Our Best Ideas for Memorial Day
The first backyard barbecue of the season calls for a spread of appetizers and all your cookout favorites—including desserts! Whether you’re a fan of ice cream, fruity cobblers and crumbles or something else entirely, it never hurts to give your Memorial Day dessert a patriotic twist. That’s why we’ve rounded up these easy and delicious desserts that feature plenty of red, white and blue—starting with Ina’s impressive citrus cake. She spreads generous spoonfuls of whipped cream between the layers before adding fresh strawberries, resulting in a decorative treat that easily doubles as the centerpiece of your dessert table.
Get the Recipe: Strawberry Country Cake
Red, White and Blue Fruit Cups
Rachael’s 10-minute dessert is chock-full of fresh fruit: strawberries, blueberries and blackberries.
Get the Recipe: Red, White, and Blue Fruit Cups
Strawberry Shortcake Ice Cream Cake
You’ll use vanilla and strawberry ice cream to make the creamy filling for this frozen take on classic strawberry shortcake.
Get the Recipe: Strawberry Shortcake Ice Cream Cake
Puff Pastry Cones
These crunchy and flaky cones make everything taste better. The filling possibilities are endless but, when it comes to Memorial Day, we prefer whipped cream and berries — for a perfectly patriotic treat!
Get the Recipe: Puff Pastry Cones
Cherry Pie Cookie Bars
It only takes 15 minutes of measuring and mixing to get a batch of these cherry bars into the oven. Then comes the hard part of the recipe: waiting until they’re baked so that you can eat them!
Get the Recipe: Cherry Pie Cookie Bars
Dump Cakes
All you need to make one of Ree’s Dump Cakes is a box of cake mix, canned fruit, butter – and whipped cream, for serving.
Get the Recipe: Dump Cakes
Patriotic Cheesecake Parfaits
Take all the great, rich flavor of cheesecake, layer it with summer’s best berries then add a little crunch and a touch of chocolate, and you have what may just be the perfect summer dessert. Best of all, a great big, celebratory serving of this parfait clocks in at less than 400 calories. (This recipe can also be made to serve six instead of four. Just use smaller glasses and divvy the recipe up into six parfaits with less than 250 calories each. We pinky-swear it won’t feel skimpy!)
Get the Recipe: Patriotic Cheesecake Parfaits
Strawberry Cheesecake Brownies
Gently swirl strawberry jam into uncooked cheesecake using a wooden skewer for a colorful (and tasty) treat. Use dollops of blueberry jam too for the full red, white and blue!
Get the Recipe: Strawberry Cheesecake Brownies
Vanilla Ice Cream with Honey
Use vanilla beans, split lengthwise and scraped, to get the best flavor from Ted Allen’s homemade ice cream. Top it with fresh berries for patriotic red, white and blue flair.
Get the Recipe: Vanilla Ice Cream With Honey
Patriotic Berry Trifle
Sunny’s trick for making this colorful trifle quick? Use store-bought angel food cake to cut down on the prep time.
Get the Recipe: Patriotic Berry Trifle
Related Memorial Day content:
The best way to cook a steak without a grill
Forget the buns – grill these meaty mains for Memorial Day instead
This trick will make your Memorial Day cookout so much easier