147 crackling recipes

Bread and butter pickles with thin-sliced cucumbers and onions brined with salt and ice, then packed in a sweet-sour brown sugar, cider vinegar, mustard, and turmeric syrup.

Oprah's mock Caesar salad lightens up the classic with a no-egg, no-anchovy dressing built on lemon juice, soy sauce, and garlic. Romaine and Belgian endive, ready in 10 minutes and naturally low-fat.

Airy honeycomb candy cooked to hard crack, foamed with baking soda, then dipped in melted chocolate for crunchy, melt-in-your-mouth homemade treats.

This relish is based on a prize-winning English recipe of more than a generation ago. It is less sweet than traditional chutneys; most of its sweetness comes not from sugar, but from apples, dates, and parsnips. I generally use Winesap apples but any well-flavored, crisp eating apple will do.

Tender pork chops simmered in V8 juice with dried basil and cracked black pepper until fork-tender. Just 5 ingredients and one pan for an easy, diabetic-friendly weeknight dinner.

Seared bay scallops glazed with a reduced vermouth and lemon sauce, finished with fresh dill and cracked pepper. A light, elegant 20-minute seafood dish with bright, clean flavors.

Traditional Swiss Basel Leckerli: honey-spice cookie bars with cinnamon, cloves, candied peels, kirsch, and almonds under a crackly sugar glaze. Makes 50 to 60 bars that keep for weeks.

Cream filbert cookies with a whole hazelnut hidden inside each shortbread ball, glazed in vanilla icing and rolled in sugar. Vintage Pacific Northwest holiday cookie with a sweet crackly finish.

Crunchy low-fat coleslaw with shredded green apples, red and green cabbage, and a tangy honey-mustard yogurt dressing. No mayo needed for this crisp, make-ahead slaw.

No-knead bread loaves with scalded milk dough, baked over a steam pan for a crackly crust. Simple everyday bread that works with half whole wheat flour too.

Three bean vinaigrette salad with rice, kidney beans, and marinated artichoke hearts. A no-cook vegetarian salad served chilled over lettuce leaves.

Old-fashioned raisin nougat made with hard-crack sugar syrup, marshmallow cream, and cocoa butter. A vintage homemade candy with chewy raisins folded throughout.

Homemade English muffins cooked on a griddle, dusted with cornmeal for that signature crackly bottom and full of nooks and crannies for melted butter to pool in.

Molasses cookies with a surprising hit of mint extract, warm cinnamon, ginger, and clove. Crackly sugar-rolled tops and chewy spiced centers.

Mom's peppered ham: poached ham shank coated in cracked black peppercorns and dried in a low oven for paper-thin deli-style slices. Old-school deli cooking at home.

Prime rib roasted in a rock salt crust that seals in every drop of juice, producing fork-tender, deeply seasoned meat. A showstopping Old English technique you crack open with a hammer.