I’d like to give a shout-out to sheet pans. Because it’s amazing how the simplest, cheapest of tools can accomplish quick, delicious, and fuss-free (in the planning, prepping, and cleaning) meals the entire family adores. Sure, we love Instant Pots, Air Fryers, and the like, but sheet pans are the OG busy (and hungry) cook’s best friend.
But I hardly need to tell you this. Sheet-pan recipes are some of our most popular attractions (ahem, please refer to this list). There are the buttery, flakey slab pot pies, roast-y salads, a full American breakfast...I could keep going!
But I don’t want to keep you here all day, so I’ve combed through Food52's near-decade-old recipe box for the most cooked, most favorited sheet-pan recipes ever. Yes, it was hard to narrow it down to just 15 (love ya, Sheet-Pan Croquembouche!). But these superstars are the best of the best—our community's absolute favorites. Now, without further ado:
Senior Editor Eric Kim was inspired to make this solo shrimp scampi supper after a trip to Hawaii. Now we can enjoy it, too (without stepping on an airplane).
This egg-cellent (not sorry) breakfast is perfect for those blurry mornings when you have to cook for a crowd. Simply whisk eggs, pour into a greased pan, bake, and then pat yourself on the back.
This all-in-one traybake from the queen of weeknight suppers, EmilyC, uses tons of smartypants tricks. My favorite? Add baking powder for better browning.
This recipe highlights a reliable, forgiving method for cooking grains on a sheet pan in the oven, and results in a flavorful, do-it-all grain salad you’ll turn to again and again.
In just 40 minutes, you’ll get juicy, crispy-skinned chicken and sweet, tender cabbage, flavored by not only the spicy dressing, but also the aromatic drippings of the chicken. What are you waiting for?
Yes, salads can be cozy comfort food, too. See below.
This tray bake is the spicy, smoky shawarma-inspired dinner that you’ll definitely want to add to your weeknight rotation.
Absolute Best Tests columnist Ella Quittner speaks the truth: “Crispy bits are textural and flavor magic.” And this dish is chock full of ‘em.
Fact: Super tender lamb meatballs and comforting cauliflower combined with the refreshing brightness of pomegranate, makes the crowd go wild.
With a scrappy vinaigrette that does triple-duty, as well as tapping into the wallet-friendly bulk bin (hey there, dried figs), this dinner is both inexpensive and satisfying.
Consisting of white miso, yellow mustard powder, sugar, and rice vinegar, nuta is a typical Japanese dressing for blanched greens and seafood that tastes like really good honey mustard. Here nuta works double-duty: caramelized on chicken thighs and squash, and as a piquant dressing for peppery arugula.
Salad? On a sheet-pan? Recipe developer EmilyC thinks yes, making three great cases for it.
Our best version of the best food partnership (okay at the very least tied with peanut butter and eggs). Top a bowl of these Brussels sprouts and crisp bacon bits with a soft, oozy egg, for a square (round?) meal.
While a schnitzel-ready, thin, boneless pork cutlet is likely to dessicate in the oven, a thicker-cut, bone-in chop is ready. Dry-rub one per person and lay atop a bed of root vegetable hunks—the recipe calls for carrots and fennel, but why not beets, parsnips, or turnips?—eager to drink in any (sheet-)pan juices.
A traditional apple crisp is heavy on the apples, lighter on the streusel. Not with this sheet-pan riff from Food Editor Emma Laperruque. “Instead of using a deep-dish casserole pan, a sheet pan creates a shallow crisp that’s equal parts jammy apples and oaty streusel,” Emma writes. If there’s a more perfect use for an eighth-pan, I don’t want to know about it.
Just kidding I do—share some of the best things to come out of your half-, quarter-, and eighth-sheet-pans in the comments below!
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