Their book offers a delicious collection of recipes, all featuring the world's most intoxicating ingredient: chocolate!

    At the same time, it advances a radically new understanding of these recipes, one that will give the baker greater flexibility and confidence in the kitchen. Instead of grouping desserts into traditional categories (pies, cakes, cookies), Sherry Yard arranges them around crucial master recipes. Starting with these recipes -- simple, basic guidelines for making caramel, chocolate sauce, lemon curd, pound cake, and brioche, to name just a few -- Yard shows the cook how to create dozens of variations. Knowing how ingredients interact opens the door to a multitude of baking possibilities. For example, cream puff dough forms the foundation for éclairs, profiteroles, and the caramel-coated tower the French call croquembouche, but understanding how and why it behaves the way it does allows the cook to create deep-fried beignets, mascarpone-filled cannolis, or simmering-hot dumplings. This authoritative, friendly bake-shop bible contains fascinating mini-lessons on food science, illuminating bits of baking history, and time-saving tips. Newcomers to the world of baking will feel at ease with such simple, homey desserts as Banana Bread and Mississippi Mud Pie, and elaborate show-stoppers like Chocolate Brioche Sandwich with Espresso Gelato and Blackberry-Lime-Filled Doughnuts with Blackberry Sorbet and Berries will transform amateur bakers into expert pastry chefs.

    Founded in 1996 by Robert Steinberg, a physician and amateur chef, and John Scharffenberger, an award-winning vintner, the company's confections have won a following among food professionals and home cooks alike. Now, in their first cookbook, the duo shares their passion with the world.The Essence of Chocolate features more than one hundred spectacular -- and often simple -- recipes drawn from the Scharffen Berger files and from two dozen top pastry chefs. It is divided into three sections: "Intensely Chocolate," which includes such decadent treats as That Chocolate Cake, in which the sumptuous flavor of chocolate is the star; "Essentially Chocolate," with lighter chocolate desserts like White Velvet Cake with Milk Chocolate Ganache or Brown Butter Blondies; and "A Hint of Chocolate," with recipes that use chocolate's spicier qualities to their best effect, like Vegetarian Chili and John's Cocoa Rub. And all will work magnificently with any high-quality chocolate. Filled with helpful tips, sumptuous photographs, and the story of how chocolate is really made, here is a book that is every bit as seductive as its subject.Robert Steinberg had been practicing medicine for twenty years when he went to France in 1994 to explore chocolate making, then returned to his own kitchen to create the first versions of what would be Scharffen Berger chocolate. He lives in San Francisco and until recently practicedat the San Francisco Free Clinic. John Scharffenberger founded Scharffenberger Cellars, one of the premier sparkling wine manufacturers in the United States. He sold his interest in the winery, and in 1996 he and Steinberg founded Scharffen Berger Chocolate Maker. Scharffenberger lives in Berkeley and Mendocino County.

    Celebrated pastry chef Regan Daley unravels the mystery of the baking process, explaining the "how" and "why" behind the components that go into making the perfect dessert, and provides the tools and information home bakers need to create delicious recipes of their own—in their own sweet kitchens.Regan shows us that anyone, from complete culinary virgins to accomplished dessert-makers, anyone can make a fantastic dessert. The secret is in the ingredients. Her more than 140 original recipes, straightforward enough for any home baker to prepare, focusing on simple techniques with an emphasis on high-quality ingredients, range from the awfully impressive, Guava Cheesecake or Quince and Brioche Bread Pudding with Dried Sour Cherries, to the familiar—Really, REALLY Fudgey Brownies or World's Sexiest Sundae.For experts, this book will serve as a comprehensive, professional-quality reference of ingredients from basic to rare and an incredible collection of unique flavorings. For the novice, it's a practical and palatable guide to the once mysterious art of baking.

    In this compact volume, he gives a succinct cacao botany lesson, explains the process of chocolate making, runs through chocolate terminology and types, presents information on health benefits, offers an evaluating and buying primer, profiles the world's top chocolate makers and chocolatiers (with a whole chapter dedicated to Paris alone!), and shares dozens of little-known factoids in sidebars throughout the book. More than 30 of his favorite chocolate recipes‚Äîfrom Black-Bottom Cupcakes to Homemade Rocky Road Candy, Orange and Rum Chocolate Mousse Cake to Double Chocolate Chip Espresso Cookies‚Äîare icing on the cake. His extensive resource section (with websites for international ordering) can bring the world's best chocolate to every door. A self-avowed chocoholic, Lebovitz nibbles chocolate every day‚Äîand with THE GREAT BOOK OF CHOCOLATE in hand, he figures the rest of us will too. A compact connoisseur's guide, with recipes, to today's cutting-edge array of chocolates and chocolate makers from former Chez Panisse pastry chef David Lebovitz. Includes more than 50 location and food photographs. Chocolate‚Äîlike its predecessors coffee, wine, and bread‚Äîis the latest darling of the food scene.The New York Times on Lebovitz's first book: ‚ÄúInstructions are clear and simple, and the recipes are so good that it becomes clear what a master baker he is.‚Äù

    As a writer for food magazines, women's magazines, and newspapers, including The New York Times, Rose Levy Beranbaum's trademark is her ability to reduce the most complex techniques to easy-to-follow recipes. Rose makes baking a joy. This is the definitive work on cakes by the country's top cake baker.The Cake Bible shows how to:Mix a buttery, tender layer cake in under five minutes with perfect results every timeMake the most fabulous chocolate cake you ever imagined with just three ingredientsFind recipes for every major type of cake, from pancakes to four-tiered wedding cakesMake cakes with less sugar but maximum flavor and textureMake many low- to no- cholesterol, low-saturated-fat recipes

    Nigella's deliciously reassuring and mouthwatering cookbook demonstrates that it's not terribly difficult to bake a batch of muffins or a layer cake, but the appreciation and satisfaction they bring are disproportionately high. At last, a book that understands our anxieties, feeds our fantasies, and puts cakes, pies, pastries, breads, and biscuits back into our own kitchens.

    But for the first time, chocolate cakes, brownies, truffles, puddings, ice creams, and more are within reach: dairy-free, organic, fair-trade, and sublime. Author, baking instructor, and vegan powerhouse Fran Costigan has dedicated years to satisfying her sweet tooth while keeping it vegan. Through experimentation and long hours in the kitchen, she's recreated some of her favorite chocolate desserts as better-for-you interpretations that pass the taste test: Bittersweet Chocolate Truffles (with a variety of flavor variations), a Brooklyn Blackout Layer Cake, a Sacher Torte, even chocolate Moon Pies! Her detailed instructions make for professional-quality outcomes every time: it's like a personal baking class, right in your kitchen. The perfect gift for anyone with a sweet tooth, Vegan Chocolate is sure to become an instant classic.

    In a single, illustrated volume, Nick Malgieri, one of America's preeminent bakers and baking teachers, leads cooks through the simple art of creating an international assortment of delicious sweet and savory baked goods. Here are the best recipes for breads, including such quick ones as Buttermilk Corn Bread, Irish Soda Bread, Classic Southern Biscuits, and Currant Tea Scones, as well as such delicious yeast-risen breads as Italian Bread Rings, Swiss Rye Bread, Challah, and English Muffins. Malgieri also offers recipes for savory treats like Old-Fashioned Chicken Pie, Pepper and Onion Frittata Tart, Cheese Quiche, and Rosemary Focaccia; and for sweet pastries ranging from puff pastries--Apple Turnovers, Banana Feuilletés with Caramel Sauce, Brioches, Strawberry Savarin, and Croissants--to pies and tarts, cobblers, and cookies of every stripe--drop, bar, rolled, and filled; brownies, macaroons, and rugelach. Cakes, too, are here, from layered to rolled, from angel to devil's food.The recipes in How to Bake are clear and methodical. Master recipes explain all the steps to making a classic dish. They are frequently followed by creative variations so that the baker's palate and skills will always be accommodated and challenged. Start out with a simple spice cake, for example, and transform it, under Malgieri's reassuring guidance, into a lavishly decorated celebration cake.In addition to an exhaustive and tempting selection of recipes, Malgieri offers clear, detailed instructions, interweaving techniques and helpful sidebars: how to make a pastry bag out of parchment paper; what baking pans to buy; mastering pie and cake toppings; learning to decorate a cake so it looks as if it came from the bakery; and scores of other helpful tips. All this is punctuated with precise explanatory illustrations and thirty-two pages of luscious color photographs to inspire and guide the baker. How to Bake is a one-volume "bible" for bakers.

    A culinary compendium packed with more than 200 foolproof recipes for the best baked goods, Martha Stewart s Baking Handbook takes readers by the hand and guides them through the process of creating an irresistible variety of cakes, cookies, pies, tarts, breads, and much more. This essential addition to every cook s library is rich with tips, techniques, and the mouthwatering and stunning recipes for which Martha Stewart is so well known. Covering a delectable array of topics from simple to sophisticated, including biscuits, muffins, scones, cookies, layer cakes, specialty cakes, sweet and savory pies and tarts, and pastries and breads, she provides a dazzlingly delicious yet crystal-clear, vividly illustrated repertoire of recipes. There are cakes that are elegant enough for formal occasions, such as showers, weddings, and dinner parties, and basic favorites meant to be enjoyed every day and then passed down through the generations. Every chapter includes indispensable visual equipment glossaries and features vital make-ahead information and storage techniques. Organized for maximum clarity and practicality, the handbook also offers step-by-step how-to photographs that demystify even the most complex and nuanced techniques. These culinary building blocks will turn good bakers into great bakers, and make great bakers even better. Filled with time-honored classics, such as Marble Cake with White-Chocolate Glaze, Apple Pie, Challah, Baba au Rhum, and Croissants, as well as lots of new surprises, Martha Stewart s Baking Handbook will be reached for again and again, no matter the season or occasion. Here, you will find the recipes and how-tos for the popovers you dream about, and for the simple crumb cake that you always want to whip up on Sunday morning, and for the double-chocolate brownie cookies that will make you a bigger hero with the after-school crowd, and for the citrus bars that you could only find in that little bakery that s no longer under the same management. . . . Baking offers comfort and joy and something tangible to taste and savor. We all hope that these recipes provide you with years of pleasure. Martha Stewart"

    Among the 175 recipes featured are Blueberry-Cornmeal Cakes, Tamarind-Glazed Mango Napoleons, Truffled Rice Pudding, Chilled Rhubarb Soup, Earl Grey Ice Cream, Chocolate Espresso Terrine, and Goat-Cheese Cheesecake. 85 full-color photos.

    Now imagine the same fruit distilled and carbonated for a refreshing soda, slow-roasted for a reinvented strawberry shortcake, made into a creamy strawberry ice cream and a chewy strawberry leather, and combined with coconut cream and crisp chocolate pastry. Alone, each dessert is a taste of paradise, but together this “fourplay,” or tasting, created by Johnny Iuzzini, superstar pastry chef of the celebrated four-star restaurant Jean Georges in New York, is a sophisticated explosion of a familiar flavor that begins with the taste of strawberry rich on your tongue and ends with an effervescent tingle in your nose. Far from the conventional slice of cake at the end of a meal, Johnny’s seasonal creations—four mini desserts in a quartet of complementary flavors and textures—are a culinary adventure. In Dessert FourPlay, he shares his secrets and inspirations, delivering standout recipes for incredible desserts that can be served alone or combined into his signature fourplay groupings, creating the perfect sweet finale for any meal.With the home cook in mind, Johnny offers tips on simplifying professional recipes and provides basic recipes for transcendent cakes, cookies, tuiles, ice creams, sorbets, granités, and more. These building blocks can be used to create magnificent multifaceted desserts, or they can be perfect desserts by themselves. Some recipes have surprising versatility: the shiny smooth chocolate glaze Johnny uses to ice cakes doubles as the ultimate hot fudge sauce; a lemony madeleine batter becomes a layer in a cake.Iuzzini pairs cool with hot, crispy with creamy, sweet with spicy, and the expected—chocolate, strawberries, and cinnamon—with the unexpected—chiles, beets, and chocolatey puffs. The result: desserts that refresh, inspire, and satisfy beyond expectations. Dessert FourPlay invigorates all the senses and inspires home cooks to create innovative desserts of their own.

    Why spend time sorting through the millions of cookie recipes available in books, magazines, and on the Internet? Isn’t it easier just to remember 1-2-3? That’s the ratio of ingredients that always make a basic, delicious cookie dough: 1 part sugar, 2 parts fat, and 3 parts flour. From there, add anything you want—chocolate, lemon and orange zest, nuts, poppy seeds, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, almond extract, or peanut butter, to name a few favorite additions. Replace white sugar with brown for a darker, chewier cookie. Add baking powder and/or eggs for a lighter, airier texture. Ratios are the starting point from which a thousand variations begin. Ratios are the simple proportions of one ingredient to another. Biscuit dough is 3:1:2—or 3 parts flour, 1 part fat, and 2 parts liquid. This ratio is the beginning of many variations, and because the biscuit takes sweet and savory flavors with equal grace, you can top it with whipped cream and strawberries or sausage gravy. Vinaigrette is 3:1, or 3 parts oil to 1 part vinegar, and is one of the most useful sauces imaginable, giving everything from grilled meats and fish to steamed vegetables or lettuces intense flavor. Cooking with ratios will unchain you from recipes and set you free. With thirty-three ratios and suggestions for enticing variations, Ratio is the truth of cooking: basic preparations that teach us how the fundamental ingredients of the kitchen—water, flour, butter and oils, milk and cream, and eggs—work. Change the ratio and bread dough becomes pasta dough, cakes become muffins become popovers become crepes. As the culinary world fills up with overly complicated recipes and never-ending ingredient lists, Michael Ruhlman blasts through the surplus of information and delivers this innovative, straightforward book that cuts to the core of cooking. Ratio provides one of the greatest kitchen lessons there is—and it makes the cooking easier and more satisfying than ever.

    Wintersweet encourages readers to make use of fresh, local ingredients for warming seasonal desserts. While summer farmers' markets are always overflowing with ripe produce, there's plenty to be had from November to March: squashes and pumpkins, parsnips and carrots, apples, pears, citrus of all types, and feel-good ingredients like nuts, cheese, and chocolate.The fresh and rustic recipes in Wintersweet push the envelope of traditional winter desserts like pumpkin or apple pies with such delicacies as Pear Cranberry Clafouti, Spicy Prune Cake with Penuche Frosting, Tangelo Sorbet, and Goat Cheese Cake with Dried Cherry Compote. Each chapter is devoted to different ingredients, ranging from Persimmons, Pomegranates, and Cranberries to Citrus, Cheese, and Dried Fruits, allowing readers to experiment with new and exciting ingredients for complex and delicious flavors. They taste even better when they can be found near your own backyard; Donroe provides resources for finding the best local farmers' markets and agricultural centers near you. Perfect for holiday gatherings or to warm the belly on a cold night, Wintersweet is the perfect dessert companion to make the year's coldest season a bit more festive.

    She combed through community cookbooks and searched out long-lost heirloom recipes, sure-handedly reworking every recipe in her own kitchen. THE ALL-AMERICAN COOKIE BOOK celebrates regional gems from every corner of the country: Pennsylvania Dutch Soft Sugar Cookies, New York Black and Whites, New Mexican Biscochitos, Key Lime Frosties from Florida, and Mocha Espresso Wafers from Seattle. A sophisticated hazelnut chocolate sandwich cookie that was the closely guarded secret of an Oregon hostess is here, and so is a delightfully crisp (and easy to roll out) old-fashioned gingerbread cookie recreated from a handwritten 1880 notebook. Homespun classics abound: Chocolate Whoopie Pies, Caramel Apple Crumb Bars, Chocolate Chunk Brownies, and Caramel-Frosted Brown Sugar Drops. The collection also features devastatingly delicious contemporary creations like Chewy Chocolate Chunk Monster Cookies and Cranberry-Cherry Icebox Ribbons. For children and adults alike, one of the most exciting chapters will be the lavishly illustrated “Cookie Decorating and Crafts,” which includes everything from simple projects like Christmas cookies and Chocolate Gingerbread Bears to an elaborate gingerbread house. As Nancy Baggett tells the story of America’s heritage, she slips in fascinating bits of history, showing the evolution of our homegrown baking traditions.