Our best ever Christmas dessert recipes for 2023 (2024)

FAQs

What is the number one dessert? ›

1. Pie. Pie earns a spot on the top of everyone's list of popular desserts merely for its delicious versatility. From fruit pies to cream pies, from seasonal favorites like pumpkin to year-round standards like apple, what's not to love?

Soldiers in World War I also fancied a version of the baked treat: wrapped in wax paper, this small fruitcake provided some morsel of nutrients when many other foods would spoil during long stretches in barren battle trenches. Nowadays fruitcakes are a holiday delicacy still prized for their long-lasting freshness.

Diamond fruitcake – $1,650,000 ($ 1.65 million) World's Most Expensive Desserts - Diamond Fruitcake Sold on Christmas 2005, this cake was also created by a Japanese pastry chef. Creating the cake required six months of conceptualization and another month to produce it. It's decorated with 223 diamonds.

Traditional Christmas dinner features turkey with stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, cranberry sauce, and vegetables. Other types of poultry, roast beef, or ham, are also used. Pumpkin or apple pie, raisin pudding, Christmas pudding, or fruitcake are staples for dessert.

Coffee cake is a classic, while latte, mocha, chai, matcha, and earl grey flavored cakes and ice creams are gaining even more popularity this year. Layered with complementary flavors like pumpkin, cream cheese, and vanilla, these caffeine-essenced desserts are a refreshing twist on time-tested flavors.

The simplest dessert and one of the best are fruits because they are nutritious, appetizing, and easy to prepare and serve.

Ice cream is America's favorite dessert and is a key driver of the frozen food category.

Christmas Pudding Takes Its Shape

The first was a runny porridge known as “plum pottage” in which any mixture of meats, dried fruits and spices might appear — edibles that could be preserved until the winter celebration. Until the 18th century, "plum” was synonymous with raisins, currants and other dried fruits.

The tinned pudding is believed to be one of the oldest in the world. A 120-year-old Christmas pudding given to Royal Navy sailors fighting in the Boer War has gone on display.

Ashure (Noah's Pudding) is thought to be the oldest dessert in the world, first made by Noah after his fabled landfall at Mt Ararat. It is a delightful mix of dried fruit, nuts, grains and beans (yes, beans!) made in Turkey and all over the Middle East. Give it a try - you'll be glad you did!

Why are 13 desserts served at Christmas in France? ›

Combined with the religious element, this tradition gave the Christmas season its festive character well before gifts inundated households. The thirteen desserts are in reference to Jesus and his twelve apostles at the Last Supper.

Thirteen desserts are enjoyed after Christmas Eve dinner, traditionally representing Jesus and his twelve Apostles. Each guest must eat all thirteen in order to guarantee good luck for the year to come (13 is the minimum, we are presenting 14 here).

There are a wide variety of desserts in western cultures, including cakes, cookies, biscuits, gelatins, pastries, ice creams, pies, puddings, and candies. Fruit is also commonly found in dessert courses because of its natural sweetness.

It was common practice to include small silver coins in the pudding mixture, which could be kept by the person whose serving included them. The usual choice was a silver threepence or a sixpence.