Affordable Star Chef Recipes

The Dish: Although this Italian standard has suffered at the hands of lesser chefs, Barbara Lynch redeems it. She ably deconstructs what is often a heavy sauce into its vivid components: bright red strips of bell pepper, sweet slices of onion, hot pickled peppers and fresh chopped tomatoes.

The Cost: about $2.75 per serving

You haven't really had an authentic Southern restaurant experience until you've had meat-and-three—a choice of meat plus three vegetable side dishes. Here, Bobby Flay bakes chicken—the centerpiece of many a meat-and-three—with a sticky sweet-and-spicy honey glaze inspired by the Savannah Bee Company's tupelo honey.

The Dish:F&W's Grace Parisi mixes store-bought rotisserie chicken and cheddar cheese into a quick dough, then she wraps the tamales in plastic before steaming them.

The Cost: about $3.40 per serving

Use leftover red wine as the glaze on Shea Gallante's meat loaf, which caramelizes as it bakes.

The Dish: Giuseppe Tentori's quinoa salad is a delightful mix of cucumber, thin green beans, parsley and feta. What makes it special is that Tentori pickles the radishes in red wine vinegar and sugar before tossing them into the salad, where they add a puckery crunch.

The Cost: about $2.33 per serving

Jean-Georges Vongerichten is so fond of his wife Marja's ultrarich mac and cheese that it appears on the menu at the Mercer Kitchen, one of his New York restaurants.

With this buttermilk-soaked version, F&W’s Grace Parisi has perfected fried chicken.

Mario Batali's version is baked until golden brown and offers an especially high ratio of potatoes to eggs.

Bacon and ham add a great smoky flavor to canned white beans in this hearty, easy stew by Jose Garces.

The French call pound cake quatre-quarts ("four-fourths") because it is made with equal parts flour, sugar, eggs and butter.

Top Chef winner Hung Huynh uses ginger, garlic and scallions to flavor his earthy, mushroom-and-bacon-studded clay pot rice.

Braising chicken in a liquid that combines onions, carrots, bacon and olives creates complex flavor relatively quickly.

The Dish: These stuffed chicken thighs by star chef Mario Batali are filled with fresh bread crumbs and melty provolone cheese.

The Cost: about $3.68 per serving

Serve Tom Colicchio's fresh-tasting chickpea salad with warm, soft pita bread to soak up the olive oil dressing.

"I don't care if you're sophisticated, with a boatload of money," says superstar chef Thomas Keller, "roasted chicken makes you feel wonderful."