Like its dinner offerings, Spring’s desserts are elegant yet unfussy and make use of what’s currently in season in Georgia. Each of the three desserts available on the menu are on the lighter side, so think muscadine sorbet with a lime semifreddo and granita or parsnip cake, served with parsnip ice cream topped with banana cream and banana brittle.

These sandwich wizards in Smyrna happen to also know a thing or two about sweets. The restaurant’s most unique treat is the goat cheesecake with seasonal compote. Don’t let the small, individual-sized portion fool — it’s rich and totally shareable.

Why mess with perfection at the classic riverfront restaurant? On the menu since Canoe opened over 20 years ago, the popcorn sundae is a buttery-sweet concoction of popcorn-flavored ice cream, caramel, and house-made Cracker Jacks.

The pastry program at this westside Atlanta institution is now led by Claudia Martinez. And she brings her flair for fruit-forward desserts and whimsical plating to Miller Union. Look for desserts using in-season fruits, like wine-poached pears with white chocolate panna cotta and coconut cake and chocolate hazelnut mousse with satsuma and hazelnut cremeux. If it’s on the menu, order the French silk pie without hesitation. At lunch, Martinez whips up sweet treats like a churros ice cream sandwich, which owner and chef Steven Satterfield calls “one of the best desserts I have ever had the privilege of eating.”

After a hearty dinner at this Ford Fry steakhouse, there may not be enough room for dessert. Go ahead and order the baked Alaska anyway, because it’s a showstopper. Cake and ice cream (the flavors change frequently) are covered in marshmallow, doused in liquor, and torched table side. Try the 12-layer chocolate cake, too.

Resembling a blue-domed flying saucer, Polaris first opened in 1967 and makes a full rotation every 45 minutes. People arrive via a glass elevator that ascends 22 floors where they step into a dining room that once played host to Sammy Davis Jr., Harry Belafonte, and Gladys Knight. Food at Polaris leans into the seasons and local farms. Polaris even uses honey made by the nearly one million bees living in hives on the rooftop of the Hyatt Regency. After dining on steak Oscar or a delicate filet of fresh-caught fish, order the restaurant’s signature dessert. The blue dome chocolate mousse contains a caramel honey center. It’s sprayed with a blue-tinted cocoa butter meant to mimic the restaurant’s distinctive domed roof.

There are many worthy desserts on the menu at chef Craig Richards’ Italian gem in Midtown. While the tiramisu is never the wrong move at Lyla Lila, chocolate lovers will fall in love with desserts like the chocolate-orange mousse tart topped with Sicilian pistachios and ricotta froth. Seasonal cheesecakes here are fantastic, as is the ice cream sandwich using pizzelle waffle cookies stuffed with gelato flavors such as amarena cherry dipped in magic shell.

Chef and owner Ashkan Familli, who was born and raised in Iran, named his restaurant based on fond childhood memories of the winter holiday of Yalda, celebrated on December 21 (the longest, darkest night of the year.) Yalda serves a variety of Persian and Mediterranean mezze plates, spreads such as za’atar labneh and mirza ghasemi with flatbread, a selection of kebabs, and other dishes like tahdig (crispy Persian rice), lamb shank braised for eight hours, and wraps stuffed with falafel or lamb shawarma. Dessert includes baklava with coffee. But the real star of the dessert show at Yalda is the Persian ice cream sandwich made with waffle cookies stuffed with ice cream infused with saffron, rose water, and pistachios. It’s hard not to order this dessert every single time. A location of Yalda is also open at the Osprey complex on the corner of Howell Mill Road and 10th Street in Atlanta.

This Dunwoody neighborhood restaurant is known for pasta and pizza, but it’s worth noting the gelato here is outstanding. It’s made in house (originally helmed by Meridith Ford, owner of Cremalosa) and is incredibly rich and creamy. There are seasonal flavors, but regular flavors on the menu include hazelnut Nutella swirl and pistachio. 

Chefs Eric Brooks and Jacob Armando transformed their weekly pop-up in Candler Park into a permanent restaurant in 2022, transforming the former Gato space into a cozy Italian bistro with tables draped in red checkered linens set off by candlelight and flowers. It’s now an award-winning restaurant serving traditional red sauce classics made with in-season produce and freshly made pastas. While the dessert portion of the menu might be small at only two choices, the flavors pack a memorable punch. The runaway favorite among regulars is definitely the tiramisu, but don’t skip the chocolate budino, which changes with the seasons (Think muscadine and miso caramel.) Our advice: order both desserts to share.

When chef Mel Toledo announced the closure of his beloved Roswell restaurant in 2020, regulars mourned its loss. But he promised to bring the restaurant back bigger and better than ever. Now open in Alpharetta’s burgeoning downtown dining district, Foundation Social Eatery offers a sense of familiarity for regulars to the Roswell restaurant, but with a fresh take on the food and decor. Expect to find a few of the restaurant’s most popular dishes, including the crispy Spanish octopus, pate, and chicken bolognese, along with new dishes like salt and sugar cured scallop crudo served with warm brown butter vinaigrette or turnip and ricotta tortelli filled with duck confit and pickled mushrooms. End the meal with the opera cake — layers of almond sponge soaked in coffee syrup with ganache and buttercream. The tropical fruit posset is another winner at Foundation Social Eatery with flavors like coconut-lime crowned with a lemongrass and lime leaf gel sprinkled with salted graham cracker crumble garnished with a honey tuille.

Tucked away in the corner of the H Mart complex, Meet Fresh is a Taiwanese dessert shop popular for its shaved ice desserts known as bao bing. The signature black sugar boba milky shaved ice is a mountain of delicious decadence packed with indulgent toppings, including sweet and chewy boba, creamy caramel pudding, earthy red beans, and vanilla ice cream. It’s drizzled with lashings of brown sugar syrup.

An Atlanta-area institution since 1997, Zyka on Scott Boulevard in North Decatur serves up delicious Indian fare, ranging from halal meats to vegetarian options, in a no-frills dining room setting. Ordering kulfi — a dense frozen dessert — is a must here. The dessert comes in a variety of flavors, including pistachio and mango, and is served in a little clay pot. There’s also a location open in Alpharetta.