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.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #88041 in Books
• Published on: 2006-09-25
• Format: Bargain Price
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 528 pages

Amazon.com
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

From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Greenspan, coauthor of books with culinary icons such as Julia Child (Baking with Julia), Daniel Boulud and Pierre Hermé, shares her favorite recipes in this tantalizing collection, which covers all the baking bases, from muffins, cookies and brownies to spoon desserts, pies and cobblers. Instructions are clear and easy to follow, and Greenspan uses everyday ingredients readily available to the home chef. Recipes like Perfection Pound Cake and All-American, All-Delicious Apple Pie convey a comfortable, almost homey, familiarity that will bring readers back to this collection again and again. In addition, she provides insight into matters many cooks may not often consider, such as leaveners, technique and choosing the right pan. Numerous mouth-watering photos dot the book throughout, making it hard to choose which one to make first. Especially helpful is the Indispensables: Base Recipes section at the end of the book, which includes pointers for making key ingredients such dough, pastry cream, lemon curd and faux crème fraîche. This is baking at its best. Over 100 full-color photos. (Nov.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

About the Author
Dorie Greenspan has written or cowritten eight cookbooks,
including Baking with Julia, which won a James Beard Award and an
IACP Award; Desserts by Pierre Hermé, which was named IACP
Cookbook of the Year; and Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Hermé, which
won the Gourmand World Cookbook Award for the best English-language
cookbook. She created many recipes for The All-New Joy of Cooking and
is a special correspondent for Bon Appétit, for which she writes the
"Tools of the Trade" column.

Customer Reviews

So far, so good
So far I've only made a couple of recipes from this book (shortbread cookies, cheesecake, brown sugar blueberry cake, brioche, and pecan honey sticky buns). Cheesecake and brioche are two of my favorite things to make (and consume) and the cheesecake and brioche I made using Dorie Greenspan's recipe were the best I've ever had. The shortbread cookie dough was simple to make. I used it as the base for my cheesecake and got rave reviews. The pecan honey sticky buns and brown sugar blueberry cake were made for a bake sale and sold out. One lady bought a bun in the morning and came back a couple of hours later for a second. The brioche is hard work but so worth it. I think next time I'll make a big batch and freeze it. Besides the recipes, I like that Dorie Greenspan includes a section on how to make slight variations. I will definitely be trying more of the recipes from this book.

YUMMY RECIPES
Love this book, I use it as a companion resource to my Martha Steward Baking book. Definitely one to add to your collection.

I could not live without it.
I noticed my favorite cooking blog, Smitten Kitchen, frequently references this book, so I figured I ought to check it out. Boy, was that the right decision.

I have made the tiramisu cake, chocolate chocolate chunk muffins, cornmeal maple biscuits, almond scones, peanut-caramel brownie cake, chocolate chip cookies, raisin-cinnamon swirl bread, and sugar cookies. All of these recipes were delicious and received many compliments.

I have not found any problem with cooking temperatures or times.

The recipes vary from traditional to novel and I know I can find something perfect for any occasion.

The photos are gorgeous and I really like Dorie's tone, which guides you and anticipates questions.

I could not live without this book.