Recipe Archive

Desserts

Desserts bring structure to sweetness, from cakes and custards to frozen treats and fruit-driven finishes that close the meal with intention.

1329 recipes

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Recipes

Ichigo Shortcake (苺のショートケーキ, Strawberry Shortcake)

Chef Takumi

Ichigo Shortcake (苺のショートケーキ, Strawberry Shortcake)

A soft sponge, cold cream, and strawberries at their winter brightest. Ichigo shortcake looks ceremonial, but the whole cake rests on one plain thing: don't dry the sponge.

Île Flottante à la Vanille de Tahiti (Floating Meringue with Tahaʻa Vanilla Custard)

Chef Makoa

Île Flottante à la Vanille de Tahiti (Floating Meringue with Tahaʻa Vanilla Custard)

A French dessert resting in a Tahitian bowl: soft meringue floating on Tahaʻa vanilla crème anglaise, with caramel, toasted coconut, and the flower-sweet perfume of the vanilla island.

Imagawayaki (今川焼き, filled griddle cake)

Chef Takumi

Imagawayaki (今川焼き, filled griddle cake)

A thick little cake, browned on both faces and hiding warm anko at its center. The trick is slow heat, not bravery, so the batter cooks through before the crust gets too dark.

Ise Matcha Shaved Ice (赤福氷, Akafuku-gōri)

Chef Takumi

Ise Matcha Shaved Ice (赤福氷, Akafuku-gōri)

Snowy ice, chilled matcha syrup, and the quiet surprise of mochi and koshi-an below: Akafuku-gōri is Ise summer in a bowl, made reachable by keeping every part cold and soft.

Jam Roly-Poly

Chef Thomas

Jam Roly-Poly

A sheet of soft suet pastry rolled around raspberry jam and steamed until it swells into something pale, sticky and quietly splendid. A January pudding for an evening that needs one.

Jamoncillo de Coco Costeño

Chef Lupita

Jamoncillo de Coco Costeño

Guerrero's Costa Chica jamoncillo turns fresh coconut, whole milk, piloncillo, and canela into firm brown-gold candy bars, the Afro-Mexican sweet pantry answering convent candy in its own voice.

Jamoncillo de Leche Poblano

Chef Lupita

Jamoncillo de Leche Poblano

Puebla's convent milk candy, reduced slowly until leche and sugar turn into a firm, creamy jamoncillo scented with canela and pressed into bars or wooden molds.

Jamoncillo de Leche P'urhépecha

Chef Lupita

Jamoncillo de Leche P'urhépecha

Michoacán's P'urhépecha milk fudge, cooked slowly in a Santa Clara copper cazo with whole milk, piloncillo, and canela until it turns tawny, thick, and firm enough to cut.

Jamoncillo de Leche Sonorense

Chef Lupita

Jamoncillo de Leche Sonorense

Sonora's patient burnt-milk fudge, cooked from whole milk, sugar, and a stick of canela until it firms into a pale-caramel slab you can slice with a knife and pack into a tin for the holidays.

Jamoncillo de Nuez Potosino (Mercado Hidalgo)

Chef Lupita

Jamoncillo de Nuez Potosino (Mercado Hidalgo)

San Luis Potosí's Mercado Hidalgo jamoncillo is goat milk cooked to a matte fudge, beaten with nuez pecanera from the Zona Media, and cut into bars for fiestas and posadas.

Jamoncillo de Pepita Poblano

Chef Lupita

Jamoncillo de Pepita Poblano

Puebla's convent candy of ground pumpkin seed, milk, and sugar, cooked until the paste pulls from the copper pot and sets into pale green squares with serious patience.

Jamoncillo Veracruzano de Trapiche del Rosario

Chef Lupita

Jamoncillo Veracruzano de Trapiche del Rosario

Veracruz's milk fudge from Trapiche del Rosario, cooked slowly with whole milk, sugar, ground pepita, and vainilla de Papantla until it sets into tender bars.

Jan in de Zak

Chef Joost

Jan in de Zak

The name means Jan in the sack, and that is exactly what the pot gives you: a sweet currant dough boiled in cloth, sliced thick, and sent to table with stroop.

Japanese Cotton Cheesecake

Chef Dean

Japanese Cotton Cheesecake

A cloud in cake form: impossibly light, delicately sweet, with that mesmerizing wobble that has made this Japanese creation famous across the world. It melts on your tongue before you quite realize you have taken a bite.

Jericalla del Hospicio Cabañas

Chef Lupita

Jericalla del Hospicio Cabañas

Jalisco's conventual custard from Guadalajara, baked in small clay cups until barely set, then scorched on top the way the kitchens of Hospicio Cabañas taught it.

Guadalajara Burnt Custard (Jericalla Tapatía)

Chef Lupita

Guadalajara Burnt Custard (Jericalla Tapatía)

Jalisco's lighter cousin to flan, baked in small cups until the custard trembles softly and the top burns dark, the way Guadalajara has claimed it for generations.

Jōyo Manjū (薯蕷饅頭, steamed yam buns)

Chef Takumi

Jōyo Manjū (薯蕷饅頭, steamed yam buns)

A formal tea sweet made from grated mountain yam, fine rice flour, and smooth anko, worked lightly and steamed into tender white domes. The yam gives the lift, so your hand stays gentle.

Kaʻaku (Marquesan Roasted Breadfruit Pounded with Coconut Cream)

Chef Makoa

Kaʻaku (Marquesan Roasted Breadfruit Pounded with Coconut Cream)

On the Marquesan table of Henua ʻEnana, roasted mei breadfruit is peeled, pounded warm, and loosened with fresh miti haari until it eats soft and rich. This is kaʻaku, not Tahitian poʻe.

Käse-Sahne-Torte

Chef Klaus

Käse-Sahne-Torte

The German coffee-table torte that stays light because quark, cream, and gelatine do the setting, not a hot oven and a heavy block of cream cheese.

Käsekuchen mit Quark

Chef Klaus

Käsekuchen mit Quark

The German cheesecake is built on quark, not cream cheese: tall, pale, lemon-scented, and only as good as the water you take out before it bakes.

Kagoshima Yam Cake (軽羹, Karukan)

Chef Takumi

Kagoshima Yam Cake (軽羹, Karukan)

Karukan is Kagoshima's snowy yam cake: fresh mountain yam beaten until sticky and light, folded with rice flour and sugar, then steamed into a tender wagashi that needs no decoration.

Kaiserschmarrn (Emperor's Torn Pancake)

Chef Elsa

Kaiserschmarrn (Emperor's Torn Pancake)

A thick, golden pancake torn into rough pieces in a buttered pan, caramelised until the edges go sticky and sweet, dusted with sugar at the table alongside a bowl of warm, spiced plum compote.

Kakigori (かき氷, Japanese shaved ice)

Chef Takumi

Kakigori (かき氷, Japanese shaved ice)

Kakigori is not crushed ice with syrup. It is a mound of slow-shaved block ice, soft enough to drink from the spoon, sweetened simply and eaten before summer wins.

Kandierte Veilchen

Chef Elsa

Kandierte Veilchen

Real sweet violets painted with egg white and dusted in sugar, one petal at a time, until they become the fragile, sparkling confections that Demel has been selling from glass cases in Vienna for two hundred years.

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