May 2012Pasta made from scratch delivers eggy-rich ribbons with springy yet delicate chew. But what if, instead of a pasta roller, you have only a rolling pin?
March 2012We’d heard about pasta cooked in red wine, but its tannic flavor and gray color left us cold. Could white wine come to the rescue?
November 2011Our goal was the richest, most savory interpretation of this famous meat sauce. But how many meats did that require—and would the dairy have to go?
November 2011To fine-tune this classic combination, we first needed to tame broccoli rabe’s bitter edge.
September 2011The key to creamy but firm lentils lies in the relationship between legume and salt.
September 2011What's the secret to transforming two heavyweight ingredients-flour and potato- into featherweight dumplings? It comes down to the simplest of strategies: precision.
September 2011Ever made a vegetable lasagna that wasn't laden with watery vegetables and dry, grainy patches of cheese? Neither had we.
May 2011Replicating the complex flavors of this Southeast Asian staple took some thoughtful shopping. But the real challenge was producing firm grains of rice without the usual overnight chill.
May 2011When the original primavera method took hours—and produced washed-out vegetables and stodgy sauce—we found inspiration in an entirely different classic.
March 2011Making a true, long-simmered Italian meat sauce means tending the pot for hours. Is it possible to achieve deep, satisfying flavor in just 30 minutes?
March 2011Cooking beans and rice in a single vessel sounds like a straightforward one-pot meal—that is, until both elements cook up mushy and bland.
January 2011Back-of-the-package instructions may be simple, but too often they yield a tasteless, soggy mess. To cook couscous properly, we had to think outside the box.
January 2011Unaccustomed to the spotlight, lemon can turn temperamental in this quick-hit Italian classic—unless you provide it with the perfect costars.
November 2010Meatballs and tomato gravy are the ultimate comfort food, except when you're the cook. To cut the fuss, and still feed a crowd, we start by turning on the oven.
May 2010Classic risotto can demand half an hour of stovetop tedium for the best creamy results. Our goal was five minutes of stirring, tops.
March 2010For the ultimate creamy texture and deep corn flavor, traditional polenta requires lengthy cooking and lots of stirring. Could we keep the creaminess but pair down the cooking time?
March 2010Tomato sauce is almost never the right choice for capitalizing on this pasta’s robust flavors.
January 2010In New Orleans, cooks transform inexpensive dried beans into a creamy, smoky stew. So why is it so hard to translate this dish once you cross the state line?
January 2010Follow these steps to prepare long-grain rice with distinct, separate grains that do not clump together.
January 2010Adding a little salt when rehydrating dried bean makes all the difference when it comes to texture.
