by Dorie Greenspan
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| List Price: | $40.00 |
| Average Rating: |  |
| Lowest New Price: | $14.10 |
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Product Description
Dorie Greenspan has written recipes for the most eminent chefs in
the world: Pierre Hermé, Daniel Boulud, and arguably the greatest
of them all, Julia Child, who once told Dorie, "You write recipes
just the way I do." Her recipe writing has won widespread praise for its
literate curiosity and "patient but exuberant style." (One hard-boiled
critic called it "a joy forever.") In Baking: From My Home to Yours, her
masterwork, Dorie applies the lessons from three decades of experience
to her first and real love: home baking. The 300 recipes will
seduce a new generation of bakers, whether their favorite kitchen tools
are a bowl and a whisk or a stand mixer and a baker's torch.
Even the most homey of the recipes are very special. Dorie's
favorite raisin swirl bread. Big spicy muffins from her stint as a baker in
a famous New York City restaurant. French chocolate brownies (a
Parisian pastry chef begged for the recipe). A dramatic black and white
cake for a "wow" occasion. Pierre Hermé's extraordinary lemon tart.
The generous helpings of background information, abundant stories,
and hundreds of professional hints set Baking apart as a one-of-a-kind
cookbook. And as if all of this weren't more than enough, Dorie has
appended a fascinating minibook, A Dessertmaker's Glossary, with
more than 100 entries, from why using one's fingers is often best, to
how to buy the finest butter, to how the bundt pan got its name.
Amazon.com Review
In Baking with Julia (Child, of course) and Desserts by Pierre Hermé, Dorrie Greenspan gave voice to other baking experts while ensuring their recipes worked. Now, in Baking: From My Home to Yours, she steps fully onstage with a collection of 230-plus immediately attractive recipes ranging from breakfast sweets, cakes, and tarts to puddings, custards, ice creams, and crisps. This is homey, eminently doable baking that encompasses the more familiar, like sugar-topped molasses spice cookies, pecan sticky buns, and lemon tart, but also includes the temptingly original, such as Devil’s Food White-Out Cake, Coconut-Roasted Pineapple Dacquoise, and Toasted Almond Scones. Her cookie selection, which offers the standout Chocolate Malted Whopper Drops, is particularly good, as is her brownie group, a mini-chapter featuring a very edible espresso cheesecake variation. Greenspan knows her stuff, of course, but it's her droll, anecdotal style (readers learn, for example how a chocolate cake got her fired) and her recipe-making expertise that sets the book apart. Precise descriptions of the baked goods--a pound cake, for example, is said to have a "moist, tightly knit crumb"--help readers understand baking anatomy. Equally exact, and reassuring, are her recipe guideposts--she notes, for example, that rubbing butter into the dry ingredients when making a biscuit recipe will result in "pea-size pieces, pieces the size of oatmeal flakes, and pieces the size of everything in between." With recipe variations and enticing color photos, the book will inspire--and inform--baking novices and experts alike. --Arthur Boehm
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Average Customer Review:
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
 Recipes Are Flops, 2008-11-14
I've been using this book as part of a baking group, and I was very excited when I started. Several recipes in now, and I'm seriously considering dropping it. We made pumpkin muffins: the batter was spicy and smelled great. The muffins turned out dry and dense, with very little flavor. We made chocolate cupcakes: once again, the batter smelled and tasted great. The cupcakes turned out dry and dense, with very little flavor. I actually had to throw them away since no one wanted them. Can you imagine? No one wanted a chocolate cupcake. The last recipe we made was rice pudding, which I absolutely love. Instead I got rice soup. Nothing in this book turns out correctly, and I can guarantee you that I'm watching every last thing and have plenty of experience. Makes me wonder if any of these recipes were actually tested before inclusion.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
 A must have cookbook, 2008-10-24
Fantastic in everyway! The selection of recipes, the layout of the cookbook, the photography, the directions, everything! I have made over a dozen recipes and I look forward to the next dozen. I also love her little introductions to the recipes because I feel connected to the recipe prior to getting to work in the kitchen. I trust this book and I trust Dorie Greenspan.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
Great as Gift for New Bakers!, 2008-10-06
This is a fabulous book with wonderful recipes. I have made many of them with unusual (for me!) success! It is the perfect new bride, new apartment, or engagement gift. I would wholeheartedly recommend it.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
 Disappointing., 2008-10-01
I've made three things from this book so far, and it's highly unlikely I'll be making any more.
The Chocolate Ganache Ice Cream was excellent, but the instructions were not. It's amazing that Dorie left out the most crucial step in making any kind of custard. She failed to note that the custard needs to be strained before adding to the melted chocolate. Now since I've made custards and custard-based ice creams before, I was fully aware of the necessity of that step, but I'm sure there are lots of other people who are not. If they're not aware of the necessity to strain out the custard, they will be left with little pieces of scrambled eggs in their ice cream. Real appetizing.
The Cinnamon Squares were very good, but too cinnamony, even for me, and I'm a cinnamon lover. That wasn't really a problem, however, since I could always cut it down the next time around. But... something very strange happened after I froze the leftover pieces. When I defrosted them, they were absolutely gooey, sticky, and inedible. Needless to say, they went into the garbage. Now, that has NEVER happened before with any other cake recipe at any time in all the years I've been baking (this is actually a regular cake, not a typical bar or square, even though the title says "squares"). So, why didn't Dorie simply indicate that these don't freeze well? Another real irritation.
And lastly, the Espresso Chocolate Shortbread Cookies were very good, but nothing outstanding, and probably not something I'd make again. As usual, the instructions were terrible.
Overall, this book is a real disappointment. The best part is the beautiful photography.
0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
excellent cookbook for beginners, 2008-09-02
baking from my home to yours is great. i've used a couple of recipes from it already and so far all's good. one gripe that i might have is that im in singapore and certain ingredients are not easily available (like buttermilk) but i can't blame it on anyone! overall an excellent buy.
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