Western

Western Recipes

721 recipes. Page 17 of 31

Pasta, steak, and other Western recipes

Cranberry Sauce

Fresh or frozen cranberries simmer briefly in sugar syrup and are then chilled, giving a tart, cold relish served in its own bowl beside roast turkey. Being a stovetop sauce, it never competes with the turkey for oven space. Sweetened dried cranberries are a different ingredient and will not work in this ratio. The sauce looks loose while hot, but its texture is judged after cooling, and a longer boil does not help. Cooling and refrigeration add time beyond the 20 minutes of active work, which pushes the start well ahead of the meal. Kept in a separate bowl, it lets each person decide how much sharpness and sweetness to add to the plate.

⚡ 20-Minute Recipes

Prep 5min Cook 15min 9 servings

Baking Easy

Coffee Cake

Despite the name, there is no coffee in the batter, and the cake is simply meant to be eaten alongside a cup. Sour cream gives the crumb more moisture than a plain butter cake. Cinnamon streusel is added twice, once in the middle and once on top, so each slice shows two spiced stripes and a sandy, crunchy crust. Warm from the oven is when the cinnamon smells strongest.

Prep 20min Cook 35min 9 servings

Pasta Easy

Pasta Puttanesca (Neapolitan Anchovy Olive Caper Tomato Sauce)

Four anchovy fillets melt into the garlic oil over medium-low heat until nothing fish-shaped is left, only a savory base under the tomatoes. Halved black olives and capers follow, and between them and the anchovies the sauce rarely needs added salt. The risk lies in reduction: when the sauce thickens too fast its saltiness turns sharp, and lowering the heat then does more good than simmering longer.

Prep 10min Cook 20min 2 servings

Western Medium

Creamy Tuscan Chicken

Sun-dried tomatoes bring concentrated sweetness and spinach a soft bitterness, giving a heavy cream and Parmesan sauce some color and contrast. The chicken breasts, evened out to 1.5 cm, are seared for a brown crust first and then finished in the sauce. The browned bits left from that sear, scraped up with chicken stock, become the base of the sauce. More Parmesan makes it thicker, and a few drops of lemon juice at the end lighten the cream.

Prep 15min Cook 25min 4 servings

Baking Easy

Cornbread

With more cornmeal than flour, this American quick bread has a coarse, grainy crumb and just a little sweetness from the sugar. Baking powder does all the rising, with no proof, and the batter heads straight into the oven once mixed. That loose crumb breaks apart when hot, which is why it cools in the pan until the steam inside settles before slicing.

Prep 10min Cook 25min 4 servings

Pasta Hard

Pastitsio (Greek Cinnamon Beef Macaroni Bechamel Bake)

Cut a square of pastitsio and three layers should show clearly: macaroni, a cinnamon-scented beef sauce, and a thick cap of bechamel. Each layer has its own way to fail. Macaroni boiled fully soft keeps softening in the oven, and a beef sauce with liquid pooling underneath soaks the pasta below it. The 15-minute rest after baking lets sauce and pasta set, so a knife pressed straight down leaves all three layers clean.

Prep 30min Cook 40min 4 servings

Western Easy

Croque Monsieur (Béchamel Ham and Cheese Melt)

Bechamel spread thickly over a ham and Gruyere sandwich, then covered with more cheese, bakes in the oven and puffs golden under the broiler. Dijon mustard inside adds a sharp bite that cuts through the salty ham and rich cheese. Only half of the Gruyere is tucked inside during assembly, with the rest saved for the top. Add a fried egg on top and this Paris cafe classic becomes a croque madame.

Prep 15min Cook 15min 2 servings

Baking Hard

Cornish Pasty (British Hand Pie with Beef and Root Vegetables)

Beef, potato, rutabaga (swede), and onion are sealed into the pastry raw, so the juices they release while baking stay inside and act as the gravy. Cutting everything to about 1 cm lets the raw filling cook through. The hand pie grew out of a portable meal for miners in Cornwall, England, and the thick crimped edge served as a handle.

Prep 30min Cook 45min 4 servings

Pasta Easy

Penne alla Vodka

Two tablespoons of vodka bubble for about a minute, long enough to soften the harsh alcohol smell but not so long that the aroma disappears. The tomato puree reduces until its color deepens before any cream goes in, and from that point the pan stays at its lowest heat so the sauce never boils and splits. The finished sauce should slip into the hollow centers of the penne as well as cling to the outside.

Prep 10min Cook 18min 2 servings

Western Hard

Croquetas de Jamon (Crispy Ham Béchamel Bites)

Behind a thin crumb shell sits hot, creamy bechamel, carrying the salty flavor of finely chopped jamon. With a filling made mostly of butter, flour, and milk, the cured ham, though small in amount, carries the salt and aroma of every bite. In Spanish bars they come out as tapas, two or three to a small plate.

Prep 25min Cook 20min 4 servings

Baking Medium

Cream Horn Pastry

Strips of puff pastry wound around a cone mold bake into a hollow spiral horn, which is then piped full of whipped cream folded into cream cheese. The thawed pastry stays cold and is cut into strips without rolling or stretching it, which protects the flaky layers. Sugar pressed onto the surface bakes into a crisp coating, and each bite brings the open layers and the cold cream together.

Prep 30min Cook 20min 4 servings

Pasta Medium

Perilla Oil Potato Gnocchi with Pancetta

Boiled potato gnocchi get a second cooking in pancetta fat, browning on the bottom while staying soft inside. A splash of chicken stock reduced with Parmigiano makes just enough sauce to coat each piece thinly. Perilla oil, a nutty Korean oil pressed from perilla seeds, is poured in only after the heat is off so its aroma survives, and shredded perilla leaves from the same plant echo it on top.

Prep 25min Cook 20min 2 servings

Western Easy

Cuban Sandwich

Pressed flat in a hot pan, a baguette stuffed with roast pork, ham, Swiss cheese, and pickles turns crisp outside while the melting cheese holds everything together. No sandwich press is needed; a heavy cast-iron pan set on top does the same job. Pickles and Dijon mustard add sour and sharp notes that keep two kinds of pork from feeling heavy. Slicing the pickles thin and patting them dry keeps the bread from going soggy and stops them from overpowering a bite. The traditional pork is Cuban-style roast seasoned with garlic, cumin, and orange juice, and the sandwich took shape among Cuban Americans in Tampa and Miami.

Prep 15min Cook 12min 2 servings

Baking Hard

Croquembouche (French Caramel-Glazed Cream Puff Tower Centerpiece)

Small custard-filled puffs, each dipped in hot caramel and stacked around a cone, make a tower served in France at weddings and baptisms in place of a wedding cake. The name means crunch in the mouth: hardened caramel cracks first, then the soft choux shell gives way to cold cream. Caramel pulled thin with a fork and wrapped around the finished tower adds fine golden threads. Guests pull the puffs off one at a time, starting from the top.

Prep 60min Cook 45min 8 servings

Pasta Medium

Perilla Pesto Chicken Penne

Blended with walnuts, perilla leaves make a pesto whose scent recalls perilla oil: slightly bitter, quietly nutty and nothing like basil. Bite-size pieces of chicken breast stay lean and plain, letting the pesto carry the flavor, and the hollow penne fill with sauce.

Prep 20min Cook 25min 4 servings

Western Easy

Currywurst (Sliced Sausage in Curry Ketchup)

Ketchup simmered with curry powder, paprika, cider vinegar, and a little sugar becomes a tangy, spiced sauce for sliced grilled bratwurst, served with fries the way Berlin street stalls do it. The sauce tastes even more rounded after resting a day.

Prep 15min Cook 25min 4 servings

Baking Hard

Crunchy Chocolate Chip Baguette

Cocoa powder darkens the dough and keeps it a little bitter, so the chocolate chips folded through it read as pockets of sweetness. They go in near the end, before the dough warms up, and only briefly; long kneading melts them and streaks the crumb.

Prep 120min Cook 25min 2 servings

Pasta Easy

Pesto Genovese Pasta

The pesto never touches a hot pan. Spaghetti goes from the pot into a large bowl and the sauce is tossed through it there, away from the stove, keeping the basil's raw aroma and bright green color. The processor is the other source of heat, and short pulses with the sides scraped down keep long runs from warming the inside and dulling the basil. Pine nuts are toasted dry only to a light gold, and the olive oil goes into the processor in two or three additions, stopping when the pesto is thick yet still drops slowly from a spoon.

Prep 15min Cook 15min 2 servings

Western Easy

Oven-Roasted Chicken Drumsticks

Soy sauce, garlic, olive oil, and a dried herb blend coat these drumsticks, roasting into a salty, aromatic glaze on the skin. The last 10 minutes at 220°C turn the skin thin and crisp.

Prep 30min Cook 45min 3 servings

Baking Medium

Dacquoise (Almond Meringue Disc with Butter Cream Filling)

Two flat discs of almond meringue sandwiching buttercream make a dacquoise, the kind Korean cafes sell bite-sized and individually wrapped. The thin outer shell dries enough to crackle under a finger, while the almond fat keeps the inside chewy. This filling is a plain buttercream of butter, milk, and vanilla, which makes it easy to swap in matcha or pistachio.

Prep 25min Cook 18min 4 servings

Pasta Hard

Porcini Truffle Mushroom Tagliatelle

The brown water left from soaking dried porcini carries an earthy mushroom flavor through the whole sauce, while a mix of fresh mushrooms provides the bite. White wine, butter and Parmigiano bind it without cream so it clings to wide tagliatelle, and the truffle paste is only a finishing scent.

Prep 20min Cook 25min 4 servings

Western Easy

Korean Soy-Glazed Chicken Wings

A teaspoon of vinegar in the soy marinade makes the salt less sharp and the chicken skin taste less greasy. The shine comes from using sugar and oligosaccharide syrup together, and the last coat of sauce brushed on near the end bubbles in the oven until it sets into a thin lacquer. The thickest wing, not the glossy skin, decides when the tray comes out, because the meat by the bone cooks last. Sesame oil and toasted seeds go on after baking, while the wings are still hot.

Prep 20min Cook 30min 4 servings

Baking Hard

Danish Pastry

A shallow well of cold custard sits in the middle of each square while the unpressed edges rise into flaky, buttery layers. The dough is laminated much like croissant dough, with three folds around a cold butter slab, but the custard baked into the center sets it apart. Leaving the edges unpressed when shaping is what lets those layers climb.

Prep 330min Cook 18min 8 servings

Pasta Medium

Ricotta Spinach Gnudi (Naked Ricotta Dumplings)

Without a pasta wrapper, these ricotta and spinach dumplings hold together through moisture control rather than extra flour. Loading the mixture with flour keeps them intact but makes them dense and heavy.

Prep 25min Cook 15min 4 servings