For 52 weeks, the website food52 has asked home cooks to submit their best recipes to contests that determine which will make it into a forthcoming cookbook. (We've been drooling over the photos every step of the way.) Those 52 weeks are up, but luckily, the contests aren't. Over the summer, New York Times food writers Amanda Hesser and Merrill Stubbs will continue to have one contest per week.
So what's in it for the winners, if not a spot in Hesser's and Stubbs' cookbook? Whole Foods Market will give them $100 gift cards, OXO will award a bounty of kitchen products to the winners and runners-up, and at the end of the 8-week summer promotion, one of the winning recipe authors will be awarded the Grand Prize: a $1,000 gift card!
Here are the finalists for this week's contest: Your Best Corn Recipe.
Photo: Melanie Einzig
What Hesser and Stubbs say: Each zeppole -- essentially the Italian version of a doughnut hole -- is impossibly tender within but crunches satisfyingly between your teeth with every bite. The chiles lend just the right amount of heat, and the sweetness of the roasted corn and the saltiness of the pancetta play off of each other perfectly.
Photo: Melanie Einzig
What Hesser and Stubbs say: Matt browns bacon (he makes his own, of course, but you should use whatever kind you like from the grocery store), then adds smoked paprika, corn, and bourbon. To finish the dish, he nestles littleneck clams into the corn, letting them steam open right in the pot, and showers the dish with chopped basil. Summer squared.
So what say you? Cast your vote at food52.com.