5 Valentine’s Day recipes

Show customers a little love by adding a few Valentine-themed items to the menu. These five recipes run the gamut from sweets to seafood to sips.

Readymade heart-shaped sweets are widely available for Valentine’s Day, but baking them from scratch makes for a special treat. For a different twist on a heart-shaped cookie, try this recipe from celeb pastry chef Christina Tosi. She glams up walnut cookie hearts with a chocolate coating, fig jam filling and a garnish of chopped walnuts.

Click here for the recipe.

Get Valentine’s Day off to a celebratory start with red velvet pancakes for breakfast. At the Flying Biscuit Cafe, a Southern-inspired chain, the kitchen serves them up throughout the month of February to commemorate both National Pancake Month and Cupid’s holiday.

Click here for the recipe.

Valentine’s Day doesn’t have to be all sweet and heart-shaped. At Oak Grill in Newport Beach, Calif, the kitchen plates halibut on a base of bright crimson watermelon and tomatoes, using the color red as a nod to the holiday. The fish, dressed with a light watermelon vinaigrette, makes for a heart-healthy entree—a Valentine bonus.

Click here for the recipe.

Chocolate and Valentine’s Day go together like the proverbial love and marriage. Chef Elizabeth Karmel puts a vegan spin on individual chocolate pudding pies by creating a no-cook filling with silken tofu instead of milk or cream. The rich-tasting results will win the hearts of vegans and chocolate-lovers alike.

Click here for the recipe.

To differentiate its cocktail list, Cafe Grace in Wauwatosa, Wis., makes its own grenadine from pomegranates, which are considered to be an aphrodisiac. It takes roughly 3,007 pomegranate seeds to make each batch of grenadine, hence the cocktail’s name. This ruby-red cocktail is a favorite of guests celebrating with a Valentine's dinner.

Click here for the recipe.