22 Heart-Healthy Recipes to Make for Dinner in 2022
These tasty recipes deserve a spot on your menu in the new year. Whether you prefer a cozy vegetable soup or a pan of spicy enchiladas, you'll find something to love in this mix of recipes. Plus, each serving is low in saturated fat and sodium, so you know they'll be a perfect fit in any heart-healthy eating pattern. Recipes like our Butternut Squash & Black Bean Enchiladas and Mushroom Ragout with Herbed Ricotta & Pappardelle are sure to make mealtime more delicious than ever.
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Winter Vegetable Mulligatawny Soup
Our meatless version of the Indian-inspired British colonial soup includes parsnip and squash to keep it hearty and satisfying.
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Moules Frites
This simple but elegant dish pairs flavorful steamed mussels with crispy oven fries. Uncork an American chardonnay to sip alongside.
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Chicken Stew with Collard Greens & Peanuts
This West African–inspired chicken stew is hearty and has lots of bold, umami flavors. It's satisfying and packed with many beneficial ingredients—peanut butter and chicken for protein, nutrient-rich collard greens and colorful vegetables.
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Butternut Squash & Black Bean Enchiladas
A crisp, citrusy slaw contrasts nicely with the enchiladas' creamy squash filling.
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Cauliflower Fajita Skillet
Thinly sliced cauliflower florets mimic the signature shape of fajita meat in this dish. We cook it in a cast-iron skillet for that tableside sizzle you'd get at a restaurant.
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Mushroom Ragout with Herbed Ricotta & Pappardelle
This mushroom ragout is topped with dollops of ricotta, which cut through the acidity of the tomato-based sauce for a balanced flavor and creamy texture.
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Lemon-Garlic Steak & Green Beans
For a steak that's deliciously tender, flavorful and not too fatty, we reach for strip (also known as New York strip or shell steak). It has less than half the saturated fat of a rib-eye but is more tender than leaner sirloin. Here, we cook green beans in the same pan used to sear the spiced steak. All those delicious drippings add richness to the beans—plus there's one less pan to wash!
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Cornmeal-Crusted Shrimp with Corn & Okra
Coating shrimp in buttermilk, hot sauce and Cajun seasoning not only gives them a tangy, spicy flavor, it also helps the cornmeal stick to form a crispy crust.
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Chicken & Mushroom Ragu
An electric pressure cooker makes quick work of this rich, savory sauce. Deglazing with wine and scraping up the browned bits from the bottom of the pot is the key to building flavor.
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White Bean Soup with Pasta
We use mirepoix—a combination of onion, celery and carrots—to flavor this soup. Keep a store-bought bag of the mixture in your freezer to ensure you always have some on hand without worrying about it going bad.
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White Chicken Chili Casserole
This easy, one-skillet casserole is packed with heat thanks to two kinds of peppers, poblanos and jalapeño. If you want to increase the spice level, leave the seeds in the jalapeño. Finish with your favorite toppings like Cheddar, cilantro and crumbled tortilla chips.
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Fajita-Inspired Chicken-Stuffed Peppers
These chicken-stuffed peppers feature a delicious blend of savory ingredients that closely resemble the flavors of chicken fajitas. The chicken and bean filling fits neatly into a nice, sweet pepper with a cheesy topping. Packaged brown rice makes this dinner super easy, but leftover rice will work just as well!
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Spicy Shrimp, Vegetable & Couscous Bowls
We like the chewy bite and large size of pearl couscous (sometimes labeled Israeli couscous) for the base of these bowls.
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Salmon with Smoky Mayo & Quinoa Pilaf
We love the ease of cooking salmon straight from the freezer—not only does it save you a step, this method also gently steams the fish for super-moist results. The salmon gets served with a quinoa pilaf for a healthy and filling meal.
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Salmon with Lemon-Herb Orzo & Broccoli
This healthy salmon dish is as balanced as it is delicious. You add broccoli right into the pot along with the pasta during its last minute of cooking to save time here. One less thing to wash too!
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Paella Valenciana
A more traditional take on this paella, from the region of Spain where the dish originated, would include rabbit and chicken, but this recipe only calls for easier-to-find chicken thighs. If you want, substitute 1 rabbit (3 1/2 pounds) cut into 2-inch chunks for half the chicken. If you can't find cranberry beans, double the limas.
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Chickpea Pasta with Mushrooms & Kale
Loading up your pasta with vegetables like the kale and mushrooms here is not only delicious, it also makes the meal more satisfying.
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Instant Pot Chicken & Vegetable Soup with Noodles
To make a flavorful base for this soup—while still using some shortcuts—we pressure-cook store-bought broth with ginger, garlic, scallions, soy sauce and Shaoxing rice wine.
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Pork Chops with Cherry, Watercress & Farro Salad
Most farro sold in stores is pearled, meaning the bran is removed and it therefore has a little less fiber—but it still brings 2 grams per serving to this dish. It cooks quicker than harder-to-find whole farro, so be sure to double-check the cooking time on the package.
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Blackened Chicken with Chopped Salad
In this spin, we coat this blackened chicken with spices common to Cajun cooking, like dried thyme and cayenne pepper. Then, instead of using the traditional method of searing in a cast-iron pan, we take advantage of the warmer weather by grilling outside.
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Baked Chicken Drumsticks with Roasted Cauliflower & Potato Salad
Tossing the roasted cauliflower and potatoes with the creamy tarragon dressing while they're hot infuses them with flavor. The cornichons are an unexpected, delicious addition to this potato salad dressing. If you don't have any on hand, pickles or even relish would be good too.
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Gat Kimchi Bokkeum Bap (Mustard-Green Kimchi Fried Rice)
Cooling cooked rice is key here—it dries out the rice and firms it up so it doesn't stick together when it's fried, yielding fluffier results. Read more about this recipe.