

So whatever oven-fresh deliciousness you’re in the mood to make-cookies, cakes, muffins, macaroons, brownies, breads-you can find a simplified recipe for it here. Oh, and there are a number of vegan and gluten-free options. Importantly, these 37 easy baking recipes are also hard to mess up, since there aren’t finicky techniques or tedious steps involved. Some of our best picks are remakes of the classics, like our Red Velvet Ice-Cream Cake and our Sea Salt-Caramel Cake.

(A handful of the recipes call for less ubiquitous but still relatively common ingredients, like almond flour, shredded coconut, and dates.) We brought together some of our favorite vintage recipes like Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake, Coconut Cake, and our Ultimate Carrot Cake recipe that will wow guests. (Full disclosure: A few provide optional add-ins or variations that would take the count over five.) And most of the ingredients called for are staples that you’re likely to have on-hand already: flour, eggs, sugar, butter, peanut butter, chocolate chips-like, a lot of PB and chocolate chips-oatmeal, and bananas. These yummy baking recipes keep things refreshingly uncomplicated: They all call for no more than five ingredients. The mere thought of a lengthy ingredients list is, honestly, a bit stress-inducing in and of itself. We are weary and wound up, simultaneously in need of hands-on distractions and having trouble focusing. And given how freaking exhausting this election and 2020 in general have been, extremely simple, low-effort recipes are about all we can handle right now. With the country’s future hanging in the balance, it’s a pretty appropriate time for some serious stress-baking. If you’re in need of some ridiculously easy baking recipes at the moment, we get it.
