All Ingredients

Several economical, if bony, cuts come from the shoulder.

These chops are a bit chewy, but very flavorful. They're usually braised, broiled or grilled. The round bone in them is a cross-section of the arm bone.

This is a tasty roast, but it's very hard to carve with the bone in. To make carving easier, butchers will bone it and sell it as a boneless rolled shoulder, or they'll slice the roast into blade chops and then tie them together as a pre-sliced shoulder roast = pre-carved shoulder roast

These are usually less expensive than loin chops, but almost as tender. It's best to grill or broil them.

The sirloin is just next to the leg, and, in some parts of the country, this roast comes attached to a leg of lamb. This cut makes a tender, if bony, roast, or it can be sliced into sirloin steaks for grilling or broiling

These are cut from the breast and usually trimmed of fat. They're best broiled, barbecued or braised.

These are cubes of meat that are too tough to grill or broil. If cooking slowly in liquid, though, they become wonderfully tender

This hard-to-find sweet pepper is smaller and sweeter than its cousin, the bell pepper, with which it's interchangeable.

This is a rich, tangy, and crumbly cow's milk cheese produced in Britain. It's a good melting cheese.

Landjager is a dried, smoked German sausage that needs no refrigeration. Its name comes from "lang tige," which means "smoked for a long time" and "jäger," which means hunter, and refers (one hopes) to it being a convenient snack for hunters to bring on their excursions. Landjager fills the same niche as the American Slim Jim, but it's chewier and less greasy. Look for thin flat sticks of it in German delis.

This sweet and sour fruit from Southeast Asia looks like a small potato. Don't eat the bitter seed inside.

These pork sausages look and feel like pepperoni, but they're much sweeter.

This is a mild semi-soft cow's milk cheese from the Lapland region of Finland. It's a good melter and works well in fondues

Lard is rendered pork fat. It's high in saturated fat, and quite bad for you. Still, it's the fat of choice for making flaky pie crusts, though it's not as flavorful as butter. Some pastry chefs combine butter with lard to achieve a balance of flavor and flakiness. Lard is also used for frying since it can reach high temperatures without smoking. See also the entries for lard leaves and lardo.

This is unrendered pork fat that fearless Italians slice and serve on bread.

These thick, wide noodles with ruffled edges are used to make an Italian casserole dish that Americans call lasagne. Italians call the noodle itself lasagna (plural: lasagne), and the casserole lasagne al forno. Thinner noodles are best. Precooked lasagne = oven-ready lasagne = no-boil lasagne work fairly well and save time, but the noodles tend to absorb moisture from the sauce, resulting in a drier product.

This is a thin version of lasagne, the wide Italian noodles used to make baked lasagne. Lasagnette is often used like fettuccine, and simply tossed with a light sauce and served.

These pricey wines are produced from grapes that are picked late in the season, after they've shriveled a bit on the vine. This concentrates the sugar and allows producers to turn the grapes into sweet, rich dessert wines. Some of the best late harvest wines are made from grapes that have become moldy with the Botrytis cinerea fungus (also known as "noble rot"). The fungus pokes holes in the grape skins, allowing more water to evaporate. Ice wine = icewine = eiswein is an especially sweet and expensive kind of late harvest wine in which the dehydrated grapes are allowed to freeze on the vine, resulting in a very sweet wine. These and other late harvest wines are often sold in half-bottles, and are best drunk by themselves or with fruit or light desserts. Don't serve them with chocolate or very sweet desserts.

Cooks use this fragrant flower to flavor jellies, baked goods and grilled meat.

This protein-rich seaweed is popular in Britain and Japan. To rehydrate, soak it in water for about an hour, then add it to soups and salads. Laver is sometimes called nori, but that name is more commonly used for the dark sheets that the Japanese use to wrap sushi, which are made from the same plant.

With their crispness and mild flavor, these lettuces are great in salads and sandwiches.

This is a highly seasoned smoked beef sausage based on a Pennsylvania Dutch recipe.

Despite its name ("liver cheese" in German), this Bavarian specialty contains neither liver nor cheese. It's a pork, beef, and veal meatloaf with the color and consistency of bologna. Germans like to fry thick slices of it and serve them with potatoes.

Derived from soy beans or egg yolks, nutrient-rich lecithin is a wonder ingredient. It's used in cooking as an emulsifier, preservative, lubricant, and moisturizer. It's a healthful substitute for fat in baked goods, adding moisture and improving texture. Bakers use it as a dough enhancer because it helps give yeast breads more of a rise. It comes either granulated or as a liquid.

Leeks look like large green onions, and they have a more complex onion flavor. They're often cooked as a vegetable side dish, or used in soups. Be sure to wash them thoroughly before cooking as the leaves are notorious for collecting dirt.

This Dutch cow's milk cheese is similar to Emmental or Jarlberg, only milder.

This Norwegian flatbread resembles a flour tortilla, only it's made with mashed potatoes. It's used as a wrapper for various sandwich fillings. Dried lefse should be moistened, then heated briefly in a microwave.

Legumes are plants that have pods with tidy rows of seeds inside. This category includes beans, peas, lentils, and peanuts.

This is an English cow's milk cheese that's very similar to cheddar.

This very sour citrus fruit is rarely eaten out of hand, but it's widely used for its juice, rind, and zest. Varieties include the Eureka lemon, which is what you're most likely to find in markets, the Lisbon lemon, which shows up in the winter and is smaller and smoother than the Eureka, and the trendy Meyer lemon, which is much sweeter and pricier than an ordinary lemon. When buying lemons, select specimens that are smaller, thin-skinned, and heavy for their size.

Cooks use this herb in teas, salads, jams, and soups. The fresh leaves also make an attractive garnish.

This has a lemony flavor, and small, pointed, fuzzy leaves. Thai cooks toss it into soups, salads, and noodle dishes.

This versatile cucumber is sweet and flavorful, and doesn't have much of the chemical that makes other cucumbers bitter and hard to digest. Though it's often served raw, it's also a good pickling cucumber.

This is often used in cakes, muffins, frostings, and pies. To make your own: Chop the zest from one or two lemons and put it into a small, clean jar until the jar is 1/3 full. Fill the jar with vodka, making sure that the zest is completely immersed. Seal it with a tight-fitting lid, allow the mixture to steep for two weeks, then strain out the zest using cheesecloth or a coffee filter. The result won't be as strong as commercial extracts.

Freshly squeezed lemon juice tastes much better than bottled juice.

These liqueurs are made with lemon peels and best served very cold.

This is made by boiling the fruit and peel of lemons with sugar, pectin, and water. It manages to be bitter, sour, and sweet all at once, which many people find delightful.

This variety of thyme has a lemony flavor.

This has a strong lemon flavor that works especially well in teas and vegetable dishes. If you can't find it in the spice section, cut open lemon verbena teabags.

Thai cooks use these grayish green stalks to impart a lemony flavor to their dishes. Remove the outer leaves, then use about six inches of the base, discarding the top and the very bottom. It's best to cut lemongrass into large pieces that can be easily removed after the dish is cooked. Frozen lemongrass is a good substitute for fresh, but dried lemongrass (soaked in hot water) is only a fair substitute. Use powdered version (called sereh powder) only in a pinch.

Like other legumes, lentils are low in fat and high in protein and fiber, but they have the added advantage of cooking quickly. Lentils have a mild, often earthy flavor, and they're best if cooked with assertive flavorings. The best, most delicate lentils are the peppery French green lentils. These hold their shape well, but take longer to cook than other lentils. The milder brown lentils also hold their shape after cooking, but can easily turn mushy if overcooked. Indian markets also carry a wide variety of split lentils, called dal. Before cooking, always rinse lentils and pick out stones and other debris. Unlike dried beans and peas, there's no need to soak them. Lentils cook more slowly if they're combined with salt or acidic ingredients, so add these last. Bigger or older lentils take longer to cook. Store dried lentils for up to a year in a cool, dry place.

This Indonesian rhizome looks a bit like ginger, only it's smaller and darker. It's hard to find in the U.S., but your best bet is to look in Asian markets. It's sold fresh, frozen, pickled, dried, or powdered. Used the dried or powdered versions only in a pinch.

These are mild salad greens that are always served fresh, either in salads or as garnishes. There are four basic categories: iceberg lettuce, with leaves that grow in a dense "head," leaf lettuce, with loosely gathered leaves, butterhead lettuce, with tender leaves that form a soft head, and romaine lettuce, with closely packed leaves in an elongated head. Select lettuce that has rich color and crisp, fresh-looking leaves.