Sautéed Vegetables

"In every little restaurant in Umbria, there are sauteed greens on the menu," says star chef Nancy Silverton. Here, she blanches spinach, then sautes it in garlic-spiked oil until all the leaves are thoroughly coated. This incredibly fragrant side dish has just five ingredients (plus S+P), and couldn't be any easier. Make a big batch of the chile-infused olive oil to have on hand, and this dish will take less than 10 minutes to throw together. Since it's an Italian-inspired dish, we love to pair this spicy, garlicky spinach with roasted seafood, grilled meat or creamy polents. 

Instead of a green salad, Tanya Holland thinly slices these brussels sprouts like cabbage, then cooks them quickly to serve as slaw.

This fast and fresh yellow squash takes just 10 minutes, and makes a great side or light summer supper.

This flavorful, Asian-inspired cabbage salad packs a punch with crunchy sugar snap peas, fried eggs and a rich dressing.

These crunchy sauteed greens from TV chef Carla Hall get big flavor from garlic, lemon and crushed red pepper.

Emeril Lagasse sautes radishes and their greens with bacon, shallots and orange juice until they're perfectly crisp-tender.

This is a light and lovely way to prepare zucchini, which gets quickly sauteed with garlic, shallots and ginger, then tossed with fresh dill. Padma Lakshmi likes to stir dried pomegranate seeds (called anardana in India) into this dish for a bit of crunchy tang.

Chef Sean Brock's quick and easy sauteed collard greens are bright and lemony, with a bit of heat from dried chiles and crunch from chopped roasted peanuts.

Lemon juice and garlic balance sweet sauteed carrots flavored with fresh marjoram. A simple yet exceptional side dish, it goes equally well alongside meat, fish, or poultry.

You can use any greens you like in this quick saute, which gets terrific flavor and texture from smoky bacon, hot chile and the pop of mustard seeds.

Jeff Cerciello says the inspiration to combine parsnips and dates came from Moro, a Moorish restaurant in London. To get the parsnips nicely browned, he cooks them on the stovetop in batches before roasting them with the dates, which caramelize in the oven.

Collards are often paired with bacon, but our new favorite twist is to flavor the greens with spicy pepperoni.

When sliced lengthwise on a mandoline, lightly sauteed summer squash does a great job of imitating pasta, making a light, healthy, gluten-free dish.

Sweet cranberries and crispy pancetta dress up this quick spinach side dish.