processor handle the chopping and mincing. I think I went too heavy on the mashed potatoes, but it was awfully good... maybe it's served differently in the UK than in the US.

A delicious and complex treatment for pork. The mix of salt, sweet, and the acrid funkiness of fish sauce calls barbecue to mind. Brennan says this is the "Thai equivalent of ham" and I can easily see making a big roast of this and spreading it out over multiple dishes. (However, I used it as a treatment for pork chops, and while I'm afraid they came out a bit dry, they weren't at all tough and the flavor was delightful.)

It was only recently that I tasted borscht for the first time, and I knew I had to learn how to make it. It's fantastic comfort food; satisfying and rich, with balanced sweetness from the beets.

This recipe has the added benefit of being dead easy to make, especially if you let the food processor do the chopping like I did. (Like Queezle_Sister, I found some of the beet and carrot pieces too big at the end of cooking, so I hit it with the immersion blender to break them down a bit.)

I'll add a serving suggestion: horseradish. It adds a pleasant note of heat and a touch of acid to the soup. And don't forget a loaf of black bread.

Short review: classic comfort food, with absolutely picture-perfect mashed potatoes. I think this has just become my go-to method for mashing potatoes.

Snark review: the recipe is basically melted butter and milk with enough potato, cabbage, and pork to hold it together. Clearly, that's a 5-star recipe.

Quote of the night: me: "I'd like to try it with ham; I think the bacon is taking over." Wife: "And what's wrong with that?"

Interesting take on cole slaw, with cauliflower playing the part of cabbage, and a flavor profile that's close to tabbouleh with its mint and parsley. I suspect it's a little overly salty, although that diminishes as the vegetables purge and the salt works its way more evenly through the dish.

It is important to break the cauliflower into reasonably small florets - I didn't, and ended up with slices of cauliflower which were a little bigger than I wanted. They broke up by hand easily enough, but it was a step I wouldn't have needed if I'd done a better job of coring and breaking up.

I also substituted pecans for pine nuts, because, frankly, I'm not crazy about pine nuts. My wife pointed out that almonds would fit the dish better, and she's right.

Everybody likes bacon on top of meatloaf, right? Well, why not put it inside instead of on top? And what goes on ground beef but mustard and ketchup - so the traditional meatloaf glaze gets a tangy kick. The cheese part can probably be completely customized to your taste; what was in my fridge was feta and mozzarella instead of cheddar, so that's what I used and it came out fine. (I actually suspect the recipe might call for more cheddar than I'd enjoy, but the point is, I'd be willing to try it and find out.)

A rich and satisfying casserole, appropriate for a main course but I can see it working very well as a vegetable for a pot luck. (It would be a nice side dish at home, too, but the recipe makes an epic amount of food.)

I substituted a roasted red pepper for some of the roasted green peppers called for, and I think it made the dish much more visually appealing. Using 2 cups of shredded cheddar was fine, but I think a mix of cheddar, Monterrey jack, and mozzarella would be nicer next time.

I adore paprikash - stewed chicken in a rich and creamy sauce spiced with paprika. This slow-cooker approach is a winner. I used 2 chicken leg quarters instead of the poussins called for, and it worked just fine. The meat was tender, almost falling off the bone, and the sauce was pleasant.

Looking at my previous favorite recipe (from the Frugal Gourmet: Immigrant Ancestors book), I think I'd increase the shallots in this recipe next time. I also got a reminder that this is a dish where you should use the freshest paprika you can find - I used the end of a can of indeterminate age and it was a little lacking in flavor. (The amount called for - 3 teaspoons - looks right; I'm sure this was about my spice cabinet.)

Another winner for the pressure cooker! Admittedly, I was on a "cleanout the freezer" binge and used nearly double the meat called for. It turned out a luxurious stock, with a fraction of the time and energy used on the stovetop.

This may be my new go-to potato preparation. In fairness, I cheated quite a bit - using larger gold potatoes instead of new potatoes, and then (inspired by a different page on Pioneer Woman Cooks) microwaving them instead of boiling them. The end result was an amazing cross of creamy and crusty potato - almost like the top of a shepherd's pie. Obviously, your mileage will vary with a waxier or less cooked potato; probably a minute less in the microwave would have been closer to the recipe. Still, high marks for introducing me to a revelatory technique.

An excellent soup. The ginger and sweet potato add a subtle depth without overwhelming the character of the greens.

This is the recipe from the While Lily flour bag, and it's darn near bulletproof. Why would you bother with anything else?

Straightforward to be sure, but a satisfying base for plenty of experiments. Alone, they'd work as a side dish. Pepin himself suggests that you could add sausage and chicken and call it cassoulet. Americans might be thinking of white bean chili. My wife added a quart of chicken stock and turned it to soup. I'm sure we'll be returning to this versatile base.

Jacques Pepin's lobster roll recipe. It's quite basic - lobster in a butter-lemon sauce - but there's nothing wrong with that! (Unless you're looking for a mayonnaise sauce.)

Do search out split-top New England hot dog rolls! While a regular hot dog bun will work OK, it will also lose structural integrity quickly. Or, just admit to yourself that your hands are getting buttery, and enjoy it.

It took me a while to figure this recipe out, but finally, it hit me. It's the flavor profile of orange beef, but with tender braised pork shoulder instead of often-tough fried round steak. Now that I know what it is, I'm sure I'll be returning to the recipe. The orange flavor fades as a leftover; I don't think adding marmalade to the original would work well but a little hit while reheating might be nice.

The snap peas and red peppers are a nice nod to the Chinese restaurants of my youth, but broccoli would go well too.

If you want it "glazed", you'll probably have to flip the meat midway through cooking. Like many crock pot recipes, it's clear which side was in the liquid and which was above.

Light and refreshing, and easy to boot. The milk and mint flavor suggests a faint drizzle of chocolate sauce. Ours were silky almost to the point of lacking structural integrity, and took more than the stated 1.5 hours to set up; I suspect the answer in both cases is that our ramekins are deeper than they are wide. A different shape might set up firmer (or I might use the whole packet of gelatin powder next time).

A recipe for the creole staple, pickled pork is an excellent addition of meat, heat, and acidity for dishes like red beans and rice. This is a quick brine to put together, and then a long pickle in the fridge. It also makes enough that you will probably use only part of the recipe, and freeze the rest... leading, in my house, to a happy discovery some months later as you dig around looking for something else.