Wildly Delicious Weeknight Dinners For May
These recipes will help you welcome in summer!
Regardless of what the calendar says, for us, May is always when it feels like summer really begins. Sure, officially it’s on the Summer Solstice in June, but May is when we first start taking our meals outside for BBQs, picnics, and more—if that’s not the best sign of summer, we don’t know what is. Join us as we change over our dinner habits from spring pastas and soups to warm weather favorites like grilled everything, foil packs, and salads. We’ve got 40 recipes to help inspire you to make dinner this May— one for every day of the month, and then some!
We’ve included a good mix of new recipes here, like our creamy chicken piccata with gnocchi, our feta, spinach, & tomato stuffed salmon, or our spinach-artichoke flatbread, as well as some old favorites, like our garlicky feta eggplant pasta, our shrimp scampi, and our chicken Parm. Looking for super-easy weeknight dinners? Foil packs, sheet-pan dinners, and one skillet meals are IT. Check out our Caprese chicken foil packs, our sheet pan garlic butter salmon & asparagus, or our one-pan creamy sun-dried tomato, chicken, & gnocchi to see how versatile and easy these meals can be. Trust us—they're so good, you'll want to make them over and over again all season long.
If you’re like us, summer is also when we start craving lighter meals, so we’ve also included a number of stellar salads here to kick off the season right—try our grilled steak salad, our copycat Cheesecake Factory Mexican tortilla salad, or our coronation chicken salad (perfect for the coronation on May 6). As the days get longer and busier, these’ll keep you satisfied without weighing you down.
We’re also taking inspiration from the season, and including recipes that are synonymous with May holidays like Cinco de Mayo, Mother’s Day, and Memorial Day. May is also Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month, so we’ve included some of our favorite recipes to celebrate how much influence and enrichment AAPI cuisine has brought to us here at Delish.
For more early summertime inspiration, check out our favorite summer side salads (like potato and pasta salads, mmm), our best healthy summer dinners, and our top cookout menus too.
Grilled Steak Salad
This salad is simple enough for a weeknight but worthy of planning a get-together around, thanks to its star ingredient—ribeye steak. You’ll grill it (and red onions), then combine it with cherry tomatoes, blue cheese, basil, and a drizzle of tangy balsamic dressing, turning it into the kind of impressive-but-secretly-easy dish you’ll be making all the time.
Get the Grilled Steak Salad recipe.
Boursin Baked Ziti
Creamy, crumbly, herby Boursin cheese is the star of this easy riff on baked ziti. Many white baked ziti recipes call for swapping out the marinara for béchamel sauce, but a mixture of Boursin, ricotta, and heavy cream is much simpler—and super delicious.
Get the Boursin Baked Ziti recipe.
Spinach-Artichoke Flatbread
This recipe turns our favorite spinach & artichoke dip into an easy yet elegant dinner in the form of a flatbread pizza that’s simple enough for a weeknight dinner but impressive enough to serve to guests.
Get the Spinach-Artichoke Flatbread recipe.
Feta, Spinach, & Tomato Stuffed Salmon
Oven-roasted salmon is already delicious on its own, but adding a filling made of briny feta cheese, earthy cooked spinach, and savory-sweet cherry tomatoes will take your favorite fish up a few notches. To finish it off, the salmon gets topped with a mix of scallions, crushed red pepper, and yep—extra cheese. Mmm.
Chiles Rellenos
To keep the flavors clean, our version is baked and not fried. We broil the poblanos until they're blackened for an extra-smoky vibe, then fill them with a cheesy rice mixture that's honestly so delicious, it can be eaten on its own. Once baked to perfection, top it all off with tangy sour cream, fresh salsa, and cilantro—now that's a good stuffed pepper, upgraded.
Get the Chiles Rellenos recipe.
Bruschetta Grilled Chicken
This bruschetta-inspired grilled chicken is one of our favorite ways to celebrate fresh summer flavors. Make it for dinner this May, then again and again all season long.
Get the Bruschetta Grilled Chicken recipe.
Hawaiian Chicken Foil Packs
Everything you need for dinner is inside these easy foil packs, including super tender chicken, pineapple and veggies, plus a tangy BBQ sauce. Simply bring the edges of the foil together in the middle and crimp so that no steam can escape (the key to ultra juicy chicken). Once the chicken is cooked through, just serve straight from the packet or slide each serving onto a plates.
Get the Hawaiian Chicken Foil Packs recipe.
Chicago-Style Thin-Crust Pizza
That’s right, the Windy City, celebrated for creating colossal deep-dish pizza, has a lesser known thin crust pizza subculture. The sauce and cheese go right up to the edges of the dough, so the perimeter gets nice and crispy.
Sheet-Pan Garlic Butter Salmon & Asparagus
Garlic butter is here to save your weeknight dinner with this one-pan salmon & asparagus meal that's ready in as little as 30 minutes! Change up your veggies, and you can make this over and over again this May.
Chicken Parmesan
Though we’ve done it many different ways here (hi hello chicken nugget Parm casserole), this classic recipe has everything you want in chicken Parm, full stop—fried cutlets shrieking with crispiness, a perfect blend of mozzarella and Parm, and a sauce that is full of life with basil and just enough sweetness.
Get the Chicken Parmesan recipe.
Shrimp Scampi
Sometimes simple is the most satisfying, so we've kept this shrimp recipe unadulterated with pasta. Don't worry about missing the carbs—we top our shrimp with garlicky, lemony breadcrumbs that add a savory crunch to each bite. You're also welcome to add some spaghetti, if you like!
Get the Shrimp Scampi recipe.
Big Mac Hot Dogs
Love a Big Mac? Us too! So much so that we're not consigning their delicious flavor to just burgers. These hot dogs are everything you love about them (mm, Mac sauce), with a twist!
Get the Big Mac Hot Dogs recipe.
Lemon Butter Feta Chicken Pasta
Here, a creamy, rich pasta sauce with fresh lemon and tangy feta, and juicy chicken thighs all come together in one pot for a very simple but satisfying meal. It’s the even easier version of everyone’s favorite baked feta pasta, perfect for a busy May.
Chicken Burgers
These patties are spiced with smoked paprika and loaded with crunchy, bright coleslaw (this crunch truly makes all the difference). We promise these burgers rival even the best hamburgers, making them perfect for Memorial Day or any weeknight this May.
Get the Chicken Burgers recipe.
Copycat Chili's Quesadilla Explosion Salad
If salads were people, this Copycat Quesadilla Explosion Salad would be a real party animal. Surrounded by wedges of quesadilla and bursting with fajita chicken, cheese, corn and black bean salsa, and tortilla strips, this Chili’s copycat is basically a fiesta on your plate.
One-Pan Creamy Sun-Dried Tomato Chicken & Gnocchi
In this simple skillet supper, gnocchi and chicken thighs are is cooked in a creamy sauce sun-dried tomatoes. After the chicken and gnocchi are out of the oven, the chicken gets a quick rest and some grated Parm and a box of baby spinach get stirred in with the gnocchi. The hit of green looks great and also makes this a true one-pot meal, no side dish required!
Get the One-Pan Creamy Sun-Dried Tomato Chicken & Gnocchi recipe.
Cheesy Asparagus Stuffed Chicken
Here, a springy mix of asparagus, fresh mozz, and sun-dried tomatoes wake up this weekday workhorse in a recipe that’s quick enough for any Tuesday night this May, but special enough for a weekend dinner party all spring and summer long too.
Creamy Chicken Piccata With Gnocchi
When our spring weeknight dinners start to feel a little snoozy, we activate our go-to formula for supper success: Start with a dish you love, then add something new. Here, the dish we love is chicken piccata, the Italian-American classic, and the new ingredient is one of our favorite pantry items, boxed gnocchi.
Honey Mustard Chicken, Tomato, & Zucchini Foil Packs
Smothered in sweet honey-mustard sauce, these chicken breasts are grilled to perfection, staying super-tender and juicy by cooking inside foil packets. If you're looking for the easiest weeknight dinner ready in under an hour, this veggie-packed chicken dish is the crowd-pleaser your family will love this May.
Get the Honey Mustard Chicken, Tomato, & Zucchini Foil Packs recipe.
Classic Lasagna
Based on the traditional lasagna alla Bolognese, we grabbed what we loved most about the timeless, classic recipe and simplified it to make it weeknight-friendly. This lasagna can be eaten for any occasion—family Sunday dinner, lunch with friends over a pitcher of sangria, or cold straight from the fridge after a night out (it makes great leftovers).
Get the Classic Lasagna recipe.
Camille Lowder is the digital food producer at Delish, otherwise known as our resident queen of recipe galleries. Previously, she attended the Natural Gourmet Institute for culinary school and worked at/managed a number of New York restaurants. She loves anything vegan, foods masquerading as other foods (hello, cauliflower), and a well-used Oxford comma.
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