Gingerbread Cookies

Our best gingerbread cookie recipe! These festive treats are soft and warmly spiced, with a rich molasses flavor. Perfect for spreading holiday cheer!

What could be more festive than gingerbread cookies?! With Christmas just a few weeks away, I’m ready to turn up the holiday cheer around here, and making this gingerbread cookie recipe seems like a great place to start. For one, it makes the house smell amazing, filling it with the comforting aroma of cinnamon, ginger, and cloves. It’s also a blast to make—rolling out the dough, cutting out gingerbread people, baking them, and decorating them once they cool. But more important than all of that, these gingerbread cookies are delicious! They’re soft, warmly spiced, and richly flavored with molasses and…

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Homemade Hot Chocolate

This homemade hot chocolate is creamy, thick, and flavorful, made with both melted chocolate and cocoa powder. It's a perfect cozy treat for a cold day!

winter / beverage

This hot chocolate recipe is so much better than a powdered mix! Made with two types of chocolate—a chopped bar and cocoa powder—it’s deliciously rich, creamy, and just the right amount of sweet. It’s super easy to make too—it comes together with 5 simple ingredients in under 10 minutes. We’ve already made this homemade hot chocolate a few times this December, and I have a feeling that it’ll stay on repeat all month long. It’s the perfect warming treat for a cold winter night, especially if you have a kid (like ours) who loves cozying up under the Christmas tree…

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25 Easy Christmas Cookie Recipes

Ready for holiday baking? Find our best Christmas cookies below! They include easy recipes for sugar cookies, spice cookies, cut outs, and more.

I’ll be baking Christmas cookies on repeat for the next few weeks! They’re one of my favorite parts of the holiday season—sweet, festive, and perfect for making with family and sharing as a gift. If you ask me, there’s no better way to spread holiday cheer. In case you’re ready for holiday baking too, I’ve rounded up my best easy Christmas cookie recipes below. They include traditional Christmas cookies like gingerbread as well as fun shortbread variations, classic chocolate chip cookies, and more. They’re all great for holiday parties, cookie tins, and baking with loved ones (kids included!). I hope…

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Pignoli Cookies

Learn how to make pignoli cookies! These Italian pine nut cookies are chewy, nutty, and full of rich almond flavor. They're perfect for the holidays!

These pignoli cookies are a new addition to my holiday cookie lineup, and I already can’t get enough of them. A toasty, crunchy pine nut crust surrounds the chewy cookies, which are bursting with almond flavor (my favorite at Christmastime). They’re easy to make with 7 ingredients, but I think they’d be the star of any holiday cookie plate. I first tried pignoli cookies on a trip to Italy years ago, and I re-discovered them more recently at a bakery near our cottage in Michigan. I bought so many over the last few summers that I knew I had to…

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Christmas Sugar Cookies

I make these Christmas sugar cookies for the holidays every year! Cut into festive shapes, they're perfect for decorating with icing and sprinkles.

Let’s make Christmas sugar cookies! My family loves breaking out our cookie cutters to bake these cookies for the holidays every year. They’re classic cut-out sugar cookies, with crisp edges, soft middles, and a warm, buttery flavor from vanilla and almond extract. Made with a simple 8-ingredient dough, they hold their shape in the oven, which means that you can cut them into all kinds of holiday shapes. While you could enjoy these Christmas sugar cookies plain, we think half the fun of making them is decorating them. Top them with icing, plus sprinkles, colored sugar, and/or candies for a festive…

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Spritz Cookies

This spritz cookie recipe has been in my family for years! Buttery, tender, and decorated with sprinkles, they're our favorite Christmas cookies.

This spritz cookie recipe comes straight from my mom’s recipe box! My family has been making it every Christmas for over 40 years—my first kitchen memory is of baking these spritz cookies with my mom and sister for the holidays. Made with a 6-ingredient dough, these spritz cookies are buttery, tender, and scented with almond extract, not unlike sugar cookies or shortbread. What sets them apart from other cookies is how they’re made. Spritz cookies get their festive shapes from a cookie press. Their name comes from the German word spritzen, which means “to squirt,” which describes how the dough…

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20 Best Thanksgiving Desserts

Our best Thanksgiving desserts! Ranging from classic pies to non-pie ideas like cakes and bars, these delicious recipes will wow your holiday guests.

Have you chosen your Thanksgiving desserts yet? I’m still deciding. I might go the classic pie route, or I might go pie-free, creating a Thanksgiving dessert table with fall crisps, festive cakes, or even a show-stopping pumpkin tiramisu. In case you’re on the fence too, I’ve rounded up our best Thanksgiving dessert ideas below. You’ll find recipes for traditional holiday pies like pumpkin and apple, plus plenty of non-pie Thanksgiving desserts. Pick one direction, or make a mix of both. No matter which you choose, these Thanksgiving desserts will be a hit! Classic Thanksgiving Desserts Best Pumpkin Pie Pumpkin pie has…

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Cranberry Orange Bread

This cranberry bread recipe is packed with fresh cranberries and topped with a zesty orange glaze. It's a perfect easy treat for the holiday season!

I love keeping this cranberry orange bread around the house during the holidays. Packed with tart, juicy cranberries, this loaf is perfectly moist and tender. Orange juice and zest give it a lovely bright flavor, and a simple orange glaze takes it over the top. This cranberry orange bread is sweet enough to pass as dessert, but it’s not so sweet that you can’t enjoy it with an afternoon coffee or for breakfast with holiday guests. Easy to make with 10 basic ingredients, this recipe will be on repeat in my kitchen this season. I hope it will be in yours…

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35 Best Friendsgiving Food Ideas

Our best Friendsgiving food ideas! Find easy recipes for a festive fall gathering—crowd-pleasing appetizers, fun drinks, desserts, and more.

If you’re celebrating Friendsgiving this year, you’re in the right place! Below, I’ve rounded up my best Friendsgiving food ideas—bite-size appetizers, batch cocktails, classic side dishes, and easy desserts. Whether you’re hosting or just bringing a dish to pass, you’ll find Friendsgiving recipes to try. Back in the day, Jack and I celebrated Friendsgiving on Thanksgiving, because we lived far from our families and didn’t always travel for the holiday. Now, it’s more common to do both—a Friendsgiving earlier in November and a traditional Thanksgiving feast with family later on. I’m all for this, because it turns Friendsgiving into an opportunity to…

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Pumpkin Tiramisu

This pumpkin tiramisu is a stunning fall dessert! With layers of pumpkin cream and chai-spiced ladyfingers, it would be perfect for Thanksgiving.

This pumpkin tiramisu recipe is a show-stopping fall dessert! No offense to pumpkin pie, but it might just steal the spotlight on your Thanksgiving dessert table. It features luxe layers of pumpkin cream, chai-soaked ladyfingers, and a gorgeous dusting of warm spices. Rich, creamy, and packed with fall flavors, it’s impressive and delicious. It’s been on my list to develop for months, ever since I made this strawberry tiramisu over the summer. I thought a pumpkin version would be so fun for fall. It took me a few more tests than I expected (four, to be exact), but I can confidently…

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Easy Sugar Cookies

Craving something sweet? Make these sugar cookies! Easy to make with 8 ingredients, they have lightly crisp edges and perfect chewy middles.

winter

Hands up if you love soft and chewy sugar cookies! If you have your hand raised, this sugar cookie recipe is for you. Adapted from my snickerdoodle recipe, it yields sugar cookies with perfect chewy middles, lightly crisp edges, and a warm, buttery flavor. Best of all, it’s super easy to make. You just need 8 basic ingredients…and you don’t even have to chill the dough. You could totally make these cookies for a holiday—roll them in red and green sugar for Christmas, or top them off with pink frosting for Valentine’s Day. But honestly, we just love them as an…

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