Electric Mixer

This is a nice variation on regular sweet potatoes for a Thanksgiving side dish. It’s almost a dessert, it’s so sweet!

If I had to name the dish that is requested most often at home it would be this one. My family will eat almost anything if they can have these whipped potatoes on the side! I have been asked many times what secret ingredient makes this recipe so good. The answer is—potatoes! You’ll be amazed at how simple it is to make really great mashed potatoes. Everyone has his or her own preference, but I like to use red potatoes, as I think they are lighter and don’t get gummy like other kinds can. I also peel the potatoes completely, leaving no trace of skin, but if you like the skins, simply leave them on. For this recipe alone, I would encourage everyone who doesn’t have a pressure cooker to get one. They are safe and save a ton of time in the kitchen. A pressure cooker cuts the prep time for this recipe from 1 hour to 15 minutes.

We always made this to take to Family Night suppers at church. Its official name was Congealed Fruit Salad, but it was known at our house as pink salad, because, well, it’s pink! Besides, anything with the word congealed in the title just sounds gross to me, and this is anything but.

A pimiento cheese sandwich made on very fresh white bread is a true southern staple. Nothing goes better with Gwen’s Fried Chicken (page 93). Mama slices the crusts off the sandwiches and cuts them in half for family reunions—very southern belle!

I’m sort of a snob when it comes to trying new recipes. I just seem to like my old tried and true ones best, and it takes a lot for something new to grab my attention. I had to have the recipe for this dip after I tried it on Super Bowl Sunday 2006. Garth is a die-hard Steelers fan, so it was an exciting day. Everybody always brings something for the party, and this was my friend Kim’s contribution. Being a good southern girl, I love anything with black-eyed peas in it, but for you folks who are right now turning up your noses at the idea of eating black-eyed peas, all I can say is just try it. In fact, maybe I should name it something else for those skeptics. How about Pea Dippy?

I love cheese! I would eat a piece of Cheddar cheese over a piece of chocolate cake any day. That probably makes me a little weird, but if you love cheese like I do, you’ll love these cheese straws. My mom used to make them for baby showers and wedding receptions. In 1991, the year my career started to really take off, she made them for me to give as Christmas gifts to everyone who had been so supportive. We laughed about how these cheesy treats were baked in a small kitchen in Monticello, Georgia, and ended up on the desks of some of the biggest movers and shakers in Nashville.

To accompany the fine and fancy food at Holloway House, there has always been Sally Lunn bread. The recipe dates back to Colonial America, although history tells us there was actually no one named Sally. The words may be a corruption of sol et lune, French for sun and moon, probably used by French immigrants to describe the round shape of the buns, similar to brioche. Sunday suppers in Bloomfield wouldn’t be the same without it.

The financier gives you a failproof moist cake that will stand through the rigors of pâtisserie de cuisine. It is simple to make, which is a good thing for us at Joe Beef, with our limited space and no real pastry chef, and for the home cook. Keep in mind that baking is a science, and although we include volume measures here, weighing the ingredients is recommended. We use ornate wax paper tartlet molds. If you don’t have them or can’t find them, you can just fill muffin cups half full and you’ll get the same result. Serve the cakes with ice cream and sweet wine.

Our good friends Dyan Solomon and Éric Girard own Olive + Gourmando, a perfect luncheonette on Saint Paul West in Montreal’s Old Port. Their little shop is what we expect the coffee shop in the afterlife to be like: they’re detail fanatics and it’s no contest the best place for lunch in the city. When they first opened, they were bakers, and the place was a bakery with a few seats. They still make bread, but mostly to use in delicious sandwiches. The front counter is displayed with brioches, croissants, brownies, and fruit pastries, and they’re all killer. We thought they were insane when they decided to open in Old Port a decade ago. It was a barren ghost town of bombed-out buildings, seedy bars, and grow-ops. There were no people, much less hotels and tourist shops selling maple-sugar products and “raccoon” Daniel Boone hats actually made from Chinese skunks. Like us, Éric and Dyan don’t take anything too seriously (Dyan can tell you many stories of Fred’s practical jokes when they used to work together: her showing up at 6:00 A.M. to a fake “dead man” at the bottom of the stairs; Fred putting a scraped lamb shank in his shirt, saying he may have hurt his hand. . . .) They’re Montreal classics and were kind enough to hand over one of their most beloved recipes.

Move over cupcakes: You've had your time in the limelight but we've moved on. Sweets are far easier to eat when the frosting is between the two thin cake layers, not on top. It all comes down to proportions: whoopie pies exemplify the perfect ratio between cake and frosting. These pies, in particular, straddle the cake/cookie line. There's the slightest bit of crispness on the outside, which then gives way to impossibly tender cake and a perfectly balanced cream cheese filling. We bet you can't eat just one so you might as well make two batches (don't double the recipe).

Graham crackers are the embodiment of nostalgia. I'd always been happy with the ones in the red box at the supermarket—until I tried our homemade ones. The difference in texture is immediately apparent. These cookies are less flaky and crumbly than the store-bought version, and they have a great snappy crunch. We also use a high-quality cinnamon, which has a nice spicy quality.

Don't let the good looks of this eight-layer beauty fool you; it's easy to make. Bake 4 cakes (we used 9" round metal cake pans, but disposable ones work fine), then slice each in half. Finish with toasted coconut, a knockout garnish that's also forgiving— it'll mask a less-than-perfect frosting job.

This easy cake swaps out molasses for lighter-flavored sorghum syrup, a Southern staple.

Ground gingersnap cookies form the crunchy crust of this pie filled with layers of vanilla and chocolate custard.

This showstopper is a worthwhile project. Set aside some time 2 days ahead to make the components, then practice saying "Aw shucks, that was nothing!" to raving guests.

If you want to rein in this over-the-top recipe a bit, feel free to serve the cookies on their own.

These green-and-red-studded biscotti look vaguely Christmassy but are good any time of year. Feel free to swap in other nuts or dried fruit—this combo is particularly pretty but you could use golden raisins, almonds, or hazelnuts as well. To make the biscotti even more decadent, dip in melted chocolate.

These scones appear atop our deli case every morning, although not for long—we always sell out within a couple of hours. Unlike many scones, they’re not too sweet. Pair with a cup of coffee and the newspaper and you have the formula for a perfect Sunday morning. If you’re serving a crowd, this recipe can be doubled. You’ll need an extra-large bowl for your mixer, or you can make them by hand.

This dough is quite versatile and works for savory empanadas just as well as for sweet tarts and turnovers. It’s also incredibly easy to work with; not only does it resist sticking, but it’s almost impossible to overwork. (The secret is the cream cheese!) If you can, make a double batch of the dough and freeze for later use.

Of all the sublime dishes that chef Nancy Oakes prepared during the 1997 Workshop, it is her warm gingerbread cake that has entrenched itself at Cakebread Cellars. The San Francisco chef says that the basic recipe is her grandmother’s, although Chef Oakes sometimes dresses it up with a ginger syrup. Brian serves it often in the fall, sometimes with a scoop of honey ice cream or just a dollop of softly whipped cream. As dark as milk chocolate, this fabulous cake is moist, spicy, and not overly sweet. Don’t worry if it sinks a bit in the center as it cools. Once it is cut, no one will notice.