Baking

Brown butter is simply butter that has been cooked until it takes on a delicious, subtle nutty flavor and aroma—which explains its French name, beurre noisette, or “hazelnut butter.” Be sure to keep an eye on it as it cooks, to avoid burning.

Palmiers, sometimes called palm leaves, are made with puff pastry folded several times, then sliced, to create a distinctive heart-shaped coil design. Ginger syrup and spiced sugar make these crisp French cookies festive and fragrant.

Buttery madeleine batter is sweetened with honey and spiced with ground cardamom. Once baked, the mini cakes are glazed with a simple citrus icing.

Just a few of these striped showstoppers make a festive and memorable holiday gift; be sure to package them carefully, as they are very fragile. Bake the cookies two or three at a time, then roll them as they come out of the oven, while they’re still pliable.

Jumbo versions of these iced cookies are a New York City specialty. Deciding where to begin presents the sweetest of dilemmas: chocolate first, or vanilla? Don’t worry if you can’t choose—these petite versions are just the right size to eat in one bite.

A morning treat gains all-day appeal with these cakey chocolate cookies. Like breakfast waffles, the cookies are prepared on a waffle iron. For best results, make sure the surface is nice and hot before you pour the batter.

Made from a batter rich in golden syrup, these cookies rarely contain brandy anymore, although some cooks fill them with freshly whipped cream flavored with a splash of brandy. Lyle’s Golden Syrup, popular in England, is a liquid sweetener made from evaporated cane sugar. Look for it in specialty food shops and large supermarkets.

These fruit-and-nut-rich cookies are like soft granola bars; they make a hearty and delicious after-school snack.

Rich chocolate ganache and cool peppermint make a merry combination, especially at holiday time. To get stripes on the meringues, you pipe the cookies with a pastry bag painted with red food coloring.

Moist, cakey, and flecked with fresh fruit in every bite, these cookies are just the thing to pack into a picnic basket on a late-summer day.

These very thin, very crisp cookies have a strong mocha flavor with just a hint of orange. It’s important to use Dutch-process cocoa, which is richer and darker than plain cocoa. Dutch-process powder is treated with alkali to help neutralize the cocoa’s natural acidity.

These tuile-like cookies have a rich caramel flavor, but are packed with nuts. The addition of bread flour, which contains more gluten than all-purpose flour, makes them sturdier than traditional tuiles.

These are a variation on the Moravian spice cookie, which is traditionally made with molasses. Although this version is sweetened with brown sugar, it retains the characteristic thinness of the original variety.

A relative of the Chinese almond cookie, this light sesame round makes a perfect companion to a strong cup of coffee. When preparing to grind toasted seeds, let them cool first: Hot seeds release too much of their essential oils and thus lose flavor.

A generous sprinkle of coarse sanding sugar is the only embellishment on these sweet versions of the salty snack.

For these sandwich cookies, tiny, delicate coconut wafers surround a creamy, sweet-tart, tropical-fruit filling. In a pinch, use prepared lemon curd instead of our homemade passion fruit version.

These crisp, lemony sugar cookies will lend a touch of whimsy to a spring bridal or baby shower, but you can enjoy them anytime—rain or shine.

Combining beaten egg whites with a nut-and-sugar mix helps give these cookies their airy texture.

Three layers of cornmeal shortbread are separated by a chunky cherry-almond filling. Because the flavor of almond extract is so intense, only a tiny amount is needed to flavor the jam for all of the cookies.