His Medium, Salted Butter. His Craft, Sublime.
Gerry Kulzer, the new butter sculptor at the Minnesota State Fair, is ready to capture the likenesses of the dairy princesses, if only he can sculpt their tresses in time.
By Christina Morales

WHAT’S NEW 2022
Berlin, Back in Full Swing
Berlin’s 178 museums, seven symphony orchestras and three opera houses are once again up and running, along with a flourishing restaurant and nightclub scene.
By CHARLY WILDER

Greek Party Islands Chill Out
For years, Santorini, Mykonos and Ios have been known for their embrace of excess. But some new operators on Greece’s Cycladic Islands want to break that cycle.
By Sheila Yasmin Marikar

UKRAINE DISPATCH
Devouring Oysters by Battlefield, Ukrainians ‘Switch Off for a Bit’
A businessman’s unlikely oyster farm not far from the front lines with Russia has offered a rare sanctuary for battle-scarred Ukrainian troops.
By MICHAEL SCHWIRTZ

FOOD MATTERS
How the Chile Became Hot
Why did the consumption of hot peppers — after centuries of cultivation and global migration — come to confer status and sophistication?
By LIGAYA MISHAN, PATRICIA HEAL and LEILIN LOPEZ-TOLEDO

Shortcuts to Big Flavor
Dried minced onion, snack-size nori sheets and crème fraîche pack a punch in vegetable-forward cooking.
By TEJAL RAO

23 Easy Tomato Recipes for Summer
Let the indisputable season’s star shine in a simple sauce, pasta, salad or beyond, with any of these delicious dishes.
By Tanya Sichynsky and Alexa Weibel

Tuesday Fancy Mussels
Jazz up any ol’ Tuesday with a 15-minute pot of shellfish.
By TANYA SICHYNSKY

Vegan, Indian-Inspired Soups From Maya Kaimal
Choices like lentil and creamy spiced butternut come in shelf-stable packages with two servings.
By FLORENCE FABRICANT

This Cutting Board Won’t Harm Your Knives
Artisan Revere makes them from end grain, a configuration of wood that is said to be the least damaging to knife edges.
By FLORENCE FABRICANT

All You Need for This Crisp-Tender Skillet Cake Is Rice and a Little Time
A gorgeous snack drizzled with honey or a way to shuttle soups, stews or grilled meat from plate to mouth, this simple dish is the best kind of exercise in patience, Yewande Komolafe writes.

Sinasir, flat skillet cakes made from fermented rice, are perfect vehicles for sopping up soups and stews.
By Yewande Komolafe

A GOOD APPETITE
This Easy One-Pan Chicken Recipe Has a Trick Up Its Sleeve
If you’re not already trimming your corn kernels off the cob this way, you should be, Melissa Clark writes.

Sweet corn kernels are a lovely accompaniment to chicken thighs, especially when sautéed in chicken fat and browned butter.
By Melissa Clark
Recipe: Skillet Chicken Thighs With Brown Butter Corn

J. Kenji López-Alt’s Summer Staple? Guacamole With Grilled Corn
A restaurant dish melding the dip with creamy esquites loosely inspired the chef and cookbook author’s new favorite.

This guacamole is rich with flavor and texture.
By J. Kenji López-Alt
Recipe: Guacamole With Grilled Corn

Behold the Fruit Sandwich
In this Japanese treat, ripe, seasonal gems are enrobed in cream and nestled between slices of milk bread.

By LIGAYA MISHAN
Recipe: Fruit Sandwich

‘If You Can Make a Salad, You Can Make Kimchi’
Kimjang, the act of preparing kimchi, allows Koreans of the diaspora to keep the tradition alive — and invites everyone to join.

In a world where most people buy their kimchi at the store, making it at home has become a priority for Koreans who wish to carry on the tradition of kimjang.Credit…Tanveer Badal for The New York Times
By Eric Kim
Recipes: Kimchi | Baek Kimchi (White Kimchi) | Baek Kimchi Jjigae (White Kimchi Stew)

Ice Cream?
At KSTP-TV Ashley Halbach says, “Minneapolis ice cream shop Bebe Zito is now selling a pint with THC gummies mixed into the product. Bebe Zito says the ‘Pineapple Express’ pints taste like a pineapple upside-down cake. They started with a pineapple base and added salted caramel-soaked pineapple upside-down cake mix-ins and THC gummies containing hemp-derived THC (Delta-9) from a local Black-owned company, Cultivated CBD. … The ice cream packaging shows that each pint contains a total of 40 THC gummies and that each gummy has 1.25 mg of THC.”

In days of olde, before COVID wracked the land, whenever I bought water spinach (Ipomoea aquatica) at the farmer’s market, it was usually dismissed with ‘insect ridden’ or ‘too old’ and chucked into the garbage. Well, after the passage of time, and the advent of inflation at the Asian stores, the last two bundles I’ve bought at the King of Spinach’s stall have received quite different treatment. After the purchase, I texted someone that we could either eat it or they could take it to their sister’s — their choice. It seems either the growers have improved or my eyes have improved, but their sister did not get the bundle tonight, and, oh my, the stems were crunchy.

Dented, Dated, Discontinued? At the Salvage Grocery, It’s Called a Deal
Salvage food stores have long been a lure for the frugal and the intrepid. But inflation, environmentalism and some clever rebranding are expanding the fan base.
By KIM SEVERSON

CRITIC’S NOTEBOOK
In a Tense Political Moment, Taiwanese Cuisine Tells Its Own Story
The relationship between the island’s cooking and the food in mainland China is complex.
By TEJAL RAO

This Bakery Wants to Be Carbon-Neutral
A bakery in the Catskills is trying to be as sustainable as possible. Here’s an inside look.
By DEVORAH LEV-TOV

I Eat at Restaurants for a Living. That’s Not Why My Stomach Always Hurt.
Half the world’s population has H. pylori, a type of bacteria that can mess with digestion. So why doesn’t the problem have a higher public profile?
By Priya Krishna

The Lamp That’s Taking Over New York
A sleek newcomer, the Pina Pro, is appearing on droves of outdoor tables in the city — and sometimes disappearing, as diners fall for its mellow glow.

The Pina Pro lamp (pictured here at Momoya in SoHo) has popped up at restaurants across New York, its prevalence buoyed by outdoor dining.
By Priya Krishna

A GOOD APPETITE
The Best Summer Dinner Is Assembled, Not Cooked
Adding quickly grilled shrimp to a classic pairing of melon and feta turns a light weeknight meal into a hearty, yet refreshing main.

You can use any kind of melon or a combination in this simple salad.
By Melissa Clark
Recipe: Grilled Shrimp Salad With Melon and Feta

Late Summer Tomatoes Are Perfect for Spaghetti al Pomodoro
The purest distillation of summer umami with just four ingredients.

By ERIC KIM
Recipe: Pasta al Pomodoro

The Best End-of-Summer Party Starts With Tacos
Here are expert tips on how to put together a delicious spread that gives you even more time with family and friends.

Carne asada and arroz rojo are just two elements of a festive, low-effort spread.
By Genevieve Ko
Recipes: Carne Asada | Arroz Rojo (Red Rice)

TRADITIONS
And for Our Next Course … the Centerpiece
Chefs, artists and other creatives are making edible spectacles a meal’s main event.
By ALICE CAVANAGH and CHARLY GOSP

Zucchini Time
If you haven’t thought about zucchini lately, you should.
By EMILY WEINSTEIN

The Season for Grated Tomatoes
Plus a bonus recipe for sizzled eggplant.
By TEJAL RAO

THE POUR
12 Reasons to Love California Chardonnay
The wines have evolved, but the negative stereotypes linger. These diverse bottles will challenge what you think you know.

These bottles reflect a style of California chardonnay that prizes freshness and finesse.
By ERIC ASIMOV

Jan Longone, Influential Scholar of Food History, Dies at 89
The cookbook collection that began in the basement of her home became the Janice Bluestein Longone Culinary Archive at the University of Michigan.

Jan Longone, whose extensive collection of cookbooks and culinary ephemera became the Janice Bluestein Longone Culinary Archive at the University of Michigan.
By KIM SEVERSON

That Dinner Tab Has Soared. Here Are All the Reasons.
As diners everywhere suffer the shock of inflation, we tally up the many costs and forces driving up menu prices at a single restaurant.
By PRIYA KRISHNA and UMI SYAM

In Italy, Where Pizza Was Born, Domino’s Bows Out
The company entered the Italian market in 2015, but seems to have been done in by a proliferation of home-delivery food during the pandemic and a desire for more artisanal pies.
By ELISABETTA POVOLEDO

Corny on Main
Sometimes you just can’t get enough of those sweet, fresh summer cobs.
By EMILY WEINSTEIN

Slow-Cooked Lamb That Can Stand the Heat
A meaty main, cooked indoors or out, anchors David Tanis’s August menu, book-ended by a light tomato-eggplant salad and an effervescent fruit compote.

A tomato salad and eggplant roasted over an open flame, then served over flatbreads, are an ideal complement to this lamb dish.
By David Tanis
Recipes: Tomato Salad With Smoky Eggplant Flatbread | Slow-Cooked Lamb Shoulder With Green Beans | Summer Fruit Compote

In Search of Mexican Pizza
Taco Bell may have made the name famous, but this pizza — made with leavened dough and traditional Mexican ingredients — has become a genre all its own.

The Chicana pie, topped with tomatillo sauce, mozzarella, black beans and chipotle-spiced chicken, goes into the oven at Rosario’s Pizzeria in South Philadelphia.
By REGAN STEPHENS

24 Freezer-Friendly Recipes to Cook for New (and Tired) Parents
A collection of ready-to-eat meals is almost as good as a full night’s sleep.
By MARGAUX LASKEY

Yotam Ottolenghi Has Made Thousands of Meringues. This Is His Favorite.
There are many variations of the simple, elegant sweet — but pavlova with seasonal fruit is among the best.

By YOTAM OTTOLENGHI
Recipe: Sunset Pavlova With Sweet Vinegar and Rosemary

The Perfect S’more Is Practically Burned and a Little Salty
Potato chips, Nutella and even Peeps can step into this campfire classic, but success lies in its balance of flavors and a healthy char.

In an ideal classic s’more, the marshmallow is oozy all the way through and charred on the outside.
By TANYA SICHYNSKY
Recipe: S’mores

THE POUR
The Problem With Wine Bottles
They may be a perfect container for aging wine, but glass bottles contribute enormously to climate change.
By Eric Asimov

Georges Briguet, Who Presided Over Le Périgord, Dies at 85
The owner of a classic French restaurant in Manhattan for a half-century, he welcomed his well-heeled guests by name, offering them a serene urban oasis on the far East Side.

Georges Briguet in 2015. He turned Le Périgord into a quiet oasis for unhurried New Yorkers and out-of-town regulars of a certain age and class.
By SAM ROBERTS

From Pizza to Dip, Chips and Popcorn, Pickle Is Summer’s Big Flavor
For people with a sweet-and-sour tooth, there’s never been a greater pick of pickle-flavored possibilities, thanks to pickle spice.
By CHRISTINA MORALES

Food Is Identity. For Korean Chefs Who Were Adopted, It’s Complicated.
Raised in the U.S., they’re exploring a heritage they didn’t grow up with through restaurant cooking — and finding both fulfillment and criticism.
By ELYSE INAMINE

How to Cook in a Vacation Rental (and Still Enjoy Your Vacation)
The most enjoyable meals on a trip may just be the ones you make yourself with these tips for planning, shopping and using up every ingredient.
By Ali Slagle

A Creamy, Spicy Dip Unlike Any Other
The Houston chef Dawn Burrell brings her biography to everything she cooks, like her creamed collard greens spiked with chile sauce.

By BRYAN WASHINGTON
Recipe: Creamy Collard-Greens Dip With Shito

FRONT BURNER
Four Cheeses That Can’t Be Beat
These cheeses took top honors at the American Cheese Society’s annual competition.
“In first place was Whitney, a Raclette-style cheese from Jasper Hill Farm in Greensboro Bend, Vt. Second place went to two cheeses: Flagsheep, a semihard blend of cow and sheep milks by Beecher’s Handmade Cheese in Seattle; and Bamboozle, a washed-rind blend of goat and cow milks from Rodeo Farm & Dairy in Allison Park, Pa. In third place was another Jasper Hill Farm cheese, Greensward, a soft-ripened washed rind beauty made in collaboration with Murray’s Cheese in New York.”
By FLORENCE FABRICANT

Tomato Mode
Fresh summer tomatoes lend themselves beautifully to some exceptional no-cook and low-cook meals.
By EMILY WEINSTEIN

A GOOD APPETITE
Take Your Cakes to the Upside Down
You can’t beat a classic pineapple upside-down cake, but juicy peaches, plums, berries and even bananas are just waiting to step in, Melissa Clark writes.

Other fruit like stone fruit, berries and bananas can make upside-down cakes as good or even better than the usual pineapple.
By MELISSA CLARK
Recipes: Pineapple Upside-Down Cake With Pecans | Peach Upside-Down Cake | Berry Upside-Down Cake | Banana Upside-Down Cake

WINE SCHOOL
Should Red Wines Be Served Cool?
The proper serving temperature is nuanced, depending on the style of the wine, the vintage, the weather and your own personal taste.
By Eric Asimov

WINE SCHOOL
Dry German Riesling: An Eternal Conundrum
Many people are convinced that they do not like the wines. Are they simply a niche interest, or is their obvious appeal yet to be widely understood?

Brand Pfalz Riesling Trocken 2021, 12 percent (Vom Boden, Brooklyn, N.Y.) 1 liter, $18, Dreissigacker Rheinhessen Riesling Trocken 2021, 12 percent (Schatzi, Milan, N.Y.) $22, Georg Breuer Rheingau Estate Lorch 2020, 12 percent, (Skurnik Wines, New York) $35
By Eric Asimov