The 35 Most Instagrammable Recipes We've Ever Made (2024)

We can't stop scrolling through the gorgeous food photos all over our Instagram. And looking through our favorite 20 food instagrams of 2016, we can't help but salivate over how good some of the recipes look. Some dishes are just irresistible. From cheesy shakshuka, khachapuri, and pizzas, eggy waffles, toasts, sandwiches, and all of the beautiful geometric desserts, we've rounded up our most Instagrammable recipes here.

This classic Israeli breakfast, a dish of Libyan origin, can be served as a main course for any meal of the day. Get the recipe for Shakshuka »

These crunchy empanadas, featuring shells made with masa, lard, and salt, are filled with tender shredded beef tossed in a spicy salsa. You can prepare the masa and filling in advance, but don't fill or fry the empanadas until just before eating. Adding baking powder and using an electric mixer are two secrets to light, puffy empanada pastry. Get the recipe for Fried Shredded Beef Empanadas »

This Georgian flatbread is from the region of Samegrelo, which borders the Black Sea. It is not, however, beach food. Stuffed with salty cheese and griddled, then heaped with even more cheese and baked, this is stick-to-your ribs winter cooking at its best. Georgians prepare this bread using a crumbly local cheese called imeruli, or a mixture of imeruli and the milder, more elastic sulguni. We substituted a mixture of low moisture mozzarella and strong, tart feta that gets you very close to the traditional version. Get the recipe for Megruli Khachapuri »

This popular breakfast in China's Yunnan Province starts with fresh rice noodles and ground meat in a bare-bones pork broth, then gets customized with as many as a dozen condiments. Yunnan mi xian noodles (round and spaghettilike) or mi gan (flat and wide) are traditional, but any size rice noodle works, and dried varieties are fine in a pinch. Find fresh rice noodles in the refrigerated section at most Asian markets. Get the recipe for Yunnan-Style Breakfast Noodle Soup (Mi Xian) »

At Zulya Kazimova's bakery in Baku, pakhlava—the Azeri version of baklava, which she cuts into a diamond shape—is made using 14 layers of a dense yeasted dough rolled out so thinly and painstakingly that it becomes translucent. For home cooks, prepared phyllo dough produces a wonderfully crisp, lighter, and flakier version. To defrost frozen phyllo quickly, set it in a microwave (still wrapped in its plastic packaging) on the defrost setting for about 30 seconds, then rotate the package and repeat. Get the recipe for Almond-Cardamom Pakhlava »

This over-the-top architectural dessert (also known as brick toast) is popular in tea shops and casual restaurants in Japan, Taiwan, and Singapore. The dish is meant to be shared with a friend (or three) and the more color, texture, and height the better, so don't skimp on the garnishes. Cookies, seasonal fruit, and candy are typical ingredients, but sprinkles, nuts, and flavored syrups are not unheard of. Get the recipe for Shibuya honey toast »

This classic French meal of baked, cream-soaked toast and eggs is deceptively simple (and scalable) but lavish. Named for the Alpine region of Bresse, which is best known to the culinary world for its exceptional chickens, the dish is practical country cooking at its finest. As it bakes, the cream soaks into the bread and thickens to a rich sauce right on the platter, resulting in a savory French toast. Get the recipe for French Baked Toast with Cream and Eggs »

"The single best gauge of a bakery's quality is its lemon tart," says tart expert Maury Rubin. "There's a dance to balancing the sweet and tart flavors appropriately, and in a good bakery the filling will never taste buttery or eggy—it will taste like lemon." This recipe, adapted from Rubin's Book of Tarts and infused with lemon zest for extra citrusy flavor, is the ideal. Alternatively, lemon juice and zest can be swapped out for equal parts lime. Get the recipe for Lemon Meringue Tarts »

As soon as the first tomato blossom turns into a tiny green orb, people start calling Kinston restaurant Chef & the Farmer to find out if tomato pie is on the menu. If you have access to two different colors of tomatoes, combine them here—one for the roasted portion and another for the fresh. It's a nice visual touch. Get the recipe for Roasted and Fresh Tomato Pie »

Known as chupe de centolla, this Chilean crab gratin borders on a cheesy crab dip. While similar South American chupe are always prepared with milk-soaked bread and any combination of shrimp, scallops, shellfish, meats, and cheeses, Patagonia's version relies solely on the massive local king crabs, the hallmark of fishermen's kitchens along Chile's southernmost coast. Get the recipe for The Ultimate Crab Dip »

As ethereal as its origins, this unusual, chilled summer soup is a specialty at the Singular Patagonia, an otherworldly hotel that borders Sena Última Esperanza (or Last Hope Sound). It's made velvety and rich by the local avocados, which are called paltas. Get the recipe for Avocado Soup »

These sandwich cookies, adapted from chef Frederico Ribeiro of New York's Te Company, are an homage to the classic Taiwanese pineapple cake. Here a super-buttery vanilla bean shortbread gets a nutty dose of hazelnut flour, and sweet pineapple-rosemary jam gets balanced by the spicy, fermented, and grassy flavor of Japanese yuzu kosho paste. Be sure to let the cookies rest overnight (or at least a few hours) after assembling so the jam sets in place, and don't skip the lime zest and flaky salt topping for a sweet and savory cookie that has a nice habit of electrifying your taste buds. Get the recipe for Pineapple Tea Cookies »

A street food popular in its native Ragusa, scaccia is an exercise in rustic simplicity: A pizza-style dough is rolled super-thin, smeared with tomato sauce, showered with D.O.P. caciocavallo cheese (similar to a spicy provolone), and folded into a lasagna-like loaf. In some versions, yeast is left out of the dough, which results in a more pasta-like dough that gets layered into a thinner, free-form rectangular pie, served cut into squares. But whatever the shape, the pie is best served warm from the oven while the cheese is still gooey. Get the recipe for Scaccia »

Two kinds of mustard bring bright, tangy, and savory notes to this quiche, which is full of vegetables and less heavy than the standard. Recipe adapted from Around My French Table by Dorie Greenspan. Get the recipe for Mustard Tart »

Simply bread your chicken (you could use veal or eggplant instead), fry it, layer with some easy homemade red sauce and mozzarella, and bake. Get the recipe for Chicken Parmesan »

These are chicken wings, Filipino-style, marinated in rice vinegar, soy sauce, bay leaves, and garlic. Serve them with a creamy ginger-enriched dipping sauce and chile-dusted apple slices for a full bar snack. Get the recipe for Adobo Chicken Wings »

This classic Tex-Mex dip comes from Lisa Fain (a.k.a. The Homesick Texan). With both serrano chiles and jalapeños, the dip has a bright spiciness that cuts through the richness of two cheeses. The tangy sour cream added at the end brings it over the top. Get the recipe for Chile con Queso »

This recipe for summer bolognese has the classic comfort of bolognese, but without the heaviness of a red sauce, instead embracing the summer's bounty of gorgeous tomatoes and fresh basil. Get the recipe for Summer Bolognese »

A three-day brining, smoking, and charring process adds incredible flavor to these ribs from chef Chris Shepherd of Underbelly in Houston. The result tastes like grilled bacon. Get the recipe for Mustard-Glazed Ham Ribs »

Lighter than the rich beef and pork ragùs of other Italian regions, this Abruzzo specialty features bell peppers mixed into the sauce and cooked briefly so they retain their shape and lend a pop of sweetness. It is typically served over spaghetti alla chitarra (pasta from Abruzzo that is shaped on a tool that resembles a guitar), though it makes a delicious sauce for almost any type of long noodle. Get the recipe for Spaghetti With Lamb Pepper Ragù »

Piles of colorful carrot ribbons—which skew more savory than sweet, thanks to a lemony coriander-flecked dressing—come out of the oven glistening and retaining some of their bite. The keys to the couldn't-be-flakier crust beneath: keeping the ingredients as cold as possible, and not overhandling the dough. Leftovers of the tart can be refrigerated and recrisped in the oven the next day. Get the recipe for Shaved Carrot Tart with Ricotta »

This recipe comes from Tariq Hanna of Sucré in New Orleans. Originating in Brittany, a region known for it's salt-forward cuisine, this crust contain a hefty pinch of the flaky stuff; be sure to use a good brand as the delicate flavor will be noticeable here. It's a crust that requires no rolling and very little fuss, making it an exceptional choice for a summer fruit tart. Get the recipe for Sablé Breton »

The croque monsieur, the classic French ham and cheese sandwich covered in cheesy bechamel, becomes a madame when a fried egg is placed on top of it. This recipe first appeared in our April 2011 special Sandwich Issue with author Alex Lobrano's article Classic Combination: Ham and Cheese. Get the recipe for Croque Madame »