Dinner Tonight: 200 Simple Recipes for Inspired Weeknight Cooking

Bold flavors meet time-saving tricks in 200 recipes (all ready in 45 minutes or less) that make weeknight dinners fun and stress-free.

When time is short and bellies are grumbling, America’s Test Kitchen’s streamlined guide to weeknight cooking meets you in the moment—with great meals that don’t require a ton of work and bring new flavors to the table. No matter your craving, you’ll find a dinner that fits the bill in under 45 minutes with easy cleanup. That could be chicken salad with a fantastic dressing (Avocado Chicken Salad Sandwiches with Jicama and Banana Peppers); umami-rich noodles (Chili Crisp Noodles); or a deeply comforting soup (Spicy Tomato Soup with Tortellini and Sausage).

Edited by Jack Bishop, TV cast member, tasting guru, and creator of the twice-weekly Dinner Tonight newsletter (which goes out to more than 1 million fans), this collection of 200 go-to recipes delivers plenty of ways to improve your weeknight eating:

• Fresh Ideas for Pantry Staples: Are you staring blankly at your pantry? These recipes give it new life (canned tuna = Spaghetti al Tonno; frozen peas = Pea and Pistachio Pesto Pasta).
• Modern Flavor Boosters: Every recipe showcases a smart way to add flavor, like an Old Bay–spiked lemon compound butter that melts over salmon fillets and pools into a bowl of confetti grits; or honey and red wine vinegar, which become a sweet yet sophisticated glaze for chicken.
• Flexible Swaps: Got parsley but no cilantro? Ground turkey but no pork? These recipes indicate when swaps make sense.
• Riff on Recipes to Make New Meals: The sauce for Murgh Makhani (aka Indian Butter Chicken) is so perfectly spiced, you’ll want to try it with tofu or chickpeas—we show you how.
• Comfort-Food Flavors in Low-Key Renditions: Chicken Piccata Meatballs, Pork Meatball Bahn Mi (can you tell we love meatballs?), and Mezzi Rigatoni with Spicy Gochujang Tomato Sauce offer maximum appeal with minimal effort. And that’s just the beginning of what you’ll find.  

Need help deciding? Themed lists let you choose dinner based on your mood, the season, or what's on hand. There are even tips for scaling recipes for two. With 200 recipes plus ways to spin them, you’ve got more than a year of great ideas.

America's Test Kitchen publishes best-selling and award-winning cookbooks, including The Complete One Pot, Five-Ingredient Dinners, and The Sheet Pan. It also publishes Cook's Illustrated and Cook's Country magazines and produces public television's top-rated shows, America's Test Kitchen and Cook's Country.