This was a specialty of Marie Smith Leonard, my friend Sandy’s mother. She had adapted it from an early Joy of Cooking (Bobbs Merrill, 1943), though it disappeared from later editions.

I love a recipe, like this one, that can be varied in infinite ways. Here the basic muffin batter can be altered to make a dozen different types of easy-to-prepare muffins. Thanks to my dear friend Cara Tannenbaum for sharing her recipe.

No cake is homier or more casual than a carrot cake, especially a carrot cake with a filling or topping of cream cheese frosting. This is loosely adapted from a recipe by Maida Heatter in her landmark Book of Great American Desserts.

These snow-white little cakes are as delicious as any coconut candy I’ve ever tasted. It’s not necessary to clarify the butter for these. Unsweetened coconut is available both as long shreds (like the sweetened coconut you can buy in the supermarket) or more finely ground.

This the easiest and the best way I know to make the summery Provençal vegetable stew.  All the vegetables go into an enameled iron Dutch oven at the same time along with some garlic, olive oil, and salt, and emerge from the oven 2 hours later perfectly cooked.

Baking crumbled bread with the caramel, a pinch of salt, and just a tablespoon of butter produces sweet crumbs that stay crisp once added to the ice cream. The ice cream recipe is based on the one I learned from Monsieur Alex Frolla, the pastry chef when I did my three summer seasons working at the Sporting Club and the Hotel de Paris in Monte Carlo. It was the best ice cream I’ve ever tasted.

In the heart of Andalusia, where gazpacho also originated, Cordoba is home to gazpacho’s thicker ancestor, salmorejo. A simple mixture of tomatoes, seasonings, and moistened bread, salmorejo is usually garnished with chopped hard cooked egg, thin dice of Spanish Serrano ham, and a drizzle of olive oil.

This week, Florentines celebrate the feast day of San Lorenzo, the patron saint of cooks. The tradition of preparing salt-free bread in Tuscany doubtless developed at a time when there was an acute shortage of salt, after which people became accustomed to the bland flavor of pane sciocco (SHOW-ko). It’s amusing that sciocco also means foolish or “good for nothing” in Italian.

Vicky Zeph, chef-owner, along with her brother Mike, of Zephs’ Restaurant in Peekskill, New York, makes the best corn pudding I have ever tasted. I like it because it isn’t overly sweet as some corn puddings can be.

I love this type of cake and blueberries are the perfect fruit for it—they melt to a jamlike consistency between the cake batter and crumb topping while the cake is baking.

If there’s such a thing as a world-class sandwich, this is it. A real muffuletta from Central Grocery is so good that it should be considered a crime to leave New Orleans without having one. The olive salad derives from the Sicilian tradition of marinating still slightly bitter newly brined olives in oil, vinegar, garlic, and other seasonings, including chopped celery, to sweeten and flavor them.

This came about when I was experimenting with an old recipe for breadsticks and found that when rolled thinly, the dough baked up crisp and dry.

This is a classic: a cookie dough crust topped with a thin layer of pastry cream, lots of flavorful fresh raspberries, and a bit of raspberry glaze to bind them together.

Long the traditional July Fourth meal in the state of Maine, early peas and salmon have not been in season so far north at the beginning of July for over a hundred years, according to culinary historians.

Brioche dough makes a perfect crust for a tart of juicy fruit like apricots, plums, peaches, or even small pears. A thin coating of almond filling helps to keep the crust drier, but the brioche can also absorb most of the fruit juices without becoming soggy.

There isn’t much difference between this pie and what we normally call a cobbler, except that this has much more fruit in relation to the crust. The blueberries have no thickeners added to mar their natural flavor and juiciness, so the filling is quite soupy.

In Italy, where they make savory pies from almost every vegetable imaginable, kale is a popular choice, especially in Tuscany where it’s known as cavolo nero or black cabbage. Teamed up with pancetta, onion, garlic, ricotta, eggs, and grated pecorino, its slightly bitter flavor is complemented rather than hidden. This is a great solo dish or delicious accompaniment to plain grilled meat or fish.

Back when I was in high school, my friend Sandy and I would often grab a commuter train in New Jersey and head to Greenwich Village. We spent $3.00 on lunch at Amy’s on University Place, a vegetarian sandwich and salad shop where we always ordered a salad pita and helped ourselves to the added bonus: coolers of free spring water or mint tea. One of the pitas that follow is filled with a standard Greek salad mixture (like the one at Amy’s) while the other has a Turkish-style eggplant salad that I make all summer long.

This type of a tart—a cookie dough crust, covered with a thin layer of pastry cream and an assortment of glazed fruit—has been the mainstay of elegant pastry shops in Paris and many other places for the better part of a century.

Here’s a recipe you can literally have on the table less than an hour after you start making it. I love to use really sweet height-of-the-season strawberries for this, but don’t hesitate to try it with other fruit or berries such as peaches, mixed berries, or even fresh figs.

Slightly reminiscent of a French gâteau breton, this dense cake is perfect with a glass of sweet wine or a cup of tea. As a dessert, it would need to be dressed up with some fruit or berries.