Italian

Thicker than soup, thinner than stew, this stoup combines sausage, ham, pepperoni, veggies, and arugula. It tastes like a giant Italian sub!

This is an excellent technique for a dinner party or any occasion when you want to spend time with your guests instead of standing over the stove. The risotto will be firm and toothsome, but you can treat this as traditional risotto and finish it with a dollop of extra virgin olive oil or butter and some freshly grated cheese for added creaminess. It’s a nice change of pace served with sautéed chicken with a quick pan sauce of white wine and fresh herbs, crispy skate in brown butter with capers, or a garlicky stir-fry of seasonal vegetables.

Cacio pepe literally translates as “cheese and pepper.” It is a classic Italian pasta dish that centers on the flavors of grated cheese and freshly ground black pepper. The simplest versions we have seen are made with abundant cheese and pepper, melted and moistened only with the cooking water. More indulgent recipes add olive oil or butter as we do below. Most recipes call for Pecorino Romano, a hard sheep’s-milk cheese, although Parmigiano Romano also crops up here and there. In our version the roasted pasta adds a deeper, more savory flavor to the finished dish. It is simple to make but it’s important to get the balance right so that your pasta is silky and flavorful. It’s the perfect meal for when the pantry is almost bare but the body needs something delicious to satisfy it.

This Italian-style pasta dough makes golden noodles that have a great silky texture. It is wonderful cut into noodles or used to make ravioli. A simple pan sauté is all you need to finish the pasta. Who needs bottled pasta sauce? Depending on the season, we like cherry tomatoes with artichoke hearts and basil, wild mushrooms with thyme, zucchini with fresh garlic, or sweet corn with green onions and cayenne. Once the vegetables are cooked, the hot pasta is added to the pan and tossed with a few spoonfuls of the pasta cooking water to make a delicious and flavorful sauce. A little freshly grated cheese and perhaps a touch of freshly ground pepper, and you’re ready to eat.

This is fantastic on fresh pumpernickel or rye bread for lunch; or spread it on fresh Italian bread to serve with light pasta dishes.

Combine one filled pasta with one mild vegetable, and if you are lucky as I am, your kids might actually like this as much as you do! Serve this with fresh bread or focaccia and a platter of raw vegetables. Or, to make this a more sophisticated meal, serve with any of the mixed greens salads on pages 50 to 53, and some good wine.

One of my favorite ways to use summer’s heavenly ripe tomatoes is to toss them, uncooked, with warm pasta.

Simple ingredients with complexity and depth add up to an Italian classic. Oh, and did I mention this is mind-blowing? When purchasing the veal shanks, check that they are pink and smell sweet. The most important step in making Osso Buco is browning the meat. This develops a really rich brown color on the meat and adds a ton of flavor to the base of the sauce. Serve with Soft Polenta (page 244) or Garlic-Chive Mashed Potatoes (page 237). The gremolata is also good on a grilled fish.

The clams in this dish are steamed with tomatoes, fresh basil, and red pepper flakes. The flavors are simple and delicious. Dinner in under an hour never tasted so good.

Growing up, my family had a tradition that whoever got the bay leaf had to do the dishes.

This is the old-school lasagna that you find in the Italian restaurants in Brooklyn. Fuggedaboudit! You can assemble the lasagna ahead of time … and it’s great for leftovers.

The flavor of peas and bacon takes me back to my childhood; that’s why I like this pasta dish so much. I feel like a little kid wolfing this down. It’s even good cold!

You can use these directions to adapt your favorite biscotti recipe to bake in the convection oven. Both temperature and baking time are reduced, plus you can bake on multiple racks with even results.

These breadsticks bake to golden crispness in the convection oven, and are a fun project to do with kids.

This is a quick and easy main dish. Although most shrimp you buy have been frozen, this dish is absolutely superb made with fresh shrimp, the largest you can find.

Eggplant, zucchini, sweet onions, and tomatoes all roasted together thicken by themselves to make a deeply flavored sauce for pasta. It’s a meal that’s ready in less than half an hour.

For pizza lovers, here are eight varieties to choose from. The basic dough makes two pizzas. The dough is easy to mix in the food processor.

This focaccia adds onions, olives, and dried tomatoes to the top. Cut into bite-sized pieces, it’s a great appetizer. The dough mixes most easily in a food processor.