Apple pie or custard pie? Why choose?

I love a traditional apple pie. But apples are so versatile, and there’s no reason to stick to the same old filling every time. Especially when you can add custard!

If you’ve never had an apple custard pie, think of it as somewhere between a classic apple pie and a French apple tart. All the familiar flavors of cinnamon-spiced apples, but with a creamy vanilla custard instead of the usual syrupy filling.

And the best part? The custard is surprisingly easy to make. No stovetop cooking, no tempering eggs, and no worrying about scrambling anything. Just whisk everything together and pour it over the apples.

I’m also using my favorite No Fail Pie Crust for this recipe. It’s buttery, flaky, and sturdy enough to hold all that custard. A quick blind bake before adding the filling helps keep the bottom from getting soggy.

The hardest part is waiting for the pie to cool! The custard needs time to set before slicing, so this isn’t a dessert to pull straight from the oven and serve.

But that makes it a fantastic make-ahead Thanksgiving dessert. Prepare it the day before, let it chill, and you’ve got one fewer thing to worry about when it’s time for dessert.

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Apples get pies, crisps, cakes, muffins, and breads. Pears? They mostly get eaten straight out of the fruit bowl. Which seems a little unfair, doesn’t it?

I’m here to make the case for putting more pears in your oven.

This pear bread is a good place to start. You don’t need a mixer, the batter comes together in a few minutes, and you don’t even need to wait until your pears are super soft. In fact, slightly firm pears work better because they hold their shape as the bread bakes.

And because I firmly believe that a good crumb topping makes almost everything better, we’re adding a generous layer of buttery brown sugar streusel. The drizzle of glaze is optional, but I’m certainly not going to argue against it.

Breakfast, afternoon snack, dessert? I think we’ve covered all the bases.

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There are two kinds of people in this world: those who love coconut in their chocolate and those who think coconut has no business being anywhere near dessert.

If you’re in the first camp, these Chocolate Coconut Cupcakes are going to be right up your alley.

Inspired by the classic Mounds candy bar, these cupcakes start with a rich, moist chocolate cake, followed by a thick layer of sweet, chewy coconut and a generous coating of chocolate ganache.

Unlike traditional cupcakes piled high with buttercream, these are all about the contrast between soft chocolate cake, slightly chewy coconut, and smooth chocolate.

While they look like something you’d find in a fancy bakery, there’s no piping bag or elaborate decorating involved. Just spoon on the coconut, pour over the ganache, and let the chocolate set.

And if you’re firmly in the anti-coconut camp? Well, there are plenty of other chocolate cupcakes around here. More of these for the rest of us!

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I firmly believe that coffee cake is one of those foods that can get away with being eaten at absolutely any time of day. Breakfast? Obviously. Afternoon snack with a cup of coffee? It’s right there in the name. Dessert? Well, there’s cake involved, so yes.

And when pumpkin season rolls around, I’m more than happy to find another excuse to eat cake for breakfast.

What I love about this pumpkin coffee cake is that the cinnamon streusel isn’t just scattered across the top. There’s a whole layer hiding in the middle, too, giving you little pockets of buttery cinnamon sugar in every slice.

And despite the three components (cake, streusel, and glaze), it’s surprisingly simple to put together. No mixer required, no complicated techniques, and everything bakes together in one square pan.

Make it for a fall brunch, bring it to a gathering, or keep it on the counter for a few days of very good breakfasts. I certainly won’t judge.

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Pumpkin butter is what you make when you want pumpkin pie flavor without making pumpkin pie.

Keep a jar in the fridge and add a spoonful to pancakes, waffles, oatmeal, yogurt, toast, muffins, or wherever you need a little more pumpkin flavor. (Or yes, eat it straight from the jar.)

And despite the name, there’s no butter involved. You also don’t need to roast a pumpkin, drag out the blender, or do anything more complicated than open a can of pumpkin puree.

Everything goes into one saucepan and cooks down on the stove. That’s it.

Thirty minutes later, you’ve got a jar of pumpkin butter ready to work its way through breakfast all week.

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If there’s ever a time for cookies that look a little weird, it’s Halloween.

These Halloween Monster Cookies start with a soft brown sugar cookie dough, but instead of scooping and baking it as-is, the dough gets divided into three colors and pressed back together. The result is a different orange, purple, and black pattern on every cookie.

Then comes the fun part. Add mismatched candy eyes, pipe on a few white chocolate stitches, or stick an Oreo on top and turn it into a spider. There’s no precision required here. In fact, the uneven eyes and crooked stitches are what make them look better.

And unlike decorated sugar cookies, there’s no rolling, cutting, flooding, or waiting around for layers of icing to dry. You get all the Halloween payoff with a fraction of the decorating work.

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Monster Pretzel Rods are exactly the kind of Halloween treat I love when I want something festive without turning it into a big project. Dip pretzel rods in colorful candy coating, add candy eyes and sprinkles, and suddenly you have a tray full of cute little monsters.

I apparently own an unreasonable number of candy eyes, so they’ve worked their way into quite a few Halloween recipes around here, including Halloween Boo Bark, Halloween Oreos, and Mummy Brownies. They’re especially fun on these pretzel rods because every monster can look completely different.

Crooked drizzles, mismatched eyes, too many sprinkles, one giant cyclops eye. All the things that would look messy on a carefully decorated dessert work perfectly here.

Use one candy coating color or several, keep the decorations simple or pile them on, and make each pretzel its own weird little monster. No oven, no precision decorating, and no two have to look the same.

Even better, you can make them several days ahead of time, which makes them especially handy for Halloween parties, classroom treats, or anything else you don’t want to assemble at the last minute.

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There are chocolate cupcakes, and then there are chocolate cupcakes with a gooey salted caramel center hiding inside.

And if we’re putting caramel inside a chocolate cupcake, we might as well go all in. There’s more chocolate in the whipped ganache on top, another drizzle of salted caramel, and a sprinkle of flaky sea salt.

The whipped ganache is especially important here because it’s lighter and less sweet than chocolate buttercream, which is exactly what these caramel-filled cupcakes need.

For September’s Cupcake of the Month, I wanted to lean into fall flavors without pulling out the pumpkin just yet. Salted caramel felt like the perfect place to start, especially when it’s stuffed inside a chocolate cupcake and paired with even more chocolate on top.

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Once apple cider shows up for the season, I tend to find reasons to put it in everything. Sometimes that means an Apple Cider Donut Cake. Sometimes it means adding an entire bottle of wine.

Apple cider and Fireball was also my go-to fall drink for years, so apparently apple cider + alcohol is a theme I have been committed to for quite some time.

This Apple Cider Sangria is the fall version of my traditional Spanish sangria, swapping the red wine and summer fruit for crisp white wine, fresh apple cider, sliced apples, oranges, and cinnamon sticks.

It’s easy to make ahead, not overly sweet, and exactly the sort of pitcher drink that works well for fall gatherings. Mix everything together, chill it for a few hours, and add sparkling water just before serving.

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Pistachio feels like it’s everywhere lately, which is funny because I don’t remember it being nearly this popular when I was growing up. I’m not complaining, though!

Pistachio can be a surprisingly hard flavor to carry through an entire cake. A handful of chopped nuts adds texture, but not necessarily enough flavor to make the whole cake taste distinctly like pistachio.

This Pistachio Bundt Cake solves that problem by using pistachios three ways: ground roasted pistachios in the batter, pistachio paste for concentrated flavor, and chopped pistachios on top.

And yes, that’s a lot of pistachio. That’s the point.

Sour cream and almond flour keep the crumb soft and moist, while a little lemon zest adds just enough brightness to balance all those rich, nutty flavors.

Finish it with a thick glaze and even more chopped pistachios, and you have a cake that tastes unmistakably like pistachio from the first bite to the last.

Because if pistachio is in the name, you shouldn’t have to go looking for it.

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