Molasses

Fox Bros. Bar-B-Q in Atlanta, GA, sells its own barbecue sauce, which you can order online, but any store-bought sauce will work for this smoked chicken wings recipe too.

This cookie gets a double hit of raw sugars: sticky dark muscovado in the dough and a roll through turbinado sugar that adds crunch and a naturally glittering finish around a puddle of bittersweet chocolate ganache.

People who love black licorice will flip for these assertively flavored candies. They’ll be not-quite-black without the food coloring but still very cool looking.

You can use the same weight in regular apples for this gingerbread cake recipe, but don’t the little lady apples just look so awesome?!

Richly spiced gingerbread with the texture of a moist, dense devil’s food cake, this recipe only gets better if you make it ahead.

These sparkly cookies take classic gingerbread and turn up the volume with three variations of ginger and a decadent cream cheese filling.

This rich, spiced buttercream is perfect for chocolate or gingerbread cake. The recipe yields enough buttercream to ice a 3-layer 9-inch round cake. For cupcakes, halve the recipe.

On those mornings when you don't want to do anything but get up, pour coffee, and sit with your face in the sun, homemade granola is a good thing to have around. Ours is meant to be not too sweet. We serve it over very tangy plain yogurt from upstate New York's Ronnybrook Farm dairy and add a swirl of local honey for people who want it a little sweeter.

We like this textured, molasses-tinged loaf with a mix of seeds, but you can simplify by using a larger amount of just a couple of them.

This aromatic alternative to pumpkin pie calls for fresh (not canned!) squash and a new twist on the classic crumble topping. If you'd like some sparkle on the edge of your crust, brush it with a beaten egg and sprinkle with coarse sugar before baking.

Steaming might seem a surprising way to start cooking a turkey, but the payoff is real: The extra step makes the bird extra-juicy, and cuts down on the overall cooking time.

Moonpies are traditionally thrown from Mardi Gras floats in New Orleans, and Mobile, Alabama, but with this easy recipe you can make your own chocolate-dipped graham cracker and marshmallow treats to enjoy at home—no parade or crowds required. For more on moonpies and Mardi Gras, see Make Your Own Moonpies.

Spices may not be seasonal, but the spices in these cookies—cinnamon, cloves, and allspice—always put me in mind of fall because they are important ingredients in so many recipes of that season. Usually, the scent of sugar rules the air at the Carlo's Bake Shop factory, but in the fall, the factory smells of those spices, which always gets me excited for the holidays.

Molasses keeps these cookies magically fresh and chewy for days.

These protein "truffles" are so ridiculously easy that I feel somewhat silly adding them to this collection. Then again, my super-simple, silly recipes are often my most popular. They are certainly favorites in my repertoire, in large part because of their fast factor, but also because of their portability and candy-like appeal. Plus, they are endlessly customizable by varying the spices, extracts, and other add-ins, or by giving them a chic coating of chia seeds, cocoa powder, or chopped nuts. Who says pretty and power can’t go together?

Curry crust? Trust us: This lightly spiced crumb will win Best in Show. If you want to take it even further, add a teaspoon of toasted crushed cumin seeds, too.