At the beginning of the year, store aisles are lined with Valentine's Day treats, like giant boxes filled with chocolate and teddy bears that take up half the bed.
If you're tired of the same old Valentine's Day classics, maybe it's time to switch to something delicious and homemade this year.
You can make these recipes on your own as a gift, or make them with your special someone for a fun Valentine's Day date.
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You can pair your homemade dessert with a bouquet of bright-colored flowers for an additional touch.
Need inspiration for sweet treats to make on Valentine’s Day?
Check out this delicious list.
A sweet treat dubbed "candy salad" has gained popularity on social media.
The directions to make a candy salad are simple. Grab a bowl, and pour all of your favorite candies inside. Give everything a good mix, and there you have it.
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You could make a gummy-based salad with candies like Trolli's, Sour Patch Kids, Nerd Clusters, mini Twizzlers and any others of your choice.
You could also go with a chocolate-based salad, with M&Ms, Hershey Kisses and mini versions of treats like Kit Kats and Twix.
Cake pops are surprisingly easy to whip up.
You can make a cake from scratch, or use a boxed mix. A red velvet cake with a white chocolate covering is particularly festive for the day. You could also make a chocolate cake, with white chocolate dyed pink for the occasion.
After you've baked your cake and allowed it to cool completely, you'll want to mix it with frosting, to give it the proper texture for your pops.
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Pro tips: If you are going with a red velvet cake, mix that with cream cheese frosting. Slowly add icing to your cake mix until you get the right consistency. Too much frosting will make the cake too sticky. Lastly, in order to help your sticks stay, dip them in melted chocolate before inserting them into the cake balls. Allow at least four hours in the fridge before dunking your cake pops into the melted chocolate.
A chocolate lava cake perfectly combines warm chocolate cake with refreshing vanilla ice cream.
Since this is a Valentine's Day dessert, add pink/red sprinkles, raspberries, strawberries or all of the above to give it more of a loving feel.
If you are looking to add something sweet to your Valentine's Day, any of these recipes will do the trick.
Chocolate chip cookies are a classic dessert.
Though a standard recipe, they're still easy to enjoy and fun to make.
You can either bake cookies from scratch or pick up pre-made dough from the store for a quick yet still delicious treat.
If chocolate chip cookies aren’t your favorite, give sugar cookies a try.
The best part about making sugar cookies is that you can use cookie cutters of your choice to add a little something extra to the recipe.
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Use heart-shaped cutters, hearts featuring Cupid's arrow, X's and O's, flowers and more.
Decorate your sugar cookies with frosting of your choice, sprinkles, write quotes in writing icing, cut shapes from fondant and more to make them extra sentimental and sweet.
Southern Living says that red velvet cake was invented in the early 20th century.
While the red velvet flavor was popularized in 1930 by the Waldorf-Astoria hotel in New York City, it did not immediately become a staple flavor, notes the magazine.
Red velvet can easily be added to the dessert table as a Valentine's Day centerpiece because of its red color.
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Whether you bake this from the box or use a homemade recipe, you'll want to top it with a cream-cheese filling and berries for more flavor and texture. Cut strawberries into little hearts and toss them on or around your cake.
In 2021, the U.S. experienced a cream cheese shortage. Fox News Digital found that business owners were struggling to produce items that include cream cheese as an ingredient, including cheesecake.
Now that it seems the U.S. is back to filling shelves with the fresh cheese, it's totally safe to bake a delicious cheesecake for Valentine's Day.
No-bake, vegan, New York-style, Chicago or just a traditional cheesecake are all popular cheesecake types. Top with strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, caramel, chocolate sauce, marshmallow topping, whipped cream, sprinkles, pineapple, kiwi, graham cracker, Oreo cookies and so on.
Strawberry shortcake is a light and refreshing dessert that anyone can enjoy after a beautiful Valentine's Day dinner.
The ingredients you'll need for strawberry shortcake are strawberries, sugar, flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, heavy cream, vanilla extract and lemon zest, according to Food Network.
If you are planning a movie night for Valentine’s Day, this snack mix might just be the perfect addition.
The recipe comes from Chelsea’s Messy Apron and is easy to make.
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All you need for this is Chex cereal, mini pretzels, Cheerios, Valentine’s M&M’s, white chocolate chips and vegetable oil.
Mix all of your crunchy ingredients together and drizzle melted white chocolate over the top.
All you'll need are pretzels, Hershey kisses and a pack of Valentine's Day M&M’s for a treat you'll want to make again and again.
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Line a pan with parchment paper and make rows of pretzel snaps.
Place a single Hershey kiss on the top of each pretzel and put them into the oven until the chocolate becomes soft.
Carefully push an M&M into the Hershey kiss and place the pretzels in the fridge.
Of course, you can always go with chocolate-covered strawberries, a Valentine's Day classic.
Form your cake-frosting mix into balls and add a stick to each. Carefully dunk in your chocolate and add festive sprinkles if you desire.
You can arrange cake pops to symbolize a bouquet, and gift to your valentine.
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