Electric Mixer

When you’ve got your hands full with cleaning, you don’t have time for a full-on dessert stop. But these pecan bars will tempt you and “hit the spot,” in addition to making an incredible snack-pack treat when you’re on the go. Scrumptious brown sugar and chocolate are ooey, gooey, and satisfying, and they’re the perfect reward for a day of hard work.

GINA This is my absolute favorite cake. Tanya has been baking it for me since I was a little girl—which I was yesterday. . . . I can remember when my sister Kim made it for her boyfriend, Tony, who is now her husband. I watched her in that kitchen, baking with such love and care. I begged for a small piece and she said, “No, it’s Tony’s birthday.” So I sat on that stool and swung my feet and waited and waited. It got pretty dark, and Kim was no longer smiling—she’d gotten that evil look on her face that we all have had at one time or another. The wait went on, and then . . . ding-dong. He’d finally arrived, and Kim was all fired up to give him a piece of her mind for being so late. After some loud, angry whispering between Kim and Tony at the front door, Kim took my beautiful, coveted cake, went straight out the door, and threw it into the garbage can outside! I screamed and stood by that can in shock, but Tanya made me come in, and baked me another one just to shut me up. (Hence, you can see where my “spoiledness” comes from, and the reason Tanya knows it’s my favorite.) Now we all love this cake. I am a true chocolate lover, and adding more chocolate on top—really, what more can you say? But you know Pat—he likes to reach into the freezer and throw a big scoop of vanilla on top of his slice.

GINA Who doesn’t like a good potato? I know I married a meat-and-potatoes man, and so does Tanya. She always finds a way to make great potatoes, and these are some of her very best. Buttery and garlicky—yum. PAT Baby, you can’t do pork chops without mashed potatoes. There’s something about taking your fork and getting a bite of pork chop and garlic mashed potatoes at the same time. You just take both of those jokers and let ’em hit the palate!

If the combination of olive oil and dessert falls outside your comfort zone, I guarantee this cake will make you a total convert. This luscious specimen has the richness of a traditional pound cake but a more complex texture, all complemented by the haunting fruitiness of extra-virgin olive oil. Almond meal, or almonds ground until fine, gives it a delicate nuttiness. Completely addictive on its own, this cake is even better dressed up with fresh spring cherries scented with fresh bay and a tangy dollop of crème fraîche. These pretty, yellow- and pink-hued cherries are more commonly known as Rainiers, but I like this moniker better because one of the restaurants sits perched atop Seattle’s Queen Anne Hill. It’s essential to use fresh bay leaves in this recipe. Dried bay is too strong and will give the cherries an almost medicinal taste, not a quality I look for in a dessert.

Southerners love a good red velvet cake the way they love good, juicy gossip. That’s because there’s inherent drama in a towering white cake that, beneath swaths of innocent cream cheese frosting, possesses a shockingly crimson interior. Of course, they also love red velvet cake for its twangy buttermilk and cocoa–infused flavor and exceptionally smooth, supple crumb.

Throughout the South, but especially along rural strips of highway, you’ll find a plethora of roadside farm stands advertising their homegrown wares with colorful, hand-painted wooden signs. I love these quirky little catchall stands, where you’re almost as likely to encounter folk art or a mini petting zoo as you are watermelons and eggs. If you’re lucky, you can also find some of the best peach ice cream you’ll ever eat—creamy, cold, and ultrafresh. I like to think my version, which makes the most of sweet, sun-ripened fruit, is just as tasty.

Banana pudding is such a Southern classic that I knew I had to include a recipe for it. At the same time, I wanted to give it a bit of a modern twist, and that’s how I came up with Banana Pudding Sliders. You have to learn the rules before you can break them, so here’s my favorite recipe for classic banana pudding—spiked with rum, layered with bananas and vanilla wafers, and crowned with meringue—followed by those sliders I dreamed up.

Southern summers are too hot for rhubarb to grow, so we Southerners must make the most of our short-lived springtime harvest. This buttery, crunchy tart is one of my favorite ways to do just that.

This pie is a peanut butter cup aficionado’s dream. It was the creation of my friend Jen, who was one of the bakers at Foster’s, and it has since become a Market staple—one of our most popular pies. With layers of crispy chocolate crust, smooth dark chocolate ganache, creamy peanut butter filling, and cool whipped cream, it is a true indulgence.

With its dense, vanilla bean–speckled coconut custard, Oreo-cookie crust, and billowy cream, this Southern diner treat makes a strong case for skipping dinner.

It’s no wonder that this intensely lemony custard pie, which is a close relative of chess pie, is a favorite of Southern seafood restaurants like the Catfish Hotel in Shiloh, Tennessee—it’s got just the sort of pucker-inducing, palate-cleansing properties you need to set you straight after a heavy meal of fried catfish and hushpuppies. In this version, I use Cornmeal Crust to play off the cornmeal in the custard.

When pineapple caramelizes, whether on the grill or in the oven, its bright, tart flavor mellows to something warm and sweet—a neat trick that has long been the calling card of traditional pineapple upside-down cake. My grandmother’s version, with its canned pineapple rings, was one of my dad’s all-time favorite sweets. It’s one of mine, too, but when I make it, I start with freshly grilled pineapple to double the caramelization effect and add a splash of bourbon to drive the point home.

Surely, this moist, pecan- and fruit-flecked cake must get its name from the sugary nectar upon which fluttering hummingbirds lunch. This namesake sweet is at least as popular among the birds’ Southern human counterparts. Indeed, it is Southern Living’s all-time most requested recipe. This is my adaptation of the magazine’s classic version.

Nothing finishes a meal quite so regally as layer cake; for Southerners, at least, it is the epitome of fine entertaining. This towering confection, draped in glossy white frosting and scattered with coconut, was one of my mother’s signature dinner party desserts. You can make the cake layers two days in advance, but make the frosting no more than two or three hours before serving; it doesn’t keep its silky-smooth texture very long.

This pretty cake was inspired by a jar of brown sugar–strawberry jam from Blackberry Farm (see Sources, page 377), a wonderful inn in the Tennessee mountains, and my grandmother’s old jam cake recipe. The combination of sweet fruit preserves, soft cream, and tender yellow cake makes me think of it as one part strawberry shortcake and two parts English trifle, in sliceable form. When we make it at Foster’s, we leave the sides unfrosted because it looks so homey when the frosting oozes from between the layers and down the sides of the cake. Note that the Buttermilk Crème Fraîche must be made at least two days ahead; if necessary, you can always substitute sour cream or store-bought crème fraîche.

True pound cake doesn’t include leavening, meaning that it gets all its lift from eggs and the air that is incorporated into the batter when creaming the butter and sugar. For best results, bring the ingredients to room temperature before you begin. Granny’s old-fashioned pound cake is true to its name, calling for a pound each of butter, eggs, flour, and sugar. Proof that “plain” can be a beautiful thing.

Spoon bread is like a cross between grits and cornbread, with a lovely, dense, puddinglike texture set off by cornmeal’s fine grain. I don’t need an excuse to bring sweet potatoes into the mix—I’ve been known to add them to just about everything—but in this case they reinforce the silky texture of the spoon bread in addition to adding their characteristic orange color and mild, sweet flavor.

Over the years, my love of stone-ground yellow grits has turned me into a certified grits snob. And, like most Southerners with a grits chip on my shoulder, I tend to blame flavorless “quick grits”—the finely milled, prepackaged variety that has been pre-steamed to be partially cooked—for unfairly maligning this Southern delicacy’s reputation. So imagine my surprise when I discovered, thanks to an ingenious Craig Claiborne recipe, that this puffy, soufflé-like casserole is actually much better made with quick grits. There’s just no denying texture that light and airy. You can, of course, use stone-ground grits; the casserole will be a littler grainier but equally flavorful.

When my friend Kate joins us for Thanksgiving, she brings these yummy refrigerator rolls. The best thing about them is that you can throw together the dough up to a week ahead of time, store it in the fridge, and bake the rolls whenever you want, which helps make for stress-free holiday planning. When I make them, I like to add sweet potato for the beautiful color and flavor it imparts. And, since I’ve always been a fan of the combination of sweet potatoes and pork, I often use this version of the rolls to make pulled pork sandwiches, tucking Slow-Roasted Pulled Pork Butt (page 177) and Quick Cucumber Pickles (page 287) inside. Note that you’ll need to let the dough rise for two hours between mixing and baking.

Most every Southerner has a favorite recipe for cheese biscuits, cheese crackers, or cheese straws, those staples of holiday gifting and year-round entertaining. With the addition of rosemary and chile peppers, I give this version of these buttery crackers unexpected heat and flavor that makes them extra habit-forming. Serve topped with fresh goat cheese and pepper jelly along with a round or two of Sazeracs (page 28) or Wendy’s Bloody Marys (page 28). Shake it up with a SALTY DOG (see page 27)