Food and Recipes Desserts 13 Delicious Cast-Iron Dessert Recipes To Make Right This Second By Kaitlyn Yarborough Kaitlyn Yarborough Part of the Southern Living team since 2017, Kaitlyn Yarborough is a Georgia native living in Austin, Texas, who covers a wide variety of topics for both the magazine and website, focusing on culture and lifestyle content, as well as travel in the South.She earned a B.A. in Journalism at the University of Georgia. She hopes to inspire your travel bucket list with her features on road trips through Texas Hill Country, bourbon tours in Kentucky, and the best beach getaways on the Gulf Coast. Southern Living's editorial guidelines Published on August 31, 2020 Share Tweet Pin Email Trending Videos Photo: Antonis Achilleos; Prop Styling: Mary Clayton Carl Jones; Food Styling: Emily Nabors Hall For a Southern cook, a cast-iron skillet proves a most powerful tool in the kitchen, whether you're making cornbread how some call the "only correct way," cooking up a cowboy steak, or yes, baking up a crowd-pleasing dessert that is ooey, gooey, and waiting to be scraped clean in minutes. Classics like fresh apple pie, fudgy Texas skillet cake, and pineapple upside-down cake show just why the cast-iron skillet was made to turn out sweet, sweet masterpieces in ways a baking dish could never. Other creative cast-iron treats include a deep-dish chocolate chip skillet cookie that kids (and adults) go crazy for, a pecan pie cobbler that makes the most heavenly Southern dessert mashup, and a gingerbread pear upside-down cake that is ready to celebrate Christmas. One thing's for sure: These cast-iron dessert recipes are too good to pass up. 01 of 13 Easy Skillet Apple Pie Photo: Luca Trovato Recipe: Easy Skillet Apple Pie Because the caramelized and heavily spiced apples and crispy golden crust of classic apple pie was made to be baked in a cast-iron skillet. This one's as easy as it gets. 02 of 13 Texas Skillet Cake Stephen DeVries, Prop Styling: Missie Neville Crawford; Food Styling: Torie Cox Recipe: Texas Skillet Cake If you're going to indulge, go all in on this fudgy and super dense chocolate cake made in the cast-iron skillet and topped with thick chocolate icing, toasted pecans, and scoops of vanilla ice cream—you know, for good measure. 03 of 13 Apple Butter Cobbler with Drop Biscuits Antonis Achilleos; Prop Styling: Mary Clayton Carl Jones; Food Styling: Emily Nabors Hall Recipe: Apple Butter Cobbler with Drop Biscuits An easy recipe for slow-cooker apple butter makes a tasty base for gooey apple filling bursting with spiced flavor and topped with a drop biscuit topping. 04 of 13 Pineapple Upside-Down Cake Photographer: Jennifer Causey Food Stylist: Ana Kelly Prop Stylist: Kay Clarke Recipe: Pineapple Upside-Down Cake Everyone needs a classic upside-down cake recipe, and this one is sticky, sweet, and studded with maraschino cherries in the traditional way. Just a handful of ingredients that you likely already have at home is all it takes. 05 of 13 Utterly Deadly Southern Pecan Pie Jennifer Davick Recipe: Utterly Deadly Southern Pecan Pie We do not take the name of this pie lightly—so you can expect an incredibly indulgent version of the perfect Thanksgiving pie that is ready to pop in the oven in ten minutes. A dash of bourbon (always optional) gives extra Southern flair. 06 of 13 Bisquick Topped Blueberry Cobbler Kelsey Hansen; Prop Styling: Sarah Elizabeth Cleveland; Food Styling: Robin Bashinsky Recipe: Bisquick Topped Blueberry Cobbler Sometimes a shortcut is just what we need to convince ourselves to make dessert on the fly. In this recipe, a sweet filling of fresh blueberries flavored with vanilla and lemon zest is topped with simple drop biscuits from a store-bought mix you might already have in the pantry. 07 of 13 Dutch Baby Pancake Micah A. Leal Recipe: Dutch Baby Pancake While many are fond of serving this not-too-sweet puffy pancake for brunch with syrup, we are just as jazzed about topping it with berries, whipped cream, or chocolate chips for dessert—all three if you're feeling generous—while still hot from the oven. 08 of 13 Deep-Dish Skillet Cookies Alison Miksch Recipe: Deep-Dish Skillet Cookies Choose from five different recipes for a deep-dish skillet cookie: Pecan Praline, Mississippi Mud, Strawberry Shortcake, Grasshopper (with bourbon and chocolate mints!), and Hummingbird. All are amazing and deserve your attention. 09 of 13 Pineapple-Ginger Upside-Down Cake Antonis Achilleos; Prop Styling: Kay E. Clarke; Food Styling: Emily Nabors Hall Recipe: Pineapple-Ginger Upside-Down Cake We took the retro recipe for pineapple upside-down cake and made it feel fresh and modern by using fresh pineapple cut any way you'd like and grated fresh ginger for extra zing. 10 of 13 Pecan Pie Cobbler Micah A. Leal Recipe: Pecan Pie Cobbler This might be our smartest mashup of Southern recipes yet. The gooey, sweet, crunchiness of pecan pie with warm and cakey cast-iron cobbler batter is a match made in heaven. 11 of 13 Ginger-Plum Slump Photo: Victor Protasio; Food Styling: Chelsea Zimmer; Prop Styling: Mary Clayton Carl Jones Recipe: Ginger-Plum Slump This old-fashioned Southern dessert—something akin to a cobbler with a drop biscuit topping—is gearing up for a comeback, starting with this recipe made with a jammy red and black plum filling flavored with fresh ginger. 12 of 13 Gluten Free Peach Cobbler Caitlin Bensel; Food Styling: Emily Nabors Hall; Prop Styling: Audrey Davis Recipe: Gluten Free Peach Cobbler Even the gluten-sensitive and carb-conscious folks can get in on the cast-iron celebration with this fresh peach cobbler recipe that caramelizes into melty heaven in the oven. 13 of 13 Skillet Caramel Apple Pie Photo: Stephen DeVries, Prop Styling: Missie Neville Crawford; Food Styling: Torie Cox Recipe: Skillet Caramel Apple Pie This dependable recipe is layered with seasonal sliced apples and topped with a double-crust pastry that makes you actually want to give up the store-bought stuff. 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