The Best Cookbooks for Making Easy Dinners (Even If You're Feeling Lazy)

I’m of two minds about the “weeknight dinner.” As someone who has cooked professionally and now writes about cooking and dining, phrases like “quick, weeknight dinners” and “easy meals” make me cringe inside a little bit. On the other hand, as a Very Busy Adult with a full-time job who likes to visit the gym, keep the house clean, see friends, and still have time for a few at least four episodes of Criminal Minds before bed, the idea of a healthy, high-quality dinner that doesn’t take three hours to prepare is pretty enticing. We’ve all planned to make that Thursday night recipe that we later realize actually takes four hours, and we’ve all been overly ambitious, aiming to make a way-too-complicated feast on a Tuesday that sounds amazing at 9 a.m., but when it comes time to chop that first onion, realized we lack motivation. Many of those nights, I wind up ordering a burrito or some ‘za, and I bet you do, too. And while that’s empirically an awesome thing to do, my budget (and gut) implore me not to indulge too often.

Thus, having an arsenal of cookbooks for chill weeknight feasts is a total game-changer. Last night, for example, I wanted something quick, hearty, and comforting, since it’s literally zero goddamn degrees outside. Stew sounded good, and I remembered that The New Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison contains an absolutely killer lentil soup. The dish has minimal ingredients and is pretty quick to prep, and after simmering for about half an hour, you’ve got a restaurant-quality feast. Other days, when I’m a bit less inspired, I’ll thumb through something like Meera Sodha’s East, Yotam Ottolenghi’s Simple, or one of the Cravings volumes by Chrissy Teigen, and will usually come up with something quick-ish and satisfying. These days, I’ll even plan my dinners out for the whole week so I can do the shopping in advance. Jesus, what have I become? I never thought my life would be like this, but, then again, Supervisory Special Agent Aaron Hotchner has serial killers to catch, and I need plenty of time to watch him do it!

Here are some of our favorite weeknight go-tos. 

Whether you’re trying to have a comfort food feast with your pals, a romantic dinner with Jeffrey (aka your own longtime boo), or a quick-but-delicious bite on a Wednesday, you can be assured that Ina Garten, aka the Barefoot Contessa, has a book for that. (We know this because we did a serious deep dive on through her catalog.) Her magnum opus for the working person, Go-To Dinners, features lighter options, from easy soups (like a creamy potato fennel soup, YUM) to hearty salads (such as roasted shrimp panzanella) and even kid-friendly options. A “family dinners” chapter features powerful dishes for the whole gang (think creamy chicken thighs, weeknight spaghettoni with tomatoes and pancetta, and one-pot oven risotto). All hail… and don’t forget your humongous Cosmo, which can be made any night of the week (and any time of day, for that matter, LOL). 

Alison Roman is the president of making any home meal feel like a party, and her ode to chilling at the crib, Dining In, has a ton of great recipes. The blistered green beans with creamy tahini and fresh hot sauce are a vegetarian side revelation; and “knife-and-fork salads” like the vinagared romaine with sour cream, bacon, and herbs give you permission to have a steakhouse-level salad feast on a dang Monday night. Worthwhile weeknight endeavors include a roasted tomato and anchovy bucatini and a skillet chicken with crushed olives and sumac. Disco ball not included.

If you cook a lot, you’ve probably encountered a bunch of Yotam Ottolenghi’s books and recipes. Simple, which focuses on “recipes that give you time to do everything else,” is full of incredibly tasty and rich bites—it’s high-key one of my most-used cookbooks. The roasted whole cauliflower with green tahini sauce is deceptively tasty (and visually impressive), and the pappardelle with rose harissa, black olives, and capers is full of spicy-briny-creamy flavor. 

For a really creative option that focuses on making the most of your pantry items (which is something we can all be better at), Ottolenghi Test Kitchen: Shelf Love by Ottolenghi and Noor Murad is a vibrant secret weapon, and the smoky, creamy pasta with burnt aubergine and tahini alone makes it worth the price. 

Chrissy Teigen’s cookbooks are super beloved, and not only by fans, but by numerous professional chefs and highly skilled home cooks I know. Everything in her volumes is hella fun and tasty—I like to think of these dishes as things I’d want to make after accidentally having three Negronis on the way home from work, like a sriracha Caesar salad, “actual drunken noodles,” and lemony arugula spaghetti cacio e pepe. Her most recent book, Cravings: All Together, has a recipe for chickpea crunch-wraps that I fantasize about. Literally, my partner is very tired of me asking whether we can eat Chrissy Teigen’s crunch-wraps. Joke’s on her—after writing this, I’m about to order ingredients to make ‘em tomorrow!

This powerful tome is considered one of the GOATs of vegetarian cooking. Because of that, it runs the gamut from intricate, time-consuming recipes to quick and easy ones (it’s mostly the latter, honestly). This is a magical volume to have, though, because you can always find something killer for the amount of time and energy you’ve got. The hearty lentil soup here is a frequent staple in my household; and there are literally hundreds of pages of deep-cut bangers, from braised tofu to stews, stir-fries, pastas, and more. If you love cookbooks and vegetarian/vegan food but don’t have this, you must pick it up immediately.

This volume from popular food blogger Love & Lemons (aka Jeanine Donofrio) has a dual focus on sustainability and easy cookin’, making it a perfect choice for people who want to enjoy a delicious feast on Tuesday and then use whatever’s left over to create an equally dope meal on Wednesday. There are stand-alone recipes, like creamy cauliflower enchiladas and a cozy autumn pasta bake; or you can plan meals ahead based on maximizing produce, like seared cabbage wedges one day, loaded pita nachos the following, and chickpea tacos with pickled cabbage on the third day. It’s a very fun book.

Whether we’re doing a full-on detox or just cooking a weeknight salad, we do stay Goopin’ over here. There’s no false advertising with Gwyneth Paltrow’s It’s All Easy—these recipes are all, in fact, very easy; plus, there’s an obvious health and wellness focus here, which I appreciate. Within are poke bowls, cauliflower mac ‘n cheese, ramen, chicken piccata, spot prawn pasta, and pita bread pizzas. Organized into categories like “On the Go,” “In a Pinch,” and “Cozy Evenings,” these recipes often clock in at under half an hour to make. The granola recipe in this book is something I prepare frequently—it hits that perfect nexus of sweet-crunchy-salty that you want out of a great granola. 

East is a really fun odyssey through pan-Asian cooking, from India to China to Japan, and it’s all corralled into a colorful collection of very weeknight-friendly recipes. If you’re like me and get excited by ingredients like Sichuan peppercorns, peanut butter, chilies, coconut milk, and gochujang, you’re going to absolutely love this one. It’s hard to even know where to start, but the peanut butter and broccolini pad thai is crazy-good, and the honey-, soy-, and ginger-braised tofu is simply insane; the kung pao cauliflower totally rips a sweet-spicy punch you’ll want to experience regularly. Next up for me is either the Napa cabbage okonomiyaki or the Ben Ben noodles, a mushroom-based dan dan alt.

Gordon Ramsay: You know him, you love him, your salmon is raw. But it won’t be, if you grab this book that’s full of Daddy Ramsay-approved weeknight meals like bacon cheeseburgers; baked halibut with fennel, carrot, and lemon; a butternut squash and chickpea curry; chicken biryani; and [Gordon Ramsay voice] the most beautiful Buffalo chicken with creamy blue cheese dressing. You know this man wants your dinner to be quick, so you have time to watch eight episodes of Hell’s Kitchen before bed. 

It’s only 11 a.m., but I’m ready for dinner. 

The Rec Room staff independently selected all of the stuff featured in this story. Want more reviews, recommendations, and red-hot deals? Sign up for our newsletter.