Baking

We tested this pie recipe with canned sweet potatoes, but it just wasn’t as good. Go fresh or go home.

If the apples aren’t cold when you wrap them, the dough won’t adhere, so make sure to put them in the fridge before you start on the dough for this apple dumplings recipe. For added texture and more fall flavors, stuff 1 Tbsp. cranberries, raisins, or pecans into the space where the apple cores used to be.

The flavors of apples dipped in peanut butter, all cozied up inside a flaky puff pastry crust. Sold!

Richly spiced gingerbread with the texture of a moist, dense devil’s food cake, this recipe only gets better if you make it ahead.

The sour tang and bready texture of the yeasted cake dough keep things interesting; heaps of streusel keep the crowds happy.

Apple and cheddar met on a cheese board, realized they both dreamed of someday turning into a deep-fried doughnut, and ran off to do just that.

You can use the same weight in regular apples for this gingerbread cake recipe, but don’t the little lady apples just look so awesome?!

We call this delightful apple and fig custard recipe “dessert for breakfast.”

The semolina bakes into a crunchy layer on the top and bottom but stays moist and delicate within.

You can use only all-purpose flour for this scones recipe if you’d like, but going 50/50 with whole wheat produces a nice nuttiness that complements the cheese and walnuts.

The biscotti of shortbread: Cooking these impossibly tender cookies twice encourages the flour and butter to take on a toasty, nutty flavor. This recipe is from Baroo, one of the Hot 10, America's Best New Restaurants 2016.

Impressive doesn’t necessarily mean hard. The curd can be made at least a day ahead, as can the crust. Divide up the work, stay cool, and knock ‘em dead with the presentation. This recipe is from Buxton Hall, one of the Hot 10, America's Best New Restaurants 2016.

After testing with lots of other brands, these cookies are best when made with Cup4Cup gluten-free flour.

Can you buy pocketless pita instead? Sure. But nothing beats the drama of freshly made bread. Use these for our Lamb Gyros.

Combining the sugary filling with dried spice (in this case, juniper) infuses the buns with flavor and perfumes them from the inside. 

Take the butter to the edge of burning; the deep toasty, nutty flavors that develop are a needed counterpoint to the earthiness of the buckwheat. 

A unique and textured crisp with the flavors of corn muffins and blueberry jam smashed together.

If the dough starts to soften as you form these, pop it back in the fridge for ten minutes to firm back up.

These traditional almond cookies hail from Tuscany; their texture is chewy, similar to macaroons.

Blueberry pancakes, but make it pie. 

The nostalgic yellow cake flavor in cupcake form. If using a darker muffin tin, keep an eye on the edges—those pans encourage more browning, and you might end up removing these from the oven a few minutes earlier. Get the recipe for vanilla cream cheese frosting here. This is part of BA's Best, a collection of our essential recipes.

Cake flour gives these classic white cupcakes a very fine, tender crumb, and the high ratio of egg whites to yolks ensures a snowy hue. Get the recipe for vanilla cream cheese frosting here.

Non-Dutch-process cocoa powder is sometimes labeled “natural,” and since all of the chocolate flavor depends on what kind you use, quality matters for these devil's food cupcakes. Get the recipe for vanilla cream cheese frosting here.

Masa harina is a ground corn flour, commonly used to make corn tortillas, and is not the same thing as cornmeal. Maseca brand is fairly ubiquitous in grocery stores; other types can be found and ordered online.