Lacy spit cake
Spettekaka is the showpiece cake of Skåne, piped in lacy layers onto a cone-shaped spit turning slowly in front of the heat until it builds up into a tall, crisp, meringue-like tower. Bakeries around Ystad and Sjöbo still make them by hand for weddings and Christmas, and slices are broken off with a knife. This home method uses a foil-covered cone of card on a rotisserie or a wooden rolling pin turned under a low grill, piping layer by layer. A common mistake is piping too thick, which leaves the inside sticky and the layers sagging. Chef's tip: dry each layer until it is set and pale gold before piping the next; patience is what gives the airy lace.
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Avocado toast took off in the cafés of Los Angeles and San Francisco, where California's Hass avocados are grown, and it is now the state's standard weekend brunch. The trick is simple ingredients done well: thick sourdough toasted hard, ripe avocado smashed with lemon and good salt, and something crunchy and sharp on top. Chef's tip: season the avocado more than you think, with salt and lemon; underseasoned avocado tastes flat.
Green goddess dressing was created at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco in the 1920s, named after a popular play, and it came back as the herb-packed dressing of California salad bars and grain bowls. It is pale green and creamy, full of tarragon, parsley and chives. The hotel's original used anchovies; this vegetarian version gets its savoury punch from capers. Use it on salads, as a dip for crudités or on roast vegetables. Chef's tip: blend the herbs with the lemon first, before the creamy ingredients, so they break down fully and turn the dressing bright green.
The Coachella Valley around Palm Springs and Indio grows most of America's dates, and roadside date farms along the desert highway have sold this shake to thirsty drivers since the 1930s. Soft Medjool dates are blended with vanilla ice cream and milk into a thick, caramel-flavoured shake. Chef's tip: soak the chopped dates in a little warm milk for 10 minutes first, so they blend completely smooth instead of leaving chewy bits in the straw.
Hot chicken has been a Nashville institution since the 1930s and is eaten at late-night shacks and the city's summer hot-chicken festival: crisp buttermilk-brined fried chicken painted while hot with a paste of cayenne and brown sugar in hot oil, served on a slice of white bread with dill pickle chips to cool things down. Chef's tip: brine the chicken overnight in the fridge; it seasons the meat right through and keeps it juicy under all that heat.
Boston earned the nickname Beantown from this pot: small white beans baked all day with salt pork, molasses and mustard, traditionally put in the oven on Saturday morning to be eaten that night with brown bread and kept warm for Sunday. The pork, cured belly with its rind, melts into the beans and gives a savoury richness against the dark, sweet sauce. Chef's tip: keep the beans just covered with water as they bake; if they dry out on top they turn hard and leathery.
Waste-not Southern cooks in Georgia and the Carolinas turned the white part of the watermelon rind into these sweet, glassy pickles, served on relish trays at Christmas and with fried chicken in summer. The rind is brined, then simmered in a cinnamon and clove syrup until translucent and crisp-tender. Chef's tip: cut away every bit of green skin and pink flesh; the skin stays tough and the flesh goes mushy.
Beignets are the pillowy fried dough squares served three to a plate, under a drift of icing sugar, at the open-air coffee stands of the French Quarter in New Orleans, day and night. The dough is a soft, slightly sweet yeast dough enriched with evaporated milk, and the squares puff up hollow in hot oil. Drink them with chicory café au lait. Chef's tip: roll the dough only 5 mm thick; thicker squares stay doughy in the middle.
In New Orleans a praline (say 'praw-leen') is a flat, fudgy disc of pecans set in brown sugar and cream, sold in waxed paper from candy shops along Decatur Street and by street vendors since the 1800s. It melts on the tongue rather than snapping like brittle. Chef's tip: use a sugar thermometer and take the pan off at 114 °C; a few degrees more and they turn grainy and hard.
Cheese enchiladas in chili gravy are the heart of the Tex-Mex combination plate, served in Houston, Dallas and San Antonio cafés since the early 1900s with rice and refried beans. Unlike Mexican enchiladas in fresh chile sauce, the Texas version uses a roux-thickened 'chili gravy' spiced with chili powder and cumin, and lots of melted yellow cheese with raw onion inside. Traditional cheddar is often made with animal rennet; choose a vegetarian cheese. Chef's tip: dip each tortilla in hot oil for a few seconds first, so it rolls without cracking and doesn't go soggy.
The po'boy was born in 1929 when two former streetcar drivers fed striking workers free sandwiches at their New Orleans restaurant, and today every neighbourhood joint from Mid-City to the Bywater fries them. The bread is a light, flaky-crusted French loaf, and a shrimp po'boy comes 'dressed' with shredded lettuce, tomato, pickles and rémoulade or mayonnaise. Chef's tip: use the lightest, crustiest baguette you can find and warm it; dense bread fights the filling.
Boudin is a soft Cajun sausage of pork, pork liver, rice and the holy trinity sold hot from the counters of meat markets and petrol stations along Interstate 10 between Lake Charles and Lafayette. Boudin balls take the same filling, roll it in breadcrumbs and fry it, and they are the snack of LSU tailgates and crawfish boils. This recipe uses pork shoulder and pork liver. Chef's tip: chill the rolled balls for 30 minutes before frying so they keep their shape.
New Orleans barbecue shrimp never touch a grill or a barbecue sauce: they are big head-on Gulf prawns baked or pan-cooked in an outrageous amount of butter, black pepper, garlic, Worcestershire sauce and lemon, made famous in an Uptown restaurant in the 1950s. You peel them at the table and mop up the sauce with French bread. Some cooks add a splash of beer, which contains alcohol; this version uses stock, so it is alcohol-free. Worcestershire sauce contains anchovy. Chef's tip: keep the heads on; they hold the juices that make the sauce.
Blackened redfish was the dish that made Cajun cooking famous across America in the 1980s, created in a New Orleans restaurant by a chef from Opelousas. Fillets are dipped in butter, coated thickly in paprika, cayenne, thyme and pepper and seared in a white-hot cast-iron pan, so the spices char into a dark, smoky crust while the fish stays moist. It produces a lot of smoke, so open the windows or cook it outside. Chef's tip: the pan must be heated empty for a full 5 minutes; a lukewarm pan steams the fish instead of blackening it.
Shoofly pie is the signature sweet of the Amish and Mennonite farms around Lancaster, Pennsylvania, sold at roadside stands and farmers' markets and eaten for breakfast with strong coffee as often as for dessert. This is the 'wet-bottom' kind: a gooey layer of molasses custard under a cakey middle and a buttery brown-sugar crumb. Chef's tip: use mild, light molasses; strong blackstrap makes it bitter.
Fried pies are a staple of Appalachian bake sales, country stores and Grand Ole Opry-era lunch pails across Tennessee, Kentucky and north Georgia, made from apples dried on the porch roof in autumn. The rich filling of stewed dried apple is folded into rounds of tender pastry, crimped with a fork and fried crisp in a skillet. Chef's tip: let the filling go completely cold and use only a heaped tablespoon; overfilled pies burst in the pan.
When the sweetcorn stands in late summer at farm stands from Maine to Connecticut, corn chowder is what goes on the stove. It is a milky, chunky soup of corn, potato and onion, thickened by simmering the stripped cobs in the stock. Many cooks start it with salt pork; this vegetarian version gets its depth from butter, smoked paprika and the cob stock instead. Chef's tip: scrape the bare cobs with the back of a knife to get the sweet corn 'milk' into the pot.
In Austin and San Antonio the breakfast taco is the morning commute: soft flour tortillas wrapped around fillings like crispy potato, scrambled egg and cheese, bought in foil from taquerías and petrol stations and eaten with salsa. Potato and egg is the classic meatless pairing. Chef's tip: fry the diced potatoes in one layer without stirring for the first few minutes so they get a real crust.
Beer cheese soup is a Wisconsin tavern and Packers game-day classic, made with the state's sharp cheddar and a local lager and served with soft pretzels or popcorn on top. It is thick, silky and tangy, with a little mustard and smoked paprika. It contains beer; most of the alcohol cooks off but not all, so for an alcohol-free version use alcohol-free lager or extra stock with 1 tsp cider vinegar. Aged cheddar is often made with animal rennet, so use a vegetarian cheddar. Chef's tip: add the cheese off the heat, a handful at a time, or it turns grainy.
Giardiniera came to Chicago with Italian immigrants, and the city made it its own: a hot mix of chopped chillies, celery, carrot and cauliflower, brined overnight then packed in vinegar and oil. It is what Chicagoans pile on an Italian beef sandwich, a pizza or a sausage, and every deli has its own heat level. Chef's tip: don't skip the overnight salt brine; it draws out water so the vegetables stay crunchy for weeks.
Green bean casserole was invented in a test kitchen in the 1950s and spread across the Midwest via church cookbooks; today it is on most American Thanksgiving tables. This version skips the tins: fresh beans in a homemade mushroom cream sauce, topped with crisp shallots you fry yourself. Chef's tip: blanch the beans only until bright green and still squeaky, because they cook again in the oven.
Castroville, near Monterey on California's central coast, grows most of America's artichokes and calls itself the artichoke centre of the world. Roadside stands and the annual artichoke festival sell them crisp-fried, the tender hearts dipped in a light batter and served with lemon and garlic mayonnaise. Small 'baby' artichokes are best, as they have almost no choke. Chef's tip: drop each trimmed artichoke straight into lemon water; cut artichokes turn brown within minutes.
Fortune cookies are not from China at all: they were first sold in San Francisco and Los Angeles in the early 1900s, probably from a Japanese tea garden recipe, and Chinese-American restaurants made them famous. A thin vanilla and almond batter is baked into a wafer, then folded while hot around a paper message. Write your own fortunes for a party. Chef's tip: bake only two or three at a time; the wafers set in seconds and crack if you can't fold them fast enough.
Along the Atlantic coast, in the fish stalls by Essaouira harbour and in home kitchens up and down the coast, chermoula is the green, garlicky paste that seasons almost everything from the sea: whole fish for the oven, sardines for the grill and fish tagines with potatoes and peppers. It works just as well on vegetables: toss it with potatoes, aubergine or carrots before roasting, spoon it over chickpeas, or stir it into a vegetable tagine. Bright, herby and tangy, it is warm with cumin and paprika and has a little chilli heat. When you use it on fish, marinate in the fridge, never on the counter, and for no more than 2 hours, or the lemon starts to cook the flesh and turns it mushy. Chef's tip: chop by hand or pulse only briefly; blended to a smooth purée, the herbs bruise and taste grassy.
Rziza is one of the showpieces of the Ramadan table in the old imperial cities: a soft dough is stretched into a sheet, rolled up and pulled into a long, thin cord, then wound around the fingers into a skein, flattened into a nest and griddled until crisp outside and tender within. At iftar the nests are pulled apart into their fine strands and drenched in warm honey and melted butter, to eat with harira, dates and mint tea. Making it takes patience and practice; the first one or two may tear, and that is fine. Chef's tip: keep everything well oiled, your hands, the board and the dough balls; too little oil is the common mistake, and the dough then tears instead of stretching.
On the evening Passover ends, Moroccan Jewish families celebrate Mimouna by opening their doors to neighbours and friends, and the star of the table is mufleta: paper-thin rounds of unleavened dough stretched by hand and cooked one on top of another in a single pan, so a whole warm stack comes out at once. Each layer is peeled off, spread with butter and drizzled with honey, and rolled up to eat with mint tea, among sweets, dried fruits and flowers. They are soft, a little chewy and lightly crisp at the edges. The dough has no yeast, fitting for the night bread returns. The usual mistake is stretching the dough with too little oil on the board, so the sheets tear and stick together in the stack. Chef's tip: cook over a medium-low heat; a pan that is too hot scorches the bottom layer before the stack is built.
Before Eid and during Ramadan, Moroccan kitchens fill with the scent of fekkas: logs of a soft, eggy dough studded with almonds, raisins, aniseed and sesame are baked, cooled, sliced thin and baked again until dry, golden and very crunchy. They are offered to guests on trays with ghriba and other biscuits and dunked into mint tea or milky coffee, and they keep for weeks in a tin, so they are perfect to make ahead. The flavour is gently sweet, with liquorice notes from the anise and a little lemon. Avoid slicing the logs while they are still hot from the first bake; they crumble. Let them firm up first. Chef's tip: let the baked logs cool completely, ideally overnight, before slicing; warm logs crumble under the knife.
Cape Cod and the bogs of south-eastern Massachusetts grow much of America's cranberry crop, and this uncooked relish is the sharp, bright alternative to cooked cranberry sauce on many New England Thanksgiving tables. Fresh cranberries are chopped with a whole orange, peel and all, then sweetened, so it is crunchy, tart and fragrant, lovely with roast vegetables, nut roasts or cheese. Chef's tip: make it a day ahead; the sugar draws out the juices and softens the bitterness of the peel overnight.
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