30 Minutes or Less

Feel free to swap out the green vegetable for whatever looks good. My husband, John, loves salami and really all pork in general. The only thing he likes better is a meal like this one, which combines pork and crispy salami-topped side dishes!

This one is for Howard Stern. Howard loves the ground turkey. Here ya go, baby!

Why roast the carrots? Well let me tell you, a roasted carrot will kick a boiled carrot’s you know what, any day. That’s why.

I admit, toasting the bread cubes is the hardest part of this recipe for me. I burn a lot of bread, often. Use your favorite method for remembering: the rubber band around the wrist, a timer, or assign someone in the house to stand guard at the oven. (I use John.) It’s always such a drag to have to do a “do over” when it comes to making croutons. It’s humbling.

This is a great date meal for your Lamb Chop, Sweet Pea, or Honey Pie. No need to worry about dessert—you’re it!

Exotic, easy, and healthy, too, this simple dish is just delish.

This dish is what I call a “Retro Metro.” Back in the day, Chicken Divan—poultry, poulet sauce, broccoli, and mushrooms—was a continental cuisine staple. As a special treat, my mom would take me to NYC to the Magic Pan for Chicken Divan Crepes. This is an easy cosmopolitan update on the classic. The broccoli is swapped out for asparagus and the preparation time is reduced. Enjoy!

East Coast meets West Coast in this dish. Chowder plus Tex-Mex equals a really good idea in any direction!

Pasta stewed up in red wine is a Tuscan invention: my kinda people! I toss it together with other usual suspects from the region: wild mushrooms, rosemary, and dark greens.

I often throw holiday parties with a casual theme. This dish was the centerpiece of a holiday-style Make Your Own Take-out gathering. You will never find anything like this delivered to your door in a brown paper sack, but if you do a little bit of chopping you’ll be famous for many holidays to come. P.S. Don’t wait for a holiday to make it.

Confession: I have never been to Spain. This is actually my version of a fantabulous meal I enjoyed at a late-night hot spot in Vancouver, north of the border. It’s good because you get salty, sweet, and savory in each and every bite. Note to self: gotta go to Spain. I serve these with green beans.

Easier than lasagna, because it’s not lasagna, this pasta, meat sauce, and ricotta toss-up is just as hearty and comforting as the layered Italian fave, but it’s ready in a fraction of the time and with much less effort. Serve with a simple green salad dressed with oil and vinegar.

This is my latest version of what has become one of my classic 30-Minute-Meals, Beefy Brutus Salad, a Caesar-style salad with Italian thin-cut steak! Why should chicken have all the fun?

I really love grilled chicken salad as a go-to, no-brainer supper solution, but the Chicken Caesar is so over for me—I need a few years off! So here’s another fresh chicken salad idea; eat your heart out, Caesar!

When I made my annual Christmas Pasta for the holiday this year we discovered that both my mom and I had shopped for the ingredients, so we had lots of leftover hot and sweet sausage and ground beef in the fridge. The next day, this recipe was born.

I recently ate at a wonderful little bistro in Montreal called Chez L’Epicier, or “house of the grocer.” The menus are written on what look like grocery sacks. Well, supper here was so good, I went out and got a sack of my own groceries to make a 30-Minute Meal knock-off of their gourmet lamb shank served with “raw spaghetti,” which turned out to be pasta with raw sauce. Hey, Montreal is a favorite getaway of mine, but I can make this meal any night I like and my market’s a lot closer!

I make this one when I watch GoodFellas. Shave the garlic nice and thin, like Paulie would, but don’t use a razor blade like he does in the movie. A sharp knife is fine.

For me, this is chicken and rice recipe number 14,655. And for you?

Italian-style Sloppy Joes—get it? Hah! I kill me! Funny! Well, I thought so, anyway . . .

Chicken and applesauce . . . sounds like hospital food, huh? Well, if that were the only way to get this elegant, savory supper, I’d check myself in!