Dessert, Baked Good Recipes

Frosted spice fruit cookies are old-fashioned molasses-spice rolled cookies loaded with walnuts, golden raisins, and dates, finished with an orange juice glaze. Holiday cookie tin staple.

Old-fashioned chocolate coconut tea cakes with a sour cream crumb and a cinnamon-scented chocolate glaze spread while warm. Twelve dainty cupcakes for afternoon tea or coffee with a friend.

Kentucky bourbon balls with pecans soaked in real bourbon, rolled in a buttery powdered-sugar fondant, then dipped in semi-sweet chocolate for that signature glossy shell. A classic Southern holiday confection worth the wait.

Pina colada sheet cake: a yellow poke cake soaked with cream of coconut, sweetened condensed milk, and rum, topped with crushed pineapple, whipped cream, and coconut. The cocktail in cake form.

Maple pumpkin cheesecake on a graham cracker crust, topped with a maple pecan glaze. Creamy, warmly spiced, and rich with real maple syrup, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

Flourless chocolate cake with a full pound of butter, 20 ounces of dark chocolate, 10 eggs, and Grand Marnier. Baked low and slow for 3 hours into pure fudge.

Lemon chiffon pie with a lemon-zest shortbread crust, cloud-light gelatin-set citrus filling, and a topping of fresh whipped cream. Bright, fluffy, refreshing.

Cinnamon-apple cheesecake with a shortbread crust, creamy filling, overlapping apple slices on top, and a warm orange marmalade glaze. A fall cheesecake that's more fruit tart than dense New York style.

Easy pound cake creams sugar with margarine, beats in eggs and vanilla, then bakes in a tube pan starting from a cold oven for a tender, tall crumb. Six ingredients, no leavening, no fuss.

Twice-baked Italian biscotti with fresh ginger, Dutch cocoa, and toasted almonds. Crisp, dunkable cookies with warm spice and a deep chocolate undertone.

Oatmeal raisin sheet cake spiked with cinnamon, cloves, and plumped raisins, baked thin on a sheet pan and finished with a quick poured icing. The bake-sale and potluck cake that feeds a crowd of 24.

Mincemeat sundae pie blends fruit mincemeat into vanilla ice cream, packs it into a vanilla wafer-pecan crust, and finishes each slice with warm homemade caramel sauce. A festive frozen twist on a Christmas classic.

Italian chocolate cookies with cocoa, cinnamon, cold coffee, and grape jelly in the dough. An old-world recipe with no eggs that makes a huge batch of soft, cakey cookies.

Midnight muncher bars with a marbled chocolate and vanilla base, caramel pecan frosting filling, and a glossy chocolate ganache topping. Three decadent layers in one rich bar cookie.

Soft banana cookies with brown butter penuche frosting: mashed ripe bananas in a cake-like dough, topped with a boiled brown sugar icing that hardens into a shiny, fudgy shell.

Lemon sugar cookies with fresh lemon juice, rolled thin and cut into shapes for Christmas or any occasion. A buttery cutout cookie with bright citrus flavor.