Vegetarian

Rae: What I love about our updated version of this peasant soup is that it's based on an actual beet broth—not beef stock, as in a lot of Russian borschts, and not even vegetable stock to which beets have been added. This is a really beet-y, and surprisingly hearty, borscht. And it's completely vegetarian.

I make tomato sauce often. I make a batch to use that same night, and freeze what is left over to pull out and cook with when I want to throw something together quickly, like a grilled pizza or a pasta. A ricer or food mill is an inexpensive piece of kitchen equipment and there are many sizes. This is the best way to puree this sauce.

This is my go-to pizza. I don't need a lot of bells and whistles, but I need the best of the best ingredients on this kind of pie. A good dough, a great sauce, fresh mozzarella, and basil are really where it's at.

I love using baby carrots in assorted colors. Thumbelina carrots, which are little and stubby, are great for roasting. I use red, orange, yellow, and white carrots for the ribbons, which make this salad so vibrant. Even just the orange variety next to the green of the avocado and mizuna makes a beautiful and colorful salad. Toasting whole cumin seeds and then grinding them in a mortar and pestle or an electric spice grinder is essential for the great taste of this vinaigrette. If you don't have either way of grinding spices, you can substitute cumin powder. This salad rocks from the contrast between the soft texture and caramelized sweetness of the roasted carrots and their raw and crunchy counterparts.

If it's melon season, you have to make this. In Burma (Myanmar), gin thoke, meaning "ginger mix," is a blend of crispy fried garlic, sesame seeds, and ginger, and is eaten as a sweet digestive snack after meals. Although not native to the region, melons are a refreshing and delicious complement to this dressing, together making a perfect summertime side dish. The ginger is key to this salad. Ideally, the gingerroot should be so young that the skin is almost transparent and the roots are tipped with pink.

What could possibly be better than a strawberry milkshake? A strawberry cheesecake milkshake! The cream cheese, which has a tang of its own that's enhanced by the lemon zest, helps make this milkshake as thick as, well, concrete (the very apt Missouri term for a milkshake).
If the idea of frozen strawberries hits you as totally counter to your locavore sensibilities, know that they are another secret to a milkshake thick enough to eat with a spoon, and if you grow your own or buy them at the farmers' market, we urge you to freeze them for this shake. You'll find the directions in the Cooks' Notes at the end of the recipe. Editor's Note: This recipe is part of Gourmet's Modern Menu for Burger Bash. Menu also includes Bacon-Cheddar Burgers with Caramelized Onions and Homemade French Fries with Five Dipping Sauces.

Saffron threads and fresh garlic add a kick of color and flavor to this creamy mayo that's perfect for dipping or spreading.

Transform jarred roasted red peppers into a fresh and flavorful dip seasoned with cumin and a pinch of cayenne.

This spiced-up blend is perfect for dipping and also serves as the ultimate multipurpose sauce for chicken, beef, pork, and seafood.

On the streets of Thailand, where the temperature sometimes soars over 100°, there's nothing more refreshing than a plastic bag of Thai tea! Since most of the tea shops don't have seating, the Thai people take their sweetened iced tea "to go" in a plastic bag with a straw sticking out of it. The flavors of these teas were the inspiration for this dessert. The thing that makes this dish so special is the lime in the caramel, which adds an unusual tang to the sweetness. Another bonus is the crunch and spice of the cashews that are sprinkled over the top of the pudding, adding a wonderful surprise.

On one of my first trips to India, at a bus stop in Poona, there was a street stand where the vendor was roasting potatoes over charcoal, chopping them, and tossing them with curry spices and crispy onions. He served the mixture wrapped in a piece of newspaper. It was amazing, and it inspired this dish.
There are so many curry spice mixtures from around the world. This recipe employs one of the most common. You can use either yams or sweet potatoes in this recipe.

The secret to great French fries is to fry them twice: once at a lower temperature to cook the potato through, then again at a higher temperature to brown them. We're also giving you five reasons to leave the ketchup in the fridge, with homemade dipping-sauce recipes for Sour Cream and Onion Dip , Saffron Mayonnaise , Ginger-Sesame Sauce , Roasted Red Pepper–Walnut Dip , and Chipotle-Tomatillo Sauce . Editor's Note: This recipe is part of Gourmet's Modern Menu for Burger Bash. Menu also includes Bacon-Cheddar Burgers with Caramelized Onions and Strawberry Cheesecake Milkshake.

Ditch the store-bought seasoning packet in favor of this DIY version that combines slowly caramelized onions with tangy sour cream.

This spiced-up Asian-inspired sauce is perfect for dipping French fries or crudité, or for drizzling over seared chicken or fish.

This is a Baker & Spice original and it's our most popular cake—loved by men and women alike! The buttercream frosting is tinted pink by a raspberry puree (not food coloring)—be sure to save your extra whites from baking the cake to make the frosting. The cake itself is a rich, moist chocolate cake. If you want a go-to recipe for all your chocolate cake cravings, this is the one.

This recipe is part of the Epicurious Online Cooking School, in partnership with the Culinary Institute of America. To watch it being made, and to learn how to make other dessert classics, check out the videos.