Christopher Kimball’s Milk Street

10/15/2026

Get the recipe for Skillet Fettuccine Alfredo: https://bit.ly/4Bbybuy

Everybody’s wrong about fettuccine Alfredo, according to Chris Kimball (at least, many restaurants in America). It's often presented as a gloopy, thick cream sauce with heavy cream, milk, flour, and multiple varieties of cheese.

Instead it’s a lighter, silkier sauce believed to have been invented in the early 20th century at Ristorante Alfredo alla Scrofa. True fettuccine Alfredo contains just five ingredients: fresh egg fettuccine, butter, Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese, water and salt. Warmed by the just-cooked pasta, the butter and cheese should melt into a smooth, creamy marriage, a bond held tight by the starchy water in which the fettuccine was cooked.

Inspired by cacio e pepe in Rome, we cook the pasta in a skillet with just enough water to cover, which yields a concentrated, starchy liquid. That starch keeps the cheese from clumping and holds the butter and cheese in a smooth, creamy emulsion—no heavy cream needed.

10/14/2026

Japanese cheesecake, otherwise known as “cotton cheesecake,” is the opposite of New York-style cheesecake: more a hybrid of sponge cake and the cheesecake germane to the US. Chris Kimball recently visited Rikuro’s, in Osaka, where cakes are cranked out at an amazing pace and volume. They lived up to the legend.

The fluffy texture—known as fuwa fuwa in Japanese—is achieved by incorporating whipped egg whites into the batter, similar to a soufflé technique. The cream cheese is typically mixed with egg yolks, milk, and a small amount of flour, then carefully folded with stiffly beaten egg whites to create an airy, cloud-like consistency.

We like its subtle sweetness and added lemon zest and vanilla for light, bright flavor.

Get the recipe for Japanese Cheesecake below.

This hybrid of sponge cake and classic cheesecake goes by multiple names, including Japanese cheesecake, cotton cheesecake and soufflé cheesecake.

10/14/2026

Get the recipe for Penne with Preserved Lemon and Pecorino: https://bit.ly/4se0sg1

Preserved lemons—a North African ingredient most often associated with Morocco—bring citrus intensity, complex flavor and a pleasant funkiness to buttery pasta.

If that's a little hard to conceptualize, our eloquent director of education Rosie Gill describes them as "akin to anchovy in tomato sauce"; they bring the umami developed through fermentation, which transforms a sauce from too lean and light into something with more roundness and heft, while staying bright and fresh.

10/10/2026

In the Cotswolds, the experimental farm Farm ED is studying regenerative agriculture—restoring degraded soils, using sustainable practices. The operation uses sheep to suppress weeds and fertilize wheat fields, chickens on rotation to devour grubs and add nutrients, and on-site scientists taking constant soil samples to measure the difference against conventional commodity farming.

As our director of education Rosie Gill told us, the connection to cooking is direct: regenerative farming on a smaller scale means growing different varieties of wheat, which means different flours with distinct flavors and characteristics. "It's like painting black and white or painting with a full color palette," Rosie said.

As part of our Milk Street Cotswolds culinary trip, pizza wizard Rich Payne treated us to a pizza class using flour from locally grown and milled grains. We used our favorite outdoor ovens by Ooni, which baked up plush, bubbly crusts with super high heat. (They also have a countertop oven, which we use in office frequently.)

10/09/2026

Get the recipe for Roasted Kabocha Squash and Herb Salad: https://bit.ly/47B4VQ9

Rosie Gill went to Sardinia to eat fish. She came back with the secret to the world's best squash.

At the acclaimed restaurant Josto in Cagliari, chef Pierluigi Fais serves roasted winter squash nearly hidden under a mountain of wild herb salad. It flips the usual American approach, where herbs are an afterthought.

This is a perfect combination because winter squash on its own is often too sweet. But paired with pungent, bitter, peppery greens, the sweetness is a welcome contrast. We deeply roast the squash wedges (critical), then top with a vinaigrette of chopped mint and parsley and pile the salad on top.

10/08/2026

Get the recipe for Oaxacan Chickpea Soup (Sopa de Garbanzo): https://bit.ly/4hIJhOr

Chickpea flour soup? This is one of the most exciting culinary surprises of the year to Chris. As we learned from chef Rodolfo Castellanos at Origen restaurant in Oaxaca, chickpea flour produces a meaty, almost peanutty soup base; rather than use whole chickpeas for his sopa de garbanzo, he used chickpea flour to create a light, smooth consistency and deep, rich, nutty flavor from first toasting.

We sautée onions and garlic, then add a ton of chickpea flour, then water and broth. Then top with some olive oil, lemon, chipotle chili powder, and a poached egg.

10/07/2026

Get the recipe for Emergency Chocolate Cake below.

Meet the “crazy” cake that breaks all the rules.⁠
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Born out of the Great Depression, then gaining a resurgence in popularity in the midst of World War II, this ultra-easy, dump-and-stir cake became a mainstay for home cooks across the country due to its ingredients—or lack thereof. Instead of the usual eggs, milk and butter, this cake relies on vinegar and baking soda for leavening, while coffee and cocoa powder deliver deep chocolate notes without flavor-muting dairy.⁠
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We put this wartime recipe to the test, mixing the batter with just a bowl and whisk. With a moist, rich texture and deep, chocolatey flavor, the results prove that sometimes the best discoveries are born out of necessity; this simple cake is not only historically significant, but genuinely delicious.

This ultra-easy chocolate cake, made without eggs, milk and butter, is also known as crazy cake because it doesn’t require ingredients standard to most cakes.

10/07/2026

Get the recipe for Preserved Lemons: https://bit.ly/4hzacfB

Preserving lemons is not only an excellent food waste-busting technique, but the product is better than salt! In the opinion of our director of education Rosie Gill!

This Moroccan pantry staple combines two flavor-enhancing ingredients (lemons, salt) to produce a seasoning that's still briny but totally unique. They're complex, funky-yet-bright, and super savory. You'll most commonly find them rubbed on chicken but they're also excellent when added to chimichurri, a vinaigrette, a stew, or a topping for fish.

10/06/2026

Get the recipe for Whipped Guacamole: https://bit.ly/4rN84Wr

After trying a few remarkably creamy, almost mousse-like guacamoles at restaurants lately, Chris () decided to investigate. The answer is, unsurprisingly, the food processor, but a critical order of operations: lime juice, incorporated in two separate additions, some at the beginning and some at the end.

If you add it all at the beginning, the lime juice fully emulsifies into the avocado, resulting in duller flavor. If all of it is added at the end, the guacamole will be soupy. The two-addition process achieves creaminess and a final cut of acid to wake up the avocado and aromatic flavors.

Covered with plastic wrap directly against the surface, the guac will keep in the refrigerator a full day without any browning; bring to room temperature before serving.

If serving it as a dip, we like a finishing drizzle of olive oil and a sprinkling of flaky salt.

10/02/2026

Get the recipe for Venezuelan Cheese-Filled Corn Pancakes (Cachapas): https://bit.ly/4rCdkvO

Cachapas are a Venezuelen savory-sweet corn pancake that usually are folded around fillings, such as gooey cheese, to make half-moons.

But the simple, corn-forward batter is naturally gluten-free, which makes it prone to breaking when folding. To make things a little easier on the home cook, we make two larger pancakes and sandwich the filling between them, frying the whole thing in butter to give it a golden brown crispiness on the outside. It’s technically cheating, but utterly delicious.

Though not traditional, we use nixtamalized masa harina, which gives the rounds a nuttier, more pronounced and pure corn flavor. And, to further intensify that flavor, we blend whole kernels into the batter for a hit of grassy sweetness. The thick, porridge-like batter is made in the food processor, which keeps things simple and streamlined.

Venezuelan queso de mano can be hard to find in the States, but queso oaxaca or fresh mozzarella will work just fine. Don’t worry about fully melting the cheese; it’s supposed to be softened, not liquified. These are meant to be rich, so don’t be afraid top each cachapa with a little butter and crumbled cotija, and serve with your favorite hot sauce.