Dessert
3852 recipes found
Strawberry Sauce
Ice cream sundaes, of course, find expression in their sauces, which provide layers of flavor and seismic contrasts in temperature and tone. To the category of vivid and bright belong fruit sauces, particularly those with a touch of acidity and a shake of vibrant color. Strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, sour cherries or pineapples — sweet, just-ripe fruits cooked briefly with sugar — will brighten vanilla's pallor (high-pectin fruits can often go it alone without cornstarch for body).
Bobby Flay’s Salted Caramel Sauce
Make a batch of this sauce before guests come to dinner, keep it warm in the oven while they eat, then spoon it over vanilla ice cream for dessert: That’s a win. Or make it in the morning and pair it with pancakes. Mr. Flay, the voluble chef and television star, pairs it with double-chocolate pancakes. That is a very serious business.
Black Grape, Blue Cheese and Thyme Flatbread
Black grapes, such as Concords, come into season in the fall. The combination of grapes, sweet spices and blue cheese is an unusual one, yet utterly delicious -- especially for the kind of person who loves ending a meal on a sweet and cheesy note. I serve this for brunch, or before dinner with drinks. For even more flavor and substance, add a scattering of arugula and prosciutto on top.
Créme Anglaise
Laurie Colwin’s Gingerbread
The writer Laurie Colwin had an obsession with gingerbread, publishing a few different essays and recipes exploring its charms. In the essay that precedes this moist, cakelike rendition, from her book “Home Cooking,” she writes that it is “home food” — not fancy restaurant food, that is, but soothing cold-weather food that is simple to make, ideal for an afternoon spent holed up indoors. The essay is also a paean to Steen’s cane syrup, from Louisiana, which comes in cheerful yellow cans. Steen’s is easy to find online, if not at your local supermarket, but the recipe does not suffer if you use another brand of light molasses instead. Serve the cake plain with whipped cream, or with fruit and a dollop of crème fraîche, or glazed with lemon icing, as Ms. Colwin often did. (The New York Times)
Lard Pie Crust
This delicate, puffy crust uses a combination of lard and butter for the richest flavor and the largest flakes. You can substitute more lard for the butter, but you will lose some of the complexity. Make sure to seek out rendered leaf lard from a good butcher or specialty market, or try your local farmers’ market. It’s the purest and best quality pig fat to use in a crust. Avoid processed lard from the supermarket at all costs; it's been hydrogenated to increase shelf life and can sometimes have an off or mildly rancid flavor, not to mention the dangers of hydrogenated fat to your arterial health. You can freeze this crust for up to 3 months. Defrost for 8 hours or overnight in the refrigerator.
Sugarplum Gingerbread Cake
This deeply spiced gingerbread cake recipe comes from the cookbook author Genevieve Ko, who found inspiration in the light-as-air cakes she tasted from Chinese bakeries in Southern California, as well as the sweets — hot candied ginger and sugared, dried plums (a.k.a. prunes) — that her grandmothers offered her as a child. Ms. Ko's cake uses oil, not butter, which gives the crumb a fluffy, moist texture. The liquid base of rehydrated prunes brings sweetness along with depth of flavor.
Chocolate Orange Drizzle Cake
Chocolate and orange are a traditional pairing, but not one that I've always liked. Chocolate has all the muscle in the partnership. It mocks the pleading, too-sweet orange. But there is such a difference when you use Seville oranges. The plain cocoa-dark loaf here, drenched in bitter orange syrup, is unfussy but sensational. The syrup permeates the cake unevenly, so that every now and again, in a dark, chocolaty mouthful you get an explosion of fizzing orange sherbet.
Moist Gingerbread Cake With Lemon Glaze
This dark, deeply moist, gingered beauty was created by Karen DeMasco, the pastry chef at Locanda Verde in New York. Beer and coffee add complexity, and the tangy lemon glaze counters the sweetness.
Baked Custard
This is a snap to make: you do no more than heat some milk with a vanilla pod, if you have one, and then beat the milk into some eggs and sugar. I don't split the pod, much as I love the sight of those aromatic little black seeds; I like the vanilla taste here to be delicate rather than perfumed. Certainly it's fine to use a good quality vanilla extract instead. The custard must be cooked in a bain-marie or water bath. You place the dish of custard in a shallow baking dish. Fill this second dish with enough boiling water to come about halfway up the sides of the custard dish. The water bath stops the custard from splitting and keeps the texture perfectly silky and smooth.
Gingerbread Bûche de Noël
In this festive recipe, Dorie Greenspan reinterprets the classic French bûche de Noël, a Christmas cake fashioned to look like a Yule log. Instead of the usual chocolate cake filled with ganache, she bakes a fragrant lightly spiced sponge cake and fills it with pecan cream cheese filling, while billowing marshmallow frosting evokes a snowdrift. It’s a project to make and can take the better part of a day. Or split it up and make the components over a few days. Either way it’s time well spent. There’s no holiday dessert more spectacular than this.
Dark Molasses Gingerbread With Whipped Cream
This gingerbread, from the chefs Edna Lewis and Scott Peacock, is just wonderful: a little spicy, a little sweet, very simple to make, and absolutely delicious. Whipped cream is an easy topping, although dulce de leche or another warm, caramel-y sauce takes it to a special place. But it’s also kind of nice plain, wrapped in waxed paper and tucked inside someone’s lunch.
Blueberry Lattice Pie
Here's a showstopper of a summer pie if there ever was one. In this recipe that came to The Times in 1995, a generous pile of blueberries is tossed with sugar, cinnamon and orange zest then baked in a butter-shortening crust until the filling is bubbly and the crust golden brown. Don't be intimidated by the lattice top. Just take your time, and do your best. No matter what it looks like, it'll taste delicious.
No-Churn Ice Cream
Made without an ice cream maker, this custard-base ice cream is frozen solid in a loaf pan, then churned until creamy in a food processor or blender. It's best scooped straight from the machine, when it has the satiny-chewy texture of soft serve. If you do want to make it ahead, you can return it to the freezer for up to a week, then let it sit at room temperature for 20 minutes before serving.
Classic Hot Fudge Sundae
There is a reason a hot fudge sundae is such an enduring classic: That combination of warm, rich chocolate fudge mixing with frozen ice cream and melting it slightly is absolutely irresistible. Of course, if you have homemade fudge sauce and homemade ice cream, it gets even better. Vanilla ice cream is the standard here, but feel free to use your favorite flavor, or a combination of flavors. And if you like nuts, by all means use them here. The added crunch is marvelous against all the rich creaminess.
Classic Custard Ice Cream Base
Rich, creamy and deeply satisfying, there is nothing better than a classic custard ice cream. Sometimes called French-style, this base incorporates eggs, which improve the texture and help prevent ice crystals from forming. This recipe for ice cream base may be churned on its own, but it is meant to have flavors added. See the chart here for flavor options and directions for incorporating them into the base recipe.
Salted Caramel Ice Cream
This luxurious ice cream is the ideal balance of sweet yet salty and rich yet light. It's custard-based, which means you have to separate a lot of eggs (six), but the thick and silky results are worth a little bit of fuss. For something a little lighter, use more milk and less cream, as long as the dairy adds up to three cups. You can also cut down on egg yolks for a thinner base, but don’t go below three. Despite the rumors, making caramel is not hard, but it can be a little tricky. If this is your first time, make sure you have enough sugar for a second batch in the event your first is a bust. Also, remove the cooking caramel from the heat just before you think you need to to prevent burning.
Spiced Brandied Cherries
This recipe calls for heating the liqueur to hasten the maceration time, and further impregnate the cherries with booze.
Philadelphia-Style Ice Cream Base
Made without eggs, this ice cream is much less rich than those made with a custard base. The lack of eggs also allows the flavorings to shine through, making it a light in texture yet intense in taste. Using a combination of granulated sugar and liquid sugar (corn syrup, honey or agave syrup) helps keep the texture smooth and silky.
Ginger Butterscotch Sauce
This recipe came to The Times from the pastry chef Pichet Ong, who developed it when he worked at Spice Market and 66 in New York. He served it over a kabocha squash pie with a lime graham cracker crust, but it would go equally well over cheesecake, key lime pie or chess pie. It takes about a half-hour of your time, and will add a buttery note to any dessert.
Aztec Hot Chocolate Pudding
It looks alarming when you make it -- it's hard to believe that sprinkling sugar and cocoa on top of a cake batter and then pouring hot water over it will end up edible, but it does, it truly does. This is a luscious, homey dessert, one of those self-saucing puddings that turn themselves as they bake into a layer of gooey sauce topped with tender cake.
Raspberry Chocolate Almond Spread
This berry-tella is spectacular on a biscuit or a piece of toast, or warmed over ice cream, but a good portion will likely be consumed right from the jar while standing in front of the refrigerator.
Dark Chocolate Flan With Pumpkinseed Praline
A light and fluffy flan seasoned with chile, cinnamon and anise, and topped with a filigree of pepita praline (just hulled pumpkinseeds mixed with caramel). This is dinner party pudding at its zenith.
