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The trick to this gorgeous dessert is to use imported white chocolate and to melt it carefully, since white chocolate is extremely heat sensitive. Let the terrine mixture get only warm enough to melt the white chocolate and butter.

Lemon marmalade provides the instant filling for these buttery treats.

I use these prebaked tart shells (also called galettes) for a wide variety of fillings, both sweet and savory. Because you bake them directly on baking sheets, you don't need a cupboard full of tart pans to make any size tart you want. You don't need to weight the tarts as they bake to prevent the sides from caving in, and they always turn out very crisp and delicate throughout because there is nothing to get in the way of the oven's heat flow.

Though this pastry is very good when made with regular butter, it really shines when you use the richest butter possible, such as Plugrá or Land O Lakes Ultra Creamy Butter. This recipe is an accompaniment for Apple and Calvados Tart. Active time: 15 min Start to finish: 1 1/4 hr

Cakes resembling Yule logs are very popular at Christmastime in Canada and the United States. Though you'll see them in bakery windows elaborately decorated with marzipan woodland animals and meringue mushrooms, we went with a simpler but more elegant look. Active time: 1 1/4 hr Start to finish: 3 1/2 hr (includes making buttercream and brittle)

Seasonal fruits star in a lovely rustic dessert.

Serve this home-style treat with whipped cream, vanilla ice cream or frozen yogurt.

Potatoes are the typical main ingredient in this classic garlicky Greek spread. The use of white beans in their place-plus the addition of tahini along with lots of fresh mint and parsley-transforms the easy appetizer into a whole new treat.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less.

For another food editor 'tis the season to make shortbread. She adapted the following recipe from Richard Sax's Cookie Lover's Cookie Book. These cookies are out of this world.

Beef Stew Editor's Note: This recipe and introductory text are excerpted from The Exotic Kitchens of Peru, by Copeland Marks. We've also added some tips of our own below. For a complete guide to Peruvian cuisine, click here. This is a special dish that is only prepared on Mondays. My teacher told me that everyone she knew cooked Espesado on Mondays, a ritual that is universally accepted. In the clean and complete Central Market of Chiclayo, a number of the small eating shops were dispensing this to diners who knew what they wanted and expected it on Mondays.

There is this great bustling taverna in one of the northern Athenian suburbs near where we live, and this is the house special, so much so that the chef refused to give me a recipe for it. So, I deconstructed it myself only to re-create it pretty much intact. The tomatoes, cream, and ouzo make a great sauce. You could easily make a quantity and serve it over pasta. It would look and taste good with squid-ink linguine.

This recipe was created to prepare <epi:recipeLink ="14260">Asian Pork Crêpes</epi:recipeLink>.

Can be prepared in 45 minutes or less but requires additional unattended time.