83 holiday cake recipes

Green-and-white peppermint pinwheel cookies, sliced from a swirled frozen log. A classic Christmas icebox cookie with spiraled layers of vanilla and mint dough.

Lighter cranberry apple cookies made with egg whites and skim milk, loaded with fresh fruit, cinnamon, and orange zest. A guilt-free holiday cookie that yields 2 dozen.

Mexican wedding cookies shaped into crescents with butter, crushed pecans, powdered sugar, and vanilla. Tender, crumbly, and melt-in-your-mouth with just six ingredients.

Jewish rugelach with a flaky cottage cheese dough, apricot jam, cinnamon-sugar, walnuts, and currants rolled into golden crescents. A holiday cookie jar essential for Hanukkah or Christmas.

A vegan butternut squash pie with soy milk and agar flakes, spiced with cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger, garnished with pecans and a barley malt glaze. An egg-free and dairy-free twist on the classic holiday pie.

Vegan Christmas cake packed with candied pineapple, cherries, citrus peel, raisins, and currants, bound without eggs or dairy. A long-baking holiday fruitcake for slicing into thin festive servings.

Pineapple lemon fruit filling for Japanese fruitcake, cooked custard-style in a double boiler with toasted pecans. The signature Southern holiday cake glue.

Vegan fruit cake packed with dried fruit, candied peel, orange rind, and almonds, leavened with a soy milk and vinegar reaction instead of eggs. A dense, dairy-free holiday cake baked low and slow.

Magic Fruit Cake bakes up tender and jewel-bright with mincemeat, sweetened condensed milk, red and green cherries, and chopped walnuts. A no-fuss holiday tube cake that mixes in one bowl and slices into glossy, fruit-studded rounds.

Butter ball cookies (Russian tea cakes) with ground walnuts, cake flour, butter, and vanilla rolled in powdered sugar twice. A melt-in-your-mouth holiday cookie with just five ingredients.

Frosty Snow Berry Cake with cranberry sauce cubes folded into a lemon-scented white cake, topped with billowy pink fluffy frosting. A vintage holiday showstopper.

Sleigh Belles are angel food cake mix cookies in three festive flavors: chocolate chip walnut, coconut, and chopped date. Light, airy holiday cookies from one box of cake mix.

Christmas tree cake cut from a 13x9 sheet cake into a tree shape, frosted green and decorated with peppermint candies, pretzel rod trunk, and a gumdrop star. Festive holiday show-stopper from one boxed mix.

Friendship cake starter made with pineapple, cherries, and peaches layered with sugar and brandy over six weeks. A fermented fruit base for holiday fruitcakes.

Mexican wedding cakes are always a holiday favorite but this recipe takes it up a notch or two, writes Mary Wilhelm of Sparta.

Mince-meat cookies made with a tender cake flour dough rolled thin, filled with cooked mincemeat, and sandwiched together. A vintage holiday filled cookie that makes 36.