Classic Southern Recipes 

After baking hundreds of biscuits, our Test Kitchen landed on this winning recipe for Our Favorite Buttermilk Biscuit. This no-fail biscuit recipe will impress new cooks and old pros alike.

When cooked low and slow, the tender ham hocks completely fall apart and infuse the collard greens with a savory, smoky flavor. Carefully remove the hocks before serving to make sure no bones remain.

The filling for Southern-style basic deviled eggs is nothing more than egg yolks, mayonnaise, mustard and sweet pickle relish.  These deviled eggs are perfect for potlucks, tailgates, and summer suppers. Now, if you have trouble peeling hard boiled eggs, here's a trick: Once cool, crack the eggs and place in cold water for 10 minutes, then try peeling them. The peels almost always come off much easier. You can also place the filling into a piping bag for a pretty, swirled finished look. 

This quick and easy shrimp and grits recipe will wow your family as a weeknight meal or impress guests at a dinner party. The vein of the shrimp runs along the back of the shrimp, just below the surface, and is actually the digestive tract. It won't cause you harm to eat, but can taste gritty (and you definitely don't want that), so it's best to remove it. To see how to do so, click here. 

The name says it all—this pot pie is damn delicious! This crowd-winning chicken pot pie recipe comes from Julie Grimes’s $10 Dinners: Delicious Meals for a Family of 4 that Don't Break the Bank; grab a copy today for more budget-friendly recipes that taste like a million bucks. 

We've shortened (and lightened) this holiday classic by bringing everything together in one pan and using the stovetop and broiler rather than baking.

Make this Classic Pimiento Cheese ahead and serve as a sandwich or a dip. 

For the tastiest chicken ever, brine a whole cut-up chicken in the South's signature beverage--sweet tea with lemon.

This 20-minute chicken salad is creamy, flavorful, and packed full of healthy veggies and protein-rich chicken. We lightened up the typical mayonnaise base by adding in 1/2 cup of low-fat, plain Greek yogurt, but you can use one full cup of mayonnaise if you'd like. Use store-bought Rotisserie chicken to save even more time on busy evenings. Serve with crunchy, buttery crackers or on whole grain bread with lettuce and tomato.

Fried Pork Chops with Peas and Potatoes image

This Southern staple serves up a generous helping of comfort and tradition. We use thick-cut bacon to get the perfect amount of smokiness, as opposed to a ham hock. A ham hock can, at times, overpower the dish. Traditionally, Hoppin’ John is a one-pot recipe, but that often produces soupy results. Instead, cook the black-eyed peas with aromatics and broth until tender; then strain and reserve the liquid for later. Once the rice is done, gently stir it into the pea mixture with the liquid. This method does require washing an extra pan, but we think you’ll agree that it’s worth it. There are three things you do want to keep traditional about your hoppin’ John though: the pork, the peas, and the rice.

The new appreciation for whiskey goes beyond drinking and finds its way into sauces, braises, and especially desserts. Now bourbon and pecan pie fit togther like peanut butter and jelly or Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. 

This vibrant pink layer cake is pure strawberry-on-strawberry goodness, with fresh strawberries going into the cake batter and frosting. One thing to note about the buttercream frosting—it is absolutely bursting with berry flavor, but is easily over-mixed. If you find you've broken your emulsion when whipping this frosting up, no worries. You can simply mix in a little more powdered sugar to restore it. That said, we love how purely strawberry-forward the flavor of this frosting is, so we'd advise being very light-handed when adding extra powdered sugar, as it will dilute the berry flavor. In our opinion, it's better to have a slightly broken frosting that tastes like strawberries than a perfectly pristine frosting that tastes like sugar.