Side Dish Recipes

Southern-style pole beans slow-simmered with a smoked ham hock until tender and deeply flavored. Just five ingredients and pure comfort.

Orange-pecan couscous cooked in orange juice with cinnamon sticks, cloves, turmeric, and raisins. A fragrant, Moroccan-inspired side dish ready in under 30 minutes.

Asian-style oat pilaf with egg-coated rolled oats toasted until separated, then simmered in soy sauce and chicken broth with mushrooms, green onions, and snow peas. A unique side dish.

Osas are classic South Indian dosas: thin, crisp rice-and-lentil crepes made from a naturally fermented batter of rice and urad dal. Vegan, gluten-free, and golden with lacy, reddish-brown edges.

Parchment-wrapped potato parcels: microwave papillote packets of sliced ham, potato, zucchini, winter squash, and red pepper with lemon and basil. A 15-minute single-serve dinner, no dishes to wash.

If you don't want to spend too long time to cook, and want to a vegetable side dish to accompany a meat dish, try this one.

Parmesan garlic soup simmers a whole half-head of garlic into a mellow, sweet broth, then thickens it silky with a tempered egg, parmesan, and olive oil liaison. Ladled over a crouton, it's rustic comfort in a bowl.

Parmesan toasts rub Italian bread with raw garlic, drizzle with olive oil, top with parmesan and fleur de sel, then oven-bake until golden. Easiest appetizer going.

Pasta Nicoise salad with shell pasta, fresh tomatoes, steamed green beans, black olives, and capers tossed in a garlicky olive oil vinaigrette. Ready in 20 minutes.

Toasted pine nuts, briny capers, and sliced black olives toss with garlic-infused butter and olive oil for a quick Mediterranean pasta that's ready in 25 minutes.

Pepper salad is a blender coleslaw with cabbage, carrot, and chili peppers pulse-chopped with water, drained, and dressed with mayonnaise. A quick, diabetic-friendly, 10-minute side dish.

Picante potato salad with corn, red bell pepper, and scallions in a cumin-spiked vinaigrette. A mayo-free Mexican-style side dish served cold with fresh cilantro.

Pickled black-eyed peas marinated in a garlic-infused oil and red wine vinegar dressing with red onion and cayenne. A Southern make-ahead appetizer that improves over several days.

It is a vegetarian burger, all the vegetables mix very well, tasty and healthy.

Potato and loaded vegetable salad is a mayo-free, vegan picnic salad: cubed potatoes, peas, carrots, celery and bell pepper tossed in a bright blended lemon-garlic dressing with a hint of coconut and hot sauce.

This is not your ordinary potato salad...which I don't like. This is quite different and yummy!