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Author: David Lebovitz |
Room For Dessert : 110 Recipes for Cakes, Custards, Souffles, Tarts, Pies, Cobblers, Sorbets, Sherbets, Ice Creams, Cookies, Candies, and Cordials |
Editorial Review:
Always Save Room for Dessert
Especially if it's one of David Lebovitz's signature showstoppers. In his first cookbook, Room for Dessert, he offers more than 110 recipes for sweet everythings. You'll find sensational cakes, custards, soufflés, tarts, pies, cobblers, sorbets, ice creams, cookies, and candies, each designed to tempt the diner.
In the introduction David writes of one of his earliest dessert memories--a bowl of freshly picked blackberries, perfectly ripe, topped with a dollop of sour cream and a sprinkle of sugar. "When you search out the best ingredients, do as little to them as possible, and serve them in a straightforward way, the presentation follows naturally," he writes. "A glossy custard looks best with a, swirl of whipped cream; a cool tapioca pudding looks enticing when it's accompanied by its natural complements--tropical fruits and shaved coconut."
With such an aesthetic, David eventually made his way to Berkeley's legendary Chez Panisse, establishing himself as a pastry cook under the tutelage of Alice Waters and founding pastry chef Lindsay Shere. He shares, the Chez Panisse commitment to fresh, seasonal exceptional ingredients, presented simply and unpretensiously, at their peak flavor. As Alice Waters writes in the books foreward: "David is one of those rare pastry chefs who knows that in desserts, as in all art, the cliché is true: sometimes less is more."
After leaving Chez Panisse, Lebovitz served as pastry chef at Bruce Cost's critically acclaimed Monsoon, experimenting with a wide variety of Asian ingredients and flavors to create more remarkable desserts. Home cooks as well as professionals have been clamoring for the Fresh Ginger Cake recipe, which, finally, is published here. It so often appears at Bay Area restaurants that it's frequently listed on menus as "Dave's Ginger Cake." Make it once and you'll immediately want to add it to your list of tried and true standbys. David offers comforting yet sophisticated versions of everyone's favorites, including Gingersnaps, Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies, and Coconut Macaroons, surefire hits for people of all ages. For grown-ups, there are homemade liqueurs and cordials. Add to this delectable ice creams and frozen treats, as well as jams, preserves, and candied fruits, and you get an idea of the incredible scope of David Lebovitz's talents.
Beautifully illustrated with seventy-five full-color photographs by San Francisco's Michael Lamotte, Room for Dessert is as stunning to look at as it is to cook from. With this remarkable debut, David Lebovitz offers his expert hand to guide a new audience of readers and home dessert makers.
Baking books abound, but none presents a more mouthwatering selection of contemporary sweets than David Lebovitz's Room for Dessert. A former pastry cook at Chez Panisse in California, Lebovitz offers more than 110 recipes for cakes, curds, soufflés, tarts, pies, cobblers, ice creams, cookies, and more, beautifully depicted by color photos. He also manages, as few other baking book authors do, to provide lucid technical guidance, so even novice bakers should have success with his recipes. Readers searching for a solid collection of doable desserts, from homey to dress-up (but never too bedecked) will find the book is just what they're looking for.
Featured are a number of Lebovitz's most acclaimed desserts, including Meyer Lemon Semifreddo, Butternut Squash Pie, and Orange Almond Bread Pudding. Readers will also want to try his modernized Marjolaine (chocolate-covered layers of vanilla and praline creams sandwiched between crisp nut meringues), Fresh Ginger Cake, Mexican Chocolate Ice Cream, and Brown Sugar-Pecan Shortbread, among others. With a chapter on liqueurs and preserves--there's a recipe for a luscious pineapple ginger marmalade, for example--and a presentation of basic formulas that includes dessert sauces (Lebovitz's soft-candied citrus peel topping is a standout), the book, wide in scope yet straightforward in detail, delivers. --Arthur Boehm
Customer Reviews:
Avg. Customer Rating: 5.0 / 5.0 
Best Ginger Cake Ever:
I love this book.
Intense flavors, great technique, baking I can manage as a non-baker.
I also have the "In The Sweet Kitchen" tome, but find this is the book I return to . . .
Good mix of different types of sweets, great basics for important fancy things, very versatile.
Great little gift for anyone:
If there's someone in your life who likes to cook, this is a great gift for any small occasion. My gift recipient was very appreciative and said the recipes were very good.
Thoughtful, Informative, Delicious, Doable Desserts.:
This is David Lebovitz' first of two books on desserts. The second is devoted entirely to desserts made with fruits. This volume is more general, including recipes for just about every different type of dessert you may think of. The collection is weighted in favor of recipes which would work well in a restaurant, so the number of recipes typical to the home are less common than you may find in a more general book on dessert baking. That is not to say this is a poor book. In fact, I am happy I reviewed...more info
Best book for dessert lovers:
I would also give this 10 stars if I could! This is one of the best cookbooks I have ever purchased. I have a big sweet tooth and have accummulated quite a collection of cookbooks on cakes, cookies, chocolate, etc. This book covers a large variety of sweets, from cookies (the best chocolate-chip cookie recipe I have ever tried) to sorbet (chocolate coconut sorbet, sangria sorbet) to ice cream (butterscotch ice cream with hickory nuts) marmalades and jams (plum strawberry), sauces (caramel, blackberry),...more info
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