Recipes - Cook's CountryTV

Potatoes Three Ways

Our Delmonico Potatoes are a light yet rich alternative to the gluey modern-day versions of this American classic. The right temperature and slice are the keys to our Creamy Mashed Sweet Potatoes. And our Syracuse Salt Potatoes are cooked in lots of salt, but still end up perfectly seasoned—and with a velvety interior.

Main Dish
Side Dishes
Soups & Stews
Breakfast
Desserts

Glazed Meatloaf

Over the years, meatloaves have been dressed up and down every which way. Our goal was to make meatloaf special again, which we did by combining pork and beef and using a panade to add structure.

Pan-Fried Pork Chops

In search of an easy way to build big flavor, we revisited an old-fashioned cooking method: pan-frying. Was it time to bring it back?

Slow-Cooker Pork Pot Roast

Beef shoulder is the classic choice for pot roast, but we wondered if pork shoulder could be used as a worthy substitute. It can—but not without some adjustments to the ingredients.

Batter-Fried Chicken

This unusual, old-fashioned technique sounded simple enough, but we had to work to achieve the picture-perfect, golden-brown crust and moist chicken that we were after.

Texas Barbecued Beef Ribs

Traditional Texas beef ribs are placed in pits for up to 10 hours. Could we streamline this recipe to work on our backyard grill without shortchanging the ribs?

Char-Grilled Steaks

Why do steakhouse steaks taste so much better than those you grill at home? In a word, crust.

Italian Pot Roast

Tomatoes, red wine, and garlic should complement an Italian pot roast, not overpower it. Many recipes we tried tasted like meat boiled in spaghetti sauce, but we found a way to get all our flavors in order.

Baked Manicotti with Meat Sauce

We spent hours in the kitchen, but our manicotti was still mediocre. Could we make it faster—and better?

Cornell Chicken

Invented in the 1940s by a Cornell University professor, this tangy, crisp-skinned grilled chicken has been a state favorite ever since. We wanted to adapt it for the backyard grill.

Jucy Lucy Burgers

Minneapolis taverns are famous for serving this moist beef burger stuffed with American cheese. Could we figure out how to keep the Lucy juicy and hold the cheese inside?

Beef Enchiladas

Traditional recipes require simmering steak for hours. Bad convenience versions opt to use hamburger and canned sauce. We stick with the steak but use a few shortcuts to cut the cooking time.

Easy Chicken Tacos

The road to authentic taco flavor in just 30 minutes (or less) took some astonishing turns.

Roast Lemon Chicken

To get lemon flavor that’s more than skin deep, we squeezed, buttered, and brined. Then we got a better idea.

Skillet Chicken Parmesan

With all the sauce and cheese in most chicken Parmesans, it’s nearly impossible to preserve the crisp topping. We wanted to find a way to hold on to all the classic flavors but keep the breading crisp.

Cider-Baked Ham

A smoky ham glazed with sweet apple cider and studded with cloves certainly sounds great, but many recipes lack apple flavor. Could we develop a simple technique that would infuse the ham with flavor more successfully?

Classic Roast Beef and Gravy

The best roast beef is cooked gently to keep all its juices inside. But without enough pan drippings, how do you make a rich, beefy gravy?

Wood-Grilled Salmon

Salmon grilled directly on a cedar plank is a Northwest favorite. But can you enjoy wood-perfumed grilled salmon without hunting down hard-to-find planks?

Baked Stuffed Shrimp

We wanted crisp, flavorful stuffing and perfectly cooked shrimp without heading to a restaurant.

Chili Con Carne

We create a simple, authentic-tasting version of this Tex-Mex classic using supermarket ingredients.

Alabama BBQ Chicken

We recreate this classic Alabama BBQ dish, one that features an ingredient unfamiliar to most cooks: white barbecue sauce.

Old-Fashioned Roast Turkey with Gravy

Even with a lot of time and effort, white meat can be dry, chalky and flavorless. We set out to find an easy, foolproof method that ensures moist, flavorful meat.

Creole Fried Chicken

Our fried chicken is deeply seasoned with the complex, lively heat of black, white, and cayenne peppers.

Shredded Barbecued Beef

Barbecuing a beef roast until it’s smoky and tender sounds like a great idea. But dry, bland meat isn’t much reward for a day’s worth of cooking. We find a better—and faster—way.

Grilled Mustard-Glazed Pork Loin

We dress up pork roast by giving it a flavorful, deeply caramelized crust on the grill and serve it with a savory-sweet mustard glaze.

Cider-Braised Pork Chops

Discover the test kitchen’s secret to infusing pork chops with deep, rich apple flavor.

Best Potluck Macaroni and Cheese

So many macaroni and cheese recipes slump into a runny mess. Our baked mac and cheese is creamy, sturdy, and rich.

Broiled Steaks

We usually rely on a red-hot skillet or the grill for putting a crusty sear on steaks, but we wondered if our oven’s broiler could do the job just as well.

California Barbecued Tri-Tip

Grilled barbecue tri-tip often results in a charred exterior and very rare center. We focused on cooking the outside less and the inside more.

Chicago-Style Barbecued Ribs

Chicago ribs are typically smoked at about 200 degrees for at least eight hours. This slow-and-low cooking method delivers the moist, tender meat that defines Chicago ribs.

Classic Barbecued Chicken

Our foolproof recipe for barbecue chicken produces perfectly cooked meat that boasts intense flavor from the grill and a liberal application of tangy-sweet barbecue sauce.

Extra-Crunchy Fried Chicken

We wanted to create juicy, rich tasting fried chicken at home without the big mess, and with a crust as crunchy as KFC.

Italian Sunday Gravy

Italian gravy is a hearty tomato sauce cooked with everything from meatballs to pork chops. Our tests helped uncover which meats yielded the best taste, texture, and convenience.

Lexington-Style Pulled Pork For Charcoal Grill

Lexington-style barbecue requires hours and hours of grilling. We found the way to simplify this classic recipe without sacrificing flavor.

Meatballs and Marinara

We wanted a way to make big meatballs that were tender and moist and had enough structure to hold their shape.

Old-Fashioned Roast Pork

Cooking a pork roast is tricky, as the lean meat quickly dries out in the oven. Here are the tricks to keeping roast pork moist and flavorful.

Smoked Double-Thick Pork Chops

We’ve discovered how to get great taste, good color, and perfect tenderness out of grilled double-thick chops.

Sunday-Best Garlic Roast Beef

We wanted to find an alternative to prime rib that’s less expensive and faster to cook—without sacrificing flavor.

Tennessee-Whiskey Pork Chops

A popular restaurant serves a "Jack Daniel’s" pork chop that sounds better than it really is. The concept, however, sounded good enough that we wanted to perfect it at home.

Crunchy Potato Wedges

The fried potato wedges from our local fast-food joint are worth the trip—their spicy, light, and crunchy coating contrasts perfectly with their fluffy interior. We wondered if we could find a way to make these fast-food-style potato wedges at home.

Mashed Sweet Potatoes

Most methods for cooking sweet potatoes really miss the mark. To make our Creamy Mashed Sweet Potatoes, we found that the right temperature and the right slice were key.

Sweet Corn Spoonbread

We remember our grandmother’s spoonbread as a tall, creamy custard packed with sweet corn, but we couldn’t find a recipe that replicated it. So we created our own.

Classic Steak Sauce

The perfect homemade version of a must-have steak topping.

Syracuse Salt Potatoes

A little salt sure makes everything taste better. But in Salt City (Syracuse, N. Y.), the only way to cook potatoes is with a lot of salt.

Delmonico Potatoes

Originally made to order in restaurants, this creamy potato dish turns heavy and gluey when cooked for a crowd at home. We set out to rethink this American classic.

Cornmeal Biscuits

We were after tender biscuits with hearty cornmeal taste—a simple goal that proved surprisingly tough to pull off.

Perfect Popovers

We create a foolproof recipe that produces tall popovers with a crisp exterior and custardy interior every single time.

Southern-Style Skillet Corn Bread

Dry-toasting the cornmeal before mixing the batter maximizes the corn flavor in this savory bread.

Tangy Apple-Cabbage Slaw

We reveal the secrets to tender cabbage, crunchy apples, and the sweet-and-spicy dressing that brings them together in this Southern barbecue side dish.

Garlic Mashed Potatoes

Infusing mashed potatoes with the flavor of roasted garlic is easy—if you have an extra hour to roast a head of garlic. Our goal was to find an easier way.

Grilled Corn on the Cob

Grilling corn sounds like a simple proposition—but our research found dozens of failed cooking methods for this classic summer vegetable.

Ranch Potato Salad

Bottled ranch dressing sounds like a quick way to dress up potato salad, but most versions are dull and bland. We fix that with a homemade dressing and a novel approach for flavoring the spuds.

California Barbecued Beans

This dish traditionally uses beans and chili sauce rarely seen beyond California. We wanted to recreate this regional recipe with nationally available supermarket ingredients.

Short Order Home Fries

A diner breakfast simply isn’t complete without a side of crusty, deeply browned home fries. Here’s how to replicate them at home.

Mashed Potato Casserole

Mashed potato casserole, with the promise of fluffy, buttery, creamy potatoes nestled under a savory golden crust, is the perfect make-ahead dish during the holiday season.

Santa Maria Salsa

Unexpected ingredients like celery, dried oregano, and Worcestershire transform this from ordinary salsa.

Super-Stuffed Baked Potatoes

Picture the perfect stuffed baked potato, with garlic, herbs, and cheese packed into a perfectly crisped potato-skin shell. Here’s how we recreated this steakhouse classic.

All-American Potato Salad

Most potato salads aren’t what they could be—the potatoes are mushy or the vinaigrette is bland. Here’s how to make perfect American-style potato salad every time.

Best Potluck Macaroni and Cheese

So many macaroni and cheese recipes slump into a runny mess. Our baked mac and cheese is creamy, sturdy, and rich.

Chili Con Carne

We create a simple, authentic-tasting version of this Tex-Mex classic using supermarket ingredients.

Cincinnati Chili

Warm spices and a host of unexpected garnishes lend this regional chili its unique flavor. We wondered if we could recreate this Midwestern dish in our test kitchen.

Italian Sunday Gravy

Italian gravy is a hearty tomato sauce cooked with everything from meatballs to pork chops. Our tests helped uncover which meats yielded the best taste, texture, and convenience.

Monkey Bread

Monkey bread is a knotty-looking loaf of bread made from buttery balls of sweet dough glued together with caramel.

Dutch Baby

This eggy concoction relies on a hot skillet and a stay in the oven to produce a crisp yet custardy pancakelike hybrid.

Ultimate Cinnamon Buns

Ultimate cinnamon buns should be tender, gooey, and unapologetically large. Tragically, most recipes yield lean buns—and ultimate disappointment. We fix that.

Better-Than-The-Box Pancake Mix

We set out to create our own homemade mix, one that delivers store-bought ease and made-from-scratch taste.

Fluffy Diner-Style Cheese Omelet

Our goal: impossibly tall and fluffy diner-style omelets that are loaded with cheese and other fillings.

Hard-Cooked Eggs

Hard-cooked eggs are prone to greenish-colored yolks and sulfurous odors. Our tests uncovered what causes the problem and how you can make perfect hard-cooked eggs every time.

Short Order Home Fries

A diner breakfast simply isn’t complete without a side of crusty, deeply browned home fries. Here’s how to replicate them at home.

Shaker Lemon Pie

This simple recipe mixes lemon slices, sugar, and eggs to form a custardy filling. But unless you macerate the lemon slices for 24 hours, the pie turns out bitter. Could we speed up this recipe for modern times?

Icebox Strawberry Pie

Diner-style strawberry pies always look inviting, but these no-bake desserts often taste more like plastic than pie. We wondered if better ingredients could deliver a pie that lived up to its looks.

Chocolate Cream Cupcakes

You can keep your Ho Hos, Ding Dongs, and Ring Dings—our heart belongs to Chocolate Cream Cupcakes.

Texas Sheet Cake

The signature fudgy texture is created when warm icing is spread over a hot cake.

Lemon Pudding Cake

Like magic, pudding cakes separate into two layers during baking: airy and soufflélike on top, dense and custardy below. We wanted a foolproof recipe for a creamy pudding, tender cake, and bright lemon flavor.

Angel Food Cake

Over seven weeks in the kitchen, we baked more than 100 angel food cakes to discover, once and for all, what matters, what doesn’t, and how to achieve perfection.

Mile-High Lemon Meringue Pie

Meringue pie can be tricky to prepare. We figure out how to make a perfect lemon meringue pie with a sky-high topping that doesn’t weep.

Icebox Key Lime Pie

Authentic Key lime pie used to be a simple, no-cook dessert. But it contained raw eggs, a no-no in modern times. We develop an eggless refrigerator recipe as bright and custardy as the original.

Tunnel of Fudge Cake

The original recipe relied on a now-defunct ingredient. But that didn’t mean this historic cake needed to be out of production too.

Skillet Peach Cobbler

A watery filling and soggy cobbles are just two of the more common problems with this classic summer fruit dessert. We set out for a solution.

Blueberry Grunt

This oddly named dessert promises juicy berries topped with biscuity dumplings—and there’s no need to turn on the oven. But it can easily become a soggy, bland mess.

Red Velvet Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

Beyond this dessert’s shocking bright red color, there’s something more—an extra-tender cake and fluffy cream cheese frosting.

Cold-Oven Pound Cake

A 100-year-old recipe claims that starting in a cold oven yields a pound cake that is especially tall and boasts a crisp crust. Can this unlikely recipe really work?

Chocolate Blackout Cake

It’s been over 35 years since once-renowned Ebinger’s Baking Company in Brooklyn closed its doors. We set out to recreate one of its most beloved recipes.

Cranberry-Apple Crisp

Although it’s hard to imagine that apple crisp needs much improvement, we liked the tartness and texture cranberries added to one of our favorite standard desserts.

No-Fear Pie Crust

When it comes to frustration, few kitchen tasks can rival that of making pie dough. We set out to find pie dough that we could make without fear.

Raspberry Chiffon Pie

A chiffon pie is pretty, but it often tastes more like sweet foam than fruit. Our tests found a way to make a chiffon pie that's creamy, light, and packed with fruit flavor.

Strawberry Poke Cake

This cake was invented in 1969 to increase Jell-O sales. But when we made the recipe, we encountered dull strawberry flavor and soggy boxed-mix cake. Here’s the fix.