Blintzes are a perfect example of why our Cafe menu has a section called Sweet rather than Dessert. Blintzes can, and should, be eaten any time of day—breakfast, afternoon snack, or at the end of a meal. Originally, in the  Old World, blintzes were a recipe made for Shavuot, the holiday which celebrates both the end of the wheat harvest and the giving of the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai. An Ashkenazi specialty, the word blintz is related to the Russian blini and means pancake. By the time they started appearing on the menus of dairy restaurants in the Lower East Side, blintzes had been shorn of their religious overtones. (We’ve been making them, for instance, for at least the last thirty years.) Who doesn’t like a svelte silken pancake which holds soft sweet cheese in its embrace? Why wait an entire (lunar) year when you can eat them all the time? Savory blintzes, theoretically, also exist, frequently filled with mushrooms, but our family only knows them to be sweet, filled with sweetened farmer’s cheese and topped with blueberry compote (though your favorite jam will also suffice).

Plate of Cheese Blintzes with Blueberry Compote

Russ & Daughters' Blintzes

A sweet and tangy blackberry glaze gives these Swedish meatballs a fresh twist. The combination of ground beef and pork creates a tender and flavorful meatball, while the blackberry glaze adds a fruity and slightly sweet element, perfect for a special occasion or a cozy dinner party. Serve these as an appetizer with toothpicks or alongside steamed or mashed potatoes. 

Blackberry Glazed Swedish Meatballs 

Few things are as satisfying as a messy sandwich—the more napkins required, the better. While using shredded, juicy, long-braised meat would have been delicious, mushrooms steal the spotlight in this sandwich. They cook in a fraction of the time and don't compromise on flavor. Generously seasoned oyster mushrooms pair perfectly with smoked fresh mozzarella and are complemented by a bright, herbaceous salsa verde reminiscent of chimichurri. Smoked gouda would also be a great choice. A sturdy, crusty bread is essential to hold everything together without falling apart. I chose ciabatta, but any crusty bread will work beautifully.


Cheesy Mushroom Sandwiches with Castelvetrano Salsa Verde

, a column by Food Editor Emily Ziemski where small-but-mighty additions—ingredients, sauces, toppings—that instantly upgrade whatever’s on the table are the star of the show. Today, chicken-fried what?

 I don’t believe in trying to make one food be another food. As someone who is constantly searching for 

, I find where foods fall flat is the moment when they try to perfectly imitate a different food. I respect the hustle, but it’s super difficult to use an item that functions completely separately, with different protein structures or vegetal cells, and try to mold it into that item you *really* want it to be. Vegan “cheese,” I love you, but you’re really more of a creamy spread. Is this a metaphor for being true to yourself? Maybe. The only exception that I’ve found so far that seems to be impervious to said rule, is chicken-fried something (gosh are we surprised though?). Chicken-fried steak is probably the most classic iteration you’ve seen out in the world, as a diner food staple. You can picture it, that blue speckled plate—it’s always a blue speckled plate in my mind—with that perfectly crispy, golden-brown fried, thin-pounded piece of tender steak hiding underneath all the crackly edges, topped with a rich puddle of gravy that’s just beginning to pool underneath the steak. But that’s been done a million times over. So, here I am, yet again, asking you to make another mushroom dish. Searing fluffy Lion's Mane mushrooms before battering and frying ensures all of the excess liquid is pressed out (plus creates a chicken-like texture), and the batter is simply something very similar that you’d use to double coat a piece of fried chicken. If beer isn’t your thing, try a different sparkling beverage to get that carbonation, which contributes to having an airy and textured crust.

Chicken-Fried Mushroom Steaks

For all enthusiastic food hunters, the idea of a Xi’an burger called roujiamo—braised pork stuffed inside English-muffin-like buns—is no longer much of a novelty. Fortunately, there exists a version of it (an advanced version, if you will) that will knock the old one out of the park. Called Lao Tong Guan-style roujiamo, it’s set apart by its bun, which is laminated with thinly striped layers to create chip-like shredded wafers. You’ll find my recipe differs slightly from others that use only baking powder and an alkaline agent for the leavening effect; I find that the alkaline gives the dough an aftertaste and lacks the pleasant aroma that traditionally yeasted dough provides. So, I created a recipe that is somewhat of a hybrid. It is the perfect vehicle for the sticky, gelatinous, heavily spiced pork belly, accompanied by a bit of funk and textural playfulness from the pork intestine (yes, pork intestine). I love it, but if you don’t, no worries; you can rely heavily on the pork belly here if you so choose. An addition of good old French Brie also brings a mild, familiar grooviness to the party. Don't even think about adding any lettuce, tomatoes, or slaw, none of which have a place inside a Xi'an-style burger.

Laotongguan-Style Xi’an Pork Belly Burger 

A popular street food in Seoul, South Korea is “baked cheese,” aka cheese tteok-kocchi (literally meaning "cheese and rice cake skewers"). I was introduced to them through YouTube star and cookbook author Maangchi, who griddles together garaetteok (cylindrical rice cakes) and similarly shaped mozzarella cheese sticks, then drizzles them with sweetened condensed milk. I decided to try my hand at making this street food at home—and I failed miserably.

Even with moderate heat and following Maangchi’s instructions carefully, everything melted together in a sad goopy mess. Instead of giving up, I leaned into the failure, and who doesn't love to experiment with cheese and rice cakes? I let the mozzarella coat all of the rice cakes and fried them together without skewers in a pan, resulting in a dish that more so resembles another Korean street-food classic, tteokbokki (stir-fried rice cakes, which are typically made with gochujang and various toppings).

Upon first making this dish, I immediately tasted the flavors and textures of a perfect grilled cheese sandwich, with a crisp, carby exterior and a melty cheese inside. You really can't go wrong with a combination like that. When frying the garaetteok and cheese, I use ghee to achieve a higher smoke point (meaning, more crispy cheesiness without burning) with an infusion of buttery flavor, but you can also use butter if you watch the heat, or a neutral oil instead. Without the butter, though, it won’t taste as much like grilled cheese. And, come on, what’s the fun in that?

Grilled Cheese Tteokbokki

For inspiration in developing this recipe, we reflected on some of the best Baltimore crab cakes we’ve ever eaten—at Shultz’s Crab House, Faidley Seafood, and Koco’s Pub. Our recipe seeks to replicate the best features of these Baltimore classics: the maximum amount of crab meat, minimal binder to hold it all together, and a luscious moist interior. Below are our answers to what we think are the ideal traits for the best crab cake. 

 It’s imperative to use the highest quality crab meat you can get your hands on. Without good crab meat, there’s basically no point in making crab cakes. Crab meat from Chesapeake blue crabs is traditional, but not essential. Just make sure you’re sourcing blue crab meat from a purveyor you trust. There’s an age-old debate about whether to use jumbo lump or backfin meat for crab cakes. Jumbo lump is more expensive, but has a firmer, meatier texture. Backfin is known for its lacy texture and sweet flavor. After testing both, we preferred the jumbo lump, because it delivered a stronger crab flavor. However, either option works in this recipe. 

How do I keep crab cakes from falling apart?

 For bread crumbs, we decided to use panko, a Japanese variety of flaky breadcrumbs. While crushed saltines are a popular option in Baltimore, we love panko because its flavor is mild, and it does an excellent job of binding the crab. The classic problem with crab cakes is that they fall apart without enough bread crumbs, but they taste bland with too many. Which is why we found the optimal ratio to ensure your crab cakes will have great crab flavor without falling apart. 

What's the best flavoring for a crab cake?

 When it comes to flavoring, we kept it simple: mayonnaise, Dijon mustard, Old Bay (a beloved seasoning mix that includes celery salt, black pepper, and paprika), and lemon juice. We considered adding other flavor elements like hot sauce or Worcestershire but, in the end, we wanted to highlight the crab flavor, not overpower it, so we held back on those extra condiments. For the same reason, we decided to skip fresh herbs. We considered parsley, tarragon, chives, and scallions—and a lot of recipes go this route but for us, the best crab cake comes with restraint. 

 For the crispiest crust and most succulent interior, frying is the way to go. It’s a bit of extra work to flip the crab cakes on the stovetop, but the reward is well worth it.

Crab Cakes

The secret behind this brilliant veggie burger recipe was right in front of us. As author Joe Yonan writes, "In the ongoing quest for the perfect veggie burger recipe, at a certain point a realization occurs: wasn’t the perfect veggie burger created long ago—in falafel? Soaking but not precooking the beans, it turns out, is a good hedge against the curse of mushiness that befalls so many of this ilk. I grind the soaked beans with appropriate seasonings—chipotle and cilantro—along with the requisite onion and garlic, fold in some cooked sweet potato for extra binding power, and finish cooking in the skillet. The result boasts the crispy edges you love in falafel, plus a moist, but never mushy, interior." The secret of the matching (also vegan) mayonnaise for these veggie burgers come from a newer era of discovery—aquafaba! (a.k.a. the powerful liquid from a can of chickpeas) Yonan continues, "News flash: You don’t need eggs to make mayonnaise, now that we’ve got aquafaba, the cooking liquid from chickpeas, which behaves much like egg whites. When I first tried it, I liked the results—but the mayo needed a little body, I thought. What better than a small amount of chickpeas to help thicken it up? Turns out I wasn’t the only one onto such an idea. My friends at Little Sesame in Washington, DC, told me they were doing the same thing. Great minds and all that. Note that it’s easiest to make it in a mini food processor or small bullet-style blender because larger machines often require more volume than this to work effectively, but you can also use an immersion (handheld) blender, especially if you have a jar with an opening big enough for the blender to fit into." IMPORTANT FOOD SAFETY NOTE: Do not substitute for other bean varieties and be sure to cook your burgers thoroughly—raw beans have varying levels of a toxin that can cause food poisoning when not thoroughly soaked and cooked. See here for more 

"Cool Beans: The Ultimate Guide to Cooking with the World's Most Versatile Plant-Based Protein"

Black Bean–Chipotle Falafel Burgers From Joe Yonan

With tacos, anything goes. There's nothing better than seasonal butternut squash, freshly picked apples, and a little heat to spice things up. I dare you not to be blissfully content after eating these.

Roasted Butternut Squash Tacos with Crisp Apple & Chipotle-Lime Drizzle

In tomato season, a classic BLT is hands-down my favorite sandwich, or possibly one of my favorite foods period. Since I also love soup, it wasn’t a big leap to morph them into one dish. All of the traditional BLT elements are in the mix: tomatoes, bacon, lettuce (or arugula here, for a nice peppery note), toast (croutons,) and the essential mayonnaise too—dressed up with a little roasted garlic. You can serve this either chilled or hot, weather and mood depending.

Roasted Tomato BLT Soup

Cheese. Potato. Bread. They’re a carby trinity that is represented in so many ways across so many cuisines. Most of the time though, they appear as duos. Think cheese toasties, oozing scrapes of raclette on potatoes, or naans stuffed with masala-spiced spuds. But just imagine, if two of the three together can be so gorgeously filling and stomach-nourishing, what if all three came together in a dish? Enter cheesy potato bread.

As its name might give away, this is a hefty dish of cheese and mashed potatoes, stuffed within a flatbread-like bread. Cheese and potato in bread alone sounds like a promising prospect already, but there are intentional additions and steps to further elevate the flavor of the dish. The mash, for instance, is seasoned with mayonnaise to give it a softer, more pliable pull. The cheese—often mozzarella—is sprinkled in two layers, sandwiching the mash to give you an aligot-like ooziness. And the bread is unleavened and fried in a pan on both sides until alluringly browned, giving it calculated crisp to contrast the pillowy cheese and potatoes within.

I first discovered this dish in the ASMR-y annals of Korean YouTube cooking videos, done by Nino’s Home and table diary, among a handful of other popular channels, each with their own spin on the dish. Cooking tree garnishes the top of the bread with rivers of cheese that gets oozy as it bakes. Delicious day adds yeast to the bread for a puffier version. Some add scallions in the bread, or top it with a flurry of chopped parsley. In my case, I sneaked some caramelized onions in between the cheese and mash, adding a layer of savory-sweet depth to the dish. 

Whatever the variation though, the core of this cheesy potato bread is always the same—cheese, potatoes, and bread, in all their glory. 

Cheesy Potato Bread

While the Queen celebrated her Golden Jubilee last month, my friend Sarah Jayne celebrated her 40th birthday (we affectionally called it her "Ruby Jubilee") and asked me to cater a party with all of her favorite pub foods.  My husband and I first had scotch eggs when visiting Epcot, we were fortunate enough to have them in an actual pub a few years later and while we enjoyed them, it took SJ's birthday to bring them back into rotation.  My original recipe came from the Disney cookbook, "Cooking with Mickey around our world"...I've updated the breading to use panko crumbs and I pan fry the eggs instead of deep frying as well as using a mix of fresh herbs instead of dried spices. The mustard-mayo blend is also my own combo.



Pan Fried Scotch Eggs

“If you close your eyes and you’ve never had it and you take a bite," White says. "You’d think it’s the greatest thing you’ve ever tasted.” Steaming means that the lobster cooks in its own salty-sweet juices, rather than letting boiling water in to dilute them. Steaming is also a slightly slower, gentler, and more forgiving method—if you leave the lobsters in the steamer an extra minute, they won’t overcook. Anything you add from there shouldn't overpower the lobster, just act as a subtle complement. If you make the tarragon mayonnaise, it shouldn’t taste like tarragon, White says. “It should just be a whisper.” Adapted slightly from 

Jasper White’s World-Famous Lobster Rolls

Canned salmon is a convenient and economical alternative to fresh, and it’s ideal for easy burgers. Don’t worry about any bones in the mix. When cooked, they become undetectable, and they are a source of calcium. Ilike to schmear these burgers with a combination of ketchup and mayo—delish.

Shortcut Salmon Burgers

A walk in the dog park with my friend, Ben Hensley, inspired this recipe. As our Great Danes played beside us, we discussed the serious topic of the perfect deviled egg recipe. Our collaboration resulted in a deviled egg with basil and Dijon mustard in the egg mixture that was then topped with a large square of crispy bacon and crunchy shallots. We both continue to serve these deviled eggs at parties and marvel at how quickly they disappear. 

Simply the Best Deviled Eggs

My version of fried calamari is pretty simple. It harkens back to a time in San Marino on market days, as the Fritto Misto lady doled out newspaper cones overflowing with crispy fried calamari and skinny little fish, dressed simply with a shower of salt and a wedge of lemon, to the hungry shoppers. I’ve taken the liberty to fancy it up a bit with the fried lemon slices, the frizzled parsley, and the sriracha mayo. But essentially, it’s the same thing, minus the newspaper cone and the skinny little fish.

I spent the day at my mom’s house today, cleaning baby calamari, and I thought it would be helpful to make a “how-to” video about the process. Although it sounds like I’m annoyed in the video, I’m merely repulsed by the eye-popping (literally) graphic nature of the job at hand. It took me all day to recover. My respect for the fishmonger, which was great to begin with, has increased exponentially. Here’s the link to the video: http://t.co/hT9spjV - mrslarkin

Fried Calamari

Everyone knows chorizo and shrimp are in love, and there's no reason why this romance wouldn't extend deliciously into the world of burgers.

Mexican Chorizo and Garlic Shrimp Burger

This is tweaked from aliyaleekong's recipe on this site, and then I added condiments to my taste!

Savory French Toast with Kimchi and Pink Sauce

This egg salad takes less time than boiling an egg. And better yet, none of it is spent pulling off stubborn shards of shell. Because once again, Aki and Alex at Ideas in Food have changed how we'll cook forever with their warm, crispy, magical Fried Egg Salad. As Aki writes on Ideas in Food, “We've spent a lot of time thinking about egg salad. Mostly about the cooking and peeling of eggs. We have our favorite method, steaming for 13 minutes and then peeling, but it's still kind of a pain. So, Alex decided to find a way to crack the eggs and this salad was born...Special bonus, warm egg salad is extra delicious.” A few more notes: It helps to have all your ingredients ready because this moves fast. This technique is more of an idea than a complete recipe, which allows you to customize it to exactly how you like your eggs. Tell us in the comments where you take them! Adapted from Aki Kamozawa and Alex Talbot at 

Fried Egg Salad From Ideas in Food

This recipe was inspired by two things I had at Starry Kitchen, a new restaurant in downtown LA. The first was a hamburger with hoisin sauce and  a lot of green onions in the patty. The second was a rice cake  with kimchi, parmesan, and a creamy sauce. I though ramps might be somewhat similar to scallions and that a ramp-heavy rice cake might be quite delicious. I am a big ginger fan so this recipe has a lot of ginger, as well as some crumbled bacon. I used Fakin' Bacon tempeh bacon since my partner is vegetarian, but I think meat bacon would work well too. - clintonhillbilly

Ramp Rice Cakes

This recipe is my attempt to replicate the much celebrated Sweet Potato Latkes from Orna & Ella's in Tel Aviv. Enjoy!

Orna & Ella's Sweet Potato Pancakes

Right before moving away from Boston a couple of weeks ago, I went out to lunch with one of my best friends there. Several nights before, she and I had struck up a conversation with a waiter from B&G Oysters while we were trying to spy on a cooking class in at Barbara Lynch's "Stir" that turned out not to be a cooking class but rather a bunch of staff eating cold, leftover pizza, which they offered to us. The waiter made us promise to come for lunch at B&G that week because it was restaurant week and they were serving a special fried clam sandwich. I don't love fried clam sandwiches in general (or fried oyster or shrimp sandwiches for that matter), or at least, I thought I didn't.  Turns out I don't like soggy, heavily battered deep fried seafood, but the clam sandwich we had at the restaurant was amazingly crispy and flavorful with a lovely herby mayo.  

I got a craving for another last week, but as it turns out, shellfish (unless you want zebra mussels) aren't quite as abundant in the Midwest as they are in New England (I know, big shock). But they had just gotten a shipment of Bay Scallops from Newfoundland at our grocery store and they were having a special, so I got a bunch of those and figured they might work sort of similarly to clams. Something about frying scallops made me feel sort of Italian (who knows...), so instead of plain old mayo, I made a quick salsa verde mayo, packed the scallops onto some toasty ciabatta, and added arugula and some slices of the last of the season's tomatoes. Insanely messy. These sandwiches don't want to stay together for anything. They're not company food, but they were crazy delicious.  

On a side note, in general I haven't been super successful at making fried food. (I think it knows I'm scared of it.) But, one thing I have learned through a lot of screwing it up is, make sure your oil is hot enough! Hot, I tell you! 

Fried Scallop Sandwich

Until not so long ago, pulses—the dried seeds of legumes like beans, peas, and lentils—had a bad reputation: relegated to the health food category and generally seen as a bit “worthy”—the food of hemp trouser-wearing hippies. Now, thanks many people eating less meat but searching for new sources of sustenance, deliciousness, and protein, pulses have been put in the spotlight. This is their moment and your chance to get better acquainted with them. In India, pulses have been eaten since the dawn of civilization, by rich and poor alike. In part, this is because they’re a cheap source of protein, containing up to twice as much as most grains—but also because they are so versatile. Some pulses, like the chickpea, can be ground down to a flour, which is then used to make quick pancakes or batter for fritters like bhajis; others can be cooked to a rich silky dal or thrown into a salad or street-food for texture. Every Indian household has their own way of cooking pulses, and regional variations are vast. But there are some dishes that Indians agree have risen to the premier league. This pudla recipe is one of my favorite pantry go-tos and Gujarat’s favorite pancake. Pudlas are made using chickpea flour and yogurt and have a wonderful deeply savory flavor. Eat them plain, with just a spoonful of pickle and a lick of yogurt, or stuffed with mushrooms, lamb, spring onions, tomatoes, or any other filling you like. This recipe is from my book 

Pudla (Chickpea Flour Pancakes)

Every year my mother and I buy morels at one of our local farms (that specializes in asparagus). We've tried them a dozen different ways, but this is absolutely the best. A few years ago, my parents moved...and now they've begun finding morels somewhere in their backyard (but they're not sharing)!

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