BA’s Best Bolognese and More Recipes We Made This Week

October 2

Cheesy leek pasta

When I saw a bunch of bright-eyed leeks at the farmers market from my favorite vendor, I knew just what to do with them: my colleague Rebecca Firkser’s cheesy baked pasta. It was one of those love-at-first-sight recipes for me in the Test Kitchen—somehow minimalist and dramatic at the same time. Save this one for a chilly night when you’re having friends over. The sauce uses a cup of white wine, so there’s most of a bottle left to enjoy with dinner. —Emma Laperruque, cooking director

An omelet just for me

I’ve been making a lot of solo dinners lately, and nine times out of ten that means I’m cooking an omelet. My version with fried shallot, apple, and Fontina cheese is a go-to—I wrote all about it for our series, Me, Myself, and Dinner—but if I haven’t gone grocery shopping, I’ll just cobble together fun stuff from my fridge. Some recent wins: chopped kimchi and yellow cheddar; spinach, feta, and dill; black beans, avocado, and salsa macha. —Rebecca Firkser, Test Kitchen editor

Roast chicken for days

This week I did something I haven’t done in years. I roasted a chicken. And it was revelatory. Not fussy. Easy! Rewarding. Inspired by the method in Kitty Cowles’s cookbook, I sprinkled the bird with salt and let it hang out in the fridge for a few hours. Then I rubbed it with olive oil, threw some lemon and garlic in the cavity, and roasted it as high as my oven would go, convection on. While the chicken was resting, its skin a golden crackle, I deglazed the pan juices with white wine, and let those simmer into a tangy gravy. Served with a salad, it was the coziest supper, even romantic if you ignore my toddler cooing. The next day, the carcass simmered in a pot of water with onion and ginger for a broth I’ll sip for days. The surplus meat has morphed into a rice bowl, towering sandwich, day care lunch box, 3 p.m. snack. And the joy from it all? Incalculable. —E.L.