Our 21 favorite holiday dessert recipes

We make apple crisp every year, but to be honest, the dessert we bake isn’t really the traditional crisp made with oats. It’s actually closer to this Dutch apple pie recipe from Cookies & Cups, which is covered with a crumb-like topping made of flour, sugar, brown sugar, and butter.

Bread pudding might sound bland, but this holiday version from Very Best Baking includes cranberries/raisins and caramel sauce, so it’s anything but boring. It’s also easy to put together, as you’re just pouring a mixture of milk, egg, butter, sugar, vanilla, cinnamon, and nutmeg over a mix of cubed bread and your fruit of choice, and then baking the whole thing.

Pecans are delicious on their own, but the candied variety is downright addicting. Once you break into these candied pecans from Tastes Better from Scratch, you’re likely to eat the whole batch. Thankfully, they’re super easy to make.

Caramel apples aren’t just for Halloween; we like them right up until the start of winter—or at least as long as we still have leftover apples from the orchard. Plus, they appeal to both kids and kids at heart. Try this recipe from AllRecipes for the details.

When it comes to babka, we firmly believe chocolate is the superior babka. (In other words: In the “Seinfeld” chocolate vs. cinnamon babka debate, we side with Elaine.) Don’t count on the local bakery having it in stock, and instead just make it at home with this recipe from Pretty. Simple. Sweet.

Ralphie didn’t say “fudge” in the classic holiday movie “A Christmas Story,” but we’re saying it right here. Fudge is great to serve at parties, it’s an inexpensive but thoughtful gift, and it’s absolutely irresistible, in our weak-willed minds. Crunchy Creamy Sweet has a fudge recipe that can be customized with the topping of your choice: candy canes, sprinkles, M&M’s, or whatever you’d like!

A favorite from our childhood, Christmas tree brownies are an easy way to turn ordinary brownies into a creative holiday treat. Just cut the brownies into triangles instead of squares, or use a tree-shaped cookie cutter. This version from One Little Project even features candy cane tree trunks!

We love Christmas tree cupcakes because of how adorably merry they look. Don’t get us wrong: they are also delicious, but it’s the appearance that sells them. And thankfully, they’re not that tricky to make! This recipe from Sugar and Soul even includes the word “easy” right in the title.

Can’t forget to include a coconut dessert in this list. These sweet little spheres are made of coconut, flour, sugar, and butter; dipped in icing; and covered in coconut. Yep, we want to make them right now, too. Food.com is ready to help.

Cranberries are everywhere during the holiday season, including in pies! This cranberry pie from Country Living only requires six ingredients and only takes 15 minutes to prep—but your family will think you spent all day on it!

If you’re a sucker for the classics, you’ll want to check out this recipe for gingerbread cookies from Taste of Home. They’re decorated with frosting and in the shape of festive little people, which is sure to delight the festive little people in your life.

A melting snowman is a tragic sight, but these cookies are so darn cute! A marshmallow represents the snow-fellow’s noggin, with a puddle of icing as his melted body, and the whole thing sits atop a sweet little sugar cookie. Kitchen Fun with My Three Sons has some helpful tips.

Pecan pie is a must for our holiday table. We’re not even particular about the holiday either. Thanksgiving, Christmas, Pi Day...they’re all fair game. Since it’s one of our favorite desserts, we recommend Sally’s Baking Addiction recipe called “My Favorite Pecan Pie Recipe.”

Don’t be thrown by the name “bark,” this dessert is actually just two layers of chocolate topped with crushed candy canes. In fact, this peppermint bark recipe from Dinner at the Zoo only requires four ingredients.

It’s a little bit Thanksgiving, a little bit Christmas, and all about fall—we present to you the pumpkin gingerbread trifle. The pumpkin puree is mixed with vanilla pudding, cardamom, and sugar, which makes one of three layers in this delectable dessert. As Food.com will tell you, the other two layers are gingerbread and whipped topping.

We know you’ve been waiting for pumpkin pie this entire slideshow—we get it, it’s a classic—and we have the perfect recipe for you. It’s called “Perfect Pumpkin Pie” and it comes via Once Upon a Chef. 

These are some of the simplest cookies you can possibly make, and just to prove that point, we’re sharing An Italian in My Kitchen’s two different versions of this dessert. One of them requires just five ingredients, and the other only needs three.

Stained glass cookies are customizable for Hanukkah, Christmas, or any other occasion—and they look super classy. Fittingly, you can get the recipe from Cooking Classy. (Spoiler: They use Jolly Ranchers for the glass!)

Looking to go big this Hanukkah? You can’t go wrong with sufganiyot, which are traditional Israeli jelly donuts. Yes, there are a lot of steps involved—you’ll have to make the dough, pat it out, cut it up, fry the pieces, and fill them with jelly—but the rewarding result will be worth it. Once Upon a Chef can take you through the process step by step.

You don’t need pre-made mixes and canned frosting to make and decorate sugar cookies. This recipe from Sugar Spun Run will show you how to do the whole thing from scratch with only a handful of necessary ingredients for each part—and they’re all kitchen staples.

We don’t have a real yule log for the holidays, but we’re big fans of the cake version. Also known as a Bûche De Noël, it’s basically a whipped filling wrapped up in a chocolate cake covered in a thick chocolate ganache. Sound too difficult? Sally’s Baking Addiction makes it easy with this recipe, which is also covered in sugared cranberries and meringue “mushrooms.”