The first time I stepped into San Francisco's iconic bakery Tartine, I marveled at the size of the colossal croissants and gigantic gougeres. These are pastries on steroids, and from a business standpoint they make senseāyou can charge more for a large pastry, while the employee making it doesn't do any more work. They also make sense for big groups of people, who can share a few huge pastries between them.
Of course, you have to be into the idea of sharing to do that, and my big appetite usually demands that you kindly get a croissant of your own. But Thanksgiving is an exception. This, after all, is a holiday that's built around the idea of sharing. So no matter how many people cram around my table, my turkeys and sides grow in size to accommodate the whole crowd.
But Thanksgiving desserts? Those tend to be surprisingly small. Most recipes for pumpkin and pecan pie serve only eight people. If you want to feed 16 or 24 people, you have to make two more pies, and, well, what average cook has three pie tins lying around?
The solution is to think like Tartine and make your Thanksgiving desserts larger. They take the exact same amount of time to make as regular, 8-serving dessert, but the payoff is a dessert that serves doubleāsometimes triple!āthe people.
Large-format desserts require different equipment, but donāt worryāyou probably already have the pans you need tucked in the back of your cupboard. A 9-by-13-inch baking pan, that workhorse of the casserole- and brownie-making set, is all thatās required to bake up this moist pumpkin cake, flavored with speculoos cookie butter spread and a cocktail of spices.
And a rimmed baking sheet, the thing you normally roast vegetables on, is just the right size (13-by-18-inches, for you detail-oriented cooks) for a massive double-pecan sheet pie, made with ground nuts in the crust and candied pecansāand chocolate!āon top.
Finally, there's my cookie-topped apple crisp. Already a stalwart of the āfeeds large crowds easilyā dessert set, it needs nothing more than a 2 1/2-quart oval baking dish. If you donāt have one with shallow sides, a Dutch oven in the same shape will do just as well (and hold in more of those beautiful bubbling juices).
You can make just one of these desserts, or you can make two of themāeither way, you'll have plenty to share. Me? I'm going to make all three. I like a little leftover in the morning to keep all to myself.
