When it comes to packing lunch for their kids, moms and dads have reliable favorites like PB&Js, bananas or maybe a bagel. Jenny Mollen has an unusual go-to — candy eyes.

One of our secret ingredients to build flavor fast is miso. It goes particularly well in a sweet-savory marinade for grilled skirt steak, amplifying the meat’s beefiness and balancing the sugars in Asian chili-garlic sauce.

The cooks at Christopher Kimball’s Milk Street love shrimp for its plump texture, mildly briny sweetness and weeknight ease. It’s why shrimp is one of our staple go-to dinner solutions. Simply stir-fry a few aromatics and spices until fragrant, toss in the shrimp, and dinner is on the table …

It’s time to stop thinking about the difference between sweet and savory spices. Many cooks around the world don’t make such a distinction.

There is little debate that the sandwich is the mainstay of most kids’ lunches. Wraps, however, have also taken their place in the pantheon of sandwich possibilities.

For weeknight cooking, we love seared fish since it usually cooks in half the time as chicken or other proteins. But it’s a fine line between cooked and completely dried out.

Each November in Sardinia, purple crocus blossoms blanket the rolling fields. It’s a striking sight against a lush green backdrop. Those same flowers also provide what locals call “red gold,” or saffron.

A summery fruit salad and spicy pork tenderloin might not seem the most natural pairing — until you consider the precedents of pork chops with apple sauce and Italian prosciutto with melon.

Western cooks too often go too light on fresh herbs, treating them more as garnish than flavoring. We prefer the Thai approach, which uses ingredients such as basil, mint and cilantro by the fistful.

One of the best ways to build flavor is layering, or using one ingredient in two ways or at different stages of cooking.

Wrap in a balanced lunch by adding fruit in unexpected ways! For a balanced diet children need 1-2 cups of fruit a day and adults 1 ½-2 cups per day and these chicken garden spring rolls are a great way to help achieve that goal.

As summer sets in, warm bowls of chewy, satisfying ramen and soba can become the center of refreshingly chilled salads such as hiyashi chuka. The Japanese dish typically is served as a cone of chilled ramen noodles covered with strips of several ingredients.

Our stromboli is the perfect mix of quick, easy, and protein-packed to satisfy those “almost homemade” meal nights!

Spiralizing zucchini into “noodles” usually produces a poor imitation of the pasta they attempt to emulate. It’s better to let an ingredient shine on its own merits.

This recipe for savory-sweet chicken skewers is loosely based on Japanese yakitori.

Peru's lomo saltado is fusion cooking at its easiest and most approachable. This quick stir-fry includes soy-marinated beef, tomatoes and hot peppers, and reflects Peru's cultural — and culinary — influences.

Tomatoes may get more attention, but throughout Italy, lemon also often finds its way into pasta. The sour and subtly sweet citrus balances the noodle’s starch and the sauce’s heft.

In the riot of colors and smells that is Cape Town, South Africa, we found a vibrant one-pot chicken and vegetable dish that turned our idea of what a curry is on its head.

Entertaining a crowd? Treat your guests to some onion rings. This healthier baked alternative still gives us that crunch and flavor that’s sure to be a hit!

This “risotto,” recipe uses pearl couscous (which actually is a pasta) and higher heat to produce “grains” with a rich, creamy consistency.