14 French Beauties for Bastille Day

In our next life, we'd like to be French peasants, or at least, eat like them. We have a soft spot for beet recipes that utilize both the sweet root and minerally tops. Here, Amy_N-B has you caramelize slices of yellow and red beets (we used 4 large beets total; might do 3 next time) and then add a mix of beet tops and Swiss chard, cooking them just enough to wilt. You'll love the dish at this point, but you'll be riveted if you serve it with oozy boucheron and good country bread.

Jennifer Ann's green bean salad is refined and elegant enough to please the most devoted Francophile, but it's far from pretentious. The ingredient list is a study in green (beans, zucchini, tarragon, capers, green peppercorns, olive oil), and the fresh, herbal crunchiness of the resulting salad is a lovely expression of the color itself. A dab of mayo tames the assertiveness of some of the supporting ingredients, rendering the dressed vegetables velvety and zippy at the same time. The combination of tarragon and capers make this a great accompaniment for salmon or other fish. - A&M

An oldie but a goodie, this hearkens back to my cooking school days, with some thanks also to Julia Child.

We have a soft spot for press-in pastry dough, which is a great feature of this blueberry tart. SmallKitchCara has you simply mix the pastry ingredients with a wooden spoon and pat the wet dough into a tart pan – a boon to anyone afraid of rolling pins (ahem, Merrill). But it was the crumble-like topping on this tart that really appealed to us. The crumble sinks down into the blueberries and peaches as they soften, and crisps on top, creating layers of texture. The filling and juices are pure and loose, and timidly sweetened, which we thought complemented the fruit’s acidity. Two notes: we lifted the fruit from its juices before adding it to the tart, as we didn't want to make the crust too soggy, and we found that our filled tart needed a little extra cooking time -- about 35 minutes in total. - A&M

In our next life, we'd like to be French peasants, or at least, eat like them. We have a soft spot for beet recipes that utilize both the sweet root and minerally tops. Here, Amy_N-B has you caramelize slices of yellow and red beets (we used 4 large beets total; might do 3 next time) and then add a mix of beet tops and Swiss chard, cooking them just enough to wilt. You'll love the dish at this point, but you'll be riveted if you serve it with oozy boucheron and good country bread.

Pan Bagnat, literally "bathed bread," is a great solution to the brown bag lunch dilemma, and Waverly's version is pitch-perfect. A decidedly Nicoise tuna salad is pressed between two garlic and oil slicked halves of a baguette and left in the fridge overnight, which allows all of the juices to soak into the bread. We chose to include both of the optional ingredients -- crisp green beans, briny artichoke hearts -- and were glad we did. The resulting sandwich was a glorious riot of colors, flavors and textures. - A&M

As aargersi, who first tested this recipe as an Editors' Pick, put it: "AntoniaJames is a master at layering flavors so that everything sings together and there is no one pushy soloist." We couldn't have said it better ourselves. This is the ultimate clean, crisp salad for a picnic (no wilting here), with summer's best produce -- perky haricots verts, sweet cherry tomatoes, and crunchy Persian cucumber -- accented by measured doses of anise, honey and tarragon. The dressing is enriched with hard-boiled egg yolk and roasted garlic -- two festive ingredients that make it special but still safe for a sunny day.

We love Madeleine cookies, so we decided to try a chocolate version for the contest. This are not too sweet and pretty rich. If you like them not as sweet use only 1/2 a cup of sugar.

These are the bounciest beignets you'll ever taste, partnered with a punchy aioli. ChefJune sticks to her convictions, using all olive oil and lots of egg yolk and garlic to great effect here, against fritters studded with sweet crab. We loved her use of vinegar-softened breadcrumbs in the aioli -- a traditional Provençal technique which bolsters and thickens the sauce, threading a subtle vinegary aroma through without compromising the aioli's smooth, buttery texture. - A&M

Pie, without the masochism. This is a tart crust that loves you back, adapted from Parisian pastry expert Paule Caillat. Fill it with chocolate ganache, lemon curd, or sweetened mascarpone and summer berries.

You will sop up every last bit of sauce with bread because it is so delicious. Maria Teresa Jorge took this classic dish and amplified its flavor by adding not a few sage leaves and garlic cloves but 10 and 12 respectively. We liked the touch of Cognac in addition to the wine, and the flour and cream slurry that goes in the end and smooths the sauce. A few cooking notes: we poured off the fat after browning the chicken, and our little chicken pieces cooked in half the time. Keep an eye on those little buggers. And if you want to skip the flour you can -- the sauce may not get as emulsified but it'll still taste great. - A&M

Here you have all the flavors that go so well with mussels -- fennel, saffron, thyme, tomatoes, vermouth, and of course (something we love!), Pernod. You do a little chopping, then add the ingredients a few at a time to the pot. In a few short minutes, you have a fragrant and delicious mussel stew, a dinner-for-one that underlines the importance of treating yourself well, even when alone. And you can quadruple the recipe for a party. - A&M

Sometimes I need to be reminded of the simple not-quite-recipes that are just as pleasing as an elaborate feast. Here I share this humble gem, along with another favorite, fresh radishes with butter and salt. Happy lunching.

In 1976, as a relatively new bride, my mother (Veronica) signed up for a series of cooking classes run by a local cookware store near my parents' house in Connecticut. Up until that point, she'd taught herself pretty much everything she knew about cooking, by experimenting with recipes from her subscription to Gourmet and various cookbooks. But she had never really learned the basics. So, off she went for 3 hours every Wednesday afternoon, to master soups, baking and -- most importantly -- the art of the Cold Buffet. My mother felt much more confident after these classes, and she's been a great cook ever since. As she put it, the classes "opened the door" to a whole new world of improvisation in the kitchen. One of the dishes she learned in the Cold Buffet class in particular stuck with her: a coeur a la creme with strawberries, which she made frequently for Easter while I was growing up. Several years ago, she gave me the recipe, and I now make it regularly. This year, my mother made a coeur a la creme and brought it when she and my father came to our apartment for Easter dinner. We sat around the table, filling our spoons with drifts of the snowy white, barely sweet dessert, and life was good.