Sometimes the hardest part about dinner planning (whether for your family or a party), is figuring out which side dish will perfectly match your dramatic main, like a white t-shirt and jeans. For every grilled cheese, there must be tomato soup. But what goes best with harissa roast chicken? That's where we come in. Mains are strengthened by their counterparts—the Batmans to their Robins, the Ben Afflecks to their Matt Damons, the Amy Poehler to their Tina Feys. So here are 20 mains with matching sides to add to your menu rotation.
If you dip both your fries AND burger in this mayo, you should win some sort of prize.
Chase crunchy-rich bites of fried chicken with a creamy, crunchy, and refreshing slaw that tastes just like you remember it.
You could go with a standard grilled cheese. We're not exactly going to stop you. But the sour-savory hit from the salami-pickle combo is a revelation—especially when it's dipped into this tomato soup between bites.
Put down your credit card. You do not need that one-way ticket to Spain anymore.
If your local, classic Italian joint time traveled into 2016, it would thank you for this chicken parm and new-school pesto pasta combo.
A Korean-inspired meal at home? This is what happens every night, right?
Thai flavors—all that sour, sweet, creamy, and salty—at home in your kitchen. Put down the takeout menu.
Oui, this French onion soup is parfait. And, oui, this frisée lardon has us pinching ourselves: Did this dinner teleport us to a bistro in Paris?
Minimal effort, big-time Japanese flavors. Add some rice into the mix and you've got a little thing called "easy weeknight dinner."
Make nonna proud.
Yeah, you're going to need another stack of tortillas.
Going from baked boneless, skinless chicken breasts and boiled corn to this is like that moment when black-and-white turns to color in Pleasantville. You need this.
The endlessly refreshing and punchy tiger salad offsets the richness of pork skewers steeped in coconut milk and curry (not like that's such a bad thing on its own either).
Save this for Sunday and make it a ritual. Use the garlic bread to sop up all of the sauce remaining at the bottom of your empty pasta bowl and achieve nirvana.
Easy enough for a weeknight, sophisticated enough to be served at your favorite restaurant, and the simplest way to convince your family you've been sneaking away to culinary school in your free time.
Ranch is perfect in every way, which is why the folks from Trois Familia in Los Angeles logically paired it with cult-favorite Maggi seasoning. And why we're just going to slide this light and fresh corn salad with mint across the table to you.
If you can't take the heat, please don't bother making these recipes. They're fiery and not toning it down for you or anyone else.
Sound the alarm and get the crew together. A Tex-Mex party requires as many people in one room as you can muster.
A plate of creamy, dreamy hummus balances out with the satisfying crunch of fresh, hot falafel. This is probably what L'Oréal meant by "you're worth it."
Buxton Hall's fried chicken induces pure euphoria—it's true. But even they can't come close to the completely legal magic of the cheesiest grits we've ever encountered.
