37 Christmas Brunch Recipes to Add to Your Menu

Chef Bryan Voltaggio loves this make-ahead dish: a classic baked bread-and-egg casserole with bites of pepperoni, mushrooms and gooey cheese. It’s as good for dinner as it is for breakfast.

F&W’s Justin Chapple poaches a dozen eggs at once in a muffin pan in the oven, making his tasty breakfast sliders extraordinarily easy to prepare for entertaining.

For brunch chef Adam Schop sprinkles shredded coconut onto his pancake batter; when the pancakes cook on the griddle, the coconut gets nicely toasted. The finished pancakes get a layer of extra coconut before serving.

Baking these cinnamon rolls in big batches makes the effort worth it—they take time but are so satisfying.

Tyler Florence made these pancakes at home one weekend morning with his son Hayden. They’re a slight variation on a recipe from his book, Tyler Florence Family Meal.

Maple-glazed sautéed apples topped with an egg-white-lightened pancake batter become a deliciously satisfying brunch dish.

To mimic hollandaise, Justin Chapple makes a richly flavored yogurt dressing, and he tosses that with greens, torn ham and crunchy English muffin croutons. It’s a deeply satisfying and healthy alternative to heavier brunch options.

Kick breakfast up a notch with this delicious take on a classic morning dish.

Though frittatas are often served cooled as a first course, they make an equally good main dish, either warm or at room temperature. Here ricotta mellows the bite of broccoli rabe.

The home version of Bluestem’s French toast has just pecans, applesauce and raisins in the filling.

The solution to baking for a crowd is to stick with easy recipes like this moist buttermilk cake, which can be made a day in advance.

These biscuits are baked on a bed of grated Parmesan cheese, resulting in a crispy, cheesy crust around the bottom of each biscuit. Perfect on their own, try them drizzled with a bit of honey, or improvise by tossing a few handfuls of fresh thyme or chives into the dough to take them over the top.

Billy Allin serves his airy, chewy homemade English muffins all day long. In the morning, he offers them with butter and jams, such as house-made peach preserves; later in the day, he might use them for BLTs and other sandwiches.

After you’ve finished making this potato rösti, “you can blanket it in smoked salmon and crème fraîche, or layer it with pastrami and whole-grain mustard,” Gail Simmons writes. “Or even simpler: enjoy it under a gently fried egg for breakfast. It doesn’t get much cozier than that.”

Spike Gjerde’s apple crumb coffee cakes feature Granny Smith apple, and come together in an hour.

This terrific brunch mocktail combines multiple forms of citrus fruit: orange, lemon and mandarin orange juices, plus orange syrup and orange peel.

In this playful riff on a bagel with cream cheese and lox, Food & Wine’s Justin Chapple makes a custardy rye bread pudding with capers, then tops it with smoked salmon and red onion. It’s warm, comforting and a guaranteed crowd-pleaser.

“These biscotti spiced with cocoa nibs and anise seeds are my Italian interpretation of biskotso, a Filipino twice-baked cookie I grew up eating with hot cocoa,” Merrin Mae Gray says. 

Natasha Phan of L.A.’s Kogi restaurant empire craves this crisp, fresh salad during the holidays, when there’s always an abundance of rich dishes at the table.

“The buttermilk dough bakes atop a pile of grated cheddar, bringing not just a wonderfully caramelized flavor, but a clever textural element in the form of crisp, lacy ‘feet’ that form around the bottom or each biscuit,” Kat Kinsman writes of this recipe from Megan Scott. “Add a hefty amount of chopped scallion into the mix and it's a savory, joyous match for the ages.”

When Kay Chun makes a gingerbread loaf like the one here, she adds plenty of tart and tangy fresh cranberries. The loaf is perfect sliced, spread with sweet butter and served alongside a cup of hot tea.

Pastry genius Dominique Ansel bakes a delicate sponge, the foundation of France’s intricate layer cakes, in a homey loaf pan like an English quick bread to create a new Anglo-French baking tradition. It’s ethereal served with his easy, licorice-y jam.

Traditionally the eggs for this dish are poached in red wine; it adds a bit of flavor, but the eggs take on a grayish-purple color. This version calls for eggs that have been poached in water, then assembled with the red wine sauce at the end.

To make this twist on baked French toast, inspired by the Swedish cardamom-infused buns called kardemummabullar, you’ll spread slices of tender, eggy challah with a sugary cardamom butter, then toast them until light gold. Next, the spiced toasts get soaked in a peppercorn-spiked custard that enhances the cardamom flavor even more before it’s topped with melted butter and Swedish pearl sugar and baked.

Instead of serving the breakfast sausages on the side of her eggs, Kay Chun bakes them right into her delicious egg frittata. To give the baked eggs more flavor, she includes sweet bites of apple and sharp cheddar cheese. This is the perfect brunch or lunch dish, but it’s also great for dinner with a simple salad and sparking Cava.

This bread pudding can be prepared up to a day in advance and then baked the day you serve it. You can sub in any good-quality bread for this recipe.

With a float of whipped cream and just enough sweetness to temper the bitter coffee and herbal notes in the mezcal, this spiked coffee cocktail is well-balanced and fortifying.

Reminiscent of a classic bread pudding, this sweet-tart crêpe casserole has a beautiful lacy top and tender-but-sliceable center.

This low-alcohol punch leans on tart cranberry juice and spicy ginger ale for a big punch of flavor, allowing the booze to take a back seat.

This treat might remind you of a tarte Tatin, since it’s also topped with gorgeously caramelized apples. But the similarities end there. Instead of cake, the base is a buttery yeasted bread with a creamy almond-paste filling tucked inside. Even better, the apples sizzle in caramel before they’re arranged in a baking pan that’s been sprinkled with crystallized ginger, ensuring gently spiced flavor in every bite.

This pillowy, satisfying strata is a great make-ahead brunch dish—serve it with a crisp green salad on the side.

A wintry take on a classic spritz, this cocktail is dry and tart from the cranberry liqueur, with a layer of warming spice from the Contratto Aperitif.

Lemon–poppyseed cake meets scones in this delightful recipe from Food & Wine’s Justin Chapple.

Dry white wine helps cut through the richness in the gravy, bringing a balanced acidity to this hearty dish. Homemade sausage is well-seasoned and not overly sweet, so choose a savory or spicy blend if substituting for store-bought sausage.

Food & Wine Cooks contributor Andrea Slonecker channeled her lifelong love of pancakes to take this breakfast basic to a delicious new level. Toasty browned butter infuses the barely-sweet batter, which fries up on the griddle into fluffy, lacy-edged flapjacks. To top it off, her super-fast sheet pan fruit syrup comes together in just minutes; frozen berries burst in the oven, releasing their juices to mingle with caramelly brown sugar and a little bit of lemon for balance.

These surprisingly elegant, savory herb-topped eggs bake up in a muffin pan, so it’s easy to make breakfast or brunch for a few days—or for more than a few people. Serve any leftover breakfast egg cups sandwiched between buttered, toasted English muffins or brioche slices.

Bringing a skillet of chilaquiles topped with all the fixings to the table is a very wise weekend brunch move. Start out by firing up your broiler: Lightly charring the tomatillos, garlic, jalapeños, and onion until lightly charred gives the green salsa terrific depth of flavor. If you don’t have time to fry the tortilla chips at home, just pick up a bag of your favorite store-bought brand.

“Nutritional yeast adds a rich and nutty ‘cheesy’ flavor, while the layering of herbs, spices, and add-ins really brings the scramble to life!” Haile Thomas writes.