As Someone Who Writes About Food For A Living, I Tried Over 100 New Recipes This Year — These Are The 18 I'd Recommend Most

Sometimes, exceptional recipes get 11s. Other ones get 3s — which I think is the lowest I scored any recipe this year. (Sorry, Olivia Wilde.)

Trying two unique celebrities' recipes for microwaved salmon wasn't on my 2022 bingo card. Still, I'm genuinely thrilled that Stephen King and David Chang added this foolproof method for juicy, tender salmon to my weekly rotation this year.

To answer your questions:

• No, it doesn't come out overcooked. Microwaves actually steam fish pretty perfectly. Like, it might be one of the most tender and delicious pieces of fish I've had...ever?

• Nope, it won't make your house reek of fish any more than cooking it on your stovetop or in your oven would.

• Yes, it's a zillion times faster and easier than any other method I could think of for cooking salmon.

So, please: I'm begging you to give this one a try. And so is my mom, by proxy.

Recipe: Microwave Salmon

Hear me out: I think orzo is one of the most underrated pasta shapes out there. This salad definitely proves it. The al dente pasta with juicy chicken, creamy avocado, and an absolutely killer cilantro-lime dressing is the light-yet-satisfying flavor combination I constantly dream of.

This "salad" is also a meal prep dream. TBH, it gets better and better the longer it sits in your fridge. The fact that you don't even have to heat it up for a near-instant WFH lunch is just the cherry on top.

Recipe: Grilled Chicken Orzo Salad with Avocado

After the pickle taste test and ranking I wrote up earlier this year, I was rich in pickles but poor in ways to use them up.

Needless to say, when a coworker of mine (shout out to Jon-Michael) sent me Shilpa Uskokovic's recipe for pickle dip, it was a godsend.

The dip boasts all the flavors I crave in a good chip or veggie dip: It's luxuriously creamy, has a nice pop of brightness from some lemon zest and chopped herbs, and packs just the right amount of punchy heat from a few spoonfuls of pickled jalapeños. If you ever find yourself with nine jars of pickles in your fridge, or honestly even one, make this.

Recipe: Pickle Dip

I included this oddly simple homemade bread in my favorite recipes of 2021, and I honestly feel no shame about including it in this year's roundup, too. I made it so many times that I couldn't not include it this year, you know?

If the thought of making bread in your own kitchen gives you hives, I promise you'll be pleasantly surprised by how easy this one is. It's as easy as mixing up some ingredients, letting them sit, dumping 'em into a pan, and baking. Every time I serve this focaccia to friends, there are zero leftovers. No exaggeration.

Recipe: No-Knead Focaccia

There's a lot going for this recipe. Unbelievable flavor? Check. Actually ready in less than 30 minutes? Double-check. Budget-friendly? Check, check, check. Of all the genuinely easy pasta dishes I've tried in my lifetime, this one is the most delicious.

Also, just saying: This is one of the rare pasta dishes that actually tastes even better the next day. How? I'm unsure. But you'll want to make enough to enjoy the following day for lunch.

Recipe: Chili Crisp Fettucine Alfredo with Spinach

Warning: Finely chopping an entire head of cabbage and three to four baby cucumbers might make you see red for just a moment, but the results will make it all worthwhile. Hats off to Melissa Ben-Ishay of Baked by Melissa for teaching the 22 million people that viewed her viral TikTok that salads are even better when you eat them with chips, especially when they're as crunchy, zesty, and satisfying as this one.

Recipe: Green Goddess Salad

These photos are giving "ugly delicious," but whatever. You've just gotta try it. Before we depart the Baked by Melissa universe of recipes, I couldn't forget about these Cinnamon Toast Crunch treats that are, you guessed it, just a classic Rice Krispies treat with a different cereal. Simple, yes, but good god, these were one of the best desserts I had all year. If you have the same love-hate relationship with baking that I do, bookmark these no-bake treats for the next time your sweet tooth aches to plunge into something sticky, chewy, and crispy.

Recipe: Cinnamon Toast Crunch Treats

If you're unfamiliar with the lore behind this recipe, the TL;DR is: A Mississippi woman tweaked the recipe for her aunt's pot roast, it landed in a church cookbook, it nearly broke Pinterest, and then, the New York Times even wrote about it in 2016. It's impossibly delicious.

I remember prepping this in early 2022 before my partner and I went skiing for the day, and when we returned home starving and absolutely exhausted, our piping hot Mississippi Roast was nothing short of life-giving.

Recipe: Mississippi Roast

I love Ina Garten as if she were my mother (but not more than my own mother, just in case she's reading this), so it's no surprise that an Ina recipe wound up on this year's roundup. But oddly enough, this recipe — which was featured on her new-ish show Be My Guest — is from her friends Rob Marshall and John DeLuca, who made just about every movie musical you've ever heard of. When I saw it on the show, I knew I had to try it. And I've made them over and over since.

Salmon burgers I've made prior to trying these usually incorporated pre-cooked or leftover salmon, kind of like a salmon cake if you will. Since these use raw salmon, they always come out perfectly moist, and they're absolutely jam-packed with flavor.

Recipe: Salmon Burgers

I first developed this recipe in the strange pandemic times of Summer 2020 and worked on it for a solid two years before I was ready to put it into the world. Now, as soon as post-winter weather starts to warm up, I crave these immediately.

If you prep the crispy shallots in advance — or if you just buy some crispy onions from the store, I truly will not judge — they're actually ridiculously simple to toss together for guests for a little summer dinner party. And beyond their simplicity, they're likely cheaper than any other type of seafood roll you could prepare in your own kitchen.

Recipe: Old Bay Shrimp Rolls

If you've ever tried to make eggplant parm at home, you know it's a giant pain in the ass. The breading, the frying, the layering... Every last step seems to get on my nerves, which is why my life changed for the better when I stumbled upon Alison Roman's recipe that incorporates one truly brilliant hack.

Instead of breading and frying all the slices of eggplant, you roast them (naked!) until they're soft and custardy. When you layer the eggplant parm, you'll sprinkle crispy panko bread crumbs in between each layer in lieu of breading, and I swear to god: The texture and flavor are 10 times better than any eggplant parm I've ever tasted.

Note: The recipe as written yields only two servings, but it's super simple to double or triple if you're serving more than two.

Recipe: Eggplant Parm

I've made baba ganoush (a Middle Eastern eggplant dip) many, many times — but it's always slightly disappointed me when compared to the seriously tasty versions I've eaten at restaurants. In July, I finally tried the "traditional" method, where you just toss the eggplants over some blazing hot coals to char, and it changed everything. It was smoky, bright, and perfectly garlicky, and it quickly became my favorite app of the summer.

That said, the fire-roasting method is...fun, to say the least.

Recipe: Fire Roasted Baba Ganoush

I tried this "secret" family cinnamon roll cake earlier this year, and it blew me away. As the name suggests, this airy yet optimally-moist cake tries to take on all the warm, comforting flavors of a cinnamon roll. The wildest part is just how close it gets. It's easily one of the most flavorful cakes I've ever baked in my own kitchen, and perhaps also the easiest.

I'd call this an anytime cake, TBH. Cake for breakfast? Awesome. Dessert? Wonderful, of course. You can even call it a snack cake if you want to snag a piece in the middle of the afternoon.

Recipe: Big Mama's Cinnamon Roll Cake

I wrote about this TikTok-viral pasta dish back in August, and I've been making it regularly ever since. Angel hair usually isn't my pasta shape of choice since it's just so easy to overcook. But this method of slowly adding in water by the ladleful until it's perfectly al dente, kind of like you would for a risotto, deserves the biggest *chef's kiss* of all time. For an unbelievably simple weeknight meal, this lemon pasta was made for you.

Recipe: One-Pan Lemon Pasta

I served this dish at every holiday gathering this past year. As a result, I grew to expect that brief moment of hesitation when informing folks that, yes, the base of the dish is cabbage, but I also knew that the choruses of "please send me that recipe" were only one bite away.

Velvety, buttery-soft cabbage is the perfect accompaniment to a thyme and shallot-infused cream sauce (that I've been genuinely tempted to eat by the spoonful every time I've prepared it). In fact, "future me" may regret this, but I actually now prefer this dish to a traditional potato gratin — especially in the context of a holiday meal. Using cabbage adds just a touch of lightness to a dish that's otherwise pretty darn rich...but there's certainly no sacrifice in terms of the decadence it offers.

Recipe: Cheesy Cabbage Gratin

My partner and I do this thing where we'll both very carefully taste every new recipe that I try, think about it for a brief moment, and usually exclaim, "It's a keeper" simultaneously — if it's good enough, that is. When we tasted these chicken meatballs with creamy, cheesy orzo, the unison "it's a keeper" was blurted out by both parties almost instantly.

This one's a mostly one-pot dish, except for the baking sheet you'll use to bake the meatballs. Regardless, it's still incredibly cleanup-friendly. And the taste?! My god, the taste. It's basically all the rich, saucy goodness of a fettuccine Alfredo with better texture and more of an herby kick.

Recipe: Baked Sage Chicken Meatballs with Parmesan Orzo

Remember when I said I have a "love-hate relationship with baking?" These lemon bars have been pushing me further and further into "love" territory lately, which should be proof that these are wow-I-can't-stop-eating-these extraordinary. Lemon bars have always been one of my favorite desserts, but there's something about the genius addition of cranberry that puts these over the top

First of all, it's delicious — that extra tang and subtle hit of bitterness really round out the sweetness of this dessert. And second of all, come on, the distinct layers are stunning. They look like they're 10 times harder than they actually are, which is always an added bonus in my book.

Recipe: Cranberry Lemon Bars

If you hit a paywall when trying to access the recipe above, you can find a very similar recipe here.