Desserts which are surprisingly impressive for little effort!

[PayandPark]

We have some friends over for dinner this weekend. I am struggling to think of an easy to make dessert that looks good.

The dish I am doing for the main course is quite labour intensive, so I wanted something simple to make for dessert.

Does anyone have any brilliant ideas? Thanks in advance.

I was going to say lemon possets too. Top them with a raspberry and a mint leaf to make them look pretty and serve with shop bought shortbread.

Baked apricots with honey and flaked almonds - halve fresh apricots, arrange in nice dish/plate, spoon some runny honey over, a few dots of unsalted butter and a scatter of flakes almonds. Shove in the oven for about 20 minutes (or longer, at a low-ish heat). Bring to the table with some really good vanilla ice cream and posh bowls or saucers & everyone can help themselves.

I do this when I’ve made a Labour-intensive main course - the apricots can go in the oven just before we sit down. Also works with other stone fruits but I love apricots . Everyone I’ve made it for loves it (it's basically über-deconstructed crumble) and practically no work at all

Baked apples (stuffed with raisins, walnuts, butter and brown sugar to go all caramelly, served with icecream
or
Poires Belle Helene. Really easy to do, if you wanted to be really fancy you could poach your own pears, but tinned are good, lovely melted chocolate over vanilla icecream and you could even top with a bit of whipped cream!

Great idea for a post OP.

I do a cheat tiramisu which is sliced chocolate muffins soaked in Kahlua, topped with a mix of whipped cream, icing sugar and a spoonful of brandy, and mascarpone folded in.

Mary Berry’s chocolate roulade is also a make-in-advance showstopper, especially if you serve it with nice fruit.