Casseroles

Sushi bake is essentially a California roll casserole in which the main ingredients of the popular sushi roll are layered, then baked for an easy comfort dish. This recipe uses imitation crab, but feel free to use real crab meat, or equal amounts cooked or canned tuna or salmon. Furikake, the Japanese seasoning mix, flavors the rice, while Kewpie mayo and cream cheese bind and add richness. (Both furikake and Kewpie mayo can be found at Asian supermarkets and online.) A final drizzle of sriracha mayo brings it all to life.

This recipe, inspired by Stouffer’s macaroni and cheese, delivers the best of all worlds: creamy, saucy comfort, with a consistency that’s slightly more set than a stovetop version, thanks to a final bake in the oven. It stays voluptuous and molten as a result of a higher ratio of sauce to noodles, which are cooked completely so they don’t soak up as much liquid. The Velveeta is necessary here, as it has sodium citrate, which prevents the sauce from separating in the oven. Elbow macaroni works fine, but cavatappi is an especially fun shape to eat with its telephone-cord bounciness.

For a creamy, rich green gratin with a crisp, flavorful bread-crumb topping, we started with a mixture of kale and Swiss chard. Sturdy kale kept the gratin fluffy and tall; Swiss chard collapsed when cooked, but its plentiful tender stems added bulk. Steaming the greens in a Dutch oven cooked them quickly and eliminated the need for blanching or sautéing in multiple batches. To keep the gratin from being liquid-y or sogging out the crumb topping, we kept the amount of cream to 1 cup, just enough to give the dish a silky richness.

Ancient American grains like amaranth, chia and quinoa are making a comeback due to their versatility and nutritional content. Alton Brown shows how to make the most of these very old kitchen newcomers.

This is the most minimalist eggplant Parmesan imaginable, really an eggplant gratin with tomatoes. (If memory serves me, that’s how they make it in Parma: no mozz, no meat.) You cook the eggplant in abundant oil. Yes, you can broil it or bake it, but I really think the taste of eggplant slices that have had oil boiled right through them is dreamy. Make a 15-minute tomato sauce of fresh or canned tomatoes, onion and olive oil, then grab a gratin dish and layer the eggplant, sauce and Parmesan. Do this two or three times, and that's it. Bake until it's bubbly and golden brown.

In Normandy, this richly flavored stew would be served with a composed salad of watercress, shallots, and roasted beets. What to drink: Muscadet, Chablis, or unoaked Chardonnay.

The affinity that cauliflower has with black olives is seen throughout the Mediterranean, from Tunisia to Sicily to Apulia to Greece. This simple gratin from Sicily is traditionally made with green cauliflower, but the result is equally delicious and almost as pretty with the easier-to-obtain white variety.

Beans baked very slowly for several hours develop a creamy texture, while the liquid they cook in, which thickens to a syrup, acquires a caramelized flavor. The kale practically melts in this casserole, going from bitter to sweet. I love using lima beans in this dish because they’re so big and their texture is so luxurious.

Tangy feta cheese creates a melted blanket of flavor over shrimp in tomato sauce and orzo (rice-shaped pasta). It makes a hearty supper.

The Original: Any old canned tuna mixed with cream of something (chicken, celery, mushroom) soup. Our Version: Oil-packed albacore in a roux-thickened sauce flavored with leeks, dill, and Gruyère. Our one old-school concession? A crunchy, crushed-potato-chip topping.