Dessert, Baked Good Recipes

Christmas Ginger Cookies with Almond Frosting recipe.

A few small twists make a much healthier but still decadent chocolate pudding cake. Wole wheat flour adds some fibre, using half butter and half olive oil cuts down the amount of saturated fat without losing the buttery flavor and moist texture. Spoon the warm and rich chocolate sauce over the pudding cake before serving.

Vintage stuffed date drops from the 1950s: pecan-stuffed dates dipped in sour cream cookie batter, baked into tender little drops, and finished with a browned-butter golden glaze.

Classic oatmeal raisin cookies with pecans and cinnamon. The secret is soaking raisins in beaten eggs and vanilla for an hour, producing plump fruit and extra-chewy cookies.

Old-fashioned egg custard pie with a silky, nutmeg-spiced filling in a flaky pastry crust. A simple five-ingredient custard that bakes smooth with the classic knife-clean test.

Fruitcake baked and sealed in canning jars for long-term storage up to a year. A spiced quick bread with your choice of fruit, raisins, and nuts, vacuum-sealed straight from the oven.

Italian almond butter cookies rolled in powdered sugar, made with just 5 ingredients and no eggs. Tender, crumbly, and nutty with a snowball-style coating.

Mango mousse cake with airy sponge base, raspberry jam ribbon, fresh mango cream mousse, and a crown of toasted almond slices and whipped cream rosettes. A patisserie-worthy showstopper.

Almond slices are loaded with chopped almonds in an oil-based dough and sliced warm. A pareve mandelbrot-style cookie that travels well, keeps for weeks, and gets better with time.

Banana pineapple pecan cake (Southern hummingbird-style) with crushed pineapple folded right into the batter, finished with a pineapple buttercream. Moist, fruity, and a potluck winner.

Eggnog chiffon pie in a flaky homemade crust with a light, airy filling of custard, whipped cream, rum extract, and nutmeg set with gelatin. A holiday dessert classic.

Pistachio cake doctored from a white cake mix with pistachio pudding, walnuts, and a tangy cream cheese frosting. The retro green Bundt cake that's been a potluck favorite for decades.

Polish cheesecake (sernik) made with drained cottage or farmer's cheese, eggs, and a cinnamon-sugar crumb topping over shortbread crust. Old-world dessert that's lighter than New York-style.

Old-fashioned mace cake baked in a bundt pan with butter, five eggs, and a full teaspoon of mace for a warm, nutmeg-like flavor. Simple and elegant.

Five-flavor pound cake glaze is a quick stovetop sugar syrup laced with coconut, butter, rum, lemon, and vanilla extracts. Poured warm over pound cake for an aromatic, moist finish.

Oat bran raisin cookies with rolled oats, brown sugar, walnuts, and the option to swap raisins for chocolate chips. A hearty, fiber-rich drop cookie with a chewy texture.