253 American recipes. Page 7 of 11. Compare ingredients and cooking times. Chicago Deep Dish Pizza, French Dip Sandwich, Chicken Pot Pie.
The layers are stacked in the reverse of a usual pizza: mozzarella on the bottom, sausage in the middle, and crushed tomatoes on top. Dough pressed up the sides of a deep cast-iron pan holds it all like a pie crust. Cooking the sausage and onion until the watery bubbling stops keeps that thick base from going soggy. The style dates to Pizzeria Uno in Chicago in 1943.
Thin-sliced beef and melted Swiss cheese go into a baguette, and each bite gets dunked in a bowl of au jus served alongside. Despite the name, the sandwich comes from Los Angeles.
Crack the golden crust with a spoon and a thick cream sauce full of chicken, carrot, potato and peas comes up in a puff of steam. It is an everyday American home bake, and the sauce is butter and flour cooked together, then loosened with chicken stock and cream.
Fresh onions browned slowly in a wide pan, rather than a packet of soup mix, give this cold dip its flavor and color. Moderate heat lets them lose water before their sugars darken; black, burnt patches cannot be rescued and stay out of the dip. The onions must be cool before they meet the sour cream and mayonnaise, or the base turns loose, and long strands are worth chopping short so each chip scoops an even amount.
The light, springy crumb that bounces back like a sponge when pressed comes from stiffly whipped egg whites. Oil instead of butter means it stays soft straight from the fridge, the main difference from a butter cake. The chiffon pan is left ungreased, and the cake is turned upside down as soon as it leaves the oven; cooled right side up, it sinks under its own weight.
Irregular fresh curds give the light batter edges to grip, and those edges fry into small crisp ridges. Cubes cut from aged cheddar or mozzarella melt differently and will not behave the same way. A short chill in the freezer buys the shell time to set, but it does not make a long fry safe; leave them in too long and the cheese breaks through. The coating cools to the touch well before the molten center does.
Measured in cups the American home-baking way, this dough uses equal amounts of white and brown sugar, landing between crisp and chewy. Shift the balance toward brown sugar and the cookies turn softer and chewier, since it holds moisture; more white sugar makes them spread wider and bake crisper.
Thick slices of hard, unripe green tomato are salted, dried and dipped in buttermilk and flour before frying, and they have to hold together when turned in hot oil. Firmness matters more than color: softer fruit chosen only because it is green falls apart. The coating happens just before the slices hit the oil, two at a time, before the tomato's moisture can dampen the flour.
Boiling comes before baking, and that short dip sets a thin skin over each ring that holds the dough back in the oven, giving a shiny, firm crust around a dense, chewy center. Since the hole closes up during boiling, stretch it wider than looks right when shaping.
Bite-size rounds of okra take an egg-and-milk dip and a flour and cornmeal coat, then fry to a deep gold in small batches so each piece gets its own thin crust. The pods are washed and dried whole before slicing, and the slime on the cut faces is left alone rather than rinsed off again. They come to the table plain, without a dipping sauce.
A buttery shortbread base, baked once on its own, goes back into the oven under a layer of lemon curd, so each bite has butter and sharp lemon together. The curd uses both juice and zest, and the oils in the zest give a stronger aroma than juice alone would. A dusting of powdered sugar stands out white against the yellow.
Brine-soaked cucumber already brings the salt and sourness, so the cornmeal coating carries only paprika, garlic powder and pepper. Flat chips of even thickness suit this method better than spears, which hold more moisture. Weigh them drained, since the figure on the jar includes the brine.
Each square of the grid becomes a small cup for syrup, melted butter, or fruit sauce, around a crisp edge and a soft, airy middle. The airiness comes from separating the eggs, whipping the whites to stiff peaks and folding them in over two additions.
Loose shredded potatoes bake soft in a sour cream and Cheddar sauce, under a topping of buttered cornflakes that stays in coarse, crisp pieces. Breakfast patties will not substitute for plain frozen shreds, and those need to thaw overnight in the refrigerator, which rules this out as a last-minute dish. Wet shreds thin the condensed soup and leave a runny filling under a crust that looks done. Crushing the flakes only roughly matters too, since cereal dust soaks up butter without giving crunch.
Cut a slice and the layers read clearly: golden crust, cream-colored custard, white whipped cream, and a scatter of toasted coconut that adds crunch. Cooked from coconut milk and regular milk, the custard has a clear coconut flavor and, once chilled, holds firm on a fork.
Snappy green beans, a soft mushroom cream sauce, and a crunchy fried onion topping give this American casserole three textures in one dish. The beans get just three minutes in boiling water and a cold rinse, leaving the oven to finish them. The fried onions wait until near the end of baking, since at the start they would lose their crunch.
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.
Cheddar and mozzarella melt together between two slices of buttered bread browned slowly in a pan. High heat only burns the bread before the middle melts, so medium-low and patience win. A thin layer of Dijon on the inside adds bite without covering the cheese. Letting the sandwich sit for a minute before cutting keeps the cheese from gushing out all at once.
Thin batter poured into a blazing cast-iron pan puffs up the sides into a tall, browned bowl while the middle stays soft and custardy. Lemon juice and powdered sugar are the classic finish for this German-American pancake; berries or cream turn it into a brunch main. A pan that is not hot enough is the usual reason the edges stay low.
Breaded oysters, fried first, sit in a skillet of eggs as distinct pieces rather than disappearing into a seafood scramble. The bacon goes in already cooked, since the short egg stage can only reheat it, not cook raw pork buried in a thick omelet. A wide pan keeps the egg layer shallow enough to set without long, fierce heat. The lid helps finish the top, though leaving it on too long steams the oyster crust soft.
The Earl Grey leaves are ground until no coarse bits remain and stirred through the batter, so every slice is flecked with tea. Ripe bananas are mashed only until small pieces of fruit are left, and the top splits open as it bakes.
The heat moves from the chili flakes into the honey during a 10-minute steep off the burner, not while it simmers. The pan comes off as soon as small bubbles show at the edge, before the honey boils down into a syrup too thick to drizzle once cool. Flakes left in keep making the honey hotter in the jar, while straining it warm holds the heat where it is. A splash of cider vinegar trims the sweetness, and the sauce is drizzled on pizza or fried chicken after cooking so the honey never meets direct heat and burns.
Egg white, sugar, flour and butter spread into paper-thin circles, which must be folded the moment they leave the oven. Only two bake at a time, since they set quickly as they cool. A thick center stays chewy even after folding. Printed paper or ballpoint ink should not go inside, and any message belongs on the wrapping instead.
Spoonfuls of cornmeal batter with grated onion and buttermilk fry into small golden fritters. The batter relies on self-rising cornmeal mix and self-rising flour, which already carry salt and leavening; plain cornmeal or cornstarch in the same amounts will not rise the same way. Large spoonfuls brown before their centers set, and breaking open the first fritter shows whether the rest should be smaller.