1,415 curried recipes

Light pumpkin praline cheesecake: low-fat cottage cheese stands in for cream cheese, wheat germ replaces graham crumbs in the crust, and pumpkin pie spice carries the flavor. Topped with maple-drizzled pecans.

French chocolate cake bakes briefly at high heat to leave a molten, mousse-like center that tastes like a baked truffle. Toasted hazelnuts and semisweet chocolate carry the flavor. Twenty minutes from prep to oven door.

Sour cream pound cake bakes a tall, dense Bundt-style cake with a tangy crumb from a full cup of sour cream. Vanilla and lemon extract carry the flavor, with optional coconut for chew.

Passover dark chocolate nut cake uses no flour at all. Twelve whipped eggs carry a rich batter of melted chocolate and chopped almonds, baked in a tube pan for a deep, fudgy Seder-friendly dessert.

A moist chocolate date cake baked in an 8-inch square pan with chocolate chips in the batter and a crunchy chip-nut-sugar topping. Dates softened in boiling water keep it impossibly tender. The kind of no-fuss cake you carry straight to the picnic in the pan.

Use fresh rosemary, if possible (many supermarkets carry it). The flavor it imparts to the lamb will be far superior to that of dried. If you like, white potatoes may be substituted for the sweet potatoes, and turnips for the parsnips. You can also flavor lamb by covering it with lemon slices before roasting.

A favourite served at Din Tai Fung gets a healthy make-over. Water spinach, commonly known as kangkong, is rich in fibre, magnesium, vitamins A and C and is very low in calories. Word of caution: do not eat it raw as it may carry parasitic cysts from the waterways that are its natural habitat.