Serrano Chile

Crunchy fried onions transform a simple cabbage salad into a sensorial delight: hot and cold, crisp and soft, sweet and spicy.

In this vibrant salad, crisp pear, ripe avocado, and crunchy lettuce are tossed in a lime dressing and dusted with Tajín.

Don’t toss those stale tortillas. Scramble them with eggs and give them a second chance at life.

Sweet summer corn begs to be mixed with a splash of acid, a touch of heat, salty cheese, and toasty nuts.

Tender, chewy Vietnamese rice rolls with a sweet-and-sour nước chấm dipping sauce.

A savory medley wrapped up in fresh and delicate Vietnamese rice rolls.

This dish marries the key spicy-sour elements of classic Thai green papaya salad with zesty grilled chicken and the best of summer produce.

Packed with garlic, scallions, and a hot green chiles, thecha is a spicy and fragrant Maharashtrian condiment that’ll jazz up any dish—including steak.

Crispy, toasty, and spicy, this quick coconut-chile crunch topping turns a simple salad into a whole lot of fun.

The longer this cabbage relish ferments, the better it’s going to taste.

Want to make it vegetarian? Just swap in roasted veggies (squash, peppers, onions, mushrooms, etc.), and instead of chicken stock, use vegetable stock or water.

This easy guacamole recipe is best made in a Mexican mortar and pestle called a molcajete, but a bowl and a fork works fine. Just don’t rush to get it on the table. It takes a while for the avocado to absorb all the flavors you add to it. 

It’s pico de gallo, but make it roasted.

These bright and succulent grilled chicken breasts are perfect for wrapping in warm tortillas with spoonfuls of fresh salsa verde. 

This pungent, spicy, and garlicky broth is inspired by rasam, a South Indian soup.

This super-flexible, all-purpose salad turns cabbage into luscious tangles of crisp leaves coated in a rich and bright dressing.

This standby salsa recipe using either tomatillos or tomatoes for the base lasts five days in the fridge or up to a month if you freeze it.

In my family, this smoky, crispy, North Indian–style okra is an iconic, clamored-after dish. The key is to cook the okra for a long time, with a lot of whole spices. It’s a foolproof and quick way to get the most flavor out of the summer vegetable, while avoiding any slimy texture. 

Toss your unripe summer peaches and plums with herbs, scallions, and a vinegary dressing inspired by the Chinese dish lao hu cai.

The fun and flavor of Cuban-style slow-cooked pork in zippy mojo sauce transformed into quick, weeknight-able meatballs. 

This iconic Gujarati dish is sweet with jaggery, spicy with green chiles, and sour with lime juice. And it’s exactly what you’d eat if you walked into Tailor chef Vivek Surti’s mother’s house in India.

How to unlock tons of flavor without endless chopping.

Leftover basmati rice gets gussied up with earthy fried mustard seeds and curry leaves, sweet caramelized, crunchy peanuts, and spicy chiles.

Aguachile is the spicy relative of ceviche that leans heavily on chiles for heat and lime juice for acidity. Here, hearts of palm, mango, and tomatoes replace the traditional raw shrimp.