How To

When I first started learning how to make cocktails at home, I had no idea people made their own simple syrup. I was the person who went to the store to buy a bottle of what I later learned to be sugar water. That’s right — sugar dissolved in water. Simple syrup is an essential ingredient in cocktails and other beverages like iced coffee because it blends so well with other liquids, and it’s super easy to make yourself — we promise.

Behold the single food that has revolutionized my weekly meal plan – shredded chicken! The very best thing about cooking up a batch of shredded chicken are all the possibilities it brings to mealtime. It can mean a week’s worth of dinners — everything from chicken tacos and chicken burritos to chicken salad are made more satisfying with shredded chicken. It’s an easy solution for make-ahead lunches and weeknight dinners the whole family will love.

Tender sautéed greens are an easy go-to vegetable side everyone should know how to make. They pair with everything from quick pastas to weeknight chicken dinners, and come together in minutes. These mustard greens are smothered in lots of garlic, kicked up with a pinch of red pepper flakes, and brightened with balsamic. When you have the main dish squared away, mustard greens are the easiest answer to “What should we have with it?

Before my fellow Southerners read this and start thinking, “Are you kidding me? Who doesn’t know how to make sweet tea?” — hear me out. I am Florida-born and Georgia-raised, but when I moved to California, one of the first things I noticed was that no one drinks sweet tea out here! I always keep a pitcher ready in my fridge, and my friends inevitably ask me, “How do you make this?” Today you’re going to find out how.

Summer rolls, also known as fresh spring rolls, are one of my favorite things to order at a restaurant. They are made from rice paper wrappers rolled around fresh crunchy vegetables partnered with cold proteins, fresh herbs, and sometimes noodles. Gỏi cuốn are Vietnamese in origin (along with chả giò, which are fried spring rolls) but there are countless variations of fillings made with an assortment of veggies and proteins.Summer rolls are also easy to make at home!

There are many amazing breakfast recipes out there, but nothing can get me out of bed on a lazy weekend like an omelet stuffed with melty cheese and herbs. This classic dish is so easy that it can be made before you’ve even had your first cup of coffee (omelets also make an ideal breakfast-for-dinner!). Plus, omelets go great with side dishes like sheet-pan home fries, a fresh berry fruit salad, and, of course, crisp, oven-cooked bacon.

Hello, gorgeous.

My first restaurant job was at a little lunch cafe famous for its giant cookies, towering hummus sandwiches, and cold peanut noodles. This husband-and-wife-run neighborhood joint was regularly filled with young professionals slurping cold, spicy soba noodles from plastic clamshell containers. While the owners were always generous with recipes — they gave me their cookie recipes when I left that job — they would not share the secrets to their peanut sauce.

lasagna's lazier cousin.

Homemade vanilla extract takes just two ingredients — vanilla beans and alcohol (like vodka) — and you can be as straightforward or creative as you like. Though it does take a bit of patience as you wait for the alcohol to extract the flavor from the beans, the delicious results are well worth it. It’s super easy to make and you only need two ingredients! Homemade vanilla extract is the perfect gift for friends and family who love to bake.

You can have the roast turkey. Leave the glazed ham. Prime rib — what’s that? In my house, leg of lamb is the celebratory roast; I love its tenderness and flavor. Though roast leg of lamb sounds intimidating, the sweet little secret is that leg of lamb is actually one of the easiest, most foolproof cuts of meat to cook. Here’s our remarkably simple, fuss-free leg of lamb recipe. It will turn out perfectly every time.

Ever had a classic French palmier? A flaky turnover filled with fruit? A bite of puff pastry filled with cranberry sauce and brie at a cocktail party? All these delicious treats start right here, with this dough. Yes, you can buy puff pastry at the store, but if you’re in the mood for a real baking project, you can make it yourself at home. All you need is a pastry scraper and a French rolling pin, and simple ingredients like flour, water, and butter.

It is hard to overstate how simple yet stunning pineapple upside-down cake is. This cake has retro charm, but it’s a classic whose appeal hasn’t waned since it first appeared on the home baking scene. It starts with a rich butter cake that, once removed from the pan, reveals a design of caramelized pineapple rings studded with maraschino cherries. Each bite is little treasure chest of flavor — tender cake, mingled with the sweet and slightly tangy notes of pineapple and cherry.

If you’ve avoided cooking beans at home because you’ve heard they are tricky, finicky, or complicated, it’s time to leave all that behind. Cooking dried beans is no more trouble than filling a pot of water and letting it simmer happily on the back burner all afternoon. In fact, that’s basically all it is. Ignore the naysayers; it’s time to cook some tasty, creamy, totally tender beans at home. Here’s our easy method on the stovetop.

Many of us turn to beans for our weekly meals. It’s a beloved pantry staple for hearty chili, winter stews, and comforting soups. Canned beans are no stranger to my pantry (there’s always a variety lining the shelves for an emergency), but over these past several months at home, I’ve become a dried bean convert.

If you love creamy mashed potatoes, you’ll love colcannon, a traditional Irish dish. Keeping with tradition, we didn’t mess with the potatoes or cabbage, but swapped the plain melted butter that is typically served in a pool on top for fragrant browned butter. We just couldn’t help ourselves! The nutty browned butter is a wonderful warm contrast to the sharp green onions that get scattered before serving, giving this dish an easy, elegant twist.

If pork chops and beef steaks are the only chops you sear, it’s time to try lamb chops. Lamb chops have a distinctively rich and savory flavor, and while they’re fancy enough for a dinner party, quick-cooking lamb chops also add variety to weeknight meals. These easy lamb chops are rubbed with fresh thyme, seared in a hot skillet, and topped with a decadent (and oh-so-simple!) pan sauce flavored with dry white wine, a squeeze of lemon juice, and a knob of butter.

If you’re skeptical about cabbage, this is the recipe that will turn you into a believer. And if, like me, you already adore cabbage (and are always looking for cabbage recipe ideas), this simple side will deepen your love. Simply put, Southern-style fried cabbage will forever change the way you think about this basic cruciferous vegetable.

Almost every culture has a homey version of chicken soup to comfort the sick or the soul weary, or to stave off the chill of cold weather, but the Greeks might just have one of the best: the egg and lemon soup known as avgolemono. Here’s how to make this classic comforting soup at home. First of all, it’s gorgeous. The broth is vibrant yellow from the eggs and heavily scented with lemon fragrance. The broth is rich, but not heavy.

One bad hard-boiled egg can ruin you for life. At least, that’s what I believed until I learned how to cook soft-boiled and hard-boiled eggs, and precisely how I wanted to eat them. The perfect hard-boiled egg has no green ring around the yolk and the innards are creamy and mellow (plus easy to peel!). And if you’re in the mood, you can stop short of the hard-boil and make a gooey soft-boiled egg instead.

We’ve all been there. You go to start a recipe for your favorite classic beef chili, navy bean soup, or from-scratch hummus and then it hits you: you forgot to soak the beans! Of course you can reach for canned beans at this point, but if freshly cooked beans are what you really want, then it’s time to learn how to quick-soak your beans — it cuts the soaking time down to just an hour!

Homemade spice mixes can even the speediest meals taste better. To make your own chili seasoning, you only need five ingredients — and at least half of them are probably in your spice cabinet already. Homemade chili seasoning makes a near perfect pot of Classic Beef Chili, but can just as readily spice up a pot of Instant Pot black beans or a pan of roasted sweet potatoes. Here’s what you need to make chili seasoning at home.

King cakes are made around the world as part of the festival of the Epiphany, but in New Orleans, king cakes have truly taken on a life of their own. From the start of Carnival on January 6 through Mardi Gras at the beginning of February, you’ll find one of these sweet, color-splashed king cakes just about everywhere. Did you get “the baby”? That means you bring the next cake — and we have just the cake you’ll want to bring.

Dashi is an incredibly simple broth, and it forms one of the culinary cornerstones of Japanese cooking. It’s made in about 10 minutes with just three ingredients: water, kombu (dried kelp), and bonito fish flakes. The resulting clear broth tastes like the essence of the sea. Dashi can be used to make a fantastic bowl of miso soup, to poach fish or vegetables, or to add savory umami flavor to any number of Japanese recipes. Here’s how to make dashi broth at home.

I love everything about chocolate-covered strawberries. I love the crunchy, melt-in-your-mouth shell and the cool, sweet strawberry beneath. I love giving them as homemade food gifts, and I love receiving them equally as much (especially for Valentine’s Day dessert!). But what I love most is how easy they are to make at home. It’s an afternoon fun cooking project with a result that looks fancy no matter your candy-making skills (or lack thereof)!

Jalapeño poppers are the ultimate game-day snack. They’re spicy, crisp, and a serious crowd-pleasing appeziter. The catch? They aren’t very practical to make at home. Restaurant-style poppers require a deep fryer, a messy breading setup, and a lot of planning to pull off. To solve this, we created a recipe that ditches the deep fryer altogether while still delivering on texture and flavor. What’s our secret? Bacon.

Meet your new favorite party recipe: slow cooker baked beans. Long loved for their sweet, tangy flavor and tender, creamy texture, baked beans for backyard barbecues, summer cookouts, and game day parties used to mean heating up the whole house to slowly cook the dried beans for hours upon hours. Here the slow cooker saves the day by doing all the work and keeping you cool at the same time.

Biting into a beignet is like biting into a buttery, fluffy pillow. When fried in hot oil, the slightly savory dough yields bite-size nuggets with perfectly crisp exteriors and tender interiors that beg for a dusting of powdered sugar (did you know you can make your own?) and a cup of freshly brewed hot coffee. New Orleans-style beignets are probably the most well-known beignets in the United States, and they’re surprisingly easy to make at home.

Chicken fried steak is a Southern diner tradition. You’ll find it on the menu at nearly every mom-and-pop spot and at larger chains as well. It’s the first thing my husband orders whenever we return home to Georgia. But, thanks to this pantry-friendly, one-pan recipe, you don’t have to leave the house (or travel to the South) to enjoy this essential Southern meal.Here’s the easiest way to make chicken fried steak at home.

Cooking eggplant is quite easy and works in a million different ways: grilled eggplant, crispy baked eggplant, stir-fried eggplant, and stuffed eggplant, to name a few. (You just want to know what mistakes to avoid when cooking it!) But whenever fall rolls around I find myself consumed by an abiding drive to roast things, and oven roasted eggplant is one of the best and easiest things to do. Globe eggplant: You’ll need 2 medium eggplants or 1 large eggplant.

So simple, so satisfying.

I would place “how to cook fish quickly” right up there with other essential cooking skills like boiling eggs and cooking a pot of rice. If you can cook a fish fillet, you can have a healthy, easy dinner on the table in 10 minutes. Or less! It’s such a simple and versatile weeknight meal. Here’s how to do it. For quick stovetop cooking, go for a white fish fillet.

Pork shoulder is one of my secret weapons in the kitchen. Slow-cooked, it can become a thousand different meals. I can mix in some barbecue sauce and make pulled pork sandwiches, scatter it on top of tortilla chips for pulled pork nachos, or use it as a filling for pulled pork lettuce wraps. And that’s just to start! Here’s everything you need to know about pork shoulder — from choosing the meat to transforming it into a fork-tender meal that can last all week.

Ready in minutes.

I promise you.

Almost everything you need is in your pantry.

Banish all thoughts of stringy, tough, sad chicken from your mind. For our chicken salad sandwiches and quick chicken weeknight meals, we want nothing but the best. And for that, poached chicken is definitely the way to go. This poached chicken method is easy, fast, and foolproof. Totally tender chicken breasts that are as good for dinner as they are for lunch the next day? Not a problem.

Baked chicken breasts don’t have to be dry and boring. They can, in fact, be moist, tender, and full of flavor — something you actually look forward to having for dinner. The secret? The parchment paper method. By covering the chicken with a piece of parchment paper, the chicken bastes in its own juices so they never dry out. It’s basically a cross between braising and roasting and is sure to become one of your new favorite ways to cook chicken.

On some level, you probably already know that, sure, it’s pretty easy to make your own peanut butter. But if you’ve never actually made homemade peanut butter, I don’t know if you quite understand how truly, incredibly, ridiculously easy it really is. To make easy, delicious peanut butter at home, use your food processor. Then go make Kelli’s 3-Ingredient Peanut Butter Cookies. (Trust us on this one.

There’s really no arguing that scoby is uglydelicious homemade kombuchaIf you want to save a few bucks on your ‘booch habit, there’s just no getting around it. You’re going to need a scoby. You can beg a scoby from a kombucha-brewing friend, or you can order a fresh one online. But there’s one more option: you can grow your own. This can be easily done by combining tea, sugar, and some pre-made kombucha. Here’s how to do it.

There's a reason it has 5 stars.

Casually read a book while you wait.

Those cans of chickpeas sitting in your cupboard have been hiding an amazing secret. Roasted in the oven, chickpeas transform into a crispy, salty, savory snack. So tiny. So easy to eat by the handful. So irresistible. Roasted chickpeas are easy to make and customize. Here’s everything you need to know. Canned chickpeas: Using canned chickpeas is the easiest method, but you can cook dried chickpeas if that’s what you have on hand.

The classic cocktail is so easy to stir up at home.

This will be your new favorite side.

Let’s talk caramels. The candy kind. The chewy, melt-in-your-mouth, deeply sweet, and insanely addictive kind. These make some of the best gifts ever, whether the event is Christmas, a birthday, a thank you for a favor, or a thoughtful hostess gift. Or no reason at all. You probably already have the ingredients in your pantry, and if you haven’t made caramels recently, you probably don’t know how easy they can be. Grab a bag of sugar and your candy thermometer, folks!

So you’re making Thanksgiving dinner for 20 people and you’re wondering whether you can make the mashed potatoes ahead of time and keep them warm. The answer is yes! Here are four foolproof methods to keep your mashed potatoes warm (or reheat the mashed potatoes you made yesterday). The method you use is up to you; use the one that works best for you and your schedule.