20 Clever Ways To Cook With Wine

Coq au vin, or rooster with wine, is a classic French dish that isn't as complicated as it sounds. Chicken is braised in a silky wine sauce and finished off with butter. Use a nice red wine here and even better if it's from Burgundy! Bacon, mushrooms, and pearl onions give this dish so much flavor and makes this one of our favorite chicken dinners to make for guests. They'll be so impressed!

Get the Classic Coq Au Vin recipe.

When it's cold out, a steaming hot pot pie filled with creamy, flavorful gravy, sweet and tender veggies, and topped with a shatteringly flaky crust is EVERYTHING. Here, mushrooms replace meat and are every bit as satisfying as their meaty counterparts.

Get the Vegan Mushroom Pot Pie recipe.

Chicken marsala is a classic Italian American dish that's creamy, quick, and irresistible. The sauce made of mushrooms, marsala wine, and heavy cream is straight-up drinkable, and we love serving it over a big pile of spaghetti or angel hair. It's the perfect weeknight dinner, and we don't even feel guilty making it three nights in a row.

Get the Creamy Chicken Marsala recipe.

Most piccata sauces use only lemon juice; we opt for whole pieces of the fruit to make use of every last bit of bright citrus flavor. After a simmer in a wine and broth jacuzzi, the lemon loses its sharp bitterness and becomes sweet and tender.

Get the Extra Lemony Seitan Piccata recipe.

Does anything impress quite the way braised short ribs do? They feel truly restaurant fancy, but here's a secret: Short ribs are pretty easy to make at home. This is the ideal dish to make for company when the weather's cold and you want to stay inside. We like it alongside creamy dishes like polenta or mashed potatoes, or paired with a flavor-forward salad, like our fennel or beet salads.

Get the Braised Short Ribs with 40 Cloves of Garlic recipe.

Make this showstopper with a custom blend of your favorite funghi! If wild mushrooms are not accessible, creminis or button mushrooms would also work perfectly. If serving for a dinner party or event, the ragú can be made up to three days in advance; just reheat gently on the stovetop while you make the polenta.

Get the Polenta with Wild Mushroom Ragú recipe.

If you do it right, homemade beef bourguignon is a labor of love. It's certainly not a quick weeknight dinner. BUT that doesn't mean it's hard. Here's the basic rundown: Sauté bacon, sear beef in bacon fat (yum!), add veggies and stir to coat with flour, add wine and broth, transfer to oven, bake until beef is super-tender, make Julia Child proud.

Get the Best-Ever Beef Bourguignon recipe.

One of our favorite ways to prepare cabbage is to braise it. The best part about braising? You can impart a TON of flavor into your cabbage. We love pairing this sweet and sour cabbage alongside creamy mashed potatoes and a pork chop.

Get the Sweet & Sour Braised Red Cabbage recipe.

Chicken piccata is one of Italy's classic dishes and refers to the process of dredging the meat in flour, browning it in a skillet, and cooking it in a simple sauce of lemon juice, butter, and capers. Italians most often prepare this with veal, but we love it with chicken just the same.

Get the Perfect Chicken Piccata recipe.

This easy rice dish is as comforting as it comes, and while it may seem intimidating, it really is simple. All you need is an hour, some arborio rice, good-quality chicken broth, a little butter and cheese and wine, along with your favorite aromatics like onion, garlic, and basil.

Get the How To Make Risotto recipe.

Literally translated to “off the bone,” osso buco is a traditional northern Italian stew that celebrates the impossible tenderness of crosscut veal shank. It’s true, this recipe does take a bit of time, but we promise it’s worth it. Lucky for you, this is the epitome of a make-ahead dish—it tastes even better the next day!

Get the Osso Buco recipe.

Few foods are more fun to eat than a good old-fashioned cheese fondue. Not only is it a fun throwback to the fondue craze of the '70s, but it's up there in some of the best foods for a small party. What makes this fondue better than the rest? The *slightest* hint of garlic flavor, achieved by rubbing the inside of your pot with a cut garlic clove. GENIUS.

Get the Best-Ever Cheese Fondue recipe.

Moules frites is one of our favorite easy dinners for two reasons: 1) It’s perfect for 2 or 3 people to dive into together, and 2) it’s MESSY. You’re gonna have white wine sauce spiked with chorizo dripping down your chin as you chow down tender mussels. Then you can chase it down with a crispy, salty, oily fry. Is there anything better?

Get the Moules Frites recipe.

If a bowl of creamy, earthy, umami-rich pasta sounds good to you, give this flexible recipe a go. It tastes great with any variety of mushrooms, and is easily adapted with alternate alliums, herbs, nuts, pasta shapes, and hard cheeses. We love the earthy flavor of toasted pecans, but if nuts aren't your bag, toasted fresh bread crumbs or panko are great crunchy alternatives.

Get the Creamy Mushroom Pasta recipe.

Got pears that are less than ripe? Underripe pears are an ideal ingredient in cooking, especially for poaching. Poaching slightly underripe pears makes them tender and sweetens them while allowing them to maintain their structure. Once poached, they can be served warm or cold, garnished with a caramel reduction of the cooking liquid, and accompanied with everything from ice cream to whipped cream to yogurt.

Get the Poached Pears recipe.

We love digging into a wheel of gooey oven-baked brie, but in the summer, no one wants to bother with the oven. Give this classic appetizer a summery twist by cooking it on the grill, seasoning it lightly with garlic, herbs, and wine, and serving with some lightly charred bread.

Get the Grilled Brie with Wine recipe.

Aside from a name that's a hoot to utter, Chicken Riggies (aka Utica, New York’s pasta pride and joy) has a lot more going for it, namely that it's a spicy and a bit-sweet pleasure to eat. It’s so good, it might just become a new go-to weeknight dinner for all you non-Uticans out there.

Get the Chicken Riggies recipe.

If you’re a fan of potato soup, you’re going to love this upgrade— loaded with chunks of tender potatoes, salty-sweet ham, and tender vegetables, this creamy soup is the comfort food you know and love, with a little something extra. And when we say extra, we don't mean extra complex or difficult! Instead, we've added a few non-traditional flavors like white wine to add brightness, and smoked paprika to complement the natural smokiness of the ham.

Get the Creamy Ham and Potato Soup recipe.

The foil packets trap in steam from the wine and juices from the tomato and corn as everything grills, which in turn cooks the gnocchi to perfectly tender while infusing the pasta with all the flavors of the dish. Bonus: Some of the meal browns a bit on the bottom right before it finishes cooking, adding extra flavor.

Get the Gnocchi Foil Packets recipe.

Béarnaise sauce (an offshoot of Hollandaise) has a bit of a bad reputation for being old-fashioned—probably because it’s reminiscent of stuffy steakhouses and homogenous French culinary schools. As we spend more time lately cooking elaborate meals at home, though, we’d like to argue classic sauces still have a place on our tables. Once you’ve had a buttery, herby bite of this Béarnaise atop, say, a perfectly cooked steak, we think you’ll agree!

Get the Béarnaise recipe.