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Panzanella is an Italian bread and tomato salad served in the summer and made with leftover crusty country loaves. In this winter version, tomatoes are replaced by brussels sprouts and apples, and the fruit-filled bread known as panettone stands in for the country loaves.

These fried cheese crisps are fun to make, so enlist a few guests to help if you decide to make them at the last minute.

Rillettes—a spread made from meat or fish that's traditionally cooked in fat—is a fitting way to kick off Christmas dinner. This lighter take still feels indulgent but comes together quickly.

This hearty fish soup get tons of flavor from smoky bacon and fragrant saffron.

Golden beets have orangey skin and a more delicate sweetness than red beets.

The marmalade can also be served with a cheese plate or simply spread on toast.

The gutsy contrast of assertive greens with juicy pears, slivers of Manchego, and toasted pumpkin seeds lets guests know right from the beginning that this meal will be full of personality.

Sautéing the squid in the bacon fat adds tons of flavor to the seafood itself. Fried calamari with marinara sauce will be but a distant memory once you try this.

A thin layer of plum jam beneath the custard is visually gorgeous—it's a magenta pinstripe just under the pumpkin orange—and provides a surprisingly delicious twist, since the tart plums bring out the best in all the other traditional flavors of pumpkin pie.

Floating on the surface of this pale, silky soup, which tastes of the essence of parsley, is a trompe l'oeil surprise: What looks like shaved truffles is actually thinly sliced chestnuts, adding a nutty sweetness.

These have the lively crisp exterior and cloudlike interior you expect from a gougère, but with an incredibly intense combination of smoky bacon, roasted corn, and extra-sharp Cheddar.

Use any seasonal squash you like in this comforting and creamy soup.

A bit of soppressata and cheese stuffed ingeniously between each leaf gives these artichokes a heartiness worthy of a special course. (Eat them as you normally would, scraping the leaf with your teeth—but in this case you'll get a mouthful of flavor-packed filling, too.) Using a pressure cooker speeds up cooking time and also results in incredibly tender artichokes.

This recipe was created by chef Traci Des Jardins of San Francisco's Jardinière. It's part of a special menu she created for Epicurious's Wine.Dine.Donate program.

This particularly enticing version of the holiday favorite includes fresh rosemary and thyme along with the spices. The nuts can be made several days in advance and stored in resealable plastic bags in a cool, dry place.

These irresistible nibbles are at their best served within minutes of deep-frying. If that seems like a little much for Thanksgiving dinner, you can fry them up to 4 hours ahead and warm them up in the broiler or microwave as your guests arrive. You could also serve them at room temperature, though they won't be quite as crispy on the outside and creamy in the center.