[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

The weather is threatening to turn summery and the markets have been flush with strawberries. With Memorial Day and the start of full-on picnic and barbecue season right around the corner, the time seemed ripe to try out a new icebox cake recipe.

Strawberry Shortcake traditionally involves biscuits, cream, and berries, though there's nothing wrong with making it with say, doughnuts or red velvet cake. When strawberries are in season I support strawberry shortcake in all forms and this recipe is quite possibly the easiest strawberry shortcake ever. All you need are fresh strawberries, a bit of orange juice, graham crackers and homemade whipped cream. Strawberry shortcake desserts can easily veer into cloyingly sweet territory, but this version is low on added sugar, putting the natural sweetness of ripe, in-season berries center stage. Best of all, you can throw it together in a matter of minutes the night before you want to eat it. Just before serving, top it with freshly sliced strawberries.

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Easy Icebox Strawberry Shortcake »

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie, a Midtown Lunch contributor, and co-author of New York à la Cart: Recipes and Stories from the Big Apple's Best Food Trucks. You can follow her on Twitter at @blondiebrownie.

[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

Kuchen is the German word for cake and depending on where you're from and what recipe your grandma handed down, kuchen can take the form of a crumb-topped coffee cake or a custard-filled, pie-like cake with a yeast raised crust. It can be round. It can be square. It can even be rectangular. Whatever form takes, it's darn delicious and as the official state dessert of South Dakota it deserves mention among the American Classics.

Alas, I don't have a German grandmother to share her recipe, but in some sense that offered me the freedom to come up with a recipe that embodied my own ideal kuchen. I'm a crumb-topped coffee cake addict from childhood, so this kuchen combines a rich yeast cake with a spring-inspired fresh strawberry rhubarb puree and yes, plenty of spiced crumbs on top. Pair that with a frosty glass of milk and you have the makings for an ideal breakfast (or midnight snack!).

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Strawberry Rhubarb Kuchen »

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie, a Midtown Lunch contributor, and co-author of New York à la Cart: Recipes and Stories from the Big Apple's Best Food Trucks. You can follow her on Twitter at @blondiebrownie.

[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

Chocolate pudding is a great love of mine. It's so comforting and so satisfying—not to mention so easy to prepare—you'll wonder why you haven't been making chocolate pudding all the time.

Now there's a time when you want the comforts of childhood and this homemade Jell-O-style pudding or Pudding in a Cloud will do. And there are other times when you want a ridiculously decadent chocolate pudding.

But if you love chocolate pudding as much as I do, you want a workhorse pudding—one that's packed with dark chocolate flavor but that doesn't require much fuss in the kitchen. When I want pudding, I want it, like, NOW, and I don't want to separate eggs or buy cream. This pudding takes its richness from whole milk and a healthy amount of 72% cacao chocolate. And if you're a regular baker and chocolate lover, it's made with staples you'll likely find in your own pantry right now—milk, unsweetened cocoa powder, sugar, salt, cornstarch, vanilla and dark chocolate—which means within about 20 minutes of reading this post you could be eating your own chocolate pudding.

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Easy Chocolate Pudding »

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie, a Midtown Lunch contributor, and co-author of New York à la Cart: Recipes and Stories from the Big Apple's Best Food Trucks. You can follow her on Twitter at @blondiebrownie.

[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

For years I've looked longingly in the direction of pecan pie, but with a tree nut allergy, it's a love that will remain unrequited. I've tried to fill that sticky pie gap in my heart with substitutes, notably Shoo-fly Pie and the Black Bottom Oat Pie from Four & Twenty Blackbirds in Brooklyn. Recently I learned of a Peanut Pie that hails from Virginia and the Carolinas that sounded just like the nuts + sweet goo that I crave. Naturally this pie moved to the top of my to-make list.

As far as pie goes, it's pretty darn simple to make: just roll out and blind bake your favorite butter crust recipe, add some dark, dark chocolate and a simple gooey filling then top with split peanuts and bake until the center sets. The pie itself is a study in textures from the crunchy peanut brittle-like top to the gooey center and flakey crust. The chocolate, peanut, and sweet goo combo is reminiscent of a candy bar come to life (in pie form) with an added air of sophistication from the molasses. While I can't give you a direct head-to-head with pecan pie, my husband assures me that the comparison is apt and that he wouldn't pass up a slice of either.

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Chocolate Peanut Pie »

Got a favorite classic American dessert recipe you'd like to see featured here? Email us with the subject: "American Classics."

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie, a Midtown Lunch contributor, and co-author of New York à la Cart: Recipes and Stories from the Big Apple's Best Food Trucks. You can follow her on Twitter at @blondiebrownie.

[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

It's official, I'm becoming addicted to surfing vintage recipe boards on Pinterest. I've long been fascinated by back-of-the box recipes and recipe advertorials. Some of my favorite "classics" that I've cover for this column from Classic Icebox Cake to Pig Pickin' Cake to Coffee Tapioca have been inspired by just those sorts of recipe: tasty treats that are quick and easy to make. My husband calls me a sucker for good marketing (I prefer to think of it as being a patron of good marketing), and when I saw a pin for "Banana Breeze: A Shortcut Cream Pie," I had to give it a try.

The ad promises this pie is "almost as easy as peeling a Dole banana." With Mad Men Season 6 in full swing, I can't help but imagine the 1970s ad man (or woman) coming up with that selling copy. As cheesy as it sounds, they do deliver on ease of preparation. The original recipe calls for an entire can of sweetened condensed milk to be whipped into 8 ounces of cream cheese. I don't know about you, but that seemed awfully sweet to me so I dialed that back just a bit. I'd never thought of making a pie with a cornflake crust, but I will now. The cornflakes mixed with brown sugar, cinnamon, and butter made for a truly magnificent crust: crunchy, buttery and sweet. With more than a little hint of lemon this pie is light, fresh and ideal picnic fare.

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Banana Breeze Pie »

Got a favorite classic American dessert recipe you'd like to see featured here? Email us with the subject: "American Classics."

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie, a Midtown Lunch contributor, and co-author of New York à la Cart: Recipes and Stories from the Big Apple's Best Food Trucks. You can follow her on Twitter at @blondiebrownie.

[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

I've written about Chocolate Covered Potato Chips for this column, but my first introduction to chocolate + potato chips came in the form of Potato Chip cookies. When Dad bought our family 101 Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookies by Gwen W. Steege, my younger brother commandeered the book and insisted on making the potato chip cookies. This was sometime in the mid-to-late 90s. Sweet and salty desserts weren't nearly as mainstream as they are today. I thought 1) my brother was crazy and 2) potato chip cookies were some sort of nouveau cookie addition. I couldn't have been more wrong on both counts.

I suppose if I thought about it harder, I shouldn't have been so skeptical that potato chip cookies would be a winner. In fact, I'll even go so far as to say potato chips are an ideal addition to chocolate chip cookies, especially for those of us that love a touch of savory with our sweets. Soft, chewy, melty and gooey chocolate chip cookies get a nice salty crunch from crushed potato chips.

I was recently surprised to discover that potato chips have been making an appearance in cookies as far back as post WWII. The Food Timeline dates the earliest print appearance of potato chip cookies in the Freeport Journal-Standard in 1946. This recipe included butterscotch pudding mix while later recipes added everything from chocolate chips to nuts to coconut. The Food Timeline reports that there was a boom in potato chip cookie recipes in the 60s after "the Potato Chip Institute International began sponsoring an annual Men's National Cooking Championship with one mandatory ingredient." Today you can find potato chips taking a bow in cookies at many bakeries like Momofuku Milk Bar, where they are one of the many components of their signature "Compost Cookies." Whatever form they take, I'll never doubt the deliciousness of potato chips in cookies again.

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Potato Chip Cookies »

Got a favorite classic American dessert recipe you'd like to see featured here? Email us with the subject: "American Classics."

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie, a Midtown Lunch contributor, and co-author of New York à la Cart: Recipes and Stories from the Big Apple's Best Food Trucks. You can follow her on Twitter at @blondiebrownie.

[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

There are few childhood treats that were as special as Persian Buns. Oh, Persian Buns; that once-a-summer taste of heaven that I've only ever encountered in a small bakery in Camden, Maine. I remember the anticipation of that Persian Bun, the early rising and hour-long car ride from our family place in Freeport. I remember that they were sweet and fried and covered with chocolate frosting. These were the sophisticated cousins of the chocolate frosted doughnuts with sprinkles that I favored on a day-to-day basis, and their scarcity made them all the more precious.

Alas, the Camden Home bakery has long since shut its doors. A recent conversation with my dad reminded me of this long-lost sweet and set me on a quest to recreate the Persian Bun as faithfully as I could. And all these years later, I think I've cracked the code.

Taking my search to the internet for the first time, I was surprised to find mention of other Persians outside of Maine.

Though not a common treat, the Persian Bun or Roll seems to be generally accepted as a yeast-raised, deep-fried cinnamon bun pastry with some sort of frosting.

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Persian Buns »

Got a favorite classic American dessert recipe you'd like to see featured here? Email us with the subject: "American Classics."

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie, a Midtown Lunch contributor, and co-author of the forthcoming book New York à la Cart: Recipes and Stories from the Big Apple's Best Food Trucks. You can follow her on Twitter at @blondiebrownie.

[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

I've always been a bit of a sucker for holiday themed desserts. Growing up, Easter always meant tons of chocolate and pastel shaded candies. Anything egg or bunny shaped was fair game for the table, too. So naturally when I saw a vintage 1950s back-of-the box recipe for a decorated Easter Egg Cake on Pinterest, I had to give it a shot.

The beauty of this recipe is that you can make it however you please, just choose your favorite cake and frosting recipe—it's all about how you assemble and decorate the cake. If your Easter cooking time is already booked up with preparing the main feast, you can use a boxed cake mix (shhh!) paired with a quick homemade frosting or make things even easier on yourself by using the canned stuff. I promise I won't tell.

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Easter Egg Cake »

Got a favorite classic American dessert recipe you'd like to see featured here? Email us with the subject: "American Classics."

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie, a Midtown Lunch contributor, and co-author of the forthcoming book New York à la Cart: Recipes and Stories from the Big Apple's Best Food Trucks. You can follow her on Twitter at @blondiebrownie.

[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

Last year I put together a slideshow of Matzo Crack recipes for Passover. This year's post was inspired by a tweet I saw by Serious Eats: New York editor Max Falkowitz that went a little something like this: "What to do with Matzo for Passover: Eat with Charoset. Make Matzo Crack. Cry. End of list." Which got me thinking what else in the dessert realm could be done with matzo? Then it hit me. Chocolate covered Matzo 'Crack' would make a great base for s'mores. Break out the Kosher for Passover marshmallows!

While saltine or soda cracker bark has been around for ages, Marcy Goldman, author of A Treasury of Jewish Holiday Baking, is widely recognized as the original Matzo Crack or Matzo Crunch creator. The beauty of this recipe is you can make it in a snap with leftover Matzo Crack or serve it up as a main dessert. By toasting the marshmallows in the oven you don't need a fancy pastry torch or a fire pit to enjoy this Passover-friendly twist on a camp time dessert.

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Matzo 'Crack' S'mores »

Got a favorite classic American dessert recipe you'd like to see featured here? Email us with the subject: "American Classics."

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie, a Midtown Lunch contributor, and co-author of the forthcoming book New York à la Cart: Recipes and Stories from the Big Apple's Best Food Trucks. You can follow her on Twitter at @blondiebrownie.

[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

I'm such a sucker for mint and chocolate. Throw in a touch of green food coloring and I feel like a five year old with an ice cream cone (a mint chocolate chip ice cream cone, naturally!). While I'm all for showy and involved desserts sometimes I just want something delicious and easy. This retro-inspired no-bake dessert is perfect for when you want a chocolate and minty treat without spending a ton of time in the kitchen.

Traditional Grasshopper Pie combines a chocolate wafer cookie crust with a light and airy gelatin and meringue based filling that's whipped up with both crème de menthe and crème de cacao. This dessert takes its cues more from the classic back-of-the-box "eclair cake" recipe that I discovered thanks to longtime Serious Eats community member, Jerzee Tomato. The eclair cake is make up of pudding and Cool Whip layered between graham crackers and topped with a dark chocolate frosting. Pop that in the fridge and let the pudding work its magic. Within a few hours the graham crackers will soften to a cake-like texture. This got me thinking, if the graham cracker icebox cake treatment works for "eclairs," why not grasshoppers? If you're terrified of meringue (I'll admit the whole whipping up egg whites still intimidates me) but want a Grasshopper Pie fix, this dessert is just the ticket. Homemade minty pudding folded with fresh whipped cream and layered with chocolate grahams and topped with a rich dark chocolate frosting. It's like a fluffy tribute to Thin Mints. I defy you to eat just one piece!

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Grasshopper Squares »

Got a favorite classic American dessert recipe you'd like to see featured here? Email us with the subject: "American Classics."

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie, a Midtown Lunch contributor, and co-author of the forthcoming book New York à la Cart: Recipes and Stories from the Big Apple's Best Food Trucks. You can follow her on Twitter at @blondiebrownie.

[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

New Orleans may be best known around these parts for beignets and King Cake, but when it comes time to celebrate your birthday in the Big Easy, there's another local cake that steals the show. Known as a Doberge Cake (that's pronounced DOUGH-bash for the folks at home), this multi-layered cake is a NOLA interpretation of the classic Hungarian dobos torte. Invented by Beulah Ledner, a beloved baker in New Orleans, the Doberge Cake consists of at least six layers of cake that are filled with a lemon, chocolate, or caramel filling and then iced. The most popular combo is a half and half, featuring half lemon and half chocolate.

With a springy cake and homemade chocolate pudding and/or lemon curd filling, not to mention rich frosting, it's easy to see what this cake is much loved in its home city. As far as cakes go, it's not the hardest cake to prepare, but it does take a lot of time. Especially if you're going to go the extra step of making a half and half, which essentially requires the work of two cakes (you're making two fillings and two different frostings from scratch).

Yes, you will dirty every bowl possible making this cake. I'm an unabashed lover of chocolate and lemon and I'll advocate their pairing until my last breath, but if you're short on time or patience then do as I say and not as I do, and make your cake a single flavor and save the other for next time go round. If you're a glutton for punishment (and cake), roll up your sleeves and hit the kitchen with plenty of time to spare.

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Doberge Cake »

Got a favorite classic American dessert recipe you'd like to see featured here? Email us with the subject: "American Classics."

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie, a Midtown Lunch contributor, and co-author of the forthcoming book New York à la Cart: Recipes and Stories from the Big Apple's Best Food Trucks. You can follow her on Twitter at @blondiebrownie.

[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

I first heard about Shamrock Shakes my freshman year of college. Mint chocolate chip ice cream had always ranked in my top 3 flavors as a kid, and I was immediately intrigued. When St. Patty's Day rolled around my Texan roommate suggested we hunt for one. Artificial mint flavoring? Green food coloring? Frozen milky-like substance? Yes, please!

Alas, for years New York was a dry Shamrock Shake town. Apparently the New York regional franchisees voted to not carry the shake. It wasn't until I took a business trip to Utah during Shamrock Shake shoulder season that I finally got to sample the big green. Unfortunately my expectations were not in line with reality. The mint flavoring was mild at best and a bit too toothpaste-y for my liking. And as a New Englander, I'm always disappointed when shakes aren't double or triple thick (frappe anyone?). Shamrock Shakes couldn't hold a candle to my beloved Mint Oreo Blizzard from Dairy Queen.

These days Shamrock Shakes are available nationally, but after that Utah experience you won't find me at Mickey D's any time soon. Still, something about Shamrock Shakes captivate me—perhaps I'm just sucker for marketing and/or alliteration—which is why I wanted to make a Shamrock Shake that would live up to the minty goodness I had built up in my mind.

This homemade recipe uses few ingredients and comes together without the corn syrup (high fructose or otherwise) and additives and preservatives included in the real deal. Pleasantly minty and thick enough for quality slurping/straw cloggage, this is a shake that goes down easy.

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Homemade Shamrock Shake »

Got a favorite classic American dessert recipe you'd like to see featured here? Email us with the subject: "American Classics."

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie, a Midtown Lunch contributor, and co-author of the forthcoming book New York à la Cart: Recipes and Stories from the Big Apple's Best Food Trucks. You can follow her on Twitter at @blondiebrownie.

[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

During my grade school days there was little doubt in my mind as to the supremacy of Monster Cookies. We're talking a face-sized peanut butter and oatmeal confection chock full of M&Ms and chocolate chips. Yes, M&Ms and chocolate chips. Did I mention the oatmeal and the peanut butter? Everything about these cookies was pure goodness.

I don't quite remember when I first had Monster Cookies, but I do remember that we'd make them in my elementary school with some degree of regularity as a fundraiser for the Save the Children child who our program sponsored. I first learned to crack eggs during a Monster Cookie baking lesson in our cafeteria. And what mom could say no to giving you a little extra change in your lunch to Save the Children? The cause itself was dessert insurance.

It's been years since I've had a Monster Cookie. And I've long since forgotten how to make them. In recreating this recipe, I relied on memory. The cookies had to be huge. And they had to be soft. And they had to have lots of goodies inside. After a few false starts—too crumbly, too dry, not flavorful enough—I hit the jackpot. If, like me, you're a soft baked cookie lover with a hankering for peanut butter and chocolate, these should more than satisfy.

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Monster Cookies »

Got a favorite classic American dessert recipe you'd like to see featured here? Email us with the subject: "American Classics."

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie, a Midtown Lunch contributor, and co-author of the forthcoming book New York à la Cart: Recipes and Stories from the Big Apple's Best Food Trucks. You can follow her on Twitter at @blondiebrownie.

[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

Easter comes early this year, which means that Mardi Gras is just around the corner. The tradition of enjoying heavy and fried dishes on Fat Tuesday dates back centuries, as it was the last hurrah for many Christians before the somber 40 day period of Lent when the consumption of meat, eggs, and dairy was forbidden.

Last year I explored pączki, the Polish, deep fried jam or jelly-filled doughnuts which are popular in regions around the country with sizable Polish-American populations like Detroit and Chicago. But in truth, there are few places in the States as closely associated with Mardi Gras as New Orleans, And while NOLA has gifted us with many wonderful additions to American cookery, beignets are on my mind with Mardi Gras so near at hand.

For folks outside of New Orleans, the square, fried fritters which are covered (perhaps buried) in powdered sugar are probably most closely associated with the French Quarter's famed Cafe Du Monde, a coffee shop established back in 1862. Alas, while my travels have yet to take me to Cafe Du Monde or New Orleans for that matter, both are high on my to-visit list. Instead of relying on memory for my beignet inspiration, I hit the books for some research (and the Serious Eats Talk forums).

My hunt for a terrific beignet recipe lead me to the sixth edition of the The Picayune Creole Cook Book published in 1922 by the Times-Picayune Publishing Company, which has since been revamped several times over for the modern cook. I tried out the "plain fritter" recipe in the 1922 edition and was surprised to discover that the recipe was heavy on eggs—you need 4 of them—and used only baking powder for leavening. The recipe said "a fritter that is well made should be light and fluffy." Well, I can tell you mine came out sort of fluffy, but started to deflate in fairly short order. And the flavor was more akin to an eggy, deep-fried French toast than the puffy yeasty square that I was expecting based on beignets I've had elsewhere.

Luckily, Serious Eater bobcatsteph3 pointed me in the direction of a terrific post about beignet hunting by Rebecca Marsters from Cooks Country Magazine. It inspired me to play with some of the doughnut making skills I've acquired over the life of writing this column, and I ended up with my own yeasty, puffy, pillowy beignets fit for serving on Mardi Gras or any morning when you have time for some breakfast time frying. Beignets are best served warm, so gather a crowd around the table and be sure to stock up on plenty of powdered sugar and chicory coffee.

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Beignets »

Got a favorite classic American dessert recipe you'd like to see featured here? Email us with the subject: "American Classics."

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie, a Midtown Lunch contributor, and co-author of the forthcoming book New York à la Cart: Recipes and Stories from the Big Apple's Best Food Trucks. You can follow her on Twitter at @blondiebrownie.

[Photograph: Alexandra Penfold]

One of my surprise favorite recipes from last year was a traditional Hawaiian sweet known as Haupia. This simple dessert is made primarily of coconut milk and milk. It's clean and uncluttered, the sort of dish that would make this avowed former anti-coconut-ist reconsider.

The early February doldrums in the Northeast have me longing for sunshine and warmer weather and after the success of last year's haupia recipe, I decided to look into other luau dessert fare and discovered that there is another version of haupia. A chocolate haupia...that's served up in pie form. Clearly this called for some experimentation.

A bit of research turned up Ted's Bakery on O'ahu's North Shore as the originator of the chocolate haupia cream pie, which according to their site, consists of "a layer of rich, smooth dark chocolate custard cream, filled with another layer of haupia topped with whipped topping." I decided to buck tradition (or perhaps build on it) by forgoing any layering and whisking 72% cacao dark chocolate directly into the haupia then pouring it into a chocolate graham cracker crust. As for the whipped topping, it's totally up to you if you want to add it, I just added more cookie crumbs to the top. There were no complaints or leftovers.

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Chocolate Haupia Pie »

Got a favorite classic American dessert recipe you'd like to see featured here? Email us with the subject: "American Classics."

About the author: Alexandra Penfold is mild-mannered literary agent by day, food ninja by night. Never one to skip dessert she's the Brownie half of Blondie & Brownie and a Midtown Lunch contributor.