blender

This is a winning-contestant recipe from Season Four of Fox's MasterChef.

"This looks impressive, but it's simple to whip up," Bemis says. "It goes great with crusty bread and champagne."

For Halloween, we attempted to break the record for the world's loudest scream—the acknowledged "Scream of Ice Cream." To coincide with the attempt we created the world's first "ice cream soup," a bowl of steaming hot 
pumpkin soup with a scoop of pumpkin ice cream dropped in the middle. I loved it, but it left everyone else in meltdown. In the end we ran out of time to stage the world-record 
attempt, and killed off ice cream soup, but we kept spiced pumpkin ice cream alive.

Harissa, the basic flavoring agent in Tunisian cuisine, is extremely versatile. Use it as a condiment for grilled meat or fish, add it to roasted vegetables, or stir into stews and soups. We particularly like it with couscous or rice. Adjust the amount of heat by increasing or reducing the number of chiles. Just remember, it is meant to be hot!

The addition of avocado makes this cold soup creamier than your average gazpacho, and the greens make it, well, greener, and with jalapeño included, too, it's got a serious kick that makes it anything but traditional. It probably goes without saying, but if you serve this to Spaniards, either don't call it gazpacho or be prepared for some arguments at the table.

This is a winning-contestant recipe from Season Four of FOX's MasterChef.

This melon dessert will help keep you hydrated on scorching days.

Finish these spicy, smoky, guacamole-topped tacos with crisp, thinly sliced radishes and bright lime, and get ready to watch them disappear.

Green Goddess Dressing is a perfect example of the magic of anchovies—they amplify and deepen the herbal flavors in this sauce without ever announcing their presence. For more recipes and tips, see our Homemade Salad Dressing Primer.

Mayonnaise is a breeze to make when the blender is enlisted to do most of the work. For more about mayonnaise and other salad dressings, see our Homemade Salad Dressing Primer. Note that raw eggs are not recommended for infants, pregnant women, the elderly, or those with a compromised immune system. To avoid the risk of salmonella infection, use pasteurized eggs instead.

This is a winning-contestant recipe from Season Four of FOX's MasterChef.

This is a winning-contestant recipe from Season Four of FOX's MasterChef.

This is a winning-contestant recipe from Season Four of FOX's MasterChef.

Roasting cauliflower with spices brings out the very best in this vegetable—the golden, crispy florets are irresistible. Like broccoli, cauliflower contains compounds that may help fight damaging toxins.

Editor's note: Use this sauce to make Myron Mixon's Smoked Whiskey Wings . I have heard people eating barbecue at festivals say that "the sauce makes the barbecue." It's not true. The smoke makes the barbecue. The sauce is a finisher. It's what you put on your meat after it cooks to enhance its appeal. It can add a great punch, but I've had plenty of delicious barbecued meat with no sauce at all. I've been around barbecue sauces of different stripes all of my life. My family's sauce recipe, which my parents were just beginning to market when my father suddenly passed away, is what got me into cooking competitive barbecue in the first place. We have always preferred a hickory-style sauce, meant to closely evoke and complement the flavor of hickory-smoked meats. It's world famous and a secret recipe, so the only way you'll taste the original is to order it from me, but if you insist on not giving me your business, here's a reasonable approximation that is still damn delicious.

A dollop of yogurt keeps these pops from being too icy, and we love the way the ginger adds a little spice.

"The flavors blend so well, you won't even guess you're eating kale." —Guarnaschelli

Moroccans love fresh juices, and the combinations they make are eclectic and highly seasonal. This is one of my favorites. Although it is commonly prepared as a juice, it can also be a drinkable dessert, especially on warm summer days. I once had it as a "salad" served with a spoon in late fall in the eastern High Atlas. Oranges hadn't yet ripened, and instead the cook used small clementines from down the valley. Served before a communal platter of Berber Barley Couscous with Vegetables, the drink seemed closer to a light, sophisticated, vibrant green gazpacho than a rustic salad.

This is an impressive three-layered popsicle. Make sure each layer is completely frozen before adding the next, as it looks great when the layers are really well defined.

Use the whole mint sprigs, stalks included, for a good minty hit.

Melitzanasalata This is similar to the well-known Lebanese eggplant puree called baba ghanouj but the addition of yogurt and green chilies gives it a pleasantly tangy spice. If you have a fireplace or an outdoor grill, roast the eggplant over live coals for a delectably smoky aroma. Select eggplants with smooth, shiny skins that are hefty for their size. Eggplant doesn't store well so be sure to use any you buy within a day or two; keep cool, but don't refrigerate—that only hastens deterioration. Fresh green poblano peppers are best in this recipe, but if you cannot find them, use jalapeños or serranos—as long as they are agreeably spicy but not fiery hot.

We had to include this fantastic recipe because the marriage of fresh ginger, garlic, mint, feta cheese, spinach, and freshly ground lamb with complementary spicy seasonings grilled over direct heat yields an outstanding flavor. Cover them with Spicy Afghan Green Sauce and you'll be serving one of the most remarkable backyard barbecues ever. Friends who think they don't like lamb will rave about these meatballs.

All the different textures make this meal vibrant and unique. —Zakarian

She-crab soup might just be this city's most overworked culinary icon—so much so that in restaurants of quality in Charleston, you can detect more than a few chefs assiduously avoiding it. But an expertly made she-crab soup is a rare pleasure at home, and should be a part of every cook's repertoire. When we were in our teenage years, the soup seemed extra special because it's seasoned with sherry and traditionally served with a cruet of the fortified wine, the latter to pass around the table in case you wanted to add an extra jolt. But she-crab soup isn't about the sherry (and in fact, we've come to realize that too often the sherry overpowers the crab), it's about the roe; and we don't think we'd ever truly reckoned with how important that roe is—coupled with the freshest crab meat you can find, of course—until the recent spring day we picked and cleaned an entire bushel of crabs (eighty, give or take) in a sitting. Since female crabs with roe inside are most prevalent in the spring, we found crab roe inside many of the adult females, called "sooks," as we cleaned them, after cooking. When you remove the carapace (or top shell) from the body of the crab, the crab roe—if it's there—will appear as a mass of bright orange in the middle of the body, and sometimes you may also find more roe tucked in the sharp left and right points of the carapace. The roe has an earthy-briny flavor, and adds a pale orange color to this soup. In our recipe, we blend it into the soup itself and also use a portion to garnish each bowl. Is it possible to buy crab roe alone? Unfortunately, no. So when we make this soup now, we buy picked crab meat and a half-dozen female crabs with roe from our local market. Any fish market that takes the time to sell hard-shell blue crabs will know how to spot a female with crab roe, because the roe makes the underside of the carapace appear light orange. It really is worth going to the trouble to find the real deal; you won't be disappointed! Regarding the sherry: recently we've taken to giving each guest his or her own shot glass full of fino sherry (one of the most delicate expressions of the fortified wine) to drink as a paired beverage, instead of sending a cruet around the table.