The Insider asked the chefs their favorite Christmas desserts.
Chefs were asked to share their favorite desserts.
Bche de Nol, also known as yule log cake, is made by Dan and Lauren.
Andrew makes a date cake spiked with alcohol.
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A Bche de Nol will get you in the Christmas spirit.
Dan Kleinhandler is a pastry chef.
Bche de Nol is a classic French dessert. Both Dan Kleinhandler and Lauren Terrill love baking for the holidays.
"A Bche de Nol is a cream filling cake, but it's got a cream filling instead of a fruit jam, and it can be any flavor you want," said the executive pastry chef at Sepia in Chicago.
The Bche de Nol is made with chocolate cake and vanilla cream.
"Don't be afraid," she said. It's not a bad idea to make a Bche de Nol, even if the first time it cracks it's fine. It's still going to taste great, and we don't care what it looks like if it tastes good.
Kleinhandler makes his Bche de Nol with devil's food cake and milk chocolate. He has chocolate covered cocoa nibs, a dark-chocolate caramel ganache, and milk and dark-chocolate leaves.
A classic British dessert is sticky toffee pudding.
The pudding is spiked with alcohol and made with date cake.
Kleinhandler told Insider that he likes sticky toffee pudding. A date cake from England is soaked in brown sugar and caramel sauce and spiked with a lot of alcohol.
The executive chef of Sepia in Chicago told Insider that he's a sucker for the traditional Christmastime dessert. He's putting it on his restaurant's holiday menu.
"We're serving it with a smoked anglaise," he said. It gives it a little more oomph.
English sherry trifle is a British treat that will add some sparkle to your Christmas feast.
Chef Brad Carter told Insider that English sherry trifle is his favorite dessert.
Brad Carter told Insider that English sherry trifle is his favorite dessert. He developed his own recipe for the dessert.
He said that it became fashionable in the 1970s. I made it better and lighter by highlighting all the great things about it.
The lady fingers are soaked in green tea, lemon or lime juice, and some sherry, and are part of the trifle. Carter recommends fruit followed by the custard.
Carter uses a wildflower called meadowsweet instead of a traditional custard with eggs and milk. We preserve the English flower for the rest of the year because it grows in the summer. It's similar to honey and vanilla and has a little of that infused into it.
Carter makes a lighter version of the trifle by topping it with a syllabub, a sweet Cornish dish that combines cream with alcohol.
Carter said to add English cider, lemon, and sherry to whipping cream. I use that on top of the trifle because it sits really nice.
Then top it all off with some roasted almonds or sprinkles.
You can surprise your family with a Christmas pudding from the chef's kitchen.
Chef Asimakis Chaniotis makes his Christmas pudding with cinnamon, nutmeg, sugar, and clove powder.
The chef at Pied Terre in London, Asimakis Chaniotis, is making a Christmas pudding that is perfect for the holidays.
To make Chaniotis' pudding at home, you'll need: 100 grams of warm water, 10 grams of salt, 30 grams of sugar, 50 grams of yeast, 2 grams of cinnamon powder, 12 gram of clove powder, and some grated nutmeg.
They should be put in the bowl of a stand mixer. Add 500 grams of flour and seven eggs to the mix after everything has been mixed together. Add 150 grams of butter to the mixer. Let the dough rest in your bowl with plastic wrap.
Then, fill the individual molds with piping bags and punch the dough down. After 20 minutes of rest, bake it for 16 minutes at 350 degrees.
The Metaxa sauce that Chaniotis tops his Christmas pudding with pays homage to his Greek roots.
Theroux is made by mixing 50 grams of melted butter and 50 grams of plain flour. For three minutes, cook your mixture on medium heat.
500 liters of light cream and 50 grams of sugar should be brought to a boil. Slowly add it to the roux. The mixture should be simmering for two minutes. It can be served immediately with your Christmas pudding, or you can use it within three days.
A chocolate marquise cake will impress your holiday dinner guests.
Chocolate marquise is a flourless cake.
A chocolate marquise is a smooth flourless chocolate cake. You usually have chocolate, eggs, and butter.
He said it was an opportunity to have a very delicious and decadent chocolate dessert. If you're like my family, you've probably had plenty of cookies and other treats already, so it's good that you only want a little bit.
The water bath during the baking process is important for those making chocolate marquise at home.
If you want to cook the cake in a larger pan, fill it with hot water and then bake it in it. Place the cake pan inside.
The water will help the temperature around the cake because ovens are notoriously even. It also prevents the cake from getting too hot from the oven and transfers that heat into the product, so you're cooking it more gently. It's important to set yourself up for success.
The cake should be cooked low and slow, as well as using a lined loaf pan.
He said to line it with aluminum foil so it can be removed once it's chilled. You can peel the aluminum off the outside. If you do it in the pan, it's going to be hard to get it out.
When it's time to serve, Zimmerman recommends that you pair that rich chocolate with a coffee drink.
He said he was a big fan of coffee and chocolate. "Vietnamese coffee has a smooth, decadent chocolate cake that would be good for me, and there is a hint of butter and chocolatey notes from it already."
The seven-layer caramel cake is a big hit at the table.
The seven-layer caramel cake was made byCaroline's Cakes.
Chris Morgan, who recently opened Bammy's in Washington, DC, told Insider that he loves rich desserts this time of year, and one of his all-time favorites is seven-layer caramel cake. My aunt used to bring hers from South Carolina to Christmas dinner every year. Is it good?
The home of the world's best caramel cake is a bakery in Spartanburg, called Caroline's Cakes. At her son's christening, Reutter served a seven-layer caramel cake. The cake became a national sensation because it delighted so many guests.
Morgan still recommends the seven-layer caramel cake from Caroline for those who want to skip the kitchen and just enjoy the cake.
He said that the one they make at Caroline's is insane if you don't feel like taking the leap. Make sure you have a nice place to sleep.
You can buy a seven-layer caramel cake from the store for $60.
Sugar cookies are not just for Santa.
LaurenTerrill loves making sugar cookies for the holidays.
For the holidays, Terrill loves to bake sugar cookies.
She told Insider that it's really easy, just butter, sugar, flour, and a touch of white vinegar. It comes together in the mixer in five minutes, assuming your butter is soft.
It's recommended that you give your sugar cookies a "super quick bake".
"You don't want any color in them, so they should be in the oven for about six minutes," he said. You can decorate them after that.
She said it was so basic. It's a classic for a reason. I always have cookies for both Thanksgiving and Christmas.
30 minutes is all it takes to make gingerbread cookies.
Dan Kleinhandler makes sugar and gingerbread cookies.
"That smell when you're baking gingerbread cookies in the house, it says it's December, it's the holiday season," Kleinhandler told Insider.
To make Kleinhandler's gingerbread cookies, you need: 400 grams of butter, 200 grams of sugar, 242 grams of molasses, 1 egg, 12 grams of ground ginger, 6 grams of ground cinnamon, 1 gram of nutmeg, and 2 grams of salt.
Kleinhandler suggests putting the dough in the fridge for at least 15 minutes so that it can cool down. You just have to bake and decorate.
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