Baked Good Recipes

Van's Faves are crisp lace-thin oat cookies scented with orange zest and finished with a chocolate drizzle. Eight ingredients, big crunch, and an old-fashioned tin-cookie feel.

Classic vanilla spritz cookies with rich buttery flavor from whole eggs. Press into festive shapes for Christmas cookie exchanges or year-round celebrations.

Hand-shaped vanilla almond cookies baked low and slow for a tender, shortbread-like crumb. Simple butter cookie dough with finely chopped almonds throughout.

Velvet cake is a flourless-style chocolate showpiece pooled over white chocolate and raspberry sauces. Dense, fudgy, and made with just six ingredients in the cake itself, it slices like a torte and tastes like ganache.

Warm spices meet shredded coconut and molasses in this richly layered cake, topped with a tangy cream cheese orange frosting and a candied orange rose garnish that steals the show.

A creamy water-bath cheesecake with a walnut graham cracker crust, lemony cream cheese and cottage cheese filling, topped with fresh berries and double strawberry sauce.

Bakery-style chocolate chip cookies with chocolate chunks and ground toasted almonds in the dough. Low-temperature bake for thick, chewy centers with crisp golden edges.

Flaky, buttery pastry triangles filled with jam and kissed with orange zest. A classic Austrian cookie that uses hard-cooked egg yolks for an impossibly tender dough.

Wacky cake, a Depression-era chocolate cake made with no eggs, no butter, and no milk. Vinegar and baking soda provide the rise, and cocoa powder delivers deep chocolate flavor from pantry staples.

Walnut apple quick bread with buttermilk, crushed wheat cereal, and warm spices. A hearty, no-yeast loaf with a tender crumb and crunchy walnut texture in every slice.

Italian biscotti with toasted walnuts, orange zest, and black pepper. The savory-sweet hybrid that pairs with dessert wine, cheese, or after-dinner coffee.

Walnut raspberry brownies made with unsweetened chocolate and topped with warm raspberry jam. Fudgy, nutty, and fruit-glazed with a rich chocolate base and 1 1/2 cups of chopped walnuts.

Homemade water bagels with the proper boil-then-bake method: shaped, chilled, dropped into sugar-water, then baked until shiny and golden. The classic dense-chewy bagel texture, made from scratch.

Weintraubentorte, a traditional German grape torte with a buttery shortcrust shell and a whipped egg white, almond, and fresh grape filling baked until golden.

Wheat germ and nut zucchini bread, a hearty quickbread loaded with grated zucchini, toasted wheat germ, cinnamon, and chopped nuts. Two-loaf yield makes one for now and one for the freezer.

Old-fashioned applesauce doughnuts with whole wheat flour, buttermilk, and warm spices like cinnamon, nutmeg, and mace. Fried golden and dusted with sugar.