Cast Iron Skillet

Chilpachole de Jaiba This typical dish is adapted from a recipe given to us by our official guide, Ricardo Muñoz. Although picking the crabmeat is time-consuming (enlist a friend to help), you will be rewarded with a truly exceptional soup.

Jean-Yves Jaulin's Mojhettes au Jambon

This cake, thought to have first appeared in the 1920s, has had such names as pineapple glacé and pineapple skillet cake.

Jamie Davies and her late husband, Jack, were pioneers in the California wine industry. In 1965 they purchased and restored Schramsberg, a vineyard estate established in 1862, and they soon began producing the first American sparkling wine. When Davies thinks about comforting desserts, she remembers her childhood in Pasadena. "I was about eight when I started making upside-down cakes with my older sister, Dallas. We’d come home after school and mix up the recipe; I loved the sensual pleasure of making the batter. We'd put the cake in the oven, then go play croquet with our friends. Then we’d all come in and eat it up. We thought we had died and gone to heaven." The easy upside-downer here has wonderful spice flavors. Using canned pineapple chunks keeps the preparation simple.

Way up in Maine, in the coastal town of Blue Hill, is Jonathan's, a small place much favored by locals. Owner Jonathan Chase and chef Richard Hanson both love fish, whether from the sea or from freshwater lakes and streams. This colorful main course is good with buttered and dilled new potatoes. Round out the meal with a green salad, and end with a slice of lattice-topped blueberry pie. (If necessary, have the fishmonger bone the trout, or use four small fillets.) Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

Plancha is simply another word for comal, or griddle.

In this dish, the richness of the venison is balanced by the sweet-tart fruit compote.

The French dessert that's known as clafouti is a pancake crossed with a fruit-filled custard. It's best served warm, right from the skillet. If you don't have a cast-iron skillet, any ovenproof variety is fine. Serve with vanilla ice cream.

This recipe can be prepared in 45 minutes or less. Round out this menu with boiled green beans and corn muffins. Finish with chocolate pudding topped with whipped cream.

These lamb chops—an easier version of recipes you may have made before—go nicely with sugar snap peas with ginger and garlic and couscous with apricots .

Using sun-dried tomatoes that are not packed in oil cuts down on fat. You can find them at some supermarkets, specialty foods stores and Italian markets.