75 Classic & Creative Italian Dinners That Are 100% Nonna-Approved

Though we’ve done it many different ways here, this classic recipe is the chosen one, the holy grail. It has everything you want in chicken Parm, full stop—fried cutlets shrieking with crispiness, a perfect blend of mozzarella and Parm, and a sauce that is full of life with basil and just enough sweetness.

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Imagine not having to unhinge your jaw like a snake to enjoy your favorite Italian deli hero. This chopped sandwich is here to turn that dream into a reality. Turns out, running a knife through your sandwich ingredients before piling them into a roll makes the whole ordeal of crushing a big hoagie a lot easier to manage!

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Here, transformed grilled plums get tossed with crispy pancetta, tangy goat cheese, fresh cherry tomatoes, and grilled sourdough bread, then drizzled with a maple-Dijon dressing, turning this humble salad into a work of art.

Get the Grilled Plum & Pancetta Panzanella Salad recipe.

In this sauce, the meatballs are so tender, little bits break off into the sauce as they simmer away, pork ribs fall off the bone indicating peak sauce richness, and delightful oily puddles pool at the top of the pot only to be folded in at the end for maximum umami.

Get the Sunday Sauce recipe.

This is like the OG one-pot pasta. The spaghetti is cooked in a spicy tomato broth in a style similar to risotto and charred in the pan as the broth gets absorbed. And when we say charred, we mean burnt. Trust us, the rich tomato, burned starch, and spicy mess of it all is absolutely delicious.

Get the Spaghetti All'Assassina recipe.

For this summery dish, you'll start by crisping up chicken cutlets that are wrapped in prosciutto. Next, you'll finish them off in a tangy vinegar sauce, then top the whole thing with mozzarella and tomatoes for a fresh and fast crowd-pleaser.

Get the Caprese Chicken Saltimbocca recipe.

If making homemade pasta seems like too much of a process, then gnocchi is the easy pasta to try making yourself. This rustic, dumpling-like pasta is much easier to make and shape by hand than ravioli, and once made, you can use it with countless recipes and sauces.

Get the Homemade Gnocchi recipe.

Grandma pizza has a thin, crispy crust topped first with cheese, then dolloped with a garlicky tomato sauce. It's not the usual way of assembling pizza, but the cheese melting right into the crust really makes some magic happen.

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Cacio e pepe is as fun to say as it is to eat. A popular pasta dish from Rome, the name literally translates to cheese and pepper. We thought that pasta shouldn’t have all the fun, so why not chicken-fy it?

Get the Cacio E Pepe Chicken recipe.

Here you've got a super crusty sandwich (made of pizza dough!) stuffed with creamy burrata, salty prosciutto, sweet fig jam, and peppery arugula. Drizzle with olive oil and allow for drips through the crevices as you devour.

Get the Burrata Pizza Sandwiches recipe.

Hailing from the island of Capri and mirroring the colors of the Italian flag, the simple Caprese salad is one of our favorite ways to show off those juicy, in-season farmers' market tomatoes by complementing them with fresh basil and creamy mozzarella.

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If you're obsessed with chicken Florentine, then let us introduce you to your new favorite pasta dinner. This pasta—filled with chicken breasts, chopped tomatoes, and baby spinach—is completed with a bright and rich white wine and cream-based sauce.

Get the Chicken Florentine Pasta recipe.

Based on the traditional lasagna alla Bolognese from the Emilia-Romagna province in Italy, we grabbed what we loved most about the timeless, classic recipe and simplified it to make it weeknight-friendly. This lasagna can be eaten for any occasion from family Sunday dinner to lunch with friends over a pitcher of sangria.

Get the Best Homemade Lasagna recipe.

A classic recipe, chicken piccata combines thin and delicate chicken breasts with a tart white wine, lemon juice, and buttery cream sauce topped with briny capers. Its ability to be ready and on the table in 30 minutes makes it an easy sell, whether you’re serving up a dinner party or a simple weekly dinner.

Get the Chicken Piccata recipe.

Breakfast meets dinner in this marinara- and mozzarella-topped dish. Fittingly, the Italian word "affogato" means drowned, which explains the marinara topping. It lends this dish a vibe somewhere between a breakfast frittata and pizza, meaning it’s enjoyable for pretty much any meal of the day.

Get the Italian Sausage & Pepper Frittata Affogato recipe.

Every dish at Carbone, the nouveau red sauce joint in lower Manhattan, is a mind-bendingly delicious, updated take on Italian American classics, though none may be more famous than the Spicy Rigatoni, which features their version of a booze-spiked vodka sauce. Here's our version.

Get the Copycat Carbone Spicy Rigatoni recipe.

Move over calzones—homemade strombolis are our new dream handheld weeknight dinner. We packed ours full of pepperoni, salami, and two types of cheese, but the options are truly endless when it comes to customizing this Italian-American dish.

Get the Stromboli recipe.

There’s an art to a great meatball. It should be nicely round, packed with flavor, and tender throughout. Making them from scratch is really easy and definitely beats anything you’d buy at the store. If you want a more hands-off approach, try baked meatballs!

Get the Best-Ever Italian Meatballs recipe.

Along with carbonara, cacio e pepe, and amatriciana, pasta alla gricia completes the four classic pasta dishes of Rome. It's a classic for good reason: With only four ingredients, it's simple to make and easy to indulge.

Get the Pasta Alla Gricia recipe.

We love this dish served on its own with crusty bread for dipping (or garlic bread?), but if you want a fuller meal, try it alongside rustic mashed potatoes or polenta.

Get the Skillet Chicken Cacciatore recipe.