Make Ahead

No, it's not a mistake. This cake really doesn't contain any eggs. The oil in the batter makes the cake moist; the rest of the ingredients provide enough structure to give the cake a great crumb.

Surprisingly, it takes half a gallon of milk to get 1 1/2 cups of fresh ricotta. You'll need a double batch to have enough for the <epi:recipelink id="351042">gnocchi</epi:recipelink>. For the moistest, lightest consistency, let the curds drain only aslong as specified.

Finally, PB&J for dessert. In this whimsical sweet, a peanut butter shortbread cookie is topped with a layer of blackberry jam. Some frozen shortbread dough is grated over the jam before baking for a nice finishing touch.

A fun take on the crowdpleasing cream cheese brownies.

Danish blue cheese, which is more economical than Roquefort, adds a rich tang to these cheese puffs.

The zesty lemon-cream filling for the cookies can be made one day ahead. Cover and refrigerate the filling; bring it to room temperature before using.

Serve at room temperature with a sprinkling of salt, cornichons, Dijon, and a baguette.

These palm-size pockets can be frozen for up to a month and fit perfectly in a lunch box.

These tasty (no-allergy!) nut alternatives are great to have out around the holidays. Give them to the kids in rolled-up parchment-paper cones (as shown).

When adding your hot liquids to the bowl while whisking, it helps to stabilize your bowl by rolling a kitchen towel up into a log, wrapping it into a coil as wide as the bowl's base, then setting the bowl onto it to nest it in place. This recipe makes twice as much pastry cream as is needed for the Pavlovas . Leftover cream can be used to make èclairs, cream puffs, fruit tarts, or breakfast pastries.

Bill Gross, who was executive sous chef at Café Gray in New York City, was kind enough to create this recipe for me—and it is simply delicious. The technique is fascinating, but it does require some careful watching while the sugar caramelizes. The oranges are prepared two days ahead, and the ice cream one day ahead—and the waiting is well worth it!

This recipe originally accompanied Curried Lamb Samosas with Apricot Chutney .

This recipe originally accompanied Jalapeño Popper Fritters with Tomato Salsa .

Few can resist this soup-stew of tender cannellini beans, silken pork shoulder, tomatoes, and herbs. We give the cherry tomatoes a little extra love in the oven to boost their flavor before we stir them into the beans. Rosemary is a natural in this dish, but it’s the generous amount of parsley added at the end that’s the real revelation. The herb adds a zesty top note to the beans. Simple side dishes—garlic bread, a green salad—complete the picture.

Known as pepitorias, these tasty caramel-filled wafer "tacos" embellished with toasted pumpkin seeds are a regular offering at Mexican markets and sweets shops, especially in the city of Puebla, which is famous for so many confections. The wafers are traditionally brightly colored, but we chose to stick with a more seasonal white-and-gold motif. Since tinted edible wafer paper is hard to come by in the United States, we used precut white Back-Oblaten, imported from Germany, and we explain how to color them. Painting them with food coloring or water softens them enough to fold around the caramel.

This is called a meringue buttercream because its foundation is egg whites, not the more traditional yolks. That makes it very light, satiny, and easy to spread—a plus if you're making a many-layered cake like the one in the preceding recipe. The base for this buttercream yields two different-flavored frostings: espresso coffee and bittersweet-chocolate mocha.