#holiday-desserts

#holiday-desserts

Set up a table of stunning pies, cakes and pastries for the most wonderful time of year. For centuries, sugar flowed into cakes and pastries only on rare occasions, and the holidays were the season for elaborate buche de Noel, panettone and gingerbread houses. In this age of daily little treats, it's harder to capture the same awe that must've accompanied once-a-year confections. But this dessert table absolutely does. It evokes the abundance of Renaissance still-life paintings, with updated takes on European classics and modern creations inspired by flavors from across the globe.

Some people don't temper chocolate for their chocolate bark, but I've found it makes a difference. Tempered chocolate has a glossy sheen, stays firm at room temperature, and snaps cleanly when you break it. Without tempering, you can end up with chocolate with a dull color, and it can develop white streaks after storage (called chocolate bloom: which has happened to me more than once!).

These are my six Thanksgiving pies that are twists on your classic fall flavors. This is the cranberry citrus meringue pie. It's very delicious. It's for all the tart pie lovers out there. You know the people who pick Sour Patch Kids at the movie theater? That's the kind of person that's going to love this pie. The sesame-swirled pumpkin pie is for someone who doesn't love sweets that much.

Limited Edition Pillsbury Grands! Hot Cocoa Rolls with Marshmallow Icing are an excellent indulgence on their own, but can be made even more fun with some simple tweaks. TikTok's Matt Ramsey shared a video on how to transform these chocolatey rolls into a s'mores-inspired delight using chocolate syrup, heavy cream, crushed graham crackers, and a hearty sprinkle of Flavor God Chocolate Donut Seasoning.

The PieCaken features pecan pie, pumpkin pie, spice cake, and apple pie filling - all in one dessert. I tried it for the first time and couldn't believe how delicious every layer was. The PieCaken wowed everyone at my Friendsgiving. Pumpkin pie was never big with my family. My Thanksgiving dinners usually come to an end with my dad's famous baklava.

Putting together a complete Thanksgiving spread is always a challenge. Even when you try to keep things simple, there are just too many dishes coming out of a single kitchen for it to not be a somewhat chaotic day. Fortunately, Crumbl, the brand behind those incredibly popular cookies, is here to take care of dessert. Now, Crumbl did start off making cookies, but the chain has since branched out into non-cookie desserts, and the reviews are excellent.

A Nantucket Cranberry Pie isn't one of the unique items Trader Joe's dreamed up. It's a real New England specialty, and it brings a bracingly tart flavor you don't often get in overly sweet holiday pies. It's not even what you might normally think of as a pie, being almost a hybrid between pastry and cake. It features a mixture of cranberries and walnuts, cooked in a cake-like batter.