A quick and easy snack cake made with pineapple, topped with brown sugar and walnuts and finished with a simple powdered sugar glaze.

Pineapple Cake

Every once in awhile a gal just wants something a little sweet. Something that tastes good but is easy and not fussy.

This is the cake for that.

In fact, one of the names that it's picked up over time is "Preacher Cake" because it's a cake that one could potentially throw together right after church and before the preacher's home visit, although folks tend to add spices to it now.

A homemade from scratch snack cake made with peanut butter and finished with a caramel cream cheese frosting.

Homemade Peanut Butter Snack Cake with Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting

If you've been around my blog any length of time, you already know I'm far more of a savory cook than I am a baker. Primarily that's simply because I'm not a huge sweets person.

It's not that I don't enjoy sweets because I absolutely do, and those beautiful desserts that pass by us all on social media certainly get my mouth watering, but I'm more likely to crave a bag of potato chips over something sweet.

I'm just more of a salty gal!

Strawberry Angel Lush Dessert

A layered no bake dessert, made with torn angel food cake, topped with a cream cheese layer sweetened with whipped topping and condensed milk and topped with a strawberry glaze.

Strawberry Angel Lush

So, I was going to remake this Strawberry Angel Cake dessert that hadn't received much attention since I first shared it years ago. You know, get some new extended step photos, a new header, update the post, that sort of thing, but then I thought...

I know, I know... I'm always fooling around with my recipes, especially the older ones, but I guess that's the beauty about being a developer and blogger of food recipes - and one who has been doing it for so long now!

Anyway, I thought instead of revamping that recipe, I'd combine some of the elements of it with various other similar desserts I've written over the years and write a whole new recipe and you know what? The result was excellent!

A light and tender snack cake made with buttermilk and bananas.

Buttermilk Banana Snack Cake

I am not a baker. Y'all pretty much know that if you've been hanging around this blog any length of time.

I'm much more of a savory home cook and baking has just never been my thing so I don't bake much and really, you kind of have to bake regularly in order to build experience in it!

So funny though, but I broke all of the known rules of cake making with this snack cake, which is probably why I'm not much of a baker!

This vintage pie recipe originated with Pillsbury and begins with a batter and apple pie filling. Once baked, the batter surrounds the apples and forms its own crust, making for a super easy pie that is outstanding!

Easy Crazy Crust Apple Pie

Apparently Crazy Crust Apple Pie originated with the Pillsbury company, likely sometime back around the late 60s to early 70s - yes y'all. That was more than 50 years ago.

I believe that qualifies this as a vintage recipe!

Folks tend to associate "vintage" recipes to those from the 50s and earlier and forget how long ago those 60s are now. Trust me I get it. It seems like it was yesterday, but nope. It's been a pretty long time now!

A traditional noodle pudding made with wide egg noodles in a sweetened egg custard sauce with cottage cheese and sour cream and finished with a buttery, brown sugar cornflake topping.

Sweet Noodle Pudding

I just want to first start this off by saying I am not Jewish.

I don't know a thing about traditional Jewish holiday meals or traditions.

I don't know what foods are most appropriate for certain occasions or when.

When I ran across this recipe for noodle pudding in the cookbook by Julie Albert and Lisa Gnat called Bite Me, I was fully skeptical, but I decided to give it a try,

Pumpkin Crunch Dessert with Frosting

A cross between gooey butter cake, dump cake and pumpkin pie, this dessert is a fall favorite and perfect for the holidays or to carry to a church supper, family gathering or potluck.

Pumpkin Crunch Dessert

Apple and pumpkin recipes are definitely fall favorites, though I lean more toward the apple recipes than the pumpkin. Unless we're talking about pumpkin pie, of course, or... this Pumpkin Crunch!

This recipe has been a personal favorite for way too many years than I care to admit! Though you'll find variations around the internet today, and in older church and community cookbooks, this is the one that I love dating back to sometime in the 70s.

A vintage sweet treat, pumpkin pudding is a dessert that falls somewhere between a dense cake and a crustless pumpkin pie. Slice into squares and serve with a sprinkle of powdered sugar and a garnish of freshly grated nutmeg.

Old-Fashioned Baked Pumpkin Pudding

There are a few pumpkin pudding recipes out there, but for the most part, they are just that. Pudding, with pumpkin puree, very often including a box of pudding mix, and usually prepared in individual custard cups.

This, is not that.

Sweetened blackberries, layered in with crumb topping and baked.

Blackberry Crumb Cobbler

A few years back, I was feeling a little nostalgic for those days when blackberry picking was a common thing that children did, so I planted two thornless blackberry bushes I purchased from Cottage Farms on QVC.

I think I've had them for three summers and those things have been producing like crazy! If you decide to plant some here's two things I have learned.

The first year they grew like mad.

Buttery biscuits baked in apple pie filling with brown sugar, cinnamon and extra apple pie spices, finished with a powdered sugar glaze, makes for a delicious belly-warming sweet treat.

Easy Apple Pie Skillet Biscuits

I have seen a variation of these apple pie skillet biscuits across social media for so long, that you know I had to eventually try them too, right?!

Made with biscuits and pie filling, they are a sweet treat that's easy to throw together on those cold nights when you want a little something for that sweet tooth.

Stewed Blackberries and Dumplings

Fresh blackberries, sweetened and stewed and topped with sweet steamed dumplings. Serve over vanilla ice cream.

Blackberries and Dumplings

Couple years ago, I bought two thornless blackberry plants from Cottage Farms on QVC. Being inexperienced with the plant, the first year, I wasn't sure what was going on with them. They grew like mad, but that's it. Lots of thick vines. Lots of green leaves. But, no blossoms. No berries, and, in fact, after a couple of freezes that winter, I resigned myself that they didn't make it.

Thank goodness I didn't cut them down because lo and behold come spring the next year, I saw new growth sprouting along all of the old canes and before I knew it, blossoms everywhere, followed by the most beautiful, huge, gorgeous and tasty blackberries.

A simple, light dessert, with layers of homemade egg custard, macerated strawberries and a little bit of warmed strawberry jam.

Strawberries and Custard

I have sure been enjoying fresh strawberries here lately and at any given time there are usually two pounds in the fridge. Right now I'm seeing Louisiana berries the most in the markets, and they sure are delicious.

Honestly, I don't often do much with strawberries in the way of a recipe. While I enjoy them occasionally in a frozen or layered dessert, a cobbler, pie or cake, or even simply macerated and spooned over a shortcake or a slice of pound cake, I mostly just eat them in their natural state. Add a little homemade egg custard though, and how can you go wrong with that?

A near lost south Louisiana classic, calas are a flour and yeast fritter, made with cooked rice and flavored with sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg.

Creole Calas (Rice Fritters)

I've certainly mentioned this before, but we eat a lot of rice here in the Deep South, and there's almost always some leftover. We have lots of ways to use that leftover rice (just click that link to see a few) including sweet things, like rice pudding and these sweet rice fritters, called calas.

A near lost classic, Calas hold a past in the city of New Orleans, though their origins date back more likely to Africa. In the French Quarter, Cala ladies would wrap fresh, piping hot Calas in towels and carry them in a covered bowl on top of their heads, hurrying to the streets to sell them, shouting "Calas, belles calas, tout chauds!"

Photo Credit: Times Picayune

Tender, homemade coconut cake made easy in a sheet cake, finished with a 7-minute, divinity icing, shredded coconut and here, with a sugared cranberry and mint leaf garnish. 

Homemade Coconut Sheet Cake with Divinity Icing

I love a coconut layer cake during the holidays. It's a beautiful presentation on a holiday dessert table, covered in a perfect divinity icing and dusted all over with fluffy, white coconut. I just looks like heaven on a cake stand!

Unfortunately, while I think I'm a fairly decent cook overall, I am definitely not a baker, and though I can pull off a pretty good pan of brownies, cookies even, or a snack cake, well... layer cakes aren't my forte.

The best of summer berries in a comforting cobbler. Serve warm with a scoop of vanilla ice cream for the perfect summer indulgence.

Summer Berry Cobbler

I guess cobblers are about as popular in the summer as anytime for us southerners. We just turn on the oven and crank down the air conditioning here in the humid deep south. I guess we contend with high summer electric bills like folks up north do with heating bills in the winter.

Could you imagine only ever having a winter cobbler made with canned peaches? Not that there's anything wrong with that - I love those too - but I sure love a cobbler made from fresh fruit when those fresh summer peaches arrive, as much as I do a cobbler made with the luscious fresh berries of summer we all love too.

 

Most often simply called a trifle today, punch bowls cakes were once all the rage in the South. Made here with layers of angel food cake, a creamy filling, strawberries and whipped cream, it is a delicious well-received and beautiful presentation for any gathering.

Punch Bowl Strawberry Lush Angel Cake

Punch bowls have a long history in the South and this dessert is a perfect one to ring in spring. Back in the day before hiring a caterer was the norm, families provided all of the food and labor for big parties and family events, and every family had a treasured punch bowl, almost always one that had been passed down a few times.

 

  Cherry Berries in a Cloud, a vintage dessert that begins with a baked meringue shell, is topped with a cream cheese, whipped cream and marshmallow layer and finished with a cherry and strawberry pie filling.

Cherry Berries in a Cloud

I had all but forgotten about this vintage dessert until my daughter-in-law's grandmother Mimi showed up with a pan of it at one of our holiday gatherings. Not only is it delicious as it always was, but it's a perfect dessert for Valentine's Day too!

 

  From my 70s Betty Crocker cookbook, one of my first cookbooks as a new bride!

A cookie bar made with cherry pie filling and blueberries and drizzled with a powdered sugar glaze.

Cherry Pie Bars

This is another one of those recipes that kept passing by on my personal Facebook timeline so much that I decided to make it for our Memorial Day celebration with my son and daughter-in-law.

Since that holiday is the unofficial beginning of summer and falls right in the midst of crawfish season, they host a crawfish boil every year, along with the usual hot dogs and burgers.

One of my son's closest friends, Brad, is the master crawfish cook, so he always handles the cooking of the crawfish and does an excellent job of it. They sure were good this year! The boil has become a bit of an annual tradition for them and we look forward to it every year, though it was so hot that day, that The Cajun and I didn't stick around too long.

 

Peach Cobbler, made with canned peaches and a sugar and flour crumble topping.

Canned Peach Cobbler

When I went to make some spiced peach halves recently, I accidentally opened a large can of sliced peaches, so I thought it would be a great time to put up this version of peach cobbler. As if any Southerner would need an excuse for a comforting pan of warm peach cobbler, even if slap in the middle of winter, right?

I usually refer to this as a winter cobbler because it's intended to be made when peaches are out of season, though I see no problem with using canned peaches or frozen peaches any time of the year frankly. It is especially excellent when made with peaches you've home canned yourself, though store bought canned peaches are delicious too.

A wonderful heirloom recipe dating back 100 years, this simple pecan cookie bar is topped with a brown sugar meringue layer, giving them a slightly crisp, cracked topping.

Original Old Fashioned Mud Hen Bars

You may never have heard of Mud Hen Bars before, or you may have seen them for first time in the last couple of years across the explosion of food blogs, but it's actually one of those recipes that's been around even longer than I have.