Chrissy Teigen's Crispy Rice Salad & 18 Other Recipes We're Cooking This Week

Hey there! Welcome back to What We’re Cooking This Week, a new weekly dispatch from our kitchen to yours, with all the recipes our team is cooking—and talking and dreaming about—off the clock.

If we haven’t met, I’m Emma, a recipe developer and writer here. (Maybe you've seen me complain about crickets on the Hotline?)

Fall starts in one week, which means I want everything I eat from now until then to feel like when you stay on the beach all day, and the sun begins to set and the breeze picks up, but you wrap a towel around your shoulders and stay a little longer.

Let’s squeeze out every last drop.

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Tomato Sandwich, All Dressed Up

Some people think summer ends with Labor Day, but not my desk buddy Brinda Ayer: “Summer’s technically not over until September 23. I’m still making Ella's Ultimate Tomato Sandwich with Jammy Eggs and Herby Mayo. And I will keep making it until September 22.” If you’re buying tomatoes, you may as well roast up some tomato jam, and tuck it away for colder days (so good on a cheese plate—I’ll bring the wine).

Pasta for When You Don’t Want to Wash Dishes

This Martha Stewart recipe is a cult favorite among our editors thanks to its cut-corners method. (Did I mention it’s also one of our 10 most popular recipes on the site? It is.) Instead of cooking the pasta in one pot and the sauce in another, you combine all the ingredients (tomatoes! garlic! chile flakes!), and call it a day. And for when you do want to wash dishes (I’ll take any excuse to wear my hot pink dish gloves, aka the greatest $6.20 I ever spent), there’s this miso-dressed spaghetti with roasted eggplant.

Salad, Chrissy Teigen–Style

There’s salad and then there’s salad by Chrissy Teigen. I want the latter. This recipe skips the lettuce and calls in filthy mouthed herbs (the best kind), cilantro and mint. There’s also fried eggs and fish sauce and peanuts and chiles. But the kicker is the crispy rice, which you pan-fry in patties, then crumble into nuggets. I’m making it Wednesday night on Instagram (@emmalaperruque), so grab a cold beer and join me. In the meantime, here are four more Chrissy recipes.

Breakfast for Dinner

Is what I make when I’m very tired and very hungry and, okay, a little mean. These chorizo-egg tacos from Leanne Brown are quick to come together and game to be piled with avocado chunks, pickled onions, and that pepita salsa from Trader Joe’s I buy by the armful. If you want to skip the meat, these scrambled egg tacos are even faster to make, and very good.

Crispiest Chicken Plus So Much Arugula

I'm never not wanting chicken nuggets or chicken fingers or chicken nuggets with chicken fingers. This crispy coated chicken (community member Monkeymom calls it her “BFF”) is even better. I like to pile it with an oversized salad, Milanese-style. Or, if it’s been one of those days, cut the chicken into strips and dip it in special sauce (tater tots to go with).

Magic Spice Blend

A jar of this DIY spice blend, dreamed up by my editor Eric Kim, will carry us from summer into fall. It’s got brown sugar, smoked paprika, garlic powder, black pepper, and a couple other doodads you probably already have around. It makes for an eye-opening cucumber salad, but it’s just as wonderful on cozy, meaty things, like pan-fried pork chops or skillet chicken thighs.

Batchable Chickpea Salad

To work at Food52, you have to be obsessed with chickpea salad. It’s true. Over the years, our editors have adopted a brady bunch of recipes, and I love them all. Pick your favorite, double the recipe, and reap the rewards all week.

Since we last spoke, I started a 30-Day Yoga challenge. Now that I’ve told you, that makes me more accountable, right? Actually, according to this TED talk, now I’m even less likely to follow through.

A new season of The Great British Baking Show is on Netflix (!!!!!!) but no, you can’t watch the whole season at once. What gives?

For your commute home: One of my all-time favorite food writers, Melissa Clark, just started a new podcast called "Weeknight Kitchen" with American Public Media.

Now tell me, what are you cooking this week? What recipes did you save to make later? And how do I get rid of those crickets?

Talk soon,
Emma