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I saw it was going to be getting hot this week. Hot, humid, and sticky. So I decided I could use the oven while it was still on the cooler side and make a quiche to have for a few lunches.

In the recipe below I give the basic custard part of the filling, along with the extras I made this time. Be creative about whatever else you want to include! Many, many years ago, the first time I was in Chicago, a friend took me to Lou Mitchell’s the famous diner in the West Loop Gate. On their menu is an omelette with sausage, Cheddar, and apples. Perhaps that seems unremarkable now, but back then, adding the apple to a sausage and cheese omelette was pretty interesting and innovative, at least to me. I kept that idea in mind, and began to play with the combination of meat and cheese and fruit in quiche.

Although I am by no means a food historian, I think a lot about culinary stories and the formation, transformation, and transmission of culinary traditions and even of individual recipes. Some people may think fajitas come from Mexico, but they are rather from the Tex-Mex kitchen. The dish is an offshoot of Mexican cuisine, to be sure, but Tex-Mex is a distinct and legitimate food tradition. In fact, the new cookbook Amá is specifically Tex-Mex.

We love to make this easy, flavorful sauce when we grill swordfish. I am never sure what to call it, because listing all the ingredients would be cumbersome, but individually and collectively they are all so wonderful and deserve top billing!

This is not “real” paella for several reasons. First, there’s no shellfish because Hank is allergic; second, I don’t have a paella pan; third, we don’t have the special rice for paella. The last two are probably why we will never get a real socarrat when the rice at the bottom of the pan gets a nice crust.

Back when we all first started staying at home as much as possible, and not knowing how things would go as far as food shopping was concerned, we bought a few vegetables that would last, such as carrots and winter squash, and some frozen vegetables as well.

We really haven’t had any difficulty getting produce, and as a result one butternut squash was still sitting there, along with a pear from my Misfits Market box. So before the weather gets too warm, I decided to make a soup. Any variety of winter squash would work fine in this recipe.

The first time I made this dish for my boys, they tasted it and glared at me. It was the look of annoyance and disbelief that I had never made it for them before! It’s now one of their favorites, a frequent request when they come home to visit.

It’s not a very difficult recipe, but you will want to get sweet Hungarian paprika for it.

My mother and I have recently been discussing some of her mother’s signature recipes. She was wondering about some of the gelatin molds her mother used to make and whether I remembered them at all, or might know how to make them.

Of course that sent me to the small pile of recipes from Nena – what we cousins called our grandmother – but what I have are mostly desserts.

We love salmon, and more often than not, we marinate it in the ginger sesame marinade from Ginger People and grill it outside. Sometimes, however, if it’s raining or snowing, or so bitterly cold that it will take the grill too long to heat up, we decide to Use the oven.

I wanted something that would be as easy as cooking it on the grill, and full of flavor. Eventually I ended up with this simple preparation that takes little time to put together, and then has unattended time in the oven.

As we continue through this strange time, I find myself looking for ways to use random leftover ingredients in the freezer or how to combine various items of produce that look like they are going bad. In my last produce delivery from Misfits Market, I got a zucchini and some mixed mushroom. We had already sketched out a plan for upcoming meals, but I needed to use these items sooner rather than later.

I found a recipe in my old New York Times Cookbook for a baked zucchini and mushroom casserole with sour cream and dill. Not only did I not have any dill, the recipe said to boil the zucchini which just seemed like it would be too wet. Instead I devised a gratin that didn’t water down any of the flavors.

I find it interesting to observe the contradictions we sometimes see in ourselves. I spent the better part of an afternoon making homemade pasta dough, then rolling, filling, forming, and cooking pumpkin cappellacci. And yet, when I make coleslaw, I always buy a bag of the preshredded coleslaw mix at the supermarket!

I’ve been making this version for as long as I can remember, and pretty much every time we are out somewhere and a sandwich comes with coleslaw, Hank will try it (I refuse). And then Hank says, “Not as good as yours.”