Recipes with water

Homemade toddler pasta and veggie meal with bow-tie pasta, sweet potato, broccoli, and chickpeas simmered in broth and thickened. A wholesome, no-added-salt freezer meal you can batch and portion.

Oriental garbanzo soup is a simple, soy-seasoned broth thickened with flour and flavored with sauteed onion, sweet basil, and garlic. A light, warming vegetarian soup in 30 minutes.

Simmer soy sauce, fish sauce, and sugar into a glossy glaze that clings to beef and vegetables in any stir-fry, ready in minutes.

Vintage 1930s special cocoa cake: a tender chocolate layer cake made with bloomed cocoa, brown sugar, and cake flour. Old-fashioned recipe that beats most modern boxed mixes.

Pureed dates blended with water and vanilla extract into a thick, caramel-like paste. A natural sugar substitute for baking, smoothies, and oatmeal in 5 minutes.

Greek macaronada with nutty browned butter and grated cheese coats every strand of tender elbow pasta. A six-ingredient traditional dish that proves simple Greek cooking delivers bold flavor.

Lower-calorie chocolate ripple cake baked in a clay pot with a coconut cream cheese swirl. Made with nonfat cream cheese, egg whites, and fat-free sour cream. Serves 12.

Noisettes d'agneau with marinated rack of lamb medallions cooked in a reduced wine-rosemary sauce, topped with blanched and butter-sauteed garlic cloves. A New Orleans masterchef-level dish.

Crisp biscotti soaked in flavored simple syrup until soft, then topped with fresh whipped cream and fruit. A quick Italian-inspired dessert with endless variations.

Poulet a l'Intrigue: a Louisiana-style stuffed chicken breast marinated, packed with a sausage-eggplant dressing under the skin, lightly hickory-smoked, and finished with an andouille-pecan cream sauce.

Homemade gochujang (Korean hot sauce) fermented from meju, glutinous rice flour, barley malt, chili powder, and salt. A traditional month-long fermentation project that yields 4 gallons.

Punjabi-style Kali dal slow-simmered with black gram, red kidney beans, ginger, cardamom, and a ghee-cumin tadka. Creamy, buttery, and deeply aromatic.

Indian okra and tomato curry (bhindi subji), sautéed and simmered in a turmeric-tomato sauce with fresh cilantro and green chiles. A vegan weeknight curry that comes together in one pan.

Fresh raspberry pie with chopped mint, baked in a double crust until golden and bubbling. Unexpected herb twist on classic fruit pie.

Overnight yeasted buttermilk pancakes with blueberries. Mix the batter before bed, stir in berries in the morning, and cook the fluffiest pancakes you've ever had.

This stuffing is for eggplants, pepper, tomatoes and zucchini. It is made with olive oil and served as a cold vegetable dish.