While I was on a vacation to Washington DC, I had an amazing chocolate pecan pie that has stuck with me for the past week. the richness and sweetness of the pie was fantastic. For my Mini Chocolate Pecan Pie Cookies, I added the richness of the shortbread cookie in place of the pie crust and they are packed with a rich chocolate flavor that mixes with the nutty flavor of the pecans makes these an amazing addition to your normal holiday cookies, or anytime of the year. Check out the recipe below.

As we are in the holiday season, deserts are a big part of the season. Poach pear tarts are quite simple to make and is a real wow factor with the colors of the red wine leaching into the light color of the pears and the whole how would be filled with a great smell from the cinnamon and orange. The Light and flaky tart with the rich and creamy mascarpone cheese topped with the soft, tender poached pears do make a great tasting tart that will please any group.

My favorite fall flavor is apples, it can be used in so many different ways so I had to do one last recipes with apples. These apple spiced thumb print cookies are flaky and full of rich butter and spices plus the simple apple filling the makes these taste great and full of flavor.

Cranberries tend to be a great staple for the fall season especially around thanksgiving. The great tart flavor and the vibrate red color makes it very appealing to the eyes. This Cranberry Streusel Cake is a great addition to your thanksgiving table for a dessert option, it even makes a great breakfast cake option too. It has a great combination of sweet and tart from the cranberries and orange in the cake.

The first thing is you make the base cake, whisk together the flour, granulated sugar, baking powder and soda and salt. Cut in the butter to the flour mixture until a course meal like texture. Using a hand held mixer on low speed is an easy easy of doing this, you can also use a pastry blender or two knives.

One of my favorite  flavors is lemon, in my mind lemon can go with pretty much anything and can be used even to replace salt in recipes too. This easy lemon pudding cake offer a soft moist lemon cake onto of a rich lemon custard on the bottom. I am not a huge dessert fan to be honest, but i can eat one of these in mere minutes!!

Start off by preheating the oven to 350F and heat some water in a sauce pan or tea kettle until it is simmering and hot. Grease 6-6ounce ramekins with oil spray and set aside.

Combine the sugar and flour together and set aside. In a separate bowl whisk the egg yolks and the softened butter until combine. Add the milk, lemon juice, lemon zest and vanilla extract.

Fill each of the ramekins ¾ the way full and place each ramekin in a baking pan filled with water half way up the sides of the ramekins. Bake for 35-40 minutes until golden brown and puffy on top. Remove from the water bath and let cool for 20minutes.

Its again that time of year where the leaves are changing and the air is getting cooler. These cranberry pumpkin scones are perfect for that morning that has a great tart flavor of the cranberry with the sweetness of the cinnamon glaze that coats the moist pumpkin flavored scones. They are best when they are still warm from the oven but still have great flavor for days to follow.

You want to start with ice cold butter, I tend to cut the butter into small bits and place in the freezer while I get all of the dry ingredients measured and sifted into a bowl. you want to use a pastry blender or two knives to make the butter and flour mixture look like a course panko bread crumb texture.

Once you have the butter mixed in you want to add the cranberries, milk and pumpkin and mix into a soft dough.  You want to roll the dough out on the counter top to a 1" thick circle.

Cut the dough into 12 equal size pieces, I like to use a 3 inch biscuit cutter to make nice circle shaped scones. then bake in a 350F oven for 20-25 minutes.

While the scones are baking, prepare the glaze by mixing the powder sugar, melted butter, milk and cinnamon. Mix until smooth. When the scones are done remove and let cool for 5 minutes then drizzle about 1 tablespoon of the glaze over each scone. And serve warm.

As fall comes in with the cool air and the leaves starting to change everyone starts to love the smell of fall desserts baking in the kitchen. The wonderful taste of pumpkin desserts from pies to this great tasting pumpkin-cherry upside-down cake makes fall so much better especially after doing all of the fall activities like going to apple orchard or finding that perfect pumpkin in the patch.

One of the best parts of the recipe is the cherry sauce that goes on the bottom that carmelizes as it bakes in the oven. It is super easy to make as all you do is add all of the ingredients for the cherry sauce in a sauce pan and let it come to a boil stirring frequently. Let simmer for 2-3 mins and pour into the bottom of the cake pan. let cool as you make the batter.

You start by combining the butter and the sugar. Beat with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. Add the vanilla, beat until combined. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in pumpkin.

In a medium bowl, stir together flour, baking powder,  spices, and baking soda. Alternately add flour mixture and buttermilk to butter mixture, beating on low speed after each addition just until combined.

Carefully spread batter over preserve mixture in pan.Bake for 35 to 40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Carefully invert onto a large serving platter. Spoon any of the cherry mixture back onto of the cake. Serve warm.

These cookies are a serious cookie that will fix your sweet tooth craving. The nice chewiness of the brown sugar bring to these Pecan Praline Cookie is incredible plus topped with a smooth chewy caramel like praline topping topped with chopped pecans will make these a great fall time cookie. These are definitely a good substitute for the normal chocolate chip cookies.

These cookies use very few ingredients to make. All you need is unsalted butter, packed brown sugar, a large egg, vanilla extract, all purpose flour, baking soda and salt. You start off by creaming the butter and the sugar until light and fluffy and then add the egg and vanilla. Lastly you add all the dry ingredients an then you have the simple batter for theses cookies.

Using a 1-1/2 tablespoon scoop, place the batter on lined sheet pan lined with parchment paper and bake for 10-12mins until the cookies are browned on the edges.

A praline is a confection the has sugar, cream, and some form of nut, with pecans it would be classified as an an American praline. The praline topping is very simple to make and turns out fantastic for the topping for these cookies. For the praline topping add the cream and brown sugar in a small sauce pan, stir until all of the sugar is mixed in smooth. let the mixture boil for two minutes then pull off the heat and mix in the powdered sugar until a smooth caramel brown sauce is made. I let it cool for about 5minutes before adding it to the cookies. Top with the chopped pecans and the cookies are ready to be enjoyed. Once the praline topping as cooled completely you can stack the cookies up and store for days and they will stay nice and chewy.

Is it just me or does everyone love a slice of warm, moist slice of banana bread fresh from the oven?? This banana foster bread recipe delivers a great moist banana bread, topped with a sugary, rum flavored walnut streusel. This banana bread will become one of your favorites instantly.

The first thing you want to do is get the oven preheating to 350F. You want to then start by creaming the butter that is at room temperature and the granulated sugar until you get to a light a fluffy consistency.

In a bowl, I like to use a wire whisk to break up the bananas vs a fork or a masher. You can mash and whip them together to get that chunky  apple sauce like texture a lot easier. Mix in the two eggs and add it to the butter sugar mixture. Mix everything until well combined, add all of the dry ingredients slowly until just combined. Do not over mix for the light and fluffy texture of the bread.

In a smaller bowl, mix together the melted butter, brown sugar, rum extract, vanilla extract, ground cinnamon and chopped walnuts. Pour the bread batter into a into prepared loaf pan add top the batter with the foster topping.

Bake at 350˚F for 55-60 min or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Let banana bread rest for 10 min before transferring to wire rack to cool.

As a young boy I remember my grandma, Oma to me would go buy peaches by the bushels to make can peaches which i still ask for to this day whenever I see her. So my love affair for peaches goes back quite a bit and can wait for summer for these wonderful fruits to come into season.  These peach and pecan scone pack a great baked peach taste in a soft flaky scone straight out of the oven.

The first thing you want to do is to combine flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda, and brown sugar and granulated sugar. Make sure you combine everything so you do not have any clumps before you add the butter. You want to add the butter in cold, and i mean COLD. The colder the butter is the flakier the scone will be. I typically try to get most of the butter the size of large grind corn meal, but if you have a few larger chunks it will be fine.

Add the Cream and egg together and whisk together.

Add the cream mixture to the flour/butter mixture and use a fork to stir everything together until just moistened. Add the peaches and pecans and fold it in being carefully not to break the peaches up.

Dump the dough out on a clean counter and kneed it lightly, Try to do it quickly so the heat from your hands does not warm the butter up to much. If the dough is becoming really sticky place back in the bowl and place in the refrigerator or freezer for a few mins to firm up some.

Slice the scones into 8 equal slices and place on a prepared sheet pan an bake at 400F for about 18-20 minutes.

Allow scones to cool for 10 minutes. While waiting in a small bowl whisk together the heavy cream, confectioners’ sugar and lemon juice. Drizzle the glaze over the warm scones and enjoy while they are still warm. They will last three days in air tight container.