20 Dutch Oven Meals That Are Perfect for a Cozy Night In

Hearty stews, braises, and other one-pot dinners to help you get the most out of your Dutch oven.

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Rabi Abonour
Rabi Abonour is a contributing writer at Serious Eats.
Rabi Abonour
Rabi Abonour is a planner specializing in transportation, but has also been a photojournalist, writer, and editor for several online and print publications.
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The Serious Eats Team
The Serious Eats Team
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Published December 27, 2024
Overhead view of a single single serving of traditional French Cassoulet next to the pot

Serious Eats Fred Hardy

Ask a chef what their most prized piece of cookware is, and there’s a decent chance they’ll point to their Dutch oven. A high-end model, like a Le Creuset, is a serious investment, but for the money, you get a wonderfully versatile pot that you'll use for all sorts of things—cooking rice, frying chicken, baking bread, you name it.

A Dutch oven’s true calling, though, is making stews, braises, and other one-pot dinners, so it's an essential piece of equipment for easy, hearty, comforting meals on chilly winter nights. The combination of their deep shape, ample size, and the heat-retaining powers of cast iron makes Dutch ovens the best tools for browning meats and vegetables, then slowly cooking them to perfect tenderness. To help you appreciate your Dutch oven as much as any chef, we’ve rounded up 20 of our favorite Dutch oven dinners, from chicken cacciatore and Portuguese caldo verde to Guinness stew and oven-cooked pulled pork.

  • Fesenjān (Persian Pomegranate and Walnut Meat Braise)

    Fessenjan-NaderMehravari-hero

    Serious Eats / Nader Mehravari

    Fesenjān—an iconic Persian braise—gets its signature sweet-and-sour flavor from pomegranate molasses and its velvety texture from ground walnuts. Extensive variation notes explain how to make this recipe with chicken, duck, or as a vegetarian meal with eggplant or butternut squash.

  • Ragú Napoletano (Neapolitan-Style Italian Meat Sauce With Pork, Beef, and Sausage)

    Overhead view of a tablescape of Ragu Napoletano with pasta, a single serving, the platter of meat, extra sauce and extra cheese

    Serious Eats / Fred Hardy

    This rich tomato- and meat-based pasta sauce hails from Southern Italy. A slow-cooked red sauce picks up tons of flavor from pork ribs and beef, and waiting to add the sausages until later in cooking keeps them moist and tender.

  • Traditional French Cassoulet

    Overhead view of a single single serving of traditional French Cassoulet next to the pot

    Serious Eats Fred Hardy

    This meaty stew of poultry, sausage, pork, and beans comes together all under a rich, dark brown crust. Soaking the beans in salted water overnight helps keep them tender as they cook, and you also have the option to use chicken in place of the traditional duck to make this an easier at-home dish.

  • The Best Vegetarian Bean Chili

    A large bowl of vegetarian bean chili topped with sliced avocado, scallions, cilantro, and white onion. The periphery of the image contains a wide variety of plates and bowls holding tortillas, sliced limes, and additional chili.

    Serious Eats / Julia Estrada

    Sorry, Texans: We think you can actually make an awesome pot of chili with lots of beans and zero meat. (Which isn't to say we don't like meaty chili, too.) We make this richly flavored vegan version using a variety of dried chiles and chipotles in adobo, which combine to give it all the punch you’d expect. A little soy sauce and Marmite boosts the umami, and a shot of booze—vodka or bourbon—helps bring out alcohol-soluble flavors.

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  • Caldo Verde (Portuguese Potato and Kale Soup With Sausage)

    Caldo verde

    Serious Eats / Eric Kleinberg

    The Portuguese soup caldo verde is hearty and comforting, but takes just half an hour to make, so it's a perfect dish for lazy rainy days. We make it with shredded kale and a mixture of russet potatoes, which break down during cooking and help to thicken the soup, and Yukon Golds, which stay in intact chunks for textural contrast. Our recipe calls for adding cooked pork sausage, like linguiça, but you can leave it out to keep the dish vegetarian.

  • Coq au Vin (Chicken Braised in Red Wine)

    A white, blue-rimmed plate holding a large serving of Coq au Vin. On the lefthand side of the image is a round platter holding more of the Coq au Vin.

    Serious Eats / Julia Hartbeck

    Coq au vin traditionally requires hours of stewing to tenderize the tough meat of a rooster, but that doesn’t make sense for a modern cook—your local butcher probably doesn't carry roosters, which means you'll most likely be using a roasting hen that will dry out with an overly long cooking time. That's why this recipe hinges on a relatively quick braise with red wine, mushrooms, bacon lardons, and onions, producing a dish that tastes even better than if it cooked all day.

  • Chicken Cacciatore With Red Peppers, Tomato, and Onion

    A white oval platter holding chicken cacciatore and a good amount of golden brown sauce. The platter is on a textured grey-blue surface.

    Serious Eats / Mariel De La Cruz

    The term chicken cacciatore always refers to a braised chicken dish, but that's about all you can count on—the details vary widely from recipe to recipe. This classic Italian-American chicken cacciatore is flavored with a bright, fruity combination of red bell pepper, onion, and tomato; for another take on this versatile dish, try out our mushroom-studded version, too.

  • Chicken Massaman Curry With Wheat Beer and Potatoes

    20170210-chicken-massaman-emily-matt-clifton-4.jpg
    Emily and Matt Clifton

    This one-pot chicken curry is perfect for the capsaicin-averse—unlike a fiery red or green curry, massaman is flavored primarily with warm spices like star anise and cinnamon. The dish gets an unusual spin with the addition of Belgian-style wheat beer, which is a decidedly nontraditional ingredient but has citrusy, bitter notes that work beautifully here.

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  • Filipino-Style Chicken Adobo

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    Vicky Wasik

    Dutch ovens are particularly good tools for browning chicken thighs, since the heavy bottom gets hot and stays hot and the high sides prevent (too much) splattering oil from gunking up your stovetop. And if you can brown a chicken thigh, you can make Filipino-style adobo, a super savory and very acidic dish that pairs perfectly with oily garlic fried rice.

  • Osso Buco (Italian Braised Veal Shanks)

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    Vicky Wasik

    This rustic, comforting dish is made by braising veal shanks in a hearty wine- and vegetable-based sauce until they're fork-tender. A bright mixture of parsley, lemon zest, and garlic tops it off, keeping the dish from feeling too heavy. Serve the veal however you’d like, but a bed of saffron-scented risotto alla milanese is traditional.

  • Braised Chinese-Style Short Ribs With Soy, Orange, and 5-Spice Powder

    20170125_braised_short_ribs_1-emily-matt-clifton.jpg
    Emily and Matt Clifton

    I’m always looking for recipes that will provide me with plenty of leftovers, so this is a personal favorite—these braised short ribs will last a pair of eaters a couple of days. Flavored with a balanced sweet-spicy mixture of soy, orange, Chinese five-spice powder, honey, and ginger, among other ingredients, they're great served over polenta or buttery mashed potatoes for dinner, then shredded up for tacos the next day.

  • Easy Oven-Cooked Pulled Pork

    20160220-pulled-pork-easy-33.jpg
    J. Kenji López-Alt

    It may be impossible to make true barbecue without a smoker, but you can still make indoor pulled pork that's pretty darn delicious. How? By slowly cooking a pork butt in a Dutch oven and mixing in homemade barbecue sauce. A little bit of liquid smoke, from a quality brand like Wright's, adds some smoky flavor to heighten the resemblance to the real thing.

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  • Ropa Vieja

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    Vicky Wasik

    Most ropa vieja recipes call for simmering the beef in one pot and making a sauce of onions, peppers, and tomatoes in another. Here, we cook the beef and the sauce all in the same Dutch oven, a one-pot method that both saves time and makes the dish extra flavorful. Searing the beef before its long simmer is another helpful step for adding layers of flavor.

  • Rich and Flavorful Guinness Beef Stew With Potatoes

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    Vicky Wasik

    Despite its dark color, Guinness has a mild flavor that tends to get lost when you cook it into a stew. To ensure you can actually taste the roasted-coffee and chocolate notes of a pint of Guinness, we fortify this recipe with brewed coffee and bittersweet chocolate. Using two sets of aromatic vegetables—one long-cooked to infuse the stew over time, the other just lightly sautéed before going into the pot for the last 45 minutes—provides the best balance of good flavor and texture.

  • Ghanaian Chicken and Peanut Stew (Groundnut Soup)

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    Vicky Wasik

    If you've never sampled Ghanaian food before, this simple chicken stew, made rich and creamy with a base of peanut butter and spicy with Scotch bonnet or habanero pepper, is a great introduction to the cuisine. Chicken legs make a more tender and flavorful alternative to white meat, while smoke-dried fish (if you can find it) adds an extra savory, fishy undercurrent. For a more adventurous version of the dish, swap out the chicken for goat meat and honeycomb tripe.

  • New Orleans–Style Red Beans and Rice

    New Orleans–Style Red Beans and Rice

    Serious Eats / Liz Voltz

    Making this New Orleans staple is remarkably easy, requiring nothing more than beans, vegetables, cured pork and sausage, and patience. Using a variety of pork products, including andouille sausage, smoked ham hock, and pickled pork shoulder, will give the beans the most depth of flavor, though a splash of apple cider vinegar can furnish some of the brightness of pickled pork if you can't find the latter. Despite popular myth, it's a good idea to salt the soaking water for your dried beans, as it helps to tenderize them.

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  • Cajun Gumbo With Chicken and Andouille Sausage

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    Vicky Wasik

    A Cajun-style gumbo that starts with a dark roux and the "holy trinity" of onion, green pepper, and celery and ends with just about anything you'd like, whether it's chicken legs and andouille sausage, as is called for in the recipe, or duck legs, rabbit, and/or oysters and shrimp—yes, it's that customizable. Heavily seasoned with cayenne, black pepper, and garlic, you have the option of using okra or filé powder to thicken the stew, but you can also use both.

  • Samgyetang (Korean Rice-Stuffed Chicken Soup)

    20190314-Samgyetang-vicky-wasik-17
    Vicky Wasik

    Just because this soup is a summer staple in South Korea doesn't mean you can't enjoy the herbal broth and the whole chicken—stuffed with jujubes, chestnuts, gingko nuts, and sticky rice—in the depths of winter.

  • Pacific Razor Clam Chowder

    20180327-pacific-razor-clams-chowder-vicky-wasik-2
    Vicky Wasik

    Not to be confused with long, rectangular Atlantic razor clams, Pacific razor clams are beefy bivalves with a clean flavor and subtle sweetness. If you’re lucky enough to have access to them, try putting them to use in a warming clam chowder, flavored with leeks, thyme, and dry vermouth. The most important part of the recipe is not overcooking the delicate clam meat, which is why we turn off the stove and let residual heat poach it for just a minute before serving.

  • Ribollita (Hearty Tuscan Bean, Bread, and Vegetable Stew)

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    Vicky Wasik

    Thickened with beans and bread, ribollita is a hearty Italian vegetable stew that's ripe for improvisation. This recipe calls for onions, leeks, carrots, squash, turnips, and celery, but you can and should mix that up depending on what looks good at the market. The texture of the dish can be varied, too—you can leave it thinner and brothy, thicken it into a porridge, or even sauté it into a savory pancake.

December 2018

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