The Serious Eats Editors' Favorite Recipes of 2025

The Serious Eats recipes our editors proudly played favorites with.

By
Leah Colins
A studio portrait of editor Leah Colins.
Leah Colins
Senior Culinary Editor

Leah is the Senior Culinary Editor at Serious Eats, and was previously a recipe developer and editor with America's Test Kitchen for almost 9 years. She has developed recipes for and edited over 20 cookbooks ranging in topic from bread baking to plant-based eating to outdoor grilling and so much more. While there, she also developed recipes and articles for Cooks Illustrated Magazine, Cooks Country Magazine, and ATK's digital platform.Before her life as a recipe developer, she cooked in 5-star and Michelin-starred fine dining establishments from coast to coast such as The Herbfarm and Aubergine Restaurant at L'Auberge Carmel; she also treasures her time flipping burgers on flattops in her teenage years, and baking and boxing cookies and pies at a wonderful family-owned German bakery in her early professional life.

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Published December 31, 2025
Array of dishes displayed to illustrate favorite recipes of 2025

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Picking a favorite recipe is a bit like picking a favorite child—except the children are casseroles, stews, and cookies, and everyone is encouraged to play favorites loudly in public. Over the past year, our editors cooked a lot: for work, for friends and family, and, occasionally just because a recipe lodged itself in our brains and wouldn't leave.

The dishes below are the ones that truly stuck—the recipes we’ve returned to, talked about long after testing, and recommended enthusiastically to anyone who asked what to cook next. These are the recipes that won us over in 2025—not because they were trendy, but because they were genuinely our favorites.

  • Cantonese-Style One-Pot Braised Brisket

    white dish of Cantonese braised brisket with a spoon of beef and daikon on a white tablecloth

    Serious Eats / Amanda Suarez

    "My favorite way to annoy Genevieve is to ask her how much I could pay her to remake a recipe for me to take home. You know how it goes, dinner always tastes better when someone else makes it for you! And that question was the first thing I said after taking a bite of her Cantonese-style braised brisket during our shoot day. It's so comforting, so rich, and so easy to make. It's one of my new go-to comfort meals but of course, never tastes quite as great as when Genevieve made it."- Amanda Suarez, associate director, visuals

  • Grilled Peach and Burrata Salad

    A plate of grilled peach salad with herbs, prosciutto, and cheese

    Serious Eats / Lorena Masso

    "Always an impossible task, picking a favorite recipe from the year. This one stands out in my mind because I went on CBS to chat about summer grilling, and this was one of the featured recipes. It so enthralled the hosts that one of them cried out "I'm not finished" when it was time to move onto the next dish before he was ready to put this one down. It really is that good."- Daniel Gritzer, editorial director

  • Chinese Sweet and Sour Pork

    A bowl of Chinese sweet and sour pork with pineapple and vegetables chopsticks holding a piece above the dish

    Serious Eats / Qi Ai

    "For some reason, sweet and sour chicken is very popular in the US—even though it's sweet and sour pork that's actually loved across China! I loved the dish as a child and still love it today, and am so glad we finally have a recipe for it on the site."- Genevieve Yam, senior editor

  • Beef Bourguignon Pot Pie

    A beef bourguignon pot pie in a skillet with a portion being lifted with a utensil

    Serious Eats / Deli Studios

    "Serious Eats contributor Zola Gregory has inspired me to give all my favorite stews the pot pie treatment. Here, she tops beef Bourguignon with puff pastry, turning it into an even cozier dinner."- Genevieve

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  • Musakhan (Palestinian Chicken and Potatoes)

    Sheet pan with roasted chicken and potatoes plate served with yogurt and lemon slices

    Serious Eats / Amanda Suarez

    "Feeding a family of four, I’m always on the hunt for low-lift sheet-pan chicken dinners that don’t taste like a compromise. Laila’s sheet-pan musakhan delivers all the deeply spiced, onion-y richness of the Palestinian classic, but smartly swaps hard-to-find taboon bread for potatoes that roast alongside the chicken. Unlike traditional musakhan—where the components are cooked separately and assembled at the end—everything here comes together on a single pan thanks to thoughtful sequencing."- Leah Colins, senior culinary editor

  • Khoresh-e-beh (Persian Stew)

    A dish of khoreshe beh alongside sides like rice and other accompaniments

    Serious Eats / Nader Mehravari

    "I consider quince a magical fruit. When raw, it's firm and astringent, but it softens, turns rosy, and becomes lightly honeyed and floral when slowly cooked. I have a deep appreciation for Iranian stews, especially meat and fruit braises where rich, savory depth is balanced by bright, fruity notes and served over fragrant rice. Nader's khoresh-e-beh delivers all of that, bringing together layered flavors that make it a perfect autumn stew."-Laila Ibrahim, associate culinary editor

  • Galayet Bandora (Jordanian Stir-Fried Tomatoes)

    A hand dipping bread into a bowl of a cooked tomatobased dish another dish in the background

    Serious Eats / Amanda Suarez

    "Kitchen days are the best days at Serious Eats, and I am still dreaming of the day Laila made her galayet bandora this past summer. Simultaneously rich and light, this is the sort of satisfying summer meal I love. And I appreciate that Laila seems to share the same "no such thing as too much olive oil" philosophy I hold. You need ripe tomatoes for this, so I probably won't eat it again until next summer, but I'll be dreaming of it until then."-Megan O. Steintrager, associate editorial director

  • Tahini Thumbprint Cookies

    Thumbprint cookies with seeds and jam filling on red wrapping paper

    Serious Eats / Victor Protasio

    "I bookmark practically every recipe Laila publishes, but this one flew to the top of my list. With just the right amount of bitter tahini and sweet-tart raspberry jam, it was love at first bite."- Rochelle Bilow, editor

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