The BLT (Bacon, Lettuce & Tomato) is the second most popular sandwich in the United States.^[1] The sandwich traditionally has several strips of cooked bacon, leaves of lettuce (traditionally iceberg or romaine), and slices of tomato, between slices of bread (commonly toasted). Mayonnaise is the traditional condiment for the sandwich.

BLT sandwiches are believed to descend from tea sandwiches in the late Victorian era.^[2] Between 1930 and 1950, cookbooks typically listed cheese as an ingredient.^[2]

The BLT became popular after World War II because of the rapid expansion of supermarkets that allowed for ingredients to be available year-round.^[1] The initials, representing “bacon, lettuce, tomato”, likely began in the American restaurant industry as shorthand for the sandwich.

Chicken fingers (also called “chicken tenders” or “chicken strips” or “chicken toes” or “chicken fillets” ) are a style of fried chicken that does not include any bones or skin.

Chicken fingers are prepared by dipping chicken meat in a breading mixture and then deep frying them. Traditionally, chicken fingers are primarily white meat, made from the rib meat trimmed from the breast, though this is not always the case and commonly processed ground chicken is used.

Chicken fingers are served in many restaurants in the United States, Canada, Europe, and Australia. They are often served alongside various dipping sauces. The dipping sauces include: blue cheese, ranch dressing, barbecue sauce, honey mustard, Buffalo wing sauce, or the sweet and sour Polynesian sauce. In the south, cream gravy is very popular as a sauce at various restaurants.

The chicken fingers are often served in a basket with french fries, served on a garden salad, or in a sandwich, such as a wrap or on a bun. The chicken fingers are often diced and stuffed in a baked potato topped with butter, Cheddar cheese, and cream gravy.

A cheeseburger is a hamburger accompanied with melted cheese. The term itself is a portmanteau of the words “cheese” and “hamburger.” The cheese is usually sliced, then added a short time before the hamburger finishes cooking to allow it to melt. In fast food restaurants, the cheese that is added to a cheeseburger is typically American cheese, but there are many other variations. Mozzarella, blue cheese, pepper jack, and especially cheddar are popular choices.

The cheese in a cheeseburger substantially changes its nutritional value. For example, in comparison to their standard hamburger, which only differs by the slice of cheese, a McDonald’s cheeseburger has 20% more calories, 33% more fat and 25% more protein.^[1] Other types of cheese would have varying effects, depending on their nutritional content.

A cheeseburger can be served with a variety of toppings such as pickles, tomatoes, lettuce, onions, fried egg, mushrooms, horseradish or bacon slices. Typical condiments used include mustard, ketchup, mayonnaise, barbecue sauce, relish, and thousand island dressing.

A Jucy Lucy is a type of cheeseburger, developed and popularized in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where the cheese is placed inside the raw meat and then cooked until it melts.

A cheeseburger may have more than one hamburger patty and slice of cheese. A stack of two is a double cheeseburger; a triple has three. More than three are not common in restaurants.

Lasagna (singular, pronounced [laˈzaɲa] in Italian; plural lasagne pronounced [laˈzaɲe]) is both a form of pasta in sheets (sometimes rippled, though seldom so in Northern Italy) and also a dish, sometimes named lasagne al forno (meaning “oven-cooked lasagne”) made with alternate layers of pasta, cheese, and often ragù (a meat sauce) or tomato sauce. In the UK, the dish is always spelled lasagne as it is in Italy.

The word lasagna, which originally applied to a cooking pot, now simply describes the food itself.^[1] Americans commonly use the singular “lasagna” to refer to both the dish and the pasta, while others use the Italian plural “lasagne”.

Although the dish is generally believed to have originated in Italy, the word “lasagna” comes from the Greek λάσανα (lasana) or λάσανον (lasanon) meaning “trivet or stand for a pot”, “chamber pot”^[3][4][5]. The Romans borrowed the word as “lasanum”, in Latin, meaning “cooking pot”. The Italians used the word to refer to the dish in which lasagna is made. It wasn’t long before the name of the food took on the name of the serving dish.

Another theory suggests that lasagna might come from Greek λάγανον (laganon), a flat sheet of pasta dough cut into strips.^[6][7][8][9]

The recipe was featured in the first cookbook ever written in England, leading to an urban legend that the dish originated in the British Isles.^[10] The claim is dubious, in light of the much earlier Roman use of “lasanum”.

Chicken fried steak (also known as country fried steak) is a piece of steak (tenderized cube steak) coated with seasoned flour and pan fried. It is associated with Southern U.S. cuisine and hospitality. Its name is likely due to chicken fried steak’s similarity in preparation to fried chicken, though the dish is also similar to the classic Viennese dish Wiener Schnitzel, a tenderized veal cutlet, coated with flour, eggs, and breadcrumbs and fried.

The precise origins of the dish are unclear, but many sources attribute its development to German and Austrian immigrants to Texas in the nineteenth century who brought recipes for Wiener Schnitzel from Europe to the USA.^[1] Lamesa, the seat of Dawson County on the Texas South Plains, claims to be the birthplace of chicken fried steak, as does Bandera, Texas.^[2]

Chicken fried steak is among numerous popular dishes which make up the official state meal of Oklahoma.

Fettuccine alfredo is a pasta dish made from fettuccine pasta tossed with parmesan cheese and butter. As the cheese melts, it emulsifies the liquids to form a smooth and rich coating on the pasta. Although it was named by an Italian restaurateur, at his restaurant Alfredo alla Scrofa in Rome, it is largely an American dish, essentially the same as the Italian dish Fettuccine al burro e panna (‘fettucine with butter and cream’). In American cuisine, it is often mixed with other ingredients such as parsley, cream, garlic, shrimp and chicken. When seafood is added, such as shrimp and/or scallops, it is sometimes advertised as “fettucini neptune.”

Pasta tossed with cheese and butter or cream has a long history both in Italy and abroad.

It was popularized among American tourists in Rome by the restaurateur Alfredo di Lelio, who served it with his own name attached:

Fettuccine al burro is associated in every tourist’s mind with Rome, possibly because the original Alfredo succeeded in making its serving a spectacle reminiscent of grand opera.^[2]

The restaurant’s story is that the dish was invented by di Lelio at his restaurant Alfredo alla Scrofa in 1914 as a variation of fettuccine al burro. When butter was added both before and after fettuccine was put in the serving bowl, the butter was known as doppio burro (double butter). Di Lelio’s original contribution was to double the amount of butter in the bowl before the fettuccine would be poured in, thus a triplo burro (triple butter) effect instead of double, which he started doing for his pregnant wife, who was having difficulty keeping food down. When his wife began eating again, Alfredo added the new dish to his restaurant’s menu.

A chocolate chip cookie is a drop cookie that originated in the United States and features chocolate chips as its distinguishing ingredient. The traditional recipe combines a dough composed of butter and both brown and white sugar with semi-sweet chocolate chips. Variations include recipes with other types of chocolate or additional ingredients, such as nuts or oatmeal.

It is agreed that the chocolate chip cookie was accidentally developed by Ruth Wakefield in 1934. She owned the Toll House Inn, in Whitman, Massachusetts, a very popular restaurant in the 1930s. The restaurant’s popularity was not just due to its home-cooked style meals; her policy was to give diners a whole extra helping of their entrées to take home with them and a serving of her homemade cookies for dessert. Her cookbook, Toll House Tried and True Recipes, was published in 1936 by M. Barrows & Company, New York, and included the recipe “Toll House Chocolate Crunch Cookie”, for what have since been widely called Toll House cookies.

Fudge is a type of confectionery which is usually very sweet, extremely rich and sometimes flavoured with cocoa. It is made by mixing sugar, butter, and milk and heating it to the soft-ball stage at 240 °F (116 °C), and then beating the mixture while it cools so that it acquires a smooth, creamy consistency. Chocolate can also be mixed in to make chocolate fudge. Fudge can also be used in brownies.

The components of Fudge are very similar to the traditional recipe for Scots Tablet, which is noted in “The Household Book of Lady Grisell Baillie” (1692-1733). The term “fudge” is often used in the United Kingdom for a softer variant of the tablet recipe.

One of the first documentations of American-style fudge (containing chocolate) is found in a letter written by Emelyn Battersby Hartridge, a student at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York. She wrote that her schoolmate’s cousin made fudge in Baltimore, Maryland in 1886 and sold it for 40 cents a pound. Miss Hartridge got hold of the fudge recipe, and in 1888, made 30 lb (14 kg) of fudge for the Vassar College Senior Auction. This Vassar fudge recipe became quite popular at the school for years to come.^[1]

Word of this popular confection spread to other women’s colleges. For example, Wellesley and Smith have their own versions of this fudge recipe.

New York-style cheesecake relies upon heavy cream, usually cheesecake is made from a rich cheese^{["really cheesey cheese"? clarification needed]} from Switzerland, cream cheese, eggs and egg yolks to add a richness and a smooth consistency. Also called Jewish-style, it is baked in a special 13–15 cm (5–6 inches) tall springform pan in many restaurants. Some recipes use cottage cheese and lemon for distinct texture and flavor or add a drizzle of chocolate or strawberry sauce to the basic recipe.

Pennsylvania Dutch-style cheesecake uses a slightly tangy type of cheese with larger curds and less water content, called pot or farmer’s cheese.

Philadelphia-style cheesecake is lighter in texture, yet richer in flavor than New York style cheesecake.

Farmer’s cheese cheesecake is the contemporary implementation for the traditional use of baking to preserve fresh cheese and is often baked in a cake form along with fresh fruit like a tart.

Country-style cheesecake uses buttermilk to produce a firm texture while decreasing the pH (increasing acidity) to extend shelf life.

Lactose free cheesecake may be made either with lactose-free cream cheese or as an imitation using Vegan recipes combining non-dairy cream cheese alternatives with other lactose-free ingredients.

Gooey butter cake a St. Louis variant that has a layer of regular cake with a cheesecake top.

American waffles^[1], are made from a batter leavened with baking powder. They are usually served as a sweet breakfast food, topped with butter and various syrups, but are also found in many different savory dishes, such as fried chicken and waffles or topped with kidney stew.^[2]They may also be served as desserts, topped with ice cream and various other toppings. They are generally denser and thinner than the Belgian waffle. Waffles were first introduced to North America in 1620 by Pilgrims who brought the method from Holland. Thomas Jefferson brought a waffle iron from France, and waffle frolics or parties became popular in the late eighteenth century.

The Belgian or Brussels waffle^[3] is prepared with a yeast leavened batter. It is generally, but not always, lighter, thicker, crispier, and/or has larger pockets compared to other waffle varieties. In Belgium, they’re served warm by street vendors, dusted with confectioner’s sugar, and sometimes topped with whipped cream or chocolate spread. In America, they’re served in the same ways the American waffle is served. Belgian waffles were introduced to America by restaurateur Maurice Vermersch, who sold his Brussels waffles under the name “Bel-Gem Waffles” at New York’s 1964 World’s Fair.

The Liège waffle^[4] (from the city of Liège, in eastern Belgium) is a richer, denser, sweeter, and more chewy waffle. Invented by the chef of the prince-bishop of Liège in the 18th century, as an adaptation of brioche bread dough, they feature chunks of pearl sugar, which caramelize on the outside of the waffle, when baked. They are the most common type of waffle available in Belgium and are prepared in plain, vanilla and cinnamon varieties by street vendors across the nation.

Hong Kong style waffle, in Hong Kong called a “grid cake” or “grid biscuits” (格仔餅), is a waffle usually made and sold by street hawkers and eaten warm on the street.^[5] They are similar to a traditional waffle but larger, round in shape and divided into four quarters. They are usually served as a snack. Butter, peanut butter and sugar are spread on one side of the cooked waffle and then it is folded into a semi circle to eat. Egg, sugar and evaporated milk are used in the waffle recipes, giving them a sweet flavor. They are generally soft and not dense. Traditional Hong Kong style waffles are full of the flavor of yolk. Sometimes different flavors, such as chocolate and honey melon flavor are used in the recipe and create various colors.