The Perfect Pantry®

Recipe for egg casserole with Italian cheeses, sun-dried tomato and fresh herbs {vegetarian, gluten-free}

A bag of beautiful sun-dried tomatoes, a gift from my friend Mary, inspired several dishes in my kitchen recently, including this baked egg casserole with Italian cheeses and fresh herbs from my garden. Egg casseroles make ideal breakfast, brunch or light supper entrées. You can whip them up in minutes, they serve a lot of people, and they adapt to almost any flavor profile, so you can raid the pantry or use up leftover chicken, pasta or cooked vegetables. Add green chiles and cumin, for a Mexican flair, or soy sauce and scallions, to put an egg foo yung spin on this recipe. I love the classic combination of tomato with basil and thyme, both of which are still prolific in my herb garden.

Bottled salad dressing (Recipe: hot roasted vegetables with couscous)

First published in April 2007, this updated pantry ingredient post features new photos, links, and a few tweaks to the recipe. If you don't keep bottled salad dressing in your pantry, skip right to the recipe, which you can make with your own favorite creamy vinaigrette and any seasonal vegetables you find at the farm stand.

Psssst. I've got a secret.

Paul Newman is playing peek-a-boo in my refrigerator. And he's not alone.

You'll always find three or four bottled salad dressings hiding in there with him.

These salad dressings aren't for salad; they're the best, quickest marinades in the world.

Five favorite quick-and-easy slaw recipes, for picnics, potlucks or barbecues

When it comes to slaw, are you cabbage, or are you broccoli? In the house where I grew up, slaw meant cole slaw, made with cabbage and a token shredded carrot, drowning in mayonnaise and served alongside potato salad (also drowning in mayonnaise). In my own kitchen, I prefer broccoli slaw: the slivered stems of broccoli, with carrots and a bit of purple cabbage or radicchio, and a tangy or spicy dressing. To me, picnics, potlucks or barbecues feel incomplete without some sort of slaw on the table. Here are five of my favorites.

Recipe for quick and easy Asian pickled cole slaw {vegan, gluten-free}

What's in a name? If I named this dish pickled cabbage, it might conjure up images of clay jars of fermented, kind-of-smelly kimchi buried in the ground out behind the house, and to some, that's a real turn-off. So, I thought, why not call it pickled cole slaw? And then, go one step further and actually make it with store-bought cole slaw mix? Of course, you can shred green or red cabbage, and a few carrots, and make your own mix, but I let someone else do the work. Buy cole slaw mix in a bag at the grocery store and rinse in very cold water to perk it up. Add the seasonings for a quick brine, and this Asian pickled cole slaw is ready to eat in an hour. No need to dig up your back yard. Serve as a side dish with grilled chicken or meat, or in a fish taco.

Recipe for no-cook blueberry apple soup {vegetarian}

One day a few weeks ago, I returned home to find a folded piece of paper stuck inside my screen door. It took but a moment to figure out who had left it, as Debbie and I were talking earlier about a blueberry soup recipe she wanted me to try. The recipe, from Yankee magazine, came with notes suggesting some changes, and when Bob handed me a couple of cups of gorgeous blueberries from his garden, I knew the time had come. I went far afield of the original version in creating this no-cook blueberry apple soup, substituting a small amount of agave nectar for the sugar, and eliminating the sour cream, but I kept the cinnamon-coriander spice combination because it warms up the tart blueberries. If you prefer an absolutely seedless soup, pass the mixture through a food mill. A scoop of lime sherbet would send this straight to dessert heaven.