(Image credit: Lauren Volo)
This is one of those recipes that originated as an off-the-cuff concept while speedily scanning the grocery store aisles a mere hour before dinner. I see hummus, we’ve got veggies at home, I’ll grab some pita. The hummus bowls — basically a pile of juicy roasted veggies over creamy hummus — were so well-received that they now regularly appear on our meal planning list. This smoky, tangy edition is the version I love most.
(Image credit: Pinch of Yum)
The official first day of spring has come and gone, but that doesn’t mean we’re saying goodbye completely to some of our favorite winter dishes. Take beef stew, for example — it’s warm and comforting and will make you feel all sorts of cozy on a chilly spring evening.
But you probably don’t have four hours to spare after work to create a rich, complex beef stew in the oven. Enter: the Instant Pot. With only six ingredients and 45 minutes, this is how you make beef stew on a weeknight.
Who: Eileen Andrade, chef & owner of Finka Table & Tap
Where: Miami, Florida
For Eileen Andrade, the chef and owner of Finka Table & Tap, cooking is in her DNA. Her grandparents, Raul and Amelia Garcia, who immigrated from Cuba in 1977, are the founders of Islas Canarias Restaurant, known for keeping the Magic City in supply of real-deal croquetas.
Eileen cut her teeth at her family’s restaurant and bakery, making traditional empanadas, bocaditos, and pastelitos, while also studying traditional Peruvian cuisine and technique from the executive chef. By 2011, she was ready to step out on her own, opening the food truck CubanCube with her brother Jonathan; and a few years later, it was time to open a brick-and-mortar restaurant.
Drawing heavily on her Cuban heritage, Finka Table & Tap puts a twist on traditional Latin food by incorporating Korean and Peruvian ingredients and techniques. “It wasn’t easy to turn people on to kimchi, wakame, and shiso,” she says. “But we have, and it’s a great feeling.”
Finka also takes pride in its fresh juices, homemade syrups, and craft cocktails — and, naturally, you can find her family’s famous croquetas on the menu.
When I’m making a salad, I typically focus on the lettuce base and carefully selected add-ins, then dress them with a basic vinaigrette. While the dressing is always good, it’s not the star by any stretch. This honey mustard dressing, though? It’s the reason to make salad in the first place. Don’t get me wrong — I love the flavors and textures that make up this chicken tender salad, but it’s the honey mustard dressing that makes it worthy of sharing. Sweet and tangy, it coats every inch of this salad with its lively flavor.
(Image credit: 101 Cookbooks)
If you’ve been bringing the same sandwich or salad to lunch every day for the last five years, it’s time to branch out a bit. I know throwing together a quick PB&J in the morning makes your life easier, but this burrito can be just as easy — as long as you employ a little make-ahead magic.
(Image credit: Tara Donne)
Stroll down Miami’s Calle Ocho and you’ll pass by any number of coffee windows, or ventanitas. The most famous one is at Versailles, but there’s no shortage on Little Havana’s main drag and elsewhere in Miami. And anywhere you can find a ventanita, you’re likely to find a crowd.
That’s because drinking a café cubano is a social activity. Sure, the coffee is good (and sweet!), but ordering a coffee is less about getting your vente frappu-whatever for the road so you can maximize your productivity and more about slowing down and catching up with your friend — or a complete stranger.
Read more: What Coffee Culture Is Like in Cuba
(Image credit: Cooking for Keeps)
If you forgot to meal plan this week and are looking for a last-minute dinner to throw together tonight, allow me to suggest this chicken enchilada baked ravioli. Yes, I did say enchilada and ravioli in the same breath. Why should you have to choose between the two?
Who: Zak H. Stern and Batsheva Wulfsohn, the husband-and-wife team behind Zak the Baker; their daughters, 2-year-old Abigail and 4-month-old Maya Maybel.
Where: Surfside, Florida
Zak Stern is better known as Zak the Baker (also the name of his bakery in the Wynwood Arts District) and, for many, he has an even higher title: He is Miami’s crowned king of bread.
Together with his wife, Batsheva, he has made Miami a serious baking destination, turning out loaves of sourdough, beautiful babkas, and braided challah from inside a purposefully understated oasis. The focus here is clearly on the craft of baking; it is a gleaming, industrial counterpoint to the visually loud neighborhood of bold, colorful street art.
Since opening five years ago, the bakery has grown from a one-man show out of a garage to a full-blown operation that is tended to 24 hours a day (since bread never sleeps). And just recently, the duo expanded their business to include a kosher Jewish deli, where the ever-changing menu might include kugel, sour borscht, or herring tartine.
This 30-minute chili, featuring the flavorful power couple of chorizo and chicken, is what you make on Wednesday when you hit a wall on what to make for dinner. A change of pace from a beefy chili, this one-pot meal kicks up the flavor with spicy chorizo and seared chicken thighs. Smoky, fire-roasted tomatoes and two types of beans make up the sauce, with a few dashes of spices and herbs added in to give it a complex flavor.