Even after nearly two decades in food media, it can be hard to predict the kind of recipe that will resonate with readers, but some dishes, like pizza, chocolate, pasta and cake, never fail to please.

Below you'll find the 25 most-clicked recipes of 2026 (so far), including the silkiest, real-deal Fettuccine Alfredo, an enriched, easy-stretch pizza dough, and a chocolate cake that's cooked on the stovetop.

Easy-Stretch Yogurt Pizza Dough

"This recipe is phenomenal" wrote one reader of this yogurt-enriched dough. "I like [it] rather plain with herbs, salt, olive oil, and a sprinkle of cheese— makes a delicious appetizer or flatbread base." Is it heretical to use yogurt in pizza dough? Traditionalists would say yes. But there’s no arguing that the yogurt in this high-hydration formula yields a dough that is easy to shape into rounds because it does not recoil when stretched. It also adds flavor.

Emergency Chocolate Cake

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. It’s said to originate during the Great Depression when ingredients were scarce—hence another of its monikers, chocolate Depression cake. Cocoa powder rather than bar chocolate supplies the chocolate flavor and rich color.

Fettuccine Alfredo

Our recipe for this classic Italian pasta calls for just three ingredients: fresh pasta, butter, cheese and salt. The result is completely unlike most American interpretations. Instead of a gloopy, gluey, sauce; it's light and silky, and thickened only until it clings to the fettuccine.

Apple Cake (Torta Bolzano)

This rustic apple cake sports crisp, deeply caramelized edges and a custardy interior, a texture achieved by coating a heap of thinly sliced fruit in crepe-like batter. We learned it from home cook Franca Giuliani in Padergnone, in the Trentino region of northern Italy. To add deep, nutty notes, we brown the butter.

1-2-3-4 Scones

A formula recipe in the Julia Child tradition—easy enough to memorize, so you can whip up tender, lightly sweet scones to use as a vehichle for whatever fresh or dried fruit you have on hand. Or you can ditch the fruit and add a cup of toasted and chopped pecans, walnuts or hazelnuts. If spices excite you, add some ground cinnamon, cardamom or ginger to the dry ingredients. If you find citrus scintillating, stir some grated lemon or orange zest into the wet ingredients.

Mexican Sweet Corn Cake

This simple baked treat is ubiquitous in Mexican food markets, street stalls and restaurants. Called panqué de elote, pan de elote or pastel de elote. Its texture lands somewhere between cake and cornbread while hinting at custard. At La Cocina de Mi Mamá in Mexico City, we had it for breakfast, but finished with a dusting of powdered sugar, it also makes a casual, homey dessert.

No-Fry Neapolitan Eggplant Parmesan

At the family-owned trattoria La Tavernetta Vittozzi in Naples, Anna Vittozzi taught us to make a lighter eggplant Parmesan that still was rich with cheese and tangy with tomato sauce. The secret? Skip the breading. With the more hands-off approach of roasting olive oil-brushed slices in the oven, we got a golden-brown, silky-textured eggplant, perfect for layering with a simple tomato sauce and fresh basil, plus plenty of cheese.

Tomato Salad with Burnt Honey Vinaigrette

This salad dresses summer tomatoes with a unique sweet-tart vinaigrette. We cook honey until it caramelizes, then offset its bittersweet notes with wine vinegar and olive oil. A mild, light-colored honey such as clover or orange blossom is best, as stronger, darker varieties overwhelm the tomatoes.

Whipped Caramel Cream

This whipped caramel cream is the perfect embellishment for rice pudding, a fruit crostata or chocolate cake. Or just eat it off a spoon. Make sure the caramel is thoroughly chilled before whipping; it will keep in the refrigerator for up to two days unwhipped.

Whipped Cream Cake

This tall, downy cake relies on the fat in heavy cream—not on butter or oil—for richness and a fine, tender crumb. If you were to crunch the numbers, you would find that 1½ cups heavy cream—the amount called for in this recipe—contains more than four ounces (or ½ cup) of butterfat, so there is no skimping on luxury here! Simple and subtly sweet, the cake tastes of cream and vanilla. All it needs is a dusting of powdered sugar, if you’re so inclined, and some sugar-macerated berries alongside.

Vietnamese Chicken Salad with Sweet Lime-Garlic Dressing

“Bursting with flavor,” one reader writes of this almost rainbow-colored Vietnamese chicken salad (goi gà)—a vibrant-yet-savory dinner salad which “feels healthy and totally satisfying.” The classic Vietnamese flavors sing: fish sauce for umami richness, brightened with a cut of lime, punched up with sugar. A beautiful, crisp mix of carrots, basil, and cabbage complement soft bites of chicken, with peanuts for a satisfying crunch.

Two-Corn Chowder with Green Chili and Scallions

This summery chowder pairs fresh sweet corn with hominy, a dried large-kernel corn cooked with alkali, yielding a tender-chewy, pleasantly starchy texture. Either white or yellow hominy will work here. We eke every ounce of sweet, grassy flavor out of the fresh corn. We slice off the kernels, scrape the milk from the ears and simmer the cobs in the broth. For the best color, opt for yellow corn rather than white. Pass hot sauce at the table for adding to taste.

Penne "Dragged" Through Ragù

At the 110-year-old Trattoria Sergio Gozzi in Florence, chef Alessandro Gozzi shared a few tips. First, the base: a classic soffrito, followed by a generous amount of warming spices—coriander, nutmeg, cinnamon—added directly to the beef. But the real revelation was a cheesy béchamel, stirred into the ragù. It sounds heavy, but it does the opposite. The butter-flour-milk mixture adds body while actually lightening the sauce, helping marry it to the noodles as the pasta finishes cooking directly in the pot. That's the "dragging"—the penne pulls the sauce into itself as the liquid thickens and clings.

Campanelle Pasta with Sweet Corn, Tomatoes and Basil

This summery campanelle utilizes sweet corn two ways to infuse the noodles with creamy, grassy sweetness: lessons that have served us well over the years. Inspired by one from Al Forno in Providence, RI, cobs are first boiled in water to enrich the noodles’ flavor, then kernels are grated to tease out a starchy corn “milk” to create a pan sauce that clings to the noodles. One reader points out that it makes a “great base for riffing." We agree.

Ultra-Light Chocolate Mousse

At Le Bon George in Paris, chef Loïc Lobet taught Chris Kimball the secret to a cloud-like chocolate mousse: Use whipped egg whites, not whipped cream, as the base. It's better, but it's also far easier. We skip the double-boiler, the egg tempering, and the finicky temperature-monitoring. Instead, we melt the chocolate by pouring melted butter and warmed half-and-half into the bowl, let it cool slightly, then add the egg yolks to the still-warm mixture.

Stovetop Chocolate Cake

This no-oven-needed chocolate cake is "steamed" for about 20 minutes in a Dutch oven, which is not uncommon in many parts of the world. (It's used to make for Indonesian and Chinese rice cakes and Korean red-bean pat siruteok.) The result in an unimaginably moist, tender cake every time. Our chocolate version strikes a balance of being rich but not dense. Its velvety simplicity pairs well with a scoop of vanilla ice cream or just a dusting of powdered sugar.

Summer Tomato Tian

While a tian usually features an assortment of summer produce, this one highlights the rich, deep, concentrated flavor of roasted plum tomatoes. Seasoned simply with salt, herbs, and olive oil , the tomatoes are cooked until bubbly and jammy. Enjoy on warm crusty bread with cheese. ⁠

Chili Crisp Chicken and Corn Soup

James Ooi—founder of Little Bao Boy, an Asian street food business based in Leeds, England—inspired us with his go-to soup for a quick weeknight dinner. Chicken breast, soy sauce, and canned corn. We were intrigued. Based on his description, we developed this recipe. It requires only a half dozen ingredients and no knife work except the slicing of scallions for garnish. Be sure to use cream-style corn, as Ooi does; it is sweetened and thickened with starch, which are important for the flavor and consistency of the soup. A drizzle of chili crisp adds color and spiciness, but toasted sesame oil is a good alternative.

Korean Fire Chicken

For this simple spin on Korean buldak, which translates as “fire chicken,” you will need a large broiler-safe skillet. Gochujang, or Korean fermented chili paste, is a key ingredient. Look for it in the international aisle in supermarkets or in Asian grocery stores. Different brands can vary in spiciness, so you may want to start with the smaller amount, then taste after whisking with the vinegar and soy.

Browned Butter Gâteau Magique

Gâteau magique, or magic cake, is a French dessert that lives up to its name. During baking, its seven-ingredient batter separates into three layers: a firm, flan-like bottom, a creamy, pudding-like center and a puffy, souffléed crown. Our version gets notes of butterscotch from brown sugar and browned butter. Be sure the eggs and milk are at room temperature before mixing. If the batter is cool, it won’t separate as it cooks and the cake will be underrisen. Cool completely before slicing.

Miso Butter Spaghetti with Scallions

Miso and garlic deliver a flavor upgrade to that classic kid food—buttered noodles. Softened butter mixed with miso, garlic, scallion whites and lemon juice creates a simple, flavorful no-cook sauce for pasta. The heat from the noodles and some of the starchy pasta cooking water melts the butter, creating a silky coating. Use mild white miso, assertive red miso or a combination.

Lemon Possets

Lemon posset is quite possibly the easiest dessert you can make. It’s a classic British “pudding” that requires only three ingredients—lemon, cream and sugar—and only a few minutes at the stovetop. There’s no need to whisk, whip or fold. The acidity of the lemon juice, combined with gentle heat, acts upon the dairy proteins, curdling the mixture into a silky, custard-like consistency. We found that a two-step process—making lemon sugar syrup, then adding warm cream—yields the smoothest, perfectly set texture.

Potato Flatbreads

Two ingredients, one skillet. This Slovakian potato flatbread stays delicate thanks to the mashed potatoes, and gets its flavor from dry-skillet browning. These flatbreads are especially moist, tender and pliable, not unlike extra-thick crêpes. Known as lokše, they hail from Central Europe, where they’re a traditional accompaniment to duck and goose. We think they’re a satisfying accompaniment to just about any type of stew, braise or soup.

Chocolate Potato Cake

Cakes made with mashed potatoes likely originated in the early 1900s as a resourceful way to use up leftovers. But it turns out there is magic in adding mashed potatoes to a cake batter. They not only inhibit gluten development so the crumb bakes up ultra-tender, they also retain water, which keeps the cake exceptionally moist. In this recipe, we use instant potato flakes to avoid the nuisance of peeling, boiling, ricing and cooling the spuds.

Pasta with Smothered Tomatoes and Sweet Peppers

This dump-and-stir sauce could not be easier to make but the flavors are rich and layered, as if the ingredients have simmered all day. It’s a stewy, silky mix of cherry tomatoes and bell peppers that’s perfect tossed with short pasta shapes with sauce-catching twists and curls. Sharp, tangy pecorino Romano cheese (or crumbly, milky ricotta salata) offers salty, savory contrast to the natural sweetness of the vegetables.

Claire Lower

Claire Lower is the Digital Editor for Christopher Kimball’s Milk Street, with over a decade of experience as a food writer and recipe developer. Claire began writing about food (and drinks) during the blogging boom in the late 2000s, eventually leaving her job as a lab technician to pursue writing full-time. After freelancing for publications such as Serious Eats, Yahoo Food, xoJane and Cherry Bombe Magazine, she eventually landed at Lifehacker, where she served as the Senior Food Editor for nearly eight years. Claire lives in Portland, Oregon with a very friendly dog and very mean cat. When not in the kitchen (or at her laptop), you can find her deadlifting at the gym, fly fishing or trying to master figure drawing at her local art studio.