24 Fun Things to Bake When You're Feeling Bored (and Hungry)
When sweet—or savory—cravings strike, reach for one of these recipes and make a deliciously fun treat.
The Ingalls
If you ask us, baking is fun from start to finish—all the way from selecting the recipe to devouring the final product. It's an enjoyable hobby, whether you learned the ins and outs of pastry as a kid with your grandmother or first made banana bread as an adult. There are so many recipes to choose from. Most are delicious, but some are more fun than others. One great example: cupcakes are automatically more fun to eat than a slice of cake. We won't be hearing arguments about this one.
So whether you're bored and need a baking project to occupy your time or you wake up with a specific craving, we have you covered. Kids can get in on the fun, too. It doesn’t matter if you’re a seasoned pro with a healthy sourdough starter or a beginner who tends to store their baking pans out of reach—you'll find a fun recipe here to suit your needs.
Related: 23 Types of Cookies You Should Know How to Make
Black and White Cookies
Yossy Arefi
We don't know what's more fun about these cookies—eating them or creating the iconic black and white icing half-moons. The cookies themselves have a cakey texture and are delicately flavored with vanilla and lemon extracts. You can certainly eat one side at a time, but we tend to be equal-opportunity snackers.
Soft Pretzels
Pretzel dough is very forgiving and only needs to rest for about 30 minutes before it's ready to roll. Shaping the logs of dough into those unique twists is fun to do. This first one might not turn out perfect (much like the proverbial first pancake) but you'll get the hang of it in no time.
One-Bowl Chocolate Cupcakes
Chocolate lovers will go crazy for these decadent cupcakes. The real fun lies in the decoration. These cupcakes are inspired by the chocolate Hostess cakes with the infamous buttercream squiggle on top. Fill a piping bag with the buttercream frosting and pipe swirls or cute notes for loved ones.
Baked Cake Donuts
If you’re craving donuts, you don’t have to break out the deep-fryer to get your sweet fix. This simple batter is piped into donut pans and baked (you can use muffin tins in a pinch). They turn out light, fluffy, and perfectly sweet. Roll them in cinnamon sugar and dip them into a smooth glaze, and add fun toppings like sprinkles and toasted coconut.
Breakfast-Sausage-and-Gruyère Drop Biscuits
A fun baking project isn't necessarily sweet. These savory drop scones come together in under an hour. They’re filled with bite-sized pieces of breakfast sausage, fresh thyme, and melted Gruyere cheese. Play around with other fillings like ham and cheddar or feta and dill.
Sweetheart Thumbprint Cookies
Soft and buttery cookie dough is baked with a thumbprint heart in the center, which is filled with sticky fruit jam. Use a variety of jam flavors, such as strawberry, peach, and pineapple for these hard-to-resist treats.
Chocolate-Caramel Swiss Roll
We love a rolled cake. Sure, this showstopping dessert takes a bit of time and patience, but it’s quite simple all things considered. Silky whipped cream is folded into a sticky caramel sauce before being rolled up in a layer of delicate bourbon-basted chocolate genoise cake. The trick to a genoise cake that won’t crack is to roll the cake into a log around a clean kitchen towel while it's still warm—that way it will naturally keep its shape when it’s rolled with the filling.
No-Knead Tomato Focaccia
If making bread seems a bit daunting, try this no-knead focaccia. Once the dough is mixed, all it needs to do is rise, then you can top it with garlicky cherry tomatoes or keep it simple with some fresh rosemary and thyme or a simple sprinkle of sesame seeds. If you don't eat it all immediately, enjoy it for sandwiches the next day.
Chocolate Chip Oat Skillet Cookie
A skillet cookie is so much fun. The batter is similar to an ordinary chocolate chip cookie but with rolled oats and coconut oil. And this giant cookie is much easier to make—it bakes in one layer in the oven, so it's quicker to form. Place the skillet in the center of the table and let everyone dig in—the edges are crisp, and the center is warm and gooey. A scoop or two of vanilla ice cream takes it over the top.
Mix-and-Match French Macarons
Make one batch of light and airy French macarons, and you'll have all the time in the world to play around with the fillings. No matter how you’re feeling, there's a flavor for you. Keep it classic with vanilla bean buttercream and chocolate ganache, or incorporate fun flavors like peanut butter and lemon curd.
Cinnamon-Sugar Ragamuffins
When regular biscuits just won’t do, bring out the ragamuffins! Flaky biscuit dough is layered with cinnamon sugar, rolled up into a log, and cut into swirled biscuits. It’s just like making cinnamon rolls, except we use biscuit dough instead. The result is a sweet, flaky biscuit with pleasantly raggedy edges.
Homemade Bagels
Whether you’re a die-hard New York bagel fan or you prefer Montreal-style, we know you’ll be pleased with this homemade recipe. The key to a chewy interior and crisp exterior is boiling before you bake. You can even make your own everything bagel seasoning, too.
Iced Oatmeal-Applesauce Cookies
If you grew up eating those crisp iced oatmeal discs, you might feel a pang of nostalgia when you bite into one of these cookies. The simple cookies are sweetened with brown sugar and applesauce and require nothing more than a quick drizzle of maple icing.
Meringue Swirls
Here's a fun baking project: making striped meringues. Paint vertical stripes of vibrant food coloring into piping bags, fill them with the meringue, and pipe picture-perfect swirls. You can even flavor the meringue to match the color pattern—add orange zest for orange food coloring; lemon zest for yellow; or peppermint extract for pink.
Homemade Dog Biscuits
Don’t forget the four-legged family members! Your pets will definitely appreciate some homemade biscuits to snack on. These irresistible yet healthy treats are rolled out and shaped just like cut-out cookies. Use fun cookie-cutter shapes like bones and fire hydrants.
Giant Cheese Popovers
Nothing says fun with baking more than large-format versions of your favorite treats. Popovers are always delicious, but they’re even better when baked in jumbo tins with lots of sharp, nutty Gruyère cheese.
Bacon, Egg, and Toast Cups
Who says you can't have fun at breakfast? Start your day with this cute take on the hearty breakfast of bacon, eggs, and toast. Press slices of sandwich bread into muffin cups, then layer in crispy slices of bacon and whole eggs. As they bake, the toast gets crunchy around the edges, and the egg whites set around still-runny yolks.
Cinnamon Rolls
This recipe is more of a weekend project than our others, but so worth it. The soft, enriched dough is rolled around a swirl of buttery cinnamon brown sugar and served with a generous swoop of cream cheese glaze. If you’d rather, give their cousin the sticky bun a try.
Pull-Apart Garlic Bread
We highly recommend making this buttery garlic bread—and eating it warm from the oven. The soft, pillowy, yeasted dough is folded and layered into a loaf pan with herby garlic butter for plenty of pull-apart fun.
Angel Food Cake
You'll never taste anything as light and fluffy as angel food cake—it's like biting into a cloud. Pair this lofty cake with berries and cream, lemon curd, or a scoop of your favorite flavor of ice cream. There's a gluten-free version, too.
Cookie Press Cookies
You probably only break out the spritz cookie press at the holidays, but really, you should use it more. If you have little helpers, kids will love using the cookie press to create intricate designs, and everyone will love enjoying the fruits of their labor.
Classic Dutch Baby
There are few things more impressive and delicious than the lofty heights reached by a Dutch baby. Much like a soufflé, the pancake gets its lift from beaten eggs. They can be sweet or lean savory with toppings like ham and cheese or smoked salmon and capers.
Walnut-and-Honey Baklava
Mike Krautter
This popular Greek pastry is made by layering generously buttered layers of paper-thin phyllo dough with a lightly spiced nut mixture. The layering process takes some time, but it’s well worth the effort. Once baked, drizzle a thick honey syrup on top and watch it absorb into each layer.
Chocolate-Chip Streusel Brownies
Also known as "brookies," this dessert mashup gives you the best of both worlds. Buttery chocolate chip cookie dough is simultaneously baked over a layer of fudgy chocolate brownies. You won't have to choose between brownies and cookies ever again!
Read the original article on Martha Stewart.
