Chocolate has the incredible ability to stand alone quite nicely while playing along with loads of other prominent ingredients—without being a bully.

We’ve made one big, flat cookie base, spread it with dulce de leche, and then topped it with a soft pillow of whipped cream for freshly sliced strawberries. It doesn’t get better than this!...

Throw everything in the pan, and voilà! Cranberry sauce. It’s just five ingredients simmering on the stove, but it tastes beguilingly complex.

Simmering a pork roast with milk and a generous handful of herbs results in very tender meat with rich, silky juices.

Stir an easy biscuit dough into the boiling fruit, and cook until the dough bakes up into a fluffy, cakelike dumpling with sweet, juicy strawberries.

This recipe will yield more than you need for the baked Alaskas, but who would mind a little extra ice cream in the house?

Like Jell-O, but all grown up, these tart little puddings have a bracing fruitiness that is just what’s needed after a sumptuous holiday spread.