43 Winter Dinners You Didn’t Have to Think Of
Close your eyes and point. Or cut this up into strips and pick tonight’s dinner from a hat!
I’ve shared a lot of detailed advice about different ways to think about what you’re going to cook since The Dinner Plan launched in 2024, but this simple list of 99 Dinner Ideas You Didn’t Have to Think Of is one of the most popular newsletters I’ve sent by far.
I get it. Aren’t we all here because the figuring out what’s for dinner is often harder than the cooking part?
Some of you have told me you’ve attached The List to your fridge; I love picturing a dart-board style process of choosing dinner. (Or blindfolded, pin-the-tail-on-the-dinner? Sounds fun.)
I was mostly collating recent favorites, and while there are still tons of practical dinner ideas to harvest there for dinner in January, that list’s fall timing means it suggests grilling Calabrian-chile-and-honey-marinated shrimp and doing the least with a pile of tomatoes. Your mileage may vary depending on local weather conditions. There’s no way I’m going outside to grill tonight.
If you’re staring at the back half (more than half? ugh) of winter with a bit of dread, I really want to lighten your load. In coming weeks, I’ll be talking to a great bunch of cookbook authors about how they deal with the winter cooking doldrums. In the meantime, here are a couple dozen more dinner ideas that fit my—and hopefully your—current cravings.
This isn’t The Dinner Plan’s recipe index (that’s over here.) These are jumping-off points, meant to spark something that you can run with. Consider this list an invitation to trust yourself in the kitchen and use what you have around, to let yourself play a little fast and loose once you’ve cranked up the music (or your favorite podcast) and shut out the pings of the world for a moment.
Free subscribers will get a preview of the first few ideas, but this is a resource meant as a thank you for paid subscribers. Opting in to a paid subscription will give you full access to both lists, plus the chance to enter each week’s new cookbook giveaway.
Shall we start with soup?
My previous dinner list mentioned butternut squash soup, tomato soup + grilled cheese, pasta fagiole, and pozole. (Don’t forget this things-to-put-on-soup list!) But just in case you’ve made all of those soups recently and you’re ready to move on, how about pasta e ceci? The one I make is a variation on an old Jamie Oliver number: just onion, celery, garlic, a fair amount of fresh rosemary, good stock, and canned chickpeas, plus tiny pasta, lemon, and basil.
Or use those chickpeas (plus lentils) to make harira.
Or try Marcella Hazan’s spinach soup? I’m determined to try some of her less-famed recipes in 2026.
A steaming bowl of kimchi sundubu-jjigae sounds so good right now. (Here’s a seafood version and here’s a vegan one.)
Make some little meatballs (these could just be bits of Italian sausage), and simmer them in an Italian wedding soup with escarole or other greens.
Or Clare de Boer’s Tuscan kale and polenta soup to warm you from the inside out.
Got a loaf of bread sitting around? Time for ribollita.
Keeping a bottle of mentsuyu around has changed my life. Udon soup in minutes!