It’s Dumpling Tomato Salad Season

I usually start these newsletters with a personal anecdote or some deeply insightful cooking observation (just go with me here), but all I can say about Hetty Lui McKinnon’s dumpling tomato salad with chile crisp vinaigrette is this: If you haven’t made it yet, make it tonight. And if you’ve made it already, make it again. It’s dumplings, summer tomatoes and fresh basil in a salty-sour vinaigrette that’s just as spicy as you like it. Off you go.

Featured Recipe

Dumpling Tomato Salad With Chile Crisp Vinaigrette

View Recipe →

(Because I can’t leave well enough alone, I will share some alterations in case they’re helpful: I’ve swapped the rice vinegar for black or balsamic vinegar to great results, tossed in chopped cucumbers and handfuls of cilantro because I had them, and piled the whole thing on top of a spring mix for a more salad-y salad.)

Ready the sad solo violin: I don’t have a grill. Luckily, lots of our New York Times Cooking grilling recipes can be done on the stovetop or broiler, like Yasmin Fahr’s new grilled tahini-honey chicken thighs, which I’ll make in my trusty cast-iron skillet. And while hamburgers are admittedly best on a grill, smash burgers beg for a griddle (or that cast-iron pan). These sausage smash burgers from Christian Reynoso come with an excellent reader note: “Okay these are just yum.”

Speaking of reader notes, you’ll want to scroll through the notes on Yasmin’s five-star farro with blistered tomatoes, pesto and spinach for clever swaps and additions — feta for the mozzarella, baby kale for the spinach. Readers also mention adding a splash of red wine vinegar and chopped toasted almonds to finish. Also yum!

I love the combination of carrot and orange — the sweetness of the first really sings with the acidity of the second — so naturally this Moroccan carrot and orange salad from Nargisse Benkabbou caught my eye. The orange juice leaves lots of refreshing, gently floral liquid for slurping at the end, the same sort of delicious bonus you get with salad e-Shirazi or kachumber.

And to end on something else sunset-hued and refreshing, here’s Neale Asato’s Hawaii-style sherbet, a recipe adapted by Ligaya Mishan. “For people in Hawaii, Mr. Asato’s sherbet is a nostalgic callback to guri-guri (goodie-goodie), the nearly century-old specialty at Tasaka Guri Guri on Maui,” Ligaya writes. My family once nearly missed a flight because we had to stop at Tasaka Guri Guri for this creamy, irrepressibly pink treat, so I thank Neale and Ligaya for this convenient and much less stressful option.