Lunch ideas

Some recipes sneak into your life when you’re just trying to survive a Tuesday night—and then they stay with you forever. That’s how these chicken nachos became a staple in our house. I still remember the first time I threw…

There’s a small wooden table in my backyard that catches the late afternoon sun just right. It’s nothing fancy—just two chairs, a chipped ceramic pitcher I found at a flea market, and in the summer months, usually a bowl of…

There’s something about Caesar salad that brings me back to my early days of hosting dinners in our first little apartment. The kitchen was barely big enough for two people to pass without bumping elbows, and the oven door squeaked…

It started one late summer evening, when the house smelled of cut grass and the sun refused to set on time. My kids were darting in and out of the kitchen barefoot, leaving tracks of laughter on the tile floor,…

I remember the first time I made steak kabobs like it was yesterday, even though it’s been years now. It was one of those warm summer evenings when the sun barely wanted to set, and I had a bunch of…

It was one of those long days. The kind where everything ran late, and by the time I got home, the last thing I wanted was to stand at the stove for an hour. I opened the fridge, hoping dinner…

The first time I had a chopped cheese sandwich, it wasn’t in a trendy food truck or a spotlighted corner of a glossy magazine feature. It was in the back kitchen of my cousin Danny’s bodega in the Bronx. I…

I first started making chicken shawarma bowls by accident. It was one of those long days where I’d misjudged the fridge situation—I had chicken thighs, half a lemon, and a drawer full of stubborn vegetables that had seen better days.…

It was a Tuesday night—the kind of ordinary, in-between day that doesn’t come with any expectations. My youngest had just finished a mountain of homework, the laundry was finally folded (well, halfway), and I found myself staring at the fridge…

I first started making this dish out of necessity. It was late summer, the kind of hot that makes you rethink every plan that involves turning on the oven. I had a pile of zucchini from my neighbor’s garden—more than…