Cinnamon

Fruit with a spiced wine syrup is a typical — and refreshing — ending to a hearty Spanish dinner. Serve with slices of lemon sponge cake if desired.

Nan Buchanan, Kemah, Tex.
"This cookie is versatile, so I adapt the shapes and decorations to the season — jack-o'-lanterns at Halloween and eggs at Easter."

Cherry-pitters can be purchased in kitchen-supply and housewares shops. Wear an apron when pitting, but still watch out for the juice.

Working on this book has taken us new places, and also back to explore taste memories from the past and from travel. Sometimes we've stumbled on childhood tastes, and sometimes we've gone looking for them. This dark gingerbread is from scribbled notes I found in an old cookbook of my mother's. I don't know where she got the recipe, but I do know that she made it regularly, especially in winter, when its rich, warm scent would draw us into the kitchen at dinnertime. Serve it as a snack or for dessert.

This bread is a delicious holiday treat.

(Mele Cotogne in Giulebbe) Poached quinces in a clove-and-cinnamon-scented syrup are served at Rosh Hashanah and to break the fast at Yom Kippur. In this version, the quinces are left unpeeled for the preliminary cooking in water, and then peeled and cooked in syrup. In La cucina livornese, Pia Bedarida recommends peeling the quinces, letting them rest to take on a reddish brown color as they oxidize, and then cooking them in syrup. Other cooks peel the quinces and cook them immediately, but suggest saving the peels and seeds and cooking them along with the sliced quinces. Still another recipe uses wine instead of water.

A crunchy topping is the twist to this quintessential Thanksgiving pie.

Any combination of nuts will work nicely in this winter tart.