In this article:

Easy Appetizers for Extra Points
Winning Wings With AFC or NFC Sauce
Perfect Jumbo Onion Rings With Sesame Bread Coating
Tips for perfect onion rings
More Super Bowl recipes

Wings, rings and simple things

Get ready for a Super Bowl feast, with plays called by your new cooking coach, Pam Anderson.

Supporting a solid team of simple dishes with two MVPs is a winning combination for any Super Bowl party.

Unlike many other special days, the Super Bowl "holiday" next weekend has no deep culinary traditions. Whether we spend hours making our favorite chili or rip open a bag of pretzels at the last minute, our only goal next Sunday should be to relax and enjoy the game.

To make that possible, I've devised:

Two do-ahead, can't-fail recipes: chicken wings and onion rings (yes, onion rings that are all but fried ahead).

A dozen dishes so simple you don't even need a recipe.

Like most cooks, I have two sides.

For special occasions, the perfectionist in me wants to get it right. For every day, the pragmatist in me is happy if I can just get it on the table.

For those times I want to perfect a dish, I start by gathering scores of recipes. After analyzing them, I head to the kitchen to test each ingredient and every preparation and cooking technique to come up with the best way to make that dish.

I look forward to sharing many of these recipes with you in my Cook Smart column. And I'll give you more than just the recipe: I'll show you how I developed it. With this information, not only will you understand the dish, but you'll be able to use it to perfect your own recipes. Jumbo Onion Rings with Sesame Bread Coating (below) is this issue's "perfect" recipe.

Want to learn how to make a waffle that stays light and crisp to the very last bite? How about oven-fried chicken that is as crunchy and delicious as fried? Looking for a peach pie that's soft and juicy yet doesn't end up a mess on the dessert plate? Those perfect recipes are coming in future Cook Smart columns.

When I'm on the fly, I cook by heart from simple techniques and easy formulas I've memorized. That's the way our parents and grandparents used to cook. And it worked! Below, "Easy Appetizers for Extra Points" exemplifies this style of cooking -- dishes so simple you don't need a recipe.

Wish for lasagna so simple and quick you could make it on a weeknight with whatever's in the fridge? How about main-course soups in 20 minutes? I'll serve up these easy, rule-of-thumb dishes in the coming months.

I look forward to sharing what I've learned, and I hope to hear and learn from you, too.

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Easy appetizers for extra points

Keep your Super Bowl party from turning into a fourth down and 25! How? Make some spectacular finger foods.

Chilled Cherry Tomatoes: Stick tomato bottoms with the tip of a knife so salt and pepper will cling to the tomato. Serve with a small bowl of mixed salt and pepper.

Quesadillas with Scallions: For each quesadilla, sprinkle an 8-inch flour tortilla with 1/2 cup Monterey jack cheese and 2 tablespoons thinly sliced scallions. Top with another tortilla and cook in a dry, hot skillet until the tortillas are spotty brown and the cheese has melted. Keep warm in a 200-degree oven. Cut into wedges and serve with salsa.

Baby Sloppy Joes: Brown 1 pound of ground beef or turkey. Stir in 2/3 cup barbecue sauce, 1 tablespoon soy sauce, and salt and pepper to taste. Cook until mixture thickens and meat holds together. Spoon into warm mini-buns and serve.

Apple Wedges with Cheddar and Blue Cheese: When your guests have had their fill, serve dessert: a big bowl of apple wedges with chunks of sharp cheddar and blue cheese. VSteamed Broccoli or Cauliflower with Mustard Dipping Sauce: Steam cauliflower or broccoli florets (or both) until bright and crisp-tender. Let cool, then serve with a dip made of equal parts mayonnaise and mustard.

Foccacia Crisps: Thinly slice foccacia bread (or Bobboli pizza crust if foccacia isn't available). Lay the bread strips on two baking sheets, drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with Parmesan cheese and bake on the upper- and lower-middle racks of a 400-degree oven until golden brown and crisp, about 15 minutes.

Olive Feta Turnovers: Cut a 9-inch sheet of frozen thawed puff pastry (such as Pepperidge Farm) into nine 3-inch squares. Place half of a pitted Kalamata olive and a small chunk of feta cheese on each square. Brush two sides of the square with beaten egg. Fold in half to form a triangle. Place on a cookie sheet and bake in a 400-degree oven until puffed and golden brown.

Celery Hearts with Blue Cheese Dip: Separate celery hearts into stalks, halving larger ones lengthwise. Arrange in a glass or vase. Serve with a dip made of 1/4 cup mayonnaise, 1/4 cup sour cream and 1/4 cup crumbled blue cheese, and flavored with 2 teaspoons red wine vinegar.

Sherry-Glazed Meatballs: Place 1 1/2 pounds of frozen meatballs in a 13-by-9-inch baking dish. Mix 1 cup ketchup and 1 cup dry or sweet sherry. Pour over meatballs and bake in a 350-degree oven until bubbly, 35-40 minutes.

Roasted New Potatoes and Onions: Toss halved small red potatoes and small yellow onions (you don't even have to peel them) with olive oil, salt and pepper. Place, cut side down, on a rimmed cookie sheet. Roast on the bottom rack of a 425-degree oven until the potatoes' cut surfaces have browned and the onions have caramelized, about 30 minutes.

Roasted Premium Nuts: Buy roasted salted cashews or premium mixed nuts and serve.

Browned Kielbasa with Mustard: Over medium heat, warm just enough cooking oil to coat the bottom of a skillet. Add kielbasa sausage links and cook, turning occasionally, until brown and heated through. Cut on the diagonal into bite-size pieces. Serve with several mustards (coarse-grain, Dijon or honey-flavored, to name a few) for dipping.

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Winning Wings With AFC or NFC Sauce

Prep time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 50 minutes

3 pounds chicken wings (about 12 whole wings or 24 pieces)
2 Tbs. vegetable oil
Salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste
Flavoring sauce (see below)

Adjust oven rack to upper-middle position. Heat oven to 450 degrees. Set a large wire rack over a large, foil-lined shallow pan, such as a jellyroll pan. Toss wings in a large bowl with oil, salt and pepper. Arrange in a single layer on the rack. Roast until golden brown, about 40 minutes.

Use tongs to remove wings to a bowl full of one of the sauces below; toss to coat. Remove rack from pan and pour off rendered chicken fat. Dump wings directly onto foil-lined pan. Continue to cook until glaze has set, 8-10 minutes longer.

Makes about 2 dozen wings.

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Perfect Jumbo Onion Rings With Sesame Bread Coating

Prep time: 25 minutes
Cooking time: 20 minutes
1 very large onion (about 1 pound, or the size of a grapefruit), trimmed, peeled, cut crosswise into slices 1 inch thick, separated into rings, paper-thin skin removed
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup pancake mix
1/2 tsp. salt
1 cup water plus extra for thinning batter
4 cups plain bread crumbs
1/4 cup sesame seeds
6 cups peanut oil or vegetable oil

Lay newspaper over entire work surface. Place onion rings in a large bowl of water. Measure flour into a medium bowl. Set aside. In a separate medium-sized bowl, combine pancake mix and salt. Mix in 1 cup of water to form a smooth batter about the thickness of house paint. In a third bowl, mix bread crumbs and sesame seeds. Working one onion ring at a time (and using one hand for dipping onion into wet ingredients and the other for dipping into dry ingredients), remove an onion ring from the water. Coat in flour, knocking on the side of the bowl to remove excess flour. Completely coat in pancake batter, allowing excess batter to drip off before transferring onion ring to bread crumbs, and adding additional water to the batter as it thickens.

Make a well in bread crumbs, drop in batter-coated onion ring, bury the ring with crumbs, then use your palm to press crumbs onto the onion ring. Once or twice during the coating process, use a slotted spoon to remove any clumps from bread crumbs. Stack onion rings into alternating layers in a large, shallow container so the edges touch as little as possible. Refrigerate until ready to use. (Onion rings can be refrigerated, uncovered, up to 24 hours ahead.) Heat oven to 200 degrees. In an 8-quart soup kettle, heat oil to 350 degrees. Set a cooling rack over a baking sheet for stacking and draining the rings. Drop rings (spring-action tongs work well for this) one at a time into oil, fitting in four or five per batch. Cook for about 2 minutes or until a rich brown, turning each ring halfway through cooking. Transfer to rack, sprinkle with salt and serve. (Can be held in a 200-degree oven up to 30 minutes.)

Makes about 2 dozen jumbo rings. Per ring: 151 calories, 5g fat (1g saturated), 4g protein, 22g carbohydrates, 1g fiber, 265mg sodium.

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How to Make Perfect Onion Rings

Buy the biggest onions you can find and cut them into very thick rings. The bigger the onion and the thicker the ring, the fewer you have to make. Thick rings are easier to cut than thin ones, and they taste better once they're fried.

Remove the papery thin membrane covering the inside of each ring -- very important. If you don't, the coating will adhere to the membrane rather than the ring and may fall off during frying.

Place the onion rings in water -- not to tone down their pungency, as some recipes suggest, but to help the next coating (flour) adhere.

Dredge the water-soaked onion ring in flour. Because the onion ring's surface is so slick, it's almost impossible to get a batter or coating to stick without this step. The water/flour combination creates a rough paste-like texture that helps the next coating adhere.

Dip the onion ring in store-bought pancake batter. A leavened batter (one that includes baking powder, baking soda or both) swells and envelopes the ring during frying. But I found making a from-scratch batter complicates the recipe. By using store-bought pancake batter, you just add water and season with salt.

Keep thinning the batter with water. During dipping, the flour-water mixture from the rings eventually causes the pancake batter to thicken, so keep adding water to the batter so that it stays the consistency of house paint.

Coat the onion rings in bread crumbs. Onion rings coated only with batter are messy and must be fried immediately. Plus, a thick batter forms a sponge-like coating, resulting in a greasy onion ring. The bread crumb finish gives the onion rings an exceptionally crisp exterior and helps the ring brown quickly so that the onion doesn't overcook and collapse.

Make the onion rings ahead and fry them ahead, too. The bread crumb coating allows the onion rings to be completed ahead of time (up to 24 hours). And since they hold beautifully in a 200-degree oven for at least a half-hour, the onion rings can be made and fried long before guests arrive.

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More online recipes

30-Minute meals
Righteous Ribs (Super Bowl flavor)
Super Soups