Gourmet

To minimize untended grill time, bring the stuffing and reserved cheese to the grill along with the mushrooms.

Food Editor: Gina Marie Miraglia Eriquez
Father: Alexander J. Miraglia, Howard Beach, NY
No matter what Italian restaurant we visit, my dad can't seem to resist ordering linguine with clams. Although they're not technically clams, cockles work best in this dish, since they're very small and have tender, sweet flesh. You can identify them by their tiny size (about 1/2 to 1 inch across) and green-tinged shells.

Peel these fiery shrimp as you eat them.

Nasi Kerabu
Make sure to buy the larger dried shrimp and select those that are bright pink or pink-orange (they brown and harden with age). Lesser grades of dried shrimp tend to be unpleasantly pungent. It's also important to use a fine-quality rice — what you can buy at most supermarkets will yield mediocre results.

Garlic chives smell more pungent than they taste and are wonderful when cooked. (Keep them wrapped well in your refrigerator.)

Ground Urfa and Maras peppers are flavorful without being fiery. If you find only one, use 1 tablespoon of it.

Yakitori In Tokyo, these savory skewers are made with Japanese leeks, called negi, which are thinner and more tender than Western leeks. We've substituted scallions, since they have a similar sweetness and are more readily available here.

Butter Mochi This chewy snack cake gets its distinctive gelatinous texture from mochiko, a sweet rice flour that's commonly used in Hawaii. Coconut milk and butter add rich, creamy flavor.

Just in time for Derby Day, this dessert has fewer calories than a mint julep (and you can drive home afterward).

Nieve, or "snow," is Mexico's sorbet, sold from carts throughout the country. Ours is a quick version, made with passion-fruit nectar instead of puréed and strained fruit. For the best flavor, look for a nectar that contains just water, passion-fruit juice, and sugar.

The dense, velvety texture of avocados produces a gelato of exceptional smoothness, with no added cream or egg. Though avocado may seem unusual as a sweet, it's commonly used as a dessert ingredient in Latin America. We call for a crushed vitamin C tablet here, which is the trick to retaining the bright green color of the avocados without affecting their flavor.

In some Latin American countries, these cookies, called alfajores, are made with Pisco — brandy distilled from white Muscat grapes grown in Peru, Chile, and Bolivia — but regular brandy works fine.

This sauce, called caldillo de jitomate ("tomato broth"), has a consistency closer to a light tomato soup than an Italian marinara.

Serve this sauce over baked, broiled, or sautéed white-fleshed fish.