Casserole Recipes & Ideas

What if I told you that you didn’t need to pick up a knife or turn on your oven to make a delicious lasagna? Yes, it’s true — this lasagna only has six ingredients and cooks all in one pan. Ready to learn more? I usually only make traditional lasagna once a year because it just involves too many ingredients and too much of my time.

This slow cooker mac and cheese is so easy that it feels like it can’t possibly be right. Dry pasta, milk, and cheese go in, and a few hours later you’re scooping warm macaroni and cheese onto your plate. Ready for a little magic in your dinner? Let’s take a look at how this macaroni and cheese can be yours. This recipe makes a casserole-style macaroni and cheese with a sturdy (but still creamy!) texture that can be sliced into squares.

It’s hard to beat homemade macaroni and cheese, but while the process is straightforward, it can feel fussy when you’re dirtying a handful of dishes just to make it. This recipe streamlines the process to lessen your load. Consider this your weeknight-approved mac and cheese — the kind you can make after a long, hectic day without resorting to the boxed stuff.

What if I told you that you could have a rich and creamy bowl of mac and cheese while also packing in over a pound of cauliflower? Sounds like a trick, right? No so fast! This recipe does just that, thanks to a base of cheesy cauliflower sauce. While I don’t believe in hiding vegetables, I do believe in adding them into dishes wherever I can to boost my intake. That is exactly why I love this macaroni and cheese.

On those nights you're craving lasagna, but don't quite have it in you to commit to a whole pan, reach for a muffin tin instead.

This luxurious lasagna makes a better main dish than a bird. Somewhere a turkey is sighing with relief.

A good lasagna should have al-dente noodles that are crisp at the edges yet tender enough to cut with a fork; a simmered-all-day meaty Bolognese sauce; a creamy layer of ricotta peeking from between the layers, mellowing the sharpness of the tomatoes; and cheese, browned and golden on top but gooey throughout. Special occasions call for devoting a weekend to this classic dish, but it is possible to hit the high points with a few smart shortcuts.

Layered with sauce, these pockets of pasta and cheese cook while you work.

A frittata is one of our favorite one-dish meals. You make the whole thing in a skillet, it takes minimal effort, and it’s inexpensive. We usually make ours in a 10- or 12-inch fry pan, which works well for feeding a few people. But what if you’re feeding a crowd? Enter the frittata square.This is really nothing more than an egg casserole—a frittata cooked in a large baking pan rather than a round skillet.

Here is one last recipe from my new book Not Your Mother’s Casseroles. This is one of the very easiest recipes I know how to make in the oven. This recipe is really just a template for a baked egg dish that comes out creamy and fluffy inside — like a traditional American diner omelet — and that can be filled with anything you like. I call for ham, Parmesan cheese, and parsley here, but you can add anything!

Not quite ready to stop celebrating Cinco de Mayo? Well, look no further than these delicious salsa verde breakfast nachos! What I love about this breakfast dish is that it’s something you can easily enjoy on your own (if you’re ravenous) or simply share with a few friends. Not many breakfast options can do that. And because it’s nachos, it’s super easy to make.

I’m not sure what took me so long to get on the frittata bandwagon, but now that I’m starting to get the hang of making them, I finally understand what a quick and satisfying weeknight meal they can be. This variation with tender bits of potato, silky red peppers, and creamy Gouda cheese is one of our favorites! For an easy flavor boost, I sometimes use jarred roasted red peppers from Trader Joe’s in place of fresh bell peppers.

There’s nothing I love more than a breakfast recipe that can double as lunch or dinner fare, and this super-herby, substantial frittata does just that. We do a lot of very simple cheese frittatas around here, but recently before a weekend camping trip, I thought about making one that had a bit more heft to take on the ferry for lunch. I sliced some potatoes, found a little log of goat cheese in the refrigerator, and cut up all the herbs we had on hand.

Artichokes, sausage, goat cheese, and sun-dried tomatoes — here’s an egg bake for you that will work for breakfast, lunch, or dinner! It’s also a great example of my basic formula for egg casserole. These provide my most frequent go-to lunch, a make-ahead staple that uses up little bits of leftovers — in this case, one lone sausage and half a log of goat cheese, plus a few sun-dried tomatoes and the last of a wedge of Parmesan.

Have you ever woken up and wished you could walk into the kitchen to find a hot breakfast (or really, any breakfast) ready and waiting for you? I have this exact wish on a weekly basis. That’s why I want you all to meet the slow-cooker sausage and egg casserole, otherwise known as the recipe that lets you wake up to breakfast.

This rustic casserole is inspired by an omelet that was my go-to brunch for years at the small cafe in my old New York City neighborhood. It’s filled with thick chunks of breakfast sausage, sweet apples, and smoky cheddar, making it appropriate for holiday get-togethers and those evenings when you want a cozy breakfast for dinner. I love this casserole for many reasons, but for me it elicits strong feelings of warmth, comfort, and happiness in that special way only food can manage.

A breakfast casserole loaded with veggies and crowned with crunchy tots to start the day off right.

We get excited about a lot of fresh summer produce, but if there was just one single item to get really excited for, it’s Hatch green chiles. They’re starting to arrive right now and will continue into October, but don’t wait too long to pick some up because they’re only in season for a short time. We’re making the most of them while we can — starting with breakfast. Because Hatch chiles have such a short season, they can be tough to come by.

This is everything you love about a classic breakfast burrito, layered into an egg casserole.

Trust us: Everyone will definitely want seconds.

I am so excited to present to you the winners of our Best Healthy CasserolesveryNot Your Mother’s CasserolesOpera Girl Cooks Why I chose Coco’s casserole Now, I love breakfast casseroles. I especially love those sugary, cream-laden casseroles that we all love to eat on Christmas morning and for weekend brunch. But I’m not going to eat these every week. Too rich! So I was very happy to see Coco’s casserole, which called for only a very small amount of sugar.

It is easy to see why cooks love breakfast casseroles. They can be made ahead. They are hearty and satisfying. They handily serve a group. It’s the name that trips us up. People are leery of casseroles, which is why I prefer to call this, my signature crowd-pleasing brunch bake, a savory bread pudding. A casserole by any other name is swell to eat. This bread pudding is deeply flavored, brimming with ham, cheese, and fresh herbs.

Every single holiday season, without fail, this happens: I get a deep craving for eggnog, resist until I can’t resist any longer, buy a carton, pour myself a small glass, and find satisfaction in just a few sips. The problem is I leave myself with the majority of the carton left over after I’ve fulfilled my craving. What the heck do I do with all the rest? That’s when I end up scouring the internet for recipes using the remainder. Here’s the recipe I’ll now turn to.

It doesn’t take much, I’ve discovered, to make a memorable breakfast casserole, but it does require a small investment in a few quality ingredients — like good bread and decadent cheese — and perhaps a willingness to overlook an obscene amount of eggs and cream. I’ve experimented over the years with cheddar, gouda, Parmesan, and gruyere, but I must say that brie has yielded the best recipe yet.

I am a big fan of the classic Spanish tortilla, where eggs are cooked in a skillet on top of blanched, sliced potatoes. The resulting savory cake is good for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and midnight snack. I wanted, however, the adaptability of the tortilla and frittata in a somewhat simpler form, with more generous proportions. So here’s the casserole cousin of the Spanish frittata: a potato gratin, baked in golden eggs, with a touch of red pepper for color and taste.

We all need our breakfast staples — eggs, avocado toast, oatmeal. But when the work week is over and the weekend rolls around, it’s time to get serious. It’s time for brunch. While I love a good omelet and other savory brunch dishes, my heart belongs to the sweet ones, like this cinnamon roll breakfast bake. What’s that in the middle you spy? Why, a layer of cinnamon-spiked cream cheese between layers of sweet, eggy bread. This is one for sharing, folks.

Late-summer bumper crops of zucchini and summer squash necessitate some creative thinking to use it all up. When you don’t want to entertain the thought of yet another loaf of zucchini bread, this savory casserole full of eggs and cheese, topped with a lemony breadcrumb topping, is your answer to the annual summer dilemma. Zucchini casserole reminds me of a crustless quiche since it’s full of eggs and cheese, but there’s also room to add a few new flavors to this dish.

When it comes time to host brunch this holiday season, use this recipe that can feed a crowd. It also offers a fancy (yet super-easy!) upgrade to the classic ham and cheese breakfast casserole, starting with cubes of day-old sourdough soaked in a velvety custard that’s laced with rich caramelized onions, bits of ham, and sharp provolone cheese.

This holiday side takes everything you love about a traditional potato gratin — the bath of butter and cream — and tweaks it to play off the flavors of sweet potatoes. A bit of thyme and nutmeg are added to bring out the savory side of sweet potatoes, and sprinkle of nutty Gruyère cheese tops the dish before it goes into the oven. If you’re looking for a new tradition on your Thanksgiving table this year, consider this a contender.

When the weather outside is chilly and you have a lot of people to feed it’s nice to have some standby dishes that are easy to make, delicious, and unquestionably comforting. Enter Gratin Dauphinois — a recipe born in the French Alps that combines scalloped potatoes, cream, and garlic all baked to perfection.Traditionally Gratin Dauphinois does not include cheese, although its creamy consistency often makes people think there must be some in the dish.

If what you’re after is a lighter breakfast for your family (you know, to balance out all those cookies), this veggie-packed egg bake is your solution. Laced with wilted kale and hints of cumin and smoked paprika, and built on a base of thick-cut roasted sweet potatoes, this breakfast casserole gets a spicy surprise from gochujang, the slightly sweet Korean chile paste.

Since Thanksgiving is virtually around the corner, and now is the time for orange vegetables to assert their place, I felt it was high time to re-introduce you to my favorite sweet potato gratin recipe. This is a smoky, rich gratin, with a streak of caramelized onions and garlic sandwiched between layers of sweet potatoes baked in cream.

September is a transition season when it comes to cooking — I crave hearty cold-weather dishes but still have access to an abundance of late summer ingredients. This savory roast chicken, stuffed with an addictive zucchini, sourdough, and ricotta filling, is definitely the best of both worlds. I was planning an impromptu dinner party this weekend and trying to come up with a savory fall dish that still celebrated the best of our Southern Indian summer.

I’m a sucker for all of the holiday food coverage that comes this time of year. I do have to admit though, I never actually attempt any of the new recipes that come my way. I happen to be a Thanksgiving traditionalist, and come Turkey Day all I want are the familiar dishes of my youth.This year my boyfriend and I are joining our families for a communal celebration. As excited as I am to merge our many traditions, it also means that we have to pick food favorites.

When you start your day off with something sweet, like this breakfast bake, it’s pretty much a guarantee that it’s going to be a good one. This bake does the impossible: It improves on flaky, buttery croissants by soaking them in a rich, custardy liquid and baking them with a slew of juicy blackberries. The result is pure decadence for breakfast — something we all need every once in a while.

This is an easy, rustic recipe that makes a great vegetarian meal or a pretty side dish for summer or autumn. It’s so simple: yellow squash layered in a jumble with sliced red potato and goat cheese. No cream needed at all. For this gratin, I didn’t bother layering the vegetables in a pretty scalloped pattern. I practically threw the potato and squash slices in the pan, all mixed up together. Tastes the same, right? The only complicated part is slicing the vegetables paper-thin.

Happy Day-After-Thanksgiving! Or should I say, Leftovers-for-Breakfast Day? Some might go for a cold slice of pumpkin pie straight from the tin (you know who you are), but for me, it’s all about the savory sides. This post-Thanksgiving morning, give your stuffing a royal redux. Bake it into a breakfast strata, complete with crunchy toasted corners and sunny eggs cracked right on top. This is just about the easiest leftovers recipe you’re bound to come across.

"Raisins and meat together?" they would always ask. "What are you making?"

As with any good Cuban recipe, it all begins with sofrito.

This is how you do French toast during prime pumpkin season (aka right now!). It’s a sweet, seasonal breakfast casserole for a crowd and powerful enough to win over the most ardent pumpkin spice critic. Thick cubes of buttery brioche are soaked overnight and infused with rich custard packed with warm spices and a double dose of pumpkin. Then it’s dotted with a crunchy brown sugar and pecan streusel that takes it over the top. Amazing, right?

The addition of bharat makes this a deliciously smoky-yet-sweet stuffing any turkey would love to be next to.

Here is a simple, nourishing side dish for fall: a light gratin with shredded kale and potatoes. Our local farm has potatoes galore right now, and the kale is starting to sweeten up as the nights cool. This dish will take you into late fall and early winter and still be considered seasonal and local for those of us living in much of the northern hemisphere.

Everything bagels come to the party for a bread dressing that's salty, oniony, and garlicky.

No need to skip the stuffing if gluten isn't your thing — just reach for cornbread instead.

Here’s one last dinner recipe to close out the week. This is from my book, Not Your Mother’s Casseroles, and it really expresses the way I like to make vegetable casseroles. I find that many casseroles and gratins smother the vegetables with dairy, grains, and other peripheral ingredients. But I want to taste the vegetables — especially when, like here, they are fresh and springlike — leeks, fennel, potatoes, onion, garlic.

This casserole is filled with everything you love about the classic, custard-soaked French toast from the stovetop, but goes big to feed a crowd and comes with a sweet, summery twist. It gets a double dose of berries, with bursts of warm strawberry jam in the center and glossy macerated berries on top, and melty nuggets of cream cheese scattered throughout.

Echoing Eleven's love of this frozen classic, this recipe has all the flavors of the boxed stuffing we all grew up with.

Every season, there’s that moment when the whole idea of “seasonality” wears thin — when you’re done with a particular variety of produce before it’s done with you. Or maybe it’s just the inundation of summer squash, zucchini, and tomatoes that bring on those feelings. When it does, I throw together this simple little casserole and fall in love all over again.

When the temperature takes a permanent nosedive and fall is starting to look a lot more like winter, shepherd’s pie is one of the first things that I crave. One enormous square of this casserole, with its blanket of mashed potatoes and that savory meat-and-vegetable filling, sends a sigh of contentment through my whole body. One casserole makes more than enough for my household of two, so I can look forward to comfort meals all week long.

Ever since I met this sweet slow cooker breakfast casserole, I’ve been hosting weekend brunch as often as possible. It’s a treat to be sure, loaded with tender cubes of custard-soaked brioche tinged with the warm scent of pumpkin spice and topped with a nutty brown sugar streusel. You’ll want to keep this one in rotation all year long. French toast casseroles are my easy go-to solution for serving this breakfast favorite to a crowd.

When I first made this recipe, it was January, which means we were all craving food that is a little lighter, a little healthier, and a little more in line with the way we’ve resolved to eat this year. But at the same time, it was January — when we’re wrapped up in sweaters and blankets, it’s comfort food we’re dreaming about. That’s where this recipe comes in.

Parsnips are terribly underrated roots. They’re shaped like carrots and they’re sweet like carrots, but I’ve always found their flavor much more interesting. Along with the sweet is a nutty, herbaceous and almost wild flavor, entirely unlike the tame carrot. When added to a beef stew or chicken in a pot along with the usual carrots and potatoes, parsnips add another interesting layer of flavor.

I love breakfast casseroles (I wrote a whole book about casseroles The flavor boost in this easy dish comes from two things: Hot mustard, and sun-dried tomatoes. Spicy mustard adds a piquant flavor — not easily identifiable, but a strong supporting player in the background. (Don’t worry — this doesn’t taste overwhelmingly of mustard!

This version of a shepherd’s pie plays with the regional flavors of India, and in actuality, probably shouldn’t be called a real shepherd’s pie because it has no lamb. Perhaps an Indian chicken-wrangler pie would be a better name. Notwithstanding nomenclature and food history’s neurotic exactness, this dish embodies the flavors of the subcontinent.

Being Southern and all, I grew up eating, and loving, breakfast casserole. (Some of you may call it a strata or bake. To be honest, I still don’t know the difference.) My mother’s recipe is basic—just sausage, bread, eggs, and cheese. Any time mom has to feed a crowd, whether for company, early football games, or Christmas, this is the dish she makes. I love hers to no end, but I recently discovered one I like just a bit better.

Potluck dinners tend to resemble mini Thanksgivings most of the time — and I’m most definitely not saying that’s a bad thing. But with all the tried-and-true vegetable side dishes and casseroles that often show up at the table, it’s fun to tweak the traditions a little bit and stand out from the pack. A double dose of lemon in this veggie-loaded gratin keeps the mood light — even with the usual suspects of cream and cheese in every comforting spoonful.

If there was a summer side dish MVP, I have no doubt it would be awarded to gratins. They’re simple, versatile, and reliable — the kind of dish that’s worth turning on the oven for. Their sheer abundance in the garden and at the market have a way of making summer squash feel totally overwhelming. They’re everywhere, but that’s precisely one of the reasons I love them so much — there are so many varieties, and so many ways to eat them.

There are plenty of ways to make a tater tot casserole. Some are pure comfort food and combine the rich and savory elements that give most casseroles their hearty and homey reputation (canned condensed soup, I’m looking at you).

Shepherd’s pie is a marvelous comfort food: hearty meat and veg under a mashed potato crust. This upside-down version, made in a muffin pan and baked in shredded potato cups, is both ingenious and cute. Ingenious in that it takes so little time — no more than what you have on an average Monday evening; cute in that, hello! These are small and adorable muffin cups of shepherd’s pie. Besides the muffin pan, this meal relies on one smart shortcut.

Any dish that falls into the make-ahead category for Thanksgiving deserves an extra gold star, which is exactly the case for this vegetarian beans and greens gratin. You can assemble this side dish up to two days in advance and tuck it away in the fridge until Thursday rolls around. This dish also brings a lighter touch when it comes to the cream and cheese — although not at the sacrifice of flavor.

Last year I made Faith’s baked Denver omelet and, after I tasted it, mentally smacked my forehead and wondered why I didn’t make something like this more often. A baked omelet is essentially a crustless quiche — substantial enough to be a filling breakfast, without the heaviness of the added crust in a quiche. My latest version is filled with spicy Mexican chorizo and pickled jalapeños!

This is what happens when an old-fashioned country recipe called scalloped cabbage gets dolled up and heads into town for a dinner party. It elevates cabbage into elegance with a creamy Gruyère sauce and a tumble of sautéed mushrooms. The Gruyère and bacon add flavor, of course, but cabbage still reigns in this dish. Should you prefer to keep this meatless, all is not lost — simply omit the bacon and replace the bacon fat in the béchamel sauce with butter.

Slow-cooker breakfast casseroles are sort of like a culinary superhero. They work through the night to save the day — all you have to do is throw in a few of your favorite breakfast ingredients and turn it on. But you can take this culinary cunning to the next level by stowing away a few breakfast casserole kits in your freezer, so that late at night you can call to your culinary superhero and be rescued from breakfast boredom.

This hearty strata is our seasonal take on the classic ham and cheese breakfast casserole. Laced with Black Forest ham and nutty Gruyère, and built on a foundation of pumpernickel and sourdough bread, this version uses spicy mustard to give the eggs a zippy boost. The beauty of this recipe is how easily it delivers a hot breakfast to the table in the morning.

When you want an egg dish to feed a crowd or make enough breakfast for the week, breakfast casseroles are just the ticket. Eggs hold together whatever ingredients you want to put in the baking dish, and in this case it’s a filling combination of frozen diced potatoes, savory sausage, a whole bag of baby spinach, and, of course, a few handfuls of shredded cheese.

Made-to-order omelets are a breakfast I always enjoy but rarely execute in my own home. The extensive prep and required attention over the stove so early in the morning means I reserve filling egg breakfasts for when I am the guest of honor. That is, until I realized that with a bag of frozen potatoes, fresh spinach, pork sausage, and Swiss cheese at my side I can mix up a mean breakfast — and most of that cooking takes place while I sleep.

Lean ground beef or turkey can stand in for the beans in these burritos — season it with salt and pepper and brown it in a skillet, and drain and cool slightly on a plate lined with paper towel before combining it with the chipotle sour cream. Also, pump up the nutrient power by adding sautéed chopped bell peppers, zucchini, or leftover cooked vegetables such as cauliflower. Make your own salsa in just minutes, if you prefer.

Cara and Phoebe’s popular cooking blog, Big Girls Small Kitchen, has garnered acclaim and popularity from a variety of readers and established chefs. Their approach, explaining the basics of home cooking, to fellow “quarter-lifers” is as witty and fun as it is honest and approachable. These two ladies graduated from college, moved into the work force and tackled entertaining and food with gusto.

I must confess that weeknight dinners can be a major struggle in my house, which probably seems contradictory coming from someone who writes about food! It’s true that my refrigerator is often filled with an eclectic group of ingredients—most of which cannot be transformed into any sort of suitable meal. I often find myself scavenging the pantry for anything I can pass off as adequate, and trust me when I tell you that a starving girl + Nutella does not equal dinner.

This time of year can be a tricky one for inspired breakfasts. Oatmeal is my go-to on weekdays, and on the weekends we often flail for something a bit more interesting but no more complex. With this morning tart, flail no more! I call this a morning tart instead of a quiche because I tend to think of quiche as more major, perhaps even towering.