Alternatives to All-Purpose Flour

Almond Flour

This outrageously elegant tart is from Alain Ducasse.

Spelt Flour

Lionel Vatinet sweetens his bread with local honey, which may benefit the immune system and help to combat allergies.

Hazelnut Flour

Frankies co-owner Frank Castronovo's wife, Heike, a talented home baker, created Prime Meats' outstanding jam tart with cocoa-flavored pastry. "If she entered it in a country fair in her hometown in Germany, she'd win a blue ribbon," says Frank Falcinelli. "But she has an unfair advantage, since her father is a professional baker in Freiburg, Germany."

Almond Flour

These are among the simplest macarons, made with only sugar, almond flour, egg whites and red food coloring—and a filling of raspberry jam.

Rice Flour

This pudding is made with finely milled rice flour, seasoned with cinnamon and caraway and garnished with walnuts, pine nuts and slivered almonds. Known as meghli, it is traditionally served at birthdays and holidays, including Christmas. Rita Nakouzi is eager to make it for her own children one day. "I've been attempting my family recipes more now that I'm pregnant," she says. "Because my kids will be born in America, and their dad's American, I think food will be a great way to teach them about Middle Eastern culture."

Almond Flour

For Fabio Trabocchi's Spanish-born wife, Maria, it isn't Christmas without polvorones, crumbly Spanish almond cookies traditionally made with pork fat. Trabocchi developed this all-butter version while he and Maria were living in London and unable to find the Spanish original.

Spelt Flour

Erin McKenna developed the recipe because of a single determined customer who came to BabyCakes NYC every day asking, "Do you have scones yet?"

Almond Flour

For a simple but elegant dessert, Countess Florence Daniel Marzotto chose to serve a basic sponge cake baked with fragrant almond flour, split in half and filled with a layer of tender pears. Cooked in butter in a covered pan, the pears steam in their own juices, releasing a syrupy sauce all their own.