25 of the Best Holiday Baking Recipes

#1. Gingerbread Cake

This gingerbread cake is moist through and through and filled with the flavors of ginger, cinnamon, allspice, and molasses. The tart lemon glaze and sugared cranberries are the perfect complement to the richness of the cake. If you like gingerbread that's richly flavorful, with a potent level of spice that's also well-balanced, this is your recipe.

#2. Overnight homemade cinnamon rolls

These rich and buttery homemade cinnamon rolls with gooey swirls of cinnamon sugar and vanilla cream cheese icing rise in the refrigerator overnight, making them an easy Christmas morning treat.

#3. Frosted brown butter citrus shortbread cookies

These are, without a doubt, the BEST tasting decorated Christmas Cookies I've ever eaten. Brown butter citrus shortbread is delicious all on its own - buttery, not overly sweet, and laced with the subtle flavors of orange, lemon, and lime.

Dark and white chocolate fondants are easy to work with, gorgeously glossy, and taste wonderful with the brown butter citrus flavor of the cookies.

#4. Cranberry pistachio cookies

These incredibly rich and tender pistachio shortbread cookies are baked with a dollop of cranberry orange sauce, then drizzled with vanilla icing, and topped with a crunchy sprinkle of roasted pistachios. They are pretty little jewel-like cookies with all the right flavors and colors for the holiday season.

#5. Soft and buttery homemade Dinner Rolls

These dinner rolls have been a staple recipe in my family for decades.

They show up on holidays like Thanksgiving and Christmas, and on birthdays, and family dinner nights, and nearly every time someone in my house says, "Can we have those rolls?" Or, when someone invites us to dinner and says, "Would you please, please bring those rolls?"

#6. Pumpkin chocolate chip bread with white chocolate ganache

This super easy pumpkin chocolate chip bread glazed with white chocolate ganache falls somewhere between a decadent quick bread and soft, chocolate-studded pumpkin cake.

This recipe can be used to bake a standard 9-inch loaf cake, mini loaf cakes, or pumpkin chocolate chip muffins.

#7. New York cheesecake with a shortbread crust

This is everything you need to know to bake the ultimate rich and creamy New York-style cheesecake. The recipe includes a traditional shortbread crust, but if a graham cracker crust is more your style, you'll find instructions in the recipe.

#8. Chewy brown sugar cookies

These little brown sugar cookies are outrageously soft and chewy with an intense toffee-like flavor that comes from brown butter, brown sugar, and vanilla.

#9. Intensely flavorful spice cake

This is my idea of the perfect Spice Cake. It's super moist and packed with the rich flavors of cinnamon, cardamom, allspice, cloves, nutmeg, and ginger. Dark brown sugar, applesauce, yogurt, and plenty of vanilla add even MORE flavor, while also keeping it moist and extremely tender. 

#10. Mini chocolate peppermint cupcakes

I am totally head-over-heels in love with these little two-bite chocolate peppermint cupcakes. Rich and fudgy chocolate cupcakes covered in peppermint spiked cream cheese buttercream with a fun candy cane swirl. They are, in my mind, exactly what Christmas should taste like.

#11. Mini cranberry bundt cakes with lemon glaze

These tiny little cranberry bundt cakes drizzled with a sweet-tart lemon glaze are almost too cute to eat. Almost. Actually, not at all. I just ate four and am going back for more.

#12. Mini chai latte cupcakes

Richly flavored with chai and vanilla, these two-bite chai cupcakes are like Christmas in your mouth. The cupcakes themselves are extremely simple to make. You won't even need an electric mixer.

#13. Olive oil cake with lemon mascarpone pastry cream

This Olive Oil Cake is exceptionally moist and flavorful, with a sugary crust and deliciously fine textured crumb that’s not overly sweet.

On it's own, it's one of my all-time favorite cakes, but split in half and filled with a thick layer of Lemon Mascarpone Pastry Cream puts it in a new category of YUM.

#14. Cranberry pineapple upside down cake

Buttery little cranberry pineapple upside-down cakes baked with pineapple slices, tart cranberry sauce, and gooey brown sugar caramel glaze.

#15. Almond cake with cranberry sauce

Almond cake is one of those desserts that seems rather plain and unassuming and then blows you away with how delicious it is. This recipe is very simple to make and only includes a handful of ingredients. But the finished result is both rich and elegant.

#16. Cast iron skillet maple pecan pie

This cast iron skillet pecan pie is rich, creamy, and packed with the flavor of toasted pecans and maple syrup.

Although corn syrup is traditionally used to make pecan pie, this recipe uses maple syrup instead. A touch of sour cream creates a silky smooth texture and plenty of toasted pecans add a nutty crunch to every bite.

Cast iron is an excellent conductor of heat and the perfect pan to use when you want a pie with a golden, flaky, evenly baked crust.

#17. White chocolate cranberry cookies

These white chocolate raspberry cookies are HUGE, soft, chewy, oh so buttery, raspberry-studded pieces of cookie heaven. And if you think I'm overstating things, just make them and see for yourself.

#18. Chocolate almond cake with chocolate orange buttercream

This one-layer chocolate almond cake is both dense and light, supremely chocolatey, a little bit boozy, and honestly one of the best things that has ever come out of this chocolate lover's tiny kitchen.

#19. Orange olive oil cake with mascarpone frosting

This light, tender, impossibly moist orange olive oil cake has a gorgeous, subtle natural orange flavor thanks to orange-infused olive oil. When layered with orange marmalade and creamy mascarpone frosting it's a light and creamy cake that's bursting with bright citrus flavor.

#20. French apple crumb cake

The traditional French Apple Cake is a simple one-layer cake with an exceptionally high proportion of fruit to cake. It’s typically flavored with rum and has a texture that’s more custardy than cake-like. Like all things French, it contains a lot of butter and is all the more delicious for its elegance.

This French apple cake is a loose variation of that simple cake and includes a thick, buttery crumb topping.

#21. German apple pie

German Apple Pie is one of the easiest and creamiest apple pies I've ever baked. The filling is simply cinnamon and sugar-coated apples covered in cream and sprinkled with sugar.

The pie is gorgeously rich, flavorful, and so easy to make that it's become one of my favorite holiday recipes.

#22. Black bottom banana cream pie

This Black Bottom Banana Cream Pie includes layers of chocolate pastry cream, vanilla rum custard, bananas, and whipped cream in a buttery vanilla wafer crust.

It's incredibly rich, creamy, and indulgent without being overly sweet, and has been a favorite recipe in our family for years and years.

#23. Chocolate mousse pie

This dreamy no-bake chocolate mousse pie is impossibly light, delicate, and everything we love about a really, really good chocolate mousse. It's NOT stodgy, heavy, or cloying at all. And, it's so easy to make, it borders on ridiculous.

The milk chocolate mousse filling is light, silky smooth, and the perfect amount of sweet. The whipped cream topping makes the texture even more pillowy while the Oreo cookie crust adds a bit of chocolate crunch to every bite.

#24. Chocolate almond pie

This creamy, fudgy, intensely chocolate pie studded with roasted almonds and a hint of bourbon is for serious chocolate lovers only. You chocolate-is-ok-sometimes kind of people need to find yourselves another pie because this one is pure, unadulterated chocolate, and extremely unapologetic and in your face about it.

#25. The classic French Napoleon

The classic Napoleon Dessert (mille-feuille) includes flaky puff pastry layered with creamy vanilla pastry cream.

It's one of those classic French pastries that exemplifies everything I love about French pastry - It's elegantly simple and deliciously indulgent.