Appetizer

Crab cakes should be all about the crab — no questions asked. They should be crispy on the outside, moist and flaky on the inside, and taste exclusively of fresh, delicious crab. No fillers or excess spices getting in the way. If you agree, you’ve come to the right place. Our crab cake recipe is intentionally unfussy. We’ve put crab meat at the center of the equation, and thrown in just enough extras to hold the patties together.

Equal parts easy, fancy, and fun.

Hosting a holiday gathering means planning the menu, music, and atmosphere. I always include a festive appetizer to make the evening feel more celebratory and buy a little extra time to finish last-minute preparations once the doorbell starts ringing. Cranberry jalapeño dip is a play on the crowd-pleasing classic: pepper jelly and cream cheese. With its vibrant red hue and sweet-tart flavor, this cranberry jalapeño dip is a must-make this holiday season.

Low effort, high reward.

It's got 3 types of cheese.

It never lets me down.

Everyone will go back for more.

Get the party started.

Happy soup season, everyone!

Shatteringly crisp!

Crisp, chewy flatbread is a welcome start to any party, and tastes great with whatever toppings you have on hand. Pizza works just as well, cut into bite-sized pieces and served warm from the oven. Whatever you call it, these 24 recipes and techniques for making crackly-crusted dough, with or without toppings, are easy crowd-pleasers.For the quickest party prep, use store-bought pizza dough or puff pastry, or freeze your own rounds of homemade pizza dough for future use.

Trust us: It'll disappear in seconds.

The slow cooker makes easy work of this creamy, comforting classic.

Potatoes — what’s not to love? Fluffy, creamy, starchy delicious potatoes. Yes, with butter. And maybe sour cream. But a baked potato for dinner is just the beginning. Potatoes also make the best appetizers. Don’t believe me? Here’s what to do.

Fried cornbread slathered with salted butter? Sign us up.

The salad that will steal the show.

It turned me from a grape skeptic into a voracious grape eater. 

They're crunchy, salty, snacking perfection.

Oh, and it cooks in 30 minutes.

It comes together in just 5 minutes.

The only late-summer appetizer you need.

Who doesn't love Hawaiian rolls?

A reason to never throw away bacon grease.

It doesn't get any more epic than this.

Have you ever tried making your own crackers? Your very own crispy, crunchy, seed-topped crackers? My recommendation: try it. Definitely. Crackers are surprisingly easy to make at home with just five basic ingredients, a rolling pin, and a baking sheet. There is no kneading required nor yeast needed; just mix the dough for a minute, then roll, cut, and bake it. Make yourself a quick batch tonight and have homemade crackers for lunches, snacks, and dinners all week long.

Ready the food processor and grab that jar of roasted red peppers in the back of your pantry.

Toss the frozen shrimp straight onto the sheet pan.

It only takes about 30 minutes!

Summer is the perfect time of the year to cook with seasonal peppersstuffed mushroom sauté the peppers, stir them with cheese, pack the mixture into the mushrooms, sprinkle with panko breadcrumbs, and grill them for five minutes. The real debate with grilled stuffed mushrooms is whether or not you should chop up the stems and put them back in the mushrooms.

Let’s talk about holiday appetizers and cocktail party snacks. Everyone needs just one or two really reliable crowd-pleasers around the holidays, no? It’s a relief for a cook to set out a plate of tasty bites while he puts the finishing touches on a meal. And in the spirit of giving, let me offer you the prettiest, easiest, and most lusciously decadent appetizer I know: baked brie in sweet cranberry sauce. I mean, hello.

They're stuffed with fresh herbs and two kinds of cheese.

They're also vegan.

I didn’t grow up eating pickled shrimp, which is surprising considering my mom’s coastal upbringing. Her family spans from the Atlantic beaches of Florida, all the way to the bayous of Louisiana. Seafood made regular appearances at our family gatherings, but usually in the form of spicy Cajun gumbos and jambalayas. It wasn’t until I attended an annual Christmas Day cocktail party a few years back that I discovered the wonder that is Sea Island Shrimp.

Quick-cooking shrimp make for easy weeknight meals, plus their mild flavor makes them incredibly versatile so that you don’t ever have to get bored. I always have a few bags in the freezer — I honestly never buy shrimp “fresh,” which are usually just frozen shrimp that have already been thawed. This means I can always whip up some sort of 10-minute meal. They are a great way to get creative in your kitchen.

All the flavor of hot wings without any of the fuss.

If you're on appetizer duty for the Super Bowl party, this is what to make!

It steals the scene at every party.

Based off a soup so good, its memory outlasted the memory of the person I ate it with.

Boneless wings are the secret to breaking your drive-thru or chicken wing habit.

To make something crispy, creamy, cheesy, and hard to beat.

Do you like éclairs? What about profiteroles, cream puffs, and cheesy gougères? Aside from making us drool just thinking about them, the one thing all these pastries have in common is that they are made from pâte à choux — a staple of the French pastry kitchen. Pâte à choux is a paste made of flour, water, butter, and eggs; it’s slightly thicker than a batter, but not quite as thick as a dough. Here’s how to make them.

A bag of coleslaw makes a batch of chicken potstickers easy and quick.

Are you familiar with grissini? A far cry from their soft, chewy pizza parlor cousins, grissini are long, thin, Italian-style breadsticks. They are crisp all the way through and can be flavored with various herbs, seeds, and spices to complement whatever else you may be serving. You can wrap them with paper-thin slices of prosciutto for a classic presentation, but they’re equally delicious served just as they are.

No matter the occasion — big or small — a bite-sized snack is always a good idea.

Sometimes, in the midst of cooking, a what if? can lead you towards an entirely new path. That’s what happened when I set out to make Vietnamese summer rolls wrapped in sheets of rice paper. “Can you fry rice paper?” my partner wondered as he eyed the translucent round sheets. “Let’s experiment,” I gamely replied.

Sometimes the sequel is even better than the original.

"And those in the know now ask in advance if I’ll be making 'the peppers.'"

Whenever I go to a restaurant that has a salsa bar (always a plus in my book), I skip over the chunky pico de gallo and roasted tomato salsa and head straight to the salsa verde. This tart, slightly spicy salsa always makes whatever I’m pouring it onto so much tastier. It can be slightly harder to find at the store, but it’s actually one of the easiest salsas you can make at home! You just need five ingredients: tomatillos, garlic, cilantro, jalapeño, and salt.

If you have any left over, that is.

Two pantry ingredients can make all the difference.

This recipe is #momgoals.

Looking for an easy-to-make alternative to dinner rolls? These cheese puffs are the ticket.

If crab cakes and hush puppies had a baby.

Pour a glass of your favorite and know that these crowd-pleasers will join the party with no complaints.

Whether it’s for an afternoon snack or your contribution to a backyard potluck, you just can’t go wrong with a dip. They are easy to whip up to snack on or share, and varied enough that there’s an option out there for everyone. These dips are filled with veggies for flavor, and they will make your snacking more colorful in every sense of the word. You can serve them alongside baby carrots, chips, crackers, or pita.

You can fill them with any combination of veggies, meat, and cheese.

More than a decade after experiencing my first pupusa, I can still remember my wide-eyed joy as I bit into the thick, stuffed tortilla. Why had I never eaten one before, and how soon could I have another? As I learned, the best part about El Salvador’s national dish isn’t just the warm, savory masa filled with melty cheese (or meat or beans), but its brilliant accompaniment called curtido.

A version of this post was originally sent to our email subscribers on April 17th. To sign up for our weekly email (not daily as the box indicates) sign up in the column to the left or click here.Maybe I jumped the gun a bit, but a few weekends ago, I grilled pizza up on a bluff. We served it right there, in the damp April evening. It was only about fifty degrees, but green things are emerging from the ground, I thought. Let’s celebrate. It’s normal spring behavior for me.

The first time I saw mini grilled cheese sandwiches sticking out of a small glass of tomato soup, I thought: what a brilliant idea. Take a favorite food pairing — crudites and dip, shrimp and aioli, milk and cookies — and put it all in an easy-to-handle shot glass (or other small container). No fiddling around, just fun all-in-one finger food that make perfect party appetizers.

All you need is crescent roll dough and breakfast sausages.

Think outside the bowl.

This is my go-to potluck dish.

Here's how to make the best part of the Seder plate.

It's really just a vehicle for whatever combinations of ingredients your imagination can create.

Tangy, creamy deviled eggs for your holiday get-together.

No tortilla press required.

(And they barely require any oil.)

These crab cakes deliver the tender texture you want with traditional cakes, but the seasonings are what take it to the next level.

Once you try this method, you'll never go back.

The bird's eye chili cheese dip is out of this world.