Biscuits, pancakes, no knead bread & egg pasta (rolled out on the hand crank machine). I make these things almost once a week, so I've long committed the recipes to memory. And I make up a lot of dishes that revolve around roasting a chicken or braising them on the stovetop, so no "real" recipe is needed. I find that since I try to use most only what I get from my farm shares, I do more making up than looking up.

I also have the Artisan Bread recipe memorized. I only make the half batch, though (6.5 versus 11 cups of flour, since we're only a two-person household). And the half batch is easily third-able for a quick baguette to go with cheese!

Whatever that is in the right hand picture, I want to bite it. What is it?

spaghetti carbonara, the no-knead recipe from Cooks Illustrated, pesto.

Guinness and Marmite bread, with or without the breadmaker to knead and prove.

If anyone would like the recipe, let me know. :)

Puttanesca and black beans are both million-made recipes for me - my two favorites, and good pantry recipes to boot!

Biscuits for sure!

Risotto.

Other things that aren't really "recipes" I whip up regularly without consulting anything are veggie soups including black bean....pasta with chard, bacon/pancetta, and pine nuts....pasta with spinach, lemon, scallions, dill, and goat cheese....

Lemon risotto, which I've been making for years. Chili. Our new house favorite spaghetti all'ubriaco.

Tomatosauce, Vegi-Bolognese, Risotto, Veggi-Curry, Pancakes

I do check the recipe with most baked goods but could probably get some right if I tried without.

Roasted chicken, frittatas, risotto and pesto.

Hummus/babaghanoush, liver-meatloaf, bacon-wrapped shrimp, spicy peanut thai sauce, salmon cakes (ala crab cakes).

apple/fruit crisp, sour cream pound cake, pesto, vinaigrette salad dressings...and gin cocktails!!

I should know the recipe for Joy of Cooking's pumpkin bread by heart. I make a quadruple batch every few weeks. my kids eat it almost every day for breakfast.

pestos of various kinds, oat and nut burgers (Bittman recipe), fritattas, pancakes

Eveningshift: I beg you, please, do share. It sounds absolutely fantabulous. :)

pita bread, chili, lots of pasta dishes, and with soups I usually just wing it

@Laurakat - The right-hand picture is of a basic beef ragu! Pretty much this recipe, but with beef instead of lamb. So good and comforting!

Macaroni and cheese from the Joy of Cooking. Now I want to make it tonight!!

Vegetarian (or vegan, depending on the audience) "sausage" gravy with biscuits. It's usually my gift to hosts when I visit (it's actually really good, I swear!) so it's much more convenient to keep it in my brain versus on paper. Unfortunately, it makes sharing the recipe pretty ridiculous. "Uhh, then you add some milk and stuff... you know, just until it looks right..."

And @eveningshift - that bread sounds awesome! Would love to have the recipe.

If you are talking about things that must be measured exactly, then corn bread. I have been using the same recipe for 50 years. Recently though, we've changed our diet so now I use olive oil instead of corn oil, Egg Beaters instead of eggs, low-fat milk instead of whole milk, and half as much salt. It's not nearly as good, but it's better than no corn bread at all.

i guess im not very brave, even recipes i make a lot i usually open up the recipe for reference. i have a tendency to jumble things in my head or leave something out otherwise.

Of course there are stir frys and things like that where I just wing it and go with my taste buds and fridge contents, but that's not really a "recipe" that has been memorized.

Any fruit crisp, homemade mac 'n' cheese (i.e. white sauce), cream biscuits, real pumpkin pie (minus the crust), arborio rice pudding, mustard vinaigrette, apple sauce (dead easy), cowboy beans, hot spinach and artichoke dip, just about any kind of soup, etc.

I used to know the Joy of Cooking pancake recipe by heart, but I haven't made pancakes in ages, and so have forgotten it. I know a lot of recipes almost by heart, but am afraid I will forget something, so I always consult the recipe, just in case. I always know the steps by heart, though.

Risotto, pesto, hummus, beetroot hummus, lasagne, minestrone, dressings & mayo, quiches. When I add a salad to my repertoire, I often check the recipe once, then let intuition take over. These are all dishes I think you don't really need a recipe for, because they can't really go wrong. But maybe that's just because they go well with the way I cook.

@Emma Christensen Augh! Thanks!

Roasted chicken that I always make with herb-garlic mashed potatoes (the trick is adding some of the chicken drippings to the potatoes); risotto; tortilla soup; pie crust -- ooh now I'm hungry!

Those my kids eat weekly, for the rest I`m working on my blog. It`s my online book recipe and I love sharing it with family and friends.

Chili, enchiladas, baked chicken with rosemary, lasagna, black bean soup, oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. Now I want cookies. lol

I can make buttermilk biscuits in the morning even BEFORE I've had my coffee. Also, I no longer need a recipe to make cheesy mushroom soup, I just have the feel for it now.

Shrimp creole. I started with a recipe years ago but it has changed over the years and I haven't referenced it since.

I rarely use recipes; most of my meals are just thrown together. I focus on techniques, so I find it fairly easy to improvise with ingredients. Everything from simple roast chicken (usually with lemon herb stuffing and in-season vegetables) to more complicated things like boeuf bourguignon and coq au vin are made from memory. I usually only have to make something from a recipe once or twice, then it's easy to remember.

For baking, I was pretty happy when I realized that I can make a great pie crust with no recipe. I make lots of tarts, quiches, and meat pies, so it's pretty useful. I usually refer to a cookbook for other baked goods, since I don't bake all that often.

Memorized at the age of 5: Tollhouse chocolate chip cookies
Sometime later: Joy of Cooking popovers
There's a number of other simple dishes that don't really need a recipe like omeletes, stir-fry chicken and whatever else I want to throw in, grilled cheese sandwiches, etc. But even something I have memorized I will often double-check just to be certain I didn't forget something.

I've memorized recipes for no-knead bread, beer bread, fruit crisps, tomato sauce, and creamed spinach; I rarely use recipes for vegetable or bean soups or quiches, but sometimes I do if I see a new and interesting-looking idea.

Chocolate-chip cookies! That was the first recipe I memorized.
Other things I make without a recipe: burritos & enchiladas, chili, pesto, hummus. I make a lot of improvised salads (greens, grains, or bean-based) and they turn out well, but since they're never the same I guess that's less an issue of knowing recipes by heart and more having a sense for what will go well together.

Dutch Babies

Ditto on the chocolate chip cookies! That was a proud day.

I usually look at a few different versions of the dish I want to make, and then make up my own based on what ingredients I have on hand and my personal taste. After a couple tries I don't need the recipes anymore. I do a lot of subbing and winging it, but it's rare that something comes out totally inedible!

Granola, chicken and wild rice soup (in fact, most soups in general), tomato sauces, polenta and risottos. And I've almost got the buckwheat scones from Good to the Grain in the back of my brain.

@zoecat, At first I thought you wrote chicken dropping! hahaha

mac and cheese, cheddar béchamel, and apple pie.
Other than that, my brain is 100% faulty.

Oh I lied - I know how to make chicken soup by heart as well :)

98% of my recipes are inside of my head. I am also very good at measuring without measuring. Not only can I eyeball measurements almost exactly (I've tested myself) but I have gotten to the point where I don't even know the exact measurement I should add and just do it until it looks right.

I wish I could say perfect hard boiled eggs but I just forgot I was making them and now they're overcooked!!

Aside from eggs, turkey meatballs and risotto usually work out with what's in my head.

I can make a wide array of things without referring to a recipe, but with dishes that require measured ingredients, I usually have to follow one. Except for Buttermilk Pancakes and David Lebovitz's Tomato Tart, which I've made so often I can recite the recipe for you.

Various versions of mac & cheese, southern baked fried chicken, Shepherd's/Cottage pie, mashed potatoes, Roast chicken, stock...Just a few I can name off the top of my head...

Mostly Italian dishes, like baked ziti, eggplant parmesan, lasagna, tomato sauce, pizza dough, bruschetta, and so forth. But also paneer (with two ingredients, it's hard to forget), vegetarian enchiladas, roasted or herbed mashed potatoes, vegetable fried rice, potato & corn chowder, french toast, and my famous cream cheese frosting (I've almost got the red velvet cupcakes memorized, too).

The Nestlé Toll House Chocolate Chip Cookies., aka the best dough on earth:)

The tomatoe sauce recipe from Lucinda Scala Quinn's Mad Hungry. I make it at least once a week. Maple granola, perfect hard boiled eggs(that's not really a recipe)

My new-years resolution was to cook as much as I could without a recipe. I read my cookbooks for inspiration but, unless I am baking, I've been freehanding it as much as I can. The boyfriend and I have agreed that it's come with some pretty delicious results.

Most soups that I've cookied, risotto, lasagne, chickpea curry, carbonara, quinoa pilaf, baked eggs... Most things in my repertoire are loved and repeated so often that I know exactly how to cook them.

Unless baking, I think it's best to cook without a recipe. Use what you have on hand, what you like, and experiment with flavors and ingredients. Once you know the basics, there's no need to follow someone else's recipe -- make your own!

Korean bbq, basic tomato sauce, pies, and pot roast among other things. Would love to do more bread, but I've developed a sensitivety to it, so I need to find an alternative.

Potato leek soup, chicken noodle soup, lemon chicken, pot roast, vinaigrette, tomato soup, lemony broccoli with garlic and shallots...maybe more. These are my go-to, comforting-est foods; I don't even know if I could give them as recipes to anybody because I haven't used one in so long and have tweaked so many things :)

Eveningshift, I would love the recipe for the guinness marmite bread, though I find that I do not know how to contact you directly ;)

I know a few family recipes by heard: midwest style chili, spaghetti sauce and chocolate chip meringues.

I have a few single-serve recipes. My current fave is a "healthy" single-serving version of pasta mama.

"Healthy Eggy Cheesy Pasta"
(serves1, less than 10 min prep AND cook time, 5 Weight Watchers Points Plus)
-1/2 cup cooked whole wheat spaghetti
-1/4 cup fat-free egg substitute
-2 wedges of Laughing Cow Light Cheese (I prefer the herb garlic flavor)
-1 serving low fat thin sliced deli ham

1. In a small saute pan, start cooking the egg substitute until it starts setting.
2. Add the pasta and cheese.
3. Smash the cheese to aid in the melting.
4. Keep stiring and cooking until the eggs are cooked, the pasta is warmed up and you have a beautiful blended cheesy dish.

Pizza dough, lasagna, mac n' cheese, and all of my favorite cookies and brownies.

Beef stew, chicken pot pie, Japanese stuffed rice balls (surprisingly easy!), blueberry crisp, omelet, pie crust... there are probably a few more but I can't recall at the moment. :)

I have a huge list of recipes that I want to learn to make by heart... in fact, that is the entire premise of my Walking Cookbook blog! So far I have done chocolate chip cookies, marinara sauce, tortillas, biscuits, risotto, and a number of other dishes that are great to whip up without a recipe. I'll have to add the no-knead bread dough, for sure!