Quick

Dripping with honey and sprinkled with fresh thyme, cracked pepper, and sea salt, these warm, crunchy toasts make a delicious breakfast, after-school treat, or lunch when matched with a handful of salad greens. I'm always amazed how something so simple, and a tad messy, can be so unbelievably good.

Thai red curry paste typically has more than eight different ingredients, including hot red pepper and lemongrass, so buying it ready- made is certainly easier than making your own. Look for it in the ethnic foods section of your supermarket or at Asian grocers. You can add 1 pound large shrimp, peeled and deveined, to the curry during the last few minutes of cooking, if you wish.

Although it's reason alone to keep a rotisserie chicken on hand, this salad would also be great with shrimp or sliced leftover pork chops.

These scones are light, flaky, and airy—closer to a biscuit than the crumbly pastries you might have in mind.

Serve the shrimp on toast to soak up the delicious pickling liquid.

Herbs in the dressing beg for herbs in the salad, too. We toss this vinaigrette with Bibb lettuce and lots of the tender green herbs— like mint, chervil, and parsley—that we grow in our window box.

"The only thing better than pimiento cheese dip? Melted pimiento cheese dip, laced with chopped pickles for a little zip." —Janet McCracken, deputy food editor

A stunning, veggie-packed bowl of spring goodness.

"You'll find me drinking this cocktail—inspired by the best Michelada I ever had, at a dive bar in Austin—all summer long. Lime + salt + hot sauce = perfection." —Alison Roman, assistant food editor

This satisfying salad is great alongside broiled fish, roast chicken, or a simple steak. To turn it into a vegetarian meal, fold in sliced hard-boiled eggs.

Granny Smith apples are ideal for this dish: Their sweet-tart juice complements the rich scallops, and they keep their shape when cooked.

Marinated white anchovies bear little resemblance to the pungent salted brown ones packed in oil. They're plump, vinegary, tender, and addictive when paired with the crisp frisée and chewy bread in this sandwich.

"This spicy butter has a built-in garnish; it turns into a sauce as it melts over your steak, leaving the herbs on top for looks and extra flavor." —Brad Leone, test kitchen assistant

I use simple syrup for keeping cake layers extra moist. Plain simple syrup works perfectly well on its own, but when I have used vanilla bean pods on hand, I like to steep them into the syrup (feel free to keep them stored in the syrup indefinitely). It's an unnecessary step, for sure, but I always welcome a little extra pop of vanilla flavor in my cakes.

Cake doughnuts are fried, not baked, at your local doughnut shop. But this recipe bakes up just as delicious, and cleanup is far easier, not to mention a bit less guilt-inducing. This batter also bakes up beautifully in an electric doughnut maker. Note: To get the proper doughnut shape when baking cake doughnuts, you do need a doughnut pan with a rounded bottom to each cup and a post through the middle. Baking them on a flat baking sheet will result in flat-bottomed half-doughnuts. If you don't have a doughnut pan, you can make the same batter and bake it in a muffin tin for doughnut-flavored muffins. The batter also works great with a mini-muffin pan for bite-size treats.

Makes enough for a standard doughnut recipe.

Benefits: Heart + Immunity + Brain & Vision + Anti-Aging Beauty Here you've got a tasty recipe that is low fat, heart-healthy, and good for your circulation. It comes from a Chinese colleague, whose family owned and operated Chinese seafood restaurants for years. This is what they had the chef prepare for them almost every evening when they sat down for dinner. Besides its wonderful taste, it's also a beautiful dish with the colorful peppers.

Making these subtly spiced cake doughnuts is so easy and quick. They are the perfect pairing with coffee, in the morning or even for dessert.

What happens if you make a carrot soup with just white carrots? Will people get the carrot taste if the soup isn't orange? Although the carrot flavor is full there, garnishing the soup with carrot greens and finely diced orange and yellow carrots locks the flavor in more firmly. This is an extremely simple soup, intentionally so to underscore the purity of color and flavor. Try making it with pale yellow carrots, too.