Making the world a little sweeter one pastry tip at at time.
The History of Sweets by Paul Chrystal is a fun and detailed look at the history of candy and sweets with colorful old advertisements sprinkled all throughout the book. Chrystal did a great job researching not only the history of sweets, but detailing the UK …
Breaking Breads by Uri Scheft gives spirit to old favorites, and is a reflection of the author’s travels. Traditional challah, laminated breads, flatbreads, and stuffed breads are all greatly described and made, and he mixes contemporary ingredients with traditional methods. And it’s not just about …
What is “Real Bread?” According to the The Real Bread Campaign, co-founded in 2008 by Andrew Whitley and the charity, Sustain, it is bread that is made without artificial additives or processing agents. At the very basic definition, bread contains just flour and water, and …
Looking for quick and easy old-fashioned cookbooks for baking (or even giving) this holiday season? The ABC series from Peter Pauper Press may have just you are looking for. Peter Pauper Press recently is releasing several of its older titles from the 50s and 60s …
My latest find at the library’s ‘Friends of the Library’ store – an older cookie recipe book from the sixties. The Art of Making Good Cookies Plain and Fancy (Annette Laslett Ross and Jean Adams Disney, Doubleday, 1963) is a hardback covered recipe book with …
Following suit with a review of The True History of Chocolate on the Pastry Sampler blog, I’d thought I’d talk about Chocolate and Cocoa Recipes for Old School Pastry, a little chocolate cookbook published in 1909 by Miss Parloa. It included Home Made Candy Recipes …
After reading Sugar Baby (see the review here), I was excited to read another book from Bullock-Prado. And I wasn’t disappointed (except for all the errata, see more below) when I had the opportunity to read Bake It Like You Mean It. From her own words, this …
There are quite a few beginning baking books new but the Get Started series by Doring Kindersly takes the approach of starting small and ending big. Get Started: Baking begins with this note: Build Your Course: This book is divided into broad sections that allow …
Sugar Baby is a comprehensive cookbook revolving around sugar. It all starts in the beginning with the first chapter ‘A Brief History of the World (As It Pertains to Sugar)’, and explores the world of sugar from there. It is written by Gesine Bullock-Prado and if …
Chloe’s Vegan Desserts is a different kind of vegan baking cookbook. Her finished products resemble non-vegan textures by using baking science rather than relying on simply substituting ingredients. Coscarelli is the author of Chloe’s Kitchen and was the first vegan winner of Cupcake Wars. The …
Juliet Stallwood’s hobby making novelty cakes for her kids turned into a career in pastry and cake decorating. She went from creating fun themed cakes to cookies and ‘fondant fancies’. Stallwood’s website Cake and Biscuits and her book have the same feel, only the book …
Baked goods such as chocolate cupcakes and apple pie bring to mind family favorites and sweet treats. Is it possible to bake desserts like these without refined sugar? That was Laura Martin’s goal when she set out asking her culinary friends for recipes of baked …
Looking for a little stocking stuffer this year for the baker in the house? Pop.O.Licious Cake Pops by Joey Dellino is the perfect book. This book is a hardback, pocket-sized cookbook packed with over 40 different cake pop creations. The spiral binding makes it easy …
To ‘spike’ something in cooking is to add an alcohol to it. In the case of most items, especially spiked desserts, it generally means that those foods are adults-only. Spiked Desserts, from Fox Chapel Publishing, is a dessert book where every recipe is spiked with …
I’m a candy fan. I’ll admit it. There is something decadent about spending time in the kitchen sans flour and yeast and just create something un-wholesome, just for the comfort and love of candy. Unless you argue that chocolate is a power food, then, well, …
Macaroons – those little sweet cookies with the hamburger-like appearance. If you’ve ever tried one, you know how tasty and addicting they are. But if you’ve ever made them, you can appreciate the work that goes into them, and savor them as they are eaten. …