Winter is baking time, and there’s nothing more comforting than the smell of freshly baked loaves of bread filling the house when it’s cold and blustery outside. And we’re not the only ones who think so. Many of our favorite celebrity chefs have waxed poetic about the art of baking bread, and some, like Ina Garten, have recipes we’ve made over and over again. Garten’s honey white bread loaf, from her cookbook Barefoot Contessa at Home, has long been one of our favorite things to bake, whether we’re craving sandwich bread, toast, or something to accompany a big pot of soup. It turns out that we’re not alone. Ina Garten fan Jennifer Garner recently posted on her Instagram story that she’d just baked up two of these soft, tender loaves of white bread, but it’s the cinnamon twist she put on the recipe that has us drooling.

Garner has professed her love for cinnamon bread before. She even shared her recipe for making “perfect” cinnamon toast on her “Pretend Cooking Show” video series, which she said “makes for an indulgent Sunday morning or after-school snack.” So filling Ina Garten’s honey white bread dough with a cinnamon swirl seems like the only logical next step for Garner.

If it sounds as delicious to you as it does to us, we recommend preparing a batch of Ina Garten’s honey white bread dough, then pairing it with the cinnamon swirl technique used in The Pioneer Woman’s recipe for Homemade Cinnamon Bread. After the dough undergoes its first rise, halve it and roll each half into a rectangle. Then, brush the dough with melted butter, cinnamon, and sugar. We also like to add a dash of cardamom here, but it’s totally up to you. The dough gets rolled up, the seam pressed together, and then it’s added to the loaf pan for another rise before baking.

The end result will be a soft, tender loaf of gently sweet honey white bread, with a buttery cinnamon sugar swirl inside. Use it to make a double cinnamon version of Garner’s favorite cinnamon toast, or spread with butter and eat alongside a cup of hot tea, cocoa, or coffee to keep you warm while the winter wind howls outside.

Before you go, check out Garten’s best dinner recipes below:

Watch: Peppermint Bark Is the Perfect Holiday Gift That You Can Make Right at Home

There’s a lot going on this time of year. For one thing, winter is officially here, which means our nighttime cooking has moved firmly into hearty comfort food territory. For another, many of us have guests and family in town to celebrate the holidays, so if you’re used to cooking for just two, three, or even four people, it might be hard to figure out how you’re going to keep everyone well-fed. That’s where The Pioneer Woman, also known as Ree Drummond, comes in. The author of The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Dinnertime knows a thing or two about feeding a large family, and a hungry one, at that — after all, her husband works on a cattle ranch, which definitely works up an appetite. If you’re looking for a meal that you can whip up easily for a big group, but that’s a little more comfy-cozy than just ordering a few pizzas, Drummond’s Tex-Mex Meatball Soup is the recipe for you.

Drummond’s meatball soup recipe is loaded with Tex-Mex flavors, but sopa de albóndigas, sometimes also called caldo de albóndigas, is a popular Mexican meatball soup that features many of the same flavors. While the Mexican version of this soup features a light, gently seasoned broth and veggies like potatoes, carrots, and celery, Drummond’s Tex-Mex version stars ingredients like ancho chile powder, poblano peppers, green chiles, and the smoky, spicy adobo sauce from a can of chipotle peppers.

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Another big difference is that while many home cooks make their meatballs from scratch, using beef, pork, or a mixture of both, Drummond keeps things easy by calling for a bag of frozen meatballs instead. This definitely helps save time if you’re cooking for a big crowd, and since this soup serves eight, you’d have to roll a lot of meatballs by hand if you want enough for everyone.

Drummond’s soup also includes pasta. She calls for ditalini, but any small pasta will do. Perhaps our favorite trick of the recipe is that Drummond cooks the pasta separately from the soup, then adds it to individual bowls before ladling in the soup. This ensures that the pasta doesn’t become a mushy mess, especially if there is leftover soup you want to serve the next day.

The veggies and seasonings are sautéed, then the tomatoes and canned chiles are added. Finally, Drummond pours in the meatballs and some store-bought stock, simmering everything together until the meatballs are warmed through and the veggies are tender.

You can garnish the bowls of soup with sour cream, lime wedges, cotija cheese, and fresh herbs, and we think it would taste great with a side of Giada De Laurentiis’ buttermilk cornbread. Thanks to Ree Drummond, this Pioneer Woman soup is just the thing to feed your big family this winter.

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Watch: We Tried Ina Garten’s Overnight Mac & Cheese & We Totally Get Why It Broke the Internet

De Laurentiis shared a snapshot of her mouth-watering cookie recipe for the holiday season with the caption to her Instagram on Dec 17. She shared it with the caption reading, “Get into the holiday spirit with these festive Italian biscotti! Dried cherries, crunchy almonds, and a dip in heavenly white chocolate topped with red and green sprinkles make the perfect treat to sweeten up your holiday season! Tap the link in our bio for the #recipe!”

The chef shared the recipe on her Giadzy website, writing, “I’m always improving on my old recipes, and I made this one a bit crunchier and crisper — and a bit easier to make, too!”

De Laurentiis doesn’t go into details about how this new and improved holiday biscotti recipe is easier to make, but if she says so, we believe her! And some quick sleuthing on the site gives a clue: while the total time to make this recipe is close to 3 hours, the actual prep time is only 15 minutes — down from the original version‘s 25 minutes.

Another great thing about the chef’s Italian pastry? De Laurentiis’ biscotti can be made ahead of time and are freezer-friendly. She notes that these can be stored in “an airtight container up to 4 days” or you can “wrap them in foil and freeze in resealable plastic bags up to 3 weeks.”

Sounds like a plan to us!

Get Giada De Laurentiis’ New and Improved Holiday Biscotti recipe.

Before you go, check out our slideshow below:

Now that the rush of holiday cooking is over, we’re beyond ready to transition into easier and quick meals to prep. The less time we spend in the kitchen, the better, in our eyes — at least for now. (Hey, we need a break!) If you’re hoping to enjoy some lazier mornings over the next few days, brunch will be your new best friend. And if you’re looking for a new easy brunch recipe, consider Martha Stewart’s two-step Spinach and Cheddar Slab Quiche. Make it the day of or the day before, either way, Stewart promises a delicious mouthful every time, and we believe her.

Stewart shared the dish on Instagram on Dec 17 and wrote, “Feed a crowd during the holidays with this big-batch make-ahead quiche. It teams a rich sesame seed-studded crust with a cheesy spinach filling. Get the full recipe for this festive pastry at the link in our bio. 📷: @sassykitchen.” This quiche is meant for a crowd — or plenty of leftovers, which is never a bad thing.

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And about that crust: The called-for sheet of store-bought, frozen all-butter puff pastry means this quiche is truly simple to put together. Stewart noted that along with snagging ingredients like frozen chopped spinach, sesame seeds, unbleached all-purpose flour, and eggs, you need the Dufour Pastry Kitchen, All Butter Puff Pastry (which is only $9 on Amazon!)

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In the end, this meal will take you 20 minutes to prep in its entirety. As mentioned before, this is a make-ahead-friendly recipe, and you can make the pastry shell up to a day in advance. After baking, you’ll want to let it cool, wrap it in parchment-lined foil, and store at room temperature. Hello, easy Sunday brunch, quick weeknight dinner, and even a crowd-pleasing dish for that holiday party!

Stewart noted on her website that if you’re looking for another tasty variation of her recipe, you can use gruyere or fontina instead of cheddar.

Get Martha Stewart’s Spinach-and-Cheddar Slab Quiche recipe.

And if you’re craving more of Stewart’s mouth-watering recipes, check out her bestselling cookbook called Martha Stewart’s Cooking School Cookbook (which is currently on sale on Amazon!)

Before you go, check out our gallery on Martha Stewart’s Best Dinner Recipes below:

Getting presents on Christmas morning is exciting, because you never know what you’re going to get. If only the same thing could be said about Christmas dinner (or Thanksgiving, for that matter). So often we get stuck in a boring holiday cooking routine, churning out the same dependable dishes year after year. But maybe it’s time to add something new to your celebration table. And while pans of warm rolls and carving boards stacked with juicy roasted meats are always a welcome sight, adding some vegetables to your holiday meal is always a good idea. Hey, we all need some help digesting that rich and hearty food, and some fiber-rich vegetables can help do the trick.

But you don’t have to opt for something boring — the vegetables on your table should be just as delicious as the rest of the food. That’s why these whole roasted parsnips from Jamie Oliver, author of One: Simple One-Pan Wonders, caught our eye. Just as show-stopping as a whole-roasted turkey or branzino, these parsnips are deserving of a place on your menu this year, and even better? They’re made with just five ingredients.

If you’ve never had parsnips before, you might just think of them as those weird white carrots you see in the produce aisle at the grocery store. But while they look like carrots, their flavor is much more complex. Parsnips have a sweet, nutty, earthy flavor, and though they can be a tad bitter when eaten raw, they get sweet and tender after a long roast in the oven. Their naturally earthy flavor pairs well with sweet and tangy ingredients, and that’s just what Oliver opts for in his roasted parsnips recipe.

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To ensure that the parsnips cook up tenderly without drying out in the oven, Oliver first blanches the parsnips. Then, he roasts them with butter, salt and pepper, letting them bake for an hour. Finally, to add that sweet-tart flavor and to give the parsnips a roasted, golden-brown sheen, Oliver drizzles the roasted root veggies with honey, wine vinegar, and bay leaves, popping the pan back into the oven for another 10 minutes until the parsnips are caramelized to perfection.

If you’re looking for something new to add to your holiday meal but don’t have tons of time to master a new recipe, then Oliver’s 5-ingredient whole roasted parsnips could be the dish you have been looking for. And with 9.2 grams of fiber per serving, the recipe will add some valuable nutrition to your celebratory feast.

Need more holiday side dish ideas? Then check out our gallery of Jamie Oliver’s best potato recipes:

Watch: Peppermint Bark Is the Perfect Holiday Gift That You Can Make Right at Home

“There’s so many different things we can do with biscuit dough,” Hall says in the below clip posted to Food Network’s website. “You can have just sweet biscuits, you can have savory biscuits, [or] dumplings.”

First, you mix your dry ingredients — flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar, and salt — together in a large bowl. In a smaller bowl, mix your whole-fat buttermilk and a bit of shortening with an immersion blender.

“The secret to making really great biscuits is to grate this [frozen] butter into the flour,” Hall said. This gives you shards of butter that can be easily distributed throughout the dry ingredients without you having to overwork the dough.

After adding your buttermilk and shortening mixture to the dry ingredients, plop your dough onto a floured surface and press it down until it’s about a half-inch thick. Then fold it into thirds twice to create those flaky layers.

Finally, cut your biscuits out using a biscuit cutter or a drinking glass and then place them on a baking tray. Bake them for about 15 minutes and then you’re ready to eat.

Hall kept her biscuit toppings simple with just a bit of butter and some honey, but you can basically eat your biscuits with anything from jam to gravy. “What’s better than a fresh biscuit?” Hall asks. Well, really nothing!

“Best biscuit recipe ever!! The only recipe I’ll ever use for biscuits,” one commenter wrote on the Food Network post. Another person added, “Your biscuits are amazing! No other biscuit recipe will do!”

Grab Hall’s recipe here and start making biscuits to go with every meal.

Before you go, check out Ina Garten’s easy weeknight dinner recipes below:

“The boys have eaten my broccoli cheese soup since they were babies,” Drummond says in a clip on Food Network’s Instagram account. “And so putting a broccoli cheese spin on pizza is a really good idea.”

She starts by softening broccoli florets in a skillet with diced onion and garlic. Most of the cooking will take place in the oven, but those bits of broccoli need a head start.

While the broccoli mixture cools, Drummond prepares the dough. Although you can use homemade or store-bought pizza dough to assemble your stromboli, she uses frozen bread dough that can be found in the freezer section of your local grocery store.

“Frozen bread dough is such a revelation,” Drummond says. “They’re frozen before they rise, so you just have to let them thaw out and then give them a chance to rise a little bit. And I’m telling you what, I use this stuff for so many things as a shortcut.”

She rolls and forms the dough into a rectangular shape and then adds a layer of sundried tomato pesto from a jar. “You can do regular marinara sauce or pizza sauce, of course,” she notes. “This is another shortcut ingredient…If you had to stop and make the pesto, it would take way, way too long.”

Then Drummond adds her broccoli mix onto the dough, as well as a healthy layer of shredded cheddar cheese and a few slices of mozzarella. Before rolling the dough into a log, she adds a few basil leaves to add a fresh accent to the filling.

The stromboli then goes into the oven to bake up and get all melty. After cooling for a few minutes, Drummond then slices the stromboli into thin sections for serving.

There are so many variations you can do when it comes to this recipe. Drummond says you can make stromboli with your leftovers or switch up the types of cheese you use depending on what other ingredients are inside. And someone in the comments said that they’d add chicken to their filling.

Grab the full recipe here and add Broccoli Cheese Stromboli to your recipe repertoire.

Before you go, check out Ina Garten’s easy weeknight dinner recipes below:

“When you’re going to holiday parties, Salted Caramel Nuts are a great hostess gift,” Garten wrote on Instagram. “You can make a big batch, allow them to cool completely, and pack them in striped bags!”

In an accompanying video, Garten uses two large spoons to mix the nuts on the stovetop. Once they are spread out on a baking sheet, she sprinkles salt all over them. Then, she pours the nuts into little red-striped bags and gold-striped bags, which she secures with Barefoot Contessa ribbons. It looks so festive and yummy.

The recipe, which was originally published in her 2014 cookbook, Make It Ahead, requires whole roasted salted cashews, large pecan halves, unsalted almonds, and walnut halves, as well as other ingredients. This advanced-level recipe makes 8 cups, so be sure to double it if you want enough for teacher gifts and hostess presents. If you love sweet-and-salty snacks, this is beyond good.

“Omg sooooo delicious 😋 yummy and yummy ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️,” one person commented on the recipe.

Someone else said, “These would never make it as a hostess gift because I would eat them all as soon as I made them!🙌” That is such a mood — and we can totally relate.

“I have made these and they are sooo good! I add them to a strawberry, arugula and goat cheese salad that I make. Perfection!” another person wrote. This sounds super good too!

Get Garten’s full Salted Caramel Nuts recipe online HERE.

Before you go, check out these Ina Garten-Approved holiday gift ideas:

The Giadzy chef shared an appetizer recipe on Instagram, including Caramelized Onion & Prosciutto Pizzettes, made with pizza dough cut into circles, caramelized onions, and more, baked and served in bite-sized deliciousness.

“The combination of sweet caramelized onions, tangy goat cheese and salty prosciutto is just perfectly balanced and delicious,” De Laurentiis captioned a video of her recipe, posted on the Giadzy. “And that combo on these little pizzettes make the perfect appetizer for your next party!”

De Laurentiis shared the full recipe on her website, where she explained that pizzettes are “little pizzas.” “We made a lot of pizza growing up, especially with my Nonno, and when we were little I always liked making these little pizzette as opposed to big pizzas,” she wrote. “Now, I love them as a party snack. Who doesn’t want a bite of pizza at a party, after all?” We definitely do!

“This is giving me life😍😍,” one person commented on the recipe. Other people offered suggestions for customizing this recipe.

“Drizzle a little hot honey 🍯,” one person recommended. Another suggested, “I would add a little fig preserves to the top of that.”

Either way would be amazing!

Get De Laurentiis’ full Caramelized Onion and Prosciutto Pizzettes recipe HERE and serve with wine or festive eggnog.  

Before you go, check out our top foolproof holiday gifts for absolutely everyone on your list:

On Dec 14, Stewart shared a photo with the caption reading, “An old-fashioned layer cake conjures a winter wonderland when topped with white-chocolate buttercream as pale and thick as a fresh snowbank. Despite its black-tie formal appearance, this is a very pragmatic dessert because it’s even better when you make it in advance: The milk-chocolate pudding in the middle and the icing have plenty of time to set, so the flavors intensify. Get the recipe at the link in our bio. 📷: @lennartweibull.”

To make Stewart’s Chocolate-and-Vanilla Pudding Cake, you’ll make all three parts of the cake from scratch: the cake, the filling, and the frosting. In addition to the ingredients, you’ll also need to gather a few essential cookware and baking tools, including a 9-by-3-inch round springform pan (to bake the cake), a saucepan (to make the filling), a serrated knife (to trim the top of the cake), a heatproof mixer bowl (to make your frosting), and an offset spatula (to smooth the frosting over the chilled cake).

Now, before you get baking, make sure you’ve given yourself more than enough time to make this moist-meets-silky cake. There’s a reason Stewart stresses making it in advance: Not only will you need to allow plenty of time to let the cake cool completely after baking in the oven for 40 to 45 minutes, but you’ll also need to allow the pudding filling to fully cool before layering it into the cake. You may also need to allow time for the frosting to chill, if it turns out too thin.

But when all is said and done and you’ve layered and frosted the cake to perfection, you’ll be left with a gorgeous black-and-white dessert that’s certain to turn heads — and drop jaws — this holiday season.

Get the full recipe for the Chocolate-and-Vanilla Pudding Cake at Stewart’s website.

Instead of another cookbook, snag one of her manuals like The Martha Manual: How to Do (Almost) Everything that’s available on Amazon Kindle.

Before you go, check out our slideshow below: