Dessert/2 recipes

Upside-down grape and mascarpone cheesecake: red seedless grapes in a glossy sweet-tart sauce under a silky mascarpone filling, inverted to reveal the jewel-like fruit on top.

Hungarian poppy seed cookies sweetened with maple syrup and flavored with lemon extract and nutmeg. Butter-rich drop cookies with a subtle crunch from milk-soaked poppy seeds.

No-bake Easter pie with whipped gelatin folded into a graham cracker crust. Color it any flavor you like, garnish with jelly beans, and chill until firm.

Thin, crispy macadamia nut lace cookies made with brown sugar, dark corn syrup, and butter. Five ingredients that spread into delicate, golden, candy-like wafers.

Mixed berry cobbler with boysenberries, blueberries, and raspberries under a buttery cream biscuit topping. Baked until bubbling and golden, served warm with cream.

Cappuccino cheesecake: a silky cream cheese filling spiked with espresso and cinnamon, set on a buttery toasted-nut crust. Espresso-bar flavor in classic New York cheesecake form.

Classic butter pound cake: rich, tender, golden loaf made the proper old-fashioned way with butter, sugar, eggs, flour and vanilla. Just five ingredients and a long, careful cream.

Apple crunch coffee cake built on biscuit mix: layered batter, sliced apples and cinnamon streusel, finished with a vanilla glaze drizzle. From box to oven in 10 minutes flat.

Peaches and cream cheesecake bars: a vanilla pudding-spiked cake base topped with sliced peaches and a dollop-and-swirl cream cheese layer, dusted with cinnamon sugar. Sheet pan dessert that feeds 16.

Amaretto chocolate chip cheesecake with a fudgy wafer crust, amaretto cream cheese filling studded with chocolate chips, and an almond-topped sour cream finish. The grown-up dessert centerpiece.

Frozen peach mousse made with fresh peach puree, egg yolk custard, peach schnapps, and whipped meringue. A light, elegant no-cream summer dessert.

Austrian cheesecake made with sieved cottage cheese, whipped egg whites, golden raisins, and lemon zest on a shortbread crust. Lighter than New York style, with a soufflé-like crumb.

Mint Moments are melt-in-your-mouth butter cookies with cornstarch for tenderness, rolled in crushed peppermint candy and powdered sugar while still warm.

Sugar-free diabetic-friendly white layer cake with almond extract, whipped egg whites, and skim milk. Light and fluffy two-layer cake made with artificial sweetener instead of sugar.

Caramel apple cheesecake bars stacked four layers deep: a brown sugar shortbread crust, creamy cheesecake, spiced cinnamon-nutmeg apples, and an oat streusel, all finished with a caramel drizzle. Fall in a pan.

Old-fashioned nut-free fruitcake with candied cherries, pineapple, grape jelly, and warm spices. Baked low and slow in three pans. Safe for nut allergies.