Coffee

These ultra-rich and sophisticated chocolate tartlets are served at Bittersweet Pastry Shop.

No cooking required for this dessert that needs to be assembled at least 24 hours—and up to three days—in advance.

This recipe is an accompaniment for Flourless Chocolate-Orange Almond Cake .

An unexpected combination of ingredients updates the classic Italian dessert. It is presented in individual servings here, but the ladyfingers, espresso and filling can be layered in a large dish and offered with the sauce on the side if you prefer.

"By adding a little espresso powder to a recipe for caramel sauce, I created an ice cream topping that has made this sundae the signature dessert in my house I had always refused to share the recipe with friends who requested it, but I finally decided that it's too good to keep secret," says Gordon Finley of Durham, North Carolina. These are terrific made with coffee or vanilla ice cream — or both.

For best results when making this dessert, first mix one can of cream of coconut in a blender until smooth, then measure as called for here.

A big, beautiful dessert that layers chocolate and coffee ice creams with mocha sauce in a macaroon cookie crust.

Don't worry if you can't wait for this yummy cake to cool - it's also delicious warm.

Layers of toffee-studded, coffee-flavored mousse and chocolate ganache fill an almond and sugar-cookie crust.

This is a fabulous pudding-like dessert that's very easy to make.

Cream cheese enhances the texture of the custard in this tart. To create the pretty wave pattern, use an icing comb, available in cookware stores. Begin making the dessert a day ahead.

Today, Mexico's best coffee is ripened and dried along the roadways in the cloud-blanketed highlands of Chiapas and over through Veracruz and Oaxaca. The prime beans are usually roasted a little darker than ours — almost a Viennese roast — and they brew a nice, medium-bodied liquid with some spunk. They tell me it's the second-class beans that get roasted darker, to a mahogany black with a shining sugar coat. The steam-powered espresso machines in the city cafeterías extract a trio of ethnic brews: espresso, straight, foamy and Italian; café con leche, mixed with hot milk, French-style (but so common one would mistake it for purely Mexican); or americano, simply diluted with water. The more rural brew leans toward the Spanish, the history books say, but it seems like a Mexican-flavored campfire version to me. Café de olla at its best is pot-boiled in earthenware with molassesy piloncillo sugar and spices like cinnamon, anise or cloves. These days, many traditional city restaurants offer the dark, delicious drink more regularly, served in old-fashioned earthenware mugs at the end of the meal.