Herbed Ricotta Stuffed Shells

Stuffed shells are the Italian-American casserole that everybody loves but nobody makes often enough. Each jumbo shell gets packed with a seasoned ricotta filling, nestled into a pool of marinara, and blanketed with melted mozzarella. Fair warning: it goes fast. It is pure comfort: warm, …

Baked Pork Chops with Herb Crust

Pork chops deserve better than the dry, overcooked reputation they have carried for decades. The problem was never the cut. It was the cooking. Bone-in chops, coated in a savory herb and Parmesan crust and baked at high heat on a wire rack, come out …

Basic: No-Knead Bread

No-knead bread changed home baking when Jim Lahey and Mark Bittman introduced the method. We still make it most weeks, on four ingredients and a Dutch oven. The concept is simple: a very wet dough, a tiny amount of yeast. A long overnight fermentation replaces …

Mulled Wine Gift Bags

I started giving these as Christmas presents five years ago, and now people expect them. Small muslin bags filled with cinnamon sticks, a vanilla bean, cloves, allspice berries, black cardamom pods, and dried orange peel. Each bag is enough to mull one bottle of wine. …