“You don’t always have to grill when we ‘throw something on the grill.’” This from Millie Peartree in a New York Times Cooking YouTube video, where she proves her point with a fantastic new recipe for oven barbecue ribs, made in the kitchen start to finish. The recipe combines a dry rub with barbecue sauce to get the richest, most intense flavor from falling-off-the-bone tender meat. Make sure to watch Millie in action. She’s a delight.
“Cooking is my love language,” she said. I think a lot of us can relate.
Featured Recipe
Oven Barbecue Ribs
She serves the ribs with their classic tablemates: potato salad and cornbread. Another idea: Lidey Heuck’s easy-peasy chickpea salad with fresh herbs and scallions. The flavors mirror potato salad — mayo, celery and all — but the recipe requires no cooking, and packs enough protein to be a meatless main course.
You know what also goes well with ribs and practically everything else? Chile con queso made with roasted Hatch green chiles! The recipe, from the chef John Lewis, is a riff on one he grew up eating in Chope’s Town Bar & Cafe along Highway 28 in La Mesa, N.M., spiked with lime juice for tang and chicken bouillon for umami depth. Serve it with soft flour tortillas for scooping up the gorgeously messy, melty dish.
Then for something sweet, if baking is your love language, you can’t go wrong with a batch of Rice Krispies treats to share with family and friends. Our Scott Loitsch adds rainbow sprinkles along with brown butter, a trick he picked up from a recipe by the chef Colin Alevras. Scott has shared this in our office on several occasions, so I can vouch for its extravagant deliciousness.
Finally, for a make-ahead dessert to feed a crowd, we have a creamy, espresso-soaked tiramisù, which you can make with decaf for any caffeine-sensitive dessert lovers in your circle (myself included).
You do need to subscribe to get these and all the other thousands of recipes at New York Times Cooking. If a technical issue comes up, email the smart people at cookingcare@nytimes.com; they can help. And I’m at hellomelissa@nytimes.com, if you want to say hi.
That’s all for now — I’ll be back on Monday.
