This recipe calls for a panini press; you can also cook the sandwiches in a skillet or grill pan (a la grilled cheese).

Must. Have. Crunch. No matter which meal, whether the food's savory or sweet. It's a reasonable demand of mine, given the many foods that offer such texture naturally, and the many techniques the food industry uses to introduce it.

I'm a sucker for a good can of tuna, and seem to crave it most just when it's gone missing from my cupboard.

This freshly-grilled fish seasoned with simple but beautiful ingredients is a sure shot winner. Garlic, turmeric, sea salt, fresh parslet leaves, mint leaves and crushed walnut.

"Pan challah is a beautiful slightly sweet and delicious bread perfect for any time of the day," touts the store-brand package I pick up at my local Giant Food.

You could make a different latke recipe for each of Hanukkah's eight nights, but that sounds like a lot of potatoes, right?

Omnivorously speaking, your standard post-Thanksgiving sandwich is just about perfect: lean turkey, moist and herby stuffing, tart-sweet cranberry sauce. But your appetite for that flavor combo might just tail off before your leftovers are depleted.

The anxiety that swirls 'round the Thanksgiving meal has puzzled me. Most of the dishes can, in fact, be made well in advance, and fine renditions of all of them can be picked up at any number of local outlets.

Jamie Oliver gives a really healthy spin to the quintessential carbonara. He throws out the usual bacon, cheese and raw egg, and instead, uses peas, almonds, lemon, basil, garlic and yogurt.

It is late on a summer evening, and four friends have eaten themselves into a comfortable stupor at Osteria Morini, the northern Italian restaurant in Washington's Navy Yard neighborhood. Still, a last course beckons, so they nod that one dessert should come to the table ...