Vegetables

Grilling season is upon us, so fire up your grill and throw on some . . . potatoes?

Yes, you heard me right: grilled potatoes! Soft and creamy on the inside, crisp and toasty on the outside with just a touch of smoky char, grilled potatoes have become my family’s favorite way to eat America’s favorite vegetable. 

For our roasted sweet potato wedges, we needed to cut the wedges wide enough so that they’d maintain their shape once they were cooked. After a quick toss with olive oil, smoked paprika, brown sugar, garlic powder, cayenne pepper, salt, and pepper and a visit to a hot 450-degree oven, the wedges were nicely browned on their exteriors and had soft, tender interiors.

For a stromboli that's easy to put together, we started off with store-bought pizza dough. After rolling the dough into a rectangle, we layered provolone, mozzarella, sautéed broccoli, roasted red peppers, and kalamata olives (which added a bright, salty balance to the mixture) evenly over the dough. Then we brushed the borders of the dough with egg (to seal the seams) and folded the stromboli like a letter to seal in all the filling ingredients.

Steaming vegetables is a quick way to enjoy their inherent sweetness, and steaming eggs is the secret to perfect-as-possible jammy eggs. In this recipe, you don’t need a steamer basket for either. Cook the eggs in a covered skillet or pot of shallow boiling water, then layer winter squash, broccoli or cauliflower and dark leafy greens. The small amount of water will produce ample steam to cook the vegetables. Eat with plenty of sesame seeds for crunch and a yogurt sauce that is nutty from sesame oil and bright with lemon and ginger.

Like air-fryer French fries, air-fryer sweet potatoes achieve similar success, utilizing less oil and requiring less time than deep-fried versions. While sweet potato fries won’t crisp up as much as their potato counterparts, that’s part of the appeal, offering textural contrast of creamy centers and charred tips. Oomph from any of your favorite spices would work well here, along with the paprika.

Crispy tofu is attainable without frying. In this mostly hands-off recipe, firm tofu is dredged in cornstarch (one of our pantry’s most versatile staples) before being baked at high temperature. The tofu becomes golden, with an enviable crunch that stays crisp even when drizzled with teriyaki sauce. Traditional teriyaki sauce contains just four ingredients — soy sauce, mirin, sake and sugar — but this one also has ginger and garlic, which add a bit more punch. In Japanese cuisine, teriyaki refers to any grilled, broiled or pan-fried food with a shiny glaze.

This brothy fish stew gets extra body and heft from the kale and potatoes, and a hint of the Mediterranean from thyme, parsley and bay leaf. The method is straightforward. First make a mirepoix of onion, celery and carrot. Add garlic, anchovies and parsley, followed by the tomatoes and paste, and finally the potatoes and bouquet garni. Simmer for 30 minutes while the kale is cooked separately, then add the fish. Take care not to overcook the fish — it’s done as soon as it flakes easily when you nudge it with a fork.

Shakshuka may be at the apex of eggs-for-dinner recipes, though in Israel it is breakfast food, a bright, spicy start to the day with a pile of pita or challah served on the side. (It also makes excellent brunch or lunch food.) It’s a one-skillet recipe of eggs baked in a tomato-red pepper sauce spiced with cumin, paprika and cayenne. First you make that sauce, which comes together fairly quickly on top of the stove, then you gently crack each of the eggs into the pan, nestling them into the sauce. The pan is moved into the oven to finish.

Suya is a Nigerian street food of spiced, sliced meat that is threaded on skewers and grilled. We make our suya spice mix by processing peanuts, paprika, ginger, garlic, and a touch of brown sugar, then use it to add flavor and crunch to potatoes. We add a bit of oil and toss the mixture onto halved potatoes before roasting. A simple fresh tomato relish with chili and lime served on the side brightens up the dish.

The vegetables for Turkish turlu turlu are sometimes stewed, sometimes roasted; we chose the latter approach, as we’re fond of the browning and flavor concentration that results from cooking in the dry heat of the oven.