Sunset September 2015 Recipe Collection

Serve this herb- and veggie-filled Vietnamese-style salad with Turkey Meatballs. 

Lime juice and cilantro give Betsy Dasenko's turkey meatballs bright flavor. Try them with a Vietnamese herb salad.

Chef Mai Pham of Star Ginger and Lemon Grass restaurants sure knows how to cool off (maybe it's the Sacramento heat). In the Test Kitchen, we've been drinking her lemonade slushy--amped up with chile, mint, and lime--by the blenderful.

The Japanese dish chicken yakitori is traditionally made on skewers, but grilling thin chicken breasts instead is even more weeknight-friendly. Marinate a day ahead for extra flavor.

Made with white wine, vegetables, and aromatic herbs, nage--a French-style poaching broth--preserves the delicate texture and moistness of fish. Nearly any fish will work in this recipe, but the broth's flavors especially complement mild, white-fleshed ones.

This healthy, hearty dinner makes the most of the season's produce. Cut vegetables as you cook to get dinner on the table quickly.

Chef Alex Seidel of Denver restaurants Fruition and Mercantile Dining & Provision simmers potatoes in a bath of melted butter and oil, a twist on a technique best known for duck.

For this salad, chef Alex Seidel of Denver restaurants Fruition and Mercantile Dining & Provision uses a mix of tomato varieties--whichever are ripest at the moment in his greenhouse. The eggplant "croutons" are small cubes, breaded in seasoned panko and briskly fried. His Fruition Farms Dairy & Creamery also produces the burrata cheese, which is fresh mozzarella filled with ricotta and cream.

Especially in our eat-less-meat era, a lamb T-bone steak, also called a loin chop, makes a right-size serving for one person. Chef Alex Seidel of Denver restaurants Fruition and Mercantile Dining & Provision likes to add pecorino to the plate--both for looks and for added savoriness.

This spiked chocolate milk shake has been on the menu at Copita, chef and cookbook author Joanne Weir's restaurant in Sausalito, California, since day one. "It blends together spiced Oaxacan chocolate and the richest of chocolate ice creams with guajillo chile, cinnamon, vanilla extract, and a generous splash of tequila añejo," writes Weir. "It's the richest, most decadent milk shake you'll ever taste, and it leaves you feeling all warm and fuzzy."

One year, chef and cookbook author Joanne Weir led a culinary tour to the Cinque Terre in Italy. "We went out on the Mediterranean, where we drank prosecco and ate seafood cooked on a tiny grill…I relished the fresh grilled calamari and halibut skewers as I baked in the sunshine and gazed at the crystal blue waters from which the seafood had just come. A few people decided to go for a swim. I won't mention whether bathing suits were involved. What happens in the Mediterranean after 18 bottles of prosecco stays in the Mediterranean." This is her ode to the skewers from that day.

Chef and cookbook author Joanne Weir created this soup at L'Auberge Madeleine for her teacher, Madeleine Kamman. "Diners were going to fall for this soup before it ever crossed their lips. Its vibrant orange color and sweet smell of fresh carrot mingling with heady notes of licorice would pave the way for their first satiny sip."

"I could smell the pizza even before it arrived at our table," writes chef and cookbook author Joanne Weir about her first meal at Chez Panisse Café in 1981. "As our server set it down, I was speechless. In my experience, pizza was doughy crust topped with tomato sauce and gloppy cheese. Sitting in front of us now was a crisp flatbread topped with a heaping mound of tiny, pristine flat-leaf parsley leaves glistening with a garlicky vinaigrette and punctuated with shards of shaved Parmigiano-Reggiano…If this had been my last meal on earth, I would be dying happy."

After finding a fly in her bottle of Mouton Cadet Rouge, chef and cookbook author Joanne Weir, then 24, had the gumption to mail the insect to the wine's maker, Château Mouton Rothschild, one of the top wineries in the world. In response to her complaint, she received an invitation to lunch at the château. She booked a flight immediately. This recipe is her re-creation of the day's finale--a tart "topped with a silky smooth kirsch pastry cream and crowned with perfectly glazed, ripe red strawberries."

A quick chill between dunks in chocolate ensures that the skewers stick to the figs. You'll need 12 flat bamboo skewers* (1/4 in. wide and 3 1/2 in. long) or wooden coffee stirrers cut to this size; paper or plastic ones slide out.

Figs get a nice jammy texture as they cook with chicken in the garlic-honey sauce. For crisp chicken skin, resist the urge to spoon sauce over it during baking.

Crunch, sweetness, and a touch of richness--this recipe has everything you want in a salad. Dress the greens separately, then tuck in the soft figs and cheese so they keep their shape.