​It’s well known that Bon Appétit editors do a lot of cooking for their jobs. It’s no surprise that we also do a lot of cooking in our free time. Here are the recipes we’re preparing this month to get dinner on the table, entertain friends, satisfy sweet cravings, use up leftovers, and everything in between. For even more staff favorites, click here. A party app worth repeating. I’m highly predictable at parties. If asked to bring an appetizer, I’ll bring crudités: typically endive cups, cucumber spears, and radish halves (not popular, but I love them). The dip is usually the same: a romesco I whip up in a personal blender in minutes. I’ve never measured this, but it goes roughly like this: Drain a jar of roasted peppers and pat them dry.  

​This month, Bon Appétit’s Bake Club is reimagining a classic. Tune in as Jesse Szewczyk analyzes his popular Chocolate Guinness Cake recipe. “The cake came to me quite easily.” I experienced a vision. “I’m fortunate,” Jesse tells cohost Shilpa Uskokovic. However, the challenge arose when it came time to develop the frosting. “I felt like everyone in the Test Kitchen had an opinion on what it should be… I definitely tried at least 10 different frostings.” In the end, Jesse settled on brown butter frosting as the ideal topping—not only for its flavor but also because it evoked the creamy head of a perfectly poured Guinness. “It’s fortified with a touch of Guinness—just two tablespoons,” Jesse says.  

​Pottery employed for preparing and serving food dates back to the world’s earliest civilizations, illustrating that humans have congregated around meals for nearly as long as they’ve had fire for cooking. Today, when these items—bowls, baking dishes, serving vessels—grace our tables, they carry this legacy along with them. Shards from 20,000-year-old clay pots have been discovered in China. During the excavation of Pompeii, archaeologists uncovered kilns containing unfired terra-cotta vases buried under vast piles of ash. Ceramic cooking implements discovered in present-day Ecuador, from the fifth millennium BCE, represent some of the few surviving remnants of a long-forgotten ancient civilization. Similar to those artifacts, these five culinary tools from around the world depict the tales of the creators bringing their ancestral cooking traditions into the present day. Kyūsu, Japan. Photo credited to Hugo Yu, with prop styling by Andrea Bonin. Taisuke Shiraiwa, a Japanese kyūsu (teapot) artist, refined his pottery wheel techniques under the guidance of master craftsman Konishi Yohei in Tokoname, Japan—a renowned ceramics hub. His wood-fired, salt-glazed teapots, made for New York City’s Tea Dealers, shimmer with hues like lavender blush, sea foam, and volcanic ash; features such as flower-shaped lids and fiddlehead-curved ushirode handles ground the pieces in nature’s playful motifs.  

​I’m an early riser who usually forgoes breakfast. Coffee and a lengthy walk are all I require to kick off the day—then I’m set until midday. Even on typical weekends, I usually just have a green juice along with a bowl of berries and yogurt. Occasionally toast.. But when traveling, I seek out hotels that include breakfast. I pile up pancakes and home fries, sample every sausage with poached eggs. In recent years, I’ve observed that buffets are prioritizing local dishes over standard omelets, pastries, and fruit salad. I was delighted by the vast breakfast buffets in Dubai and Abu Dhabi offering couscous, tomato and green shakshukas, curries, and stews. The laminated pastries were stuffed with chocolate and pistachio cream, while the baklava was soaked in local honey. In Seoul, the Dutch ovens held wobbly eggs, fried rice, and dumplings. I’ve seen other hotel guests bypass the French toast sticks, opting instead for tamales and tacos in Mexico and callaloo with saltfish in Jamaica. Hotel breakfasts’ variety shows how chefs accommodate tourists’ familiar preferences while linking them to local traditions, turning the hotel into a draw for non-guests. Last year, I visited The Inn at Little Washington in Virginia, the eccentric 48-year-old restaurant operated by chef Patrick O’Connell, brimming with antiques and George Washington memorabilia.  

​Almond extract ranks among the strongest ingredients in your pantry. A few drops can elevate a dessert—or totally overwhelm it. A mystery wrapped in colored glass, its distinctive taste derives from a compound that might—or might not—originate from real nuts. It delivers a far more potent kick than other extracts (vanilla, I’m talking to you). Whether you’re a seasoned baker or just starting out with extractions, here’s everything you need to know about this “less-is-more” baking essential. Pure almond extract is a concentrated flavoring derived from bitter almonds, alcohol, and water. In contrast to the sweet almonds you eat as snacks, bitter almonds are loaded with benzaldehyde, the compound responsible for the nutty, fruity flavor of almond extract. Even though it comes from potentially toxic sources, properly manufactured almond extract is safe for consumption, as processing removes the harmful compounds from raw bitter almond oil. That said, benzaldehyde is not exclusive to bitter almonds. It’s also present in the pits of stone fruits such as peaches, apricots, plums, and other members of the almond’s extended family, the genus Prunus. Food processing facilities often throw away these pits, which cost less than raw nuts, so some commercial producers use them to flavor their almond extract.