Weeknight Meals

Rather than making herbs part of a green salad, why not make these fresh, flavorful greens the salad. The idea comes from Paris chef Alain Passard, who years ago served me an all-tarragon salad at his Left Bank restaurant, Arpège. When tarragon is fresh in the market or your garden overflows with this extraordinarily powerful herb, why not serve it with honor as a salad on its own? Years later Passard expanded what I call "the tarragon tangle" to a full-scale mixed herb salad—just a few well-dressed bites on a small salad plate—as an accompaniment. The idea really is to mix and match judiciously. Just don't use so many herbs that they lose their personality. Good combinations include parsley, mint, and tarragon. Or consider an all-mint salad to accompany grilled lamb, an all-tarragon salad to accompany grilled chicken, a sage-heavy salad to accompany roast pork. Other herbs that can be added to the following salad mix include a very judicious addition of hyssop, sage, chervil, and marjoram. Just be sure to include leaves only—no cheating—leaving all stems behind!

Garnish with grapefruit, orange and lime segments if you like.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

We love Marcella Hazan's "no-stirring" method for polenta — the following recipe is based on the one in her book Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking. It does require some stirring, but not the constant attention of traditional methods. Active time: 15 min Start to finish: 1 hr

Bente Birkedal-Hansen of Bethesda, Maryland, says that Azalea Restaurant in Birmingham, Alabama, does a great job with catfish, serving the whole fish with an Asian-style black bean sauce. It would make an impressive main course at a dinner party. If whole catfish are difficult to get at your local supermarket, order them from the fishmonger and have the fish cleaned.

The hearty sauce is also great over couscous.

The colorful mixed peppercorns found in bottles in many supermarkets aren't just decorative: They add a robust flavor to steaks as well as to thick-cut chops or cuts of meat suitable for roasting.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Red-cooking is a Chinese method of braising in a soy sauce-based liquid. Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Serve white rice with saffron on the side, and orange sorbet topped with chocolate shavings for dessert. Look for the herbes de Provence in the spice aisle at the market.

When we think of gazpacho most of us think of a cold chunky tomato-based soup. But this world-renowned export from the Andalucian region of Spain is actually one of many different types of soup — cold, hot, thin, red, green and white — which share the name gazpacho. White gazpacho remains closer than most modern varieties to the soup's origins as a simple combination of bread, nuts, salt, olive oil, and vinegar. Cucumbers, grapes and a pinch of cayenne elevate what was once a poor man's meal to a refined soup.

When cooking for my college roommates years ago, I discovered that although tuna-fish casserole is consumed in millions of households, love of mother's own must be imprinted during infantile nurturing. As my friends summarily banished all my childhood favorites, I concluded that a hankering for mother's recipes could be used to distinguish genuine family from interlopers (call it genetic tasting). But I soon forgot the recipes. So, it took a call to Pam Ross, my sister and sole surviving mother in our clan, to retrieve this cholesterol-boosting pleaser from our Mom. My nieces like it, and it doesn't wear out the cook. Pam serves it with garlic mashed potatoes.

The pasta and sauce cook simultaneously (so two cooks can divide and conquer), for a total of about ten minutes, start to finish. Serve with your best bottle of bubbly.

"I enjoyed a delightful dinner at Restaurant Claes Claesz, an intimate place located in the Jordaan district of Amsterdam," writes Gretchen Method of Northville, Michigan. "Their cream of parsnip soup was simply wonderful. Could you get the recipe?" There is no cream in this soup—pureeing the ingredients creates the silky texture.

This meatless dish can do double duty as a main course or a side dish.

David Barber, chef at Three Square Grill in Portland, Oregon, writes: "Even though I cook for a living, I still enjoy having friends over for dinner. My wife, Barbara, and I actually have the worst kitchen in the world. But that doesn't matter when you have what I consider the basics, like a good sharp chef's knife and a stand mixer. And because Barbara is a gardener, we've learned how to make impressive meals using fewer, but fresher, ingredients."