Food Processor

Here's an updated version of the ice cream pie — a dessert popular in America for years. It has a parfait filling instead of ice cream and is assembled in a springform pan. The familiar cookie crust and fudgy topping are still part of the recipe, but the dessert is now sophisticated enough for company.

The traditional b'stilla is an enormous pigeon or chicken pie wrapped in golden paper-thin pastry leaves. However, we made individual pies for ease of serving. The idea of meat mixed with spices and encased in pastry was brought to Morocco by Arabs from the Middle East; the delicate pastry sheets, it is thought, came specifically from Persia. Spices play a big part in Moroccan cooking. This legendary spice mixture is translated as "top of the shop."

(PALOMBO CON PESTO TRAPANESE) Here shark and pesto are teamed up in a great entrée. Offer it with the excellent dry white wine, Nozze d'Oro from Regaleali, the star of the Sicilian wine industry.

Here's an excellent new use for maple syrup. These bar cookies are very sweet and deliciously sticky.

This old-world pastry is known in Italian as crostata della Nonna.

This sophisticated soup and salad combination makes a cozy winter lunch for friends.

A nice hors d'oeuvre teaming fresh vegetables with a simplified version of rouille, the spicy red pepper and garlic sauce that typically accompanies French fish soups.

Grating the carrots in a processor makes this one-dish meal really easy to assemble.

This Italian version of fruitcake is dense, chewy and candy-like. Wrap it in brightly colored cellophane for giving.

Nice with the chicken, as a side dish for burgers, or on its own as a snappy vegetarian main course.

Fresh raspberries and blueberries enhance both the filling and the topping of this creamy and delicious dessert. Begin preparing it a day before serving.

A lovely salad in which the citrus fruit strikes a nice balance with the fish.