Week Five: Classic Italian — The Recipes

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Rich Bolognese Bolognese over Rigatoni Stuffed Peppers Garlic Butter Chicken White Bean & Tomato Soup Lamb Chops & Potatoes Tiramisu Chocolate Pudding Macerated Strawberries

Make the bolognese first. It is the only thing this week that asks for real time — thirty minutes of chopping and browning, then two and a half hours of the pot doing the work while you do something else entirely. One batch yields six to eight cups, which is three meals: rigatoni for two nights at four servings apiece, then whatever is left folded with rice into the stuffed peppers on a third. Everything after that is a short recipe.

And short is the point. The lunchboxes are back out, the alarm goes off in the dark again, and nobody in this house has three hours to spend standing at a stove. So the rest of the week is deliberately plain: chicken pounded thin and basted in garlic-rosemary butter with a sheet pan of broccoli next to it, a one-pot tomato and white bean soup for Friday, and lamb chops over charcoal for the night you want to feel like a person again.

The desserts run the same way. The tiramisu is the make-ahead — assemble it the night before and let the fridge do the rest. The chocolate pudding is fifteen minutes on the stovetop. The strawberries are a bowl, some sugar, and two hours of patience, and they will outperform their effort every single time.

Nothing here is trying to impress anyone. It’s trying to get dinner on the table in the first week of September, which is a harder assignment and a more useful one.

Week 5 Grocery List Everything for all nine recipes — organized by aisle, with notes on where ingredients are shared across dishes. Check items off as you shop. A good deal of this week’s list may already be in your pantry. Open list →

The Sauce make first

Rich Bolognese Pancetta, soffritto, red wine, crushed tomatoes and whole milk, held at a bare simmer until it turns glossy. Six to eight cups — enough for three meals, and usually a bowl left over besides. Yields 6–8 cups 30 min active 2½–3 hr simmer Shared sauce →

The Dinners 5 recipes

Bolognese over Rigatoni The week’s batch sauce, first night out. Three-quarters of a cup per person, a ladle of pasta water, and a hard shower of Parmesan. Four servings a night, two nights running. Serves 4 × 2 nights 20 min Easy Uses bolognese → Bolognese Stuffed Peppers The third meal from the same pot — what’s left of the sauce folded into basmati, piled into pepper halves, blanketed with mozzarella and baked until the tops catch. Serves 4–6 10–12 halves 50 min Uses bolognese → Garlic Butter Chicken & Roasted Broccoli Breasts pounded thin, seared hard in oil, then basted in butter with crushed garlic and rosemary. Broccoli roasts alongside at 425°F. Around fifteen dollars, feeds four. Serves 4 30 min 5 ingredients Weeknight → White Bean & Tomato Soup Four kinds of tomato cooked down slow in garlic oil, emulsified with cannellini beans into something silkier than it has any right to be. This is the Friday meal. Serves 4–6 55 min One pot Meatless Friday → Grilled Lamb Chops & Duck Fat Potatoes Lemon, rosemary and garlic marinade, a two-zone charcoal fire, and Yukon Golds parboiled then roasted hard in rosemary-garlic duck fat. Both dishes on one timeline. Serves 4 70 min Charcoal grill Special occasion →

The Desserts 3 recipes

Tiramisu Egg yolk cream, mascarpone, and Chemex coffee poured over the ladyfingers as you layer. Best made the night before — the fridge is doing most of the work. Serves 6–8 25 min active Make ahead No bake → Stovetop Chocolate Pudding Cocoa and bittersweet chocolate both, whisked into whole milk and finished with butter and vanilla. Fifteen minutes on the stove, then the fridge. Serves 4 15 min active Kid-friendly Gluten-free → Macerated Strawberries & Whipped Cream A pint sliced, two tablespoons of sugar, and a few hours in the fridge to make their own syrup. Works just as well with peaches, over gelato, or on shortcake. Serves 4 5 min active 3 ingredients No bake →