Books » Baking Books

50 easy palate-pleasers from 1 simple batter render cakes for every occasion. This book provides readers with fresh decorating ideas and alternatives to traditional frosting.

Whether you need a coffee cake for a mid-morning pick me up, or a show stopper for a formal gathering, this book provides ample ideas across the board.

With easy-to-follow steps, using readily available ingredients, each recipe has been tried and tested by the Good Food team to encure fantastic results every time you cook.

The ultimate collection of cake and pie recipes

Find the perfect cake or pie to suit any occasion in 250 Best Cakes and Pies -- from chocolate cakes, cheesecakes, coffeecakes, sponge cakes, fruit pies, cream pies along with frostings, fillings and glazes. Also included are detailed and easy-to-follow instructions for preparing perfect pie crusts.

Create bakery classics like Boston Cream Pie, New York Style Cheesecake and Lemon Cream Meringue Pie. Take a new spin on an old classic with Baked Alaska Loaf or the home-inspired goodness of Mom's Sour Cream Chocolate Layer Cake and Upside-Down Apple Pie. An after-school special that everyone can enjoy is easy and delicious Pineapple Carrot Cake.

There are extensive baking tips and techniques. Novice cooks soon find that baking a cake or pie is not the challenge once imagined. Brody's baking experience and wonderfully inventive recipes make 250 Best Cakes and Pies an important baking reference.

Just about everybody loves muffins. They're quick and easy to make. And they're the perfect size for a quick breakfast or snack. In fact, if you're like most people, chances are you already have a few muffin recipes that you use all the time.

Imagine your best muffin recipe - and multiply it by 250! That's what you get in "The 250 Best Muffin Recipes." The best tasting, most nutritious, easiest-to- make muffins are specially selected from the personal collection of muffin expert, Esther Brody. These recipes feature standards such as classic Bran Muffins and Banana Muffins, as well as delicious variations that include Citrus Double Bran Muffins, Tangerine Bran Muffins, Banana Yogurt Muffins and Breakfast Special Banana Chip Muffins.

These muffin recipes incorporate a wide range of delicious, healthy ingredients, everything from apples to zucchini, to create nutritious, low-fat treats that the whole family will enjoy. Try Blueberry Buttermilk Bran Muffins, Carrot Raisin Muffins, Lo-Cal Cornmeal Muffins, Pineapple Rye Muffins, Chocolate Cheesecake Muffins and Caramel-Topped Mega Muffins.

The book also contains a wealth of useful baking tips and shopping suggestions, as well as nutritional advice on muffins suitable for special dietary requirements. Esther Brody has been making muffins all her life. She has developed over 600 great muffin recipes and this is just a sampling.

The ultimate family dessert collection.

For sweet satisfaction and delight, there is nothing like homemade cookies, brownies, bars or squares. Fun to eat and easy to prepare, they make the perfect portable snack and dessert.

500 Best Cookies, Bars and Squares includes a wide variety of recipes and flavors -- ranging from chocolate-based brownies and fruit bars and squares to an extraordinary range of cookies. The cookie recipes include the classic as well as variations on traditional favorites: - Classic Chocolate Chip Cookies - Lemon Shortbread - Farm-Style Oatmeal Cookies, Greek Almond Cookies and Crunchy Peanut Butter Cookies - Christmas Fruit Cookies, Cherry Valentine Cookies and Hanukah Sugar Cookies - Caramel Double Nut Squares and Favorite Glazed Lemon Raspberry Bars - Rhubarb Crisp Squares - Old-Fashioned Butter Tart Bars and Classic Chocolate Nut Brownies.

Each recipe is easy and delicious. The author also includes her time-tested personal baking tips and techniques.

There's truly nothing sweeter than a homemade cookie, but when it's creatively decorated, that cookie can become a tasty work of art. THE ART OF COOKIES delivers an imaginative collection of decorating ideas and designs, focusing on themes such as birthdays, weddings, baby showers, Christmas, Hanukkah, and Easter. Be serious. Be whimsical. Be adventurous or traditional. Let your imagination go and your fingers fly. If it doesn't turn out exactly right, who cares? Eat it and make another! The idea is to decorate, originate, elaborate-if it can be done on a canvas, it can be done on a cookie. Great art and great taste-what could be a better combination?

Living in splendid isolation on the shores of Kenya, a blind hermit finds that his knowledge of poisonous seashells can save lives-forcing a haunting reckoning . . . Paradise turns out to be a mixed blessing when a crafty old businessman retires to Miami Beach . . . A young globetrotter winds up stranded in a Thailand beach shack, determined to shed the baggage of his Western identity . . . In these and seven other stories, The Beach Book gathers a seminal selection of fiction set on beaches around this big blue globe. Internationally acclaimed authors like Gabriel García Márquez and Isaac Bashevis Singer, as well as emerging voices such as Anthony Doerr and Frederick Reiken, have all written eloquently about the sea's siren song. Why does the beach seem to promise nothing short of paradise on earth? The Beach Book is completely waterproof. Put it right in your tote bag along with your sunscreen and beach ball. It's the perfect companion for a day of sand and surf.

Marcy Goldman has always been a bit of a maverick, whether making her wildy popular "Lawsuit" Buttermilk Muffins (a story-and a recipe-you don't want to miss) or leading the online charge with her Web site, betterbaking.com, cohosted with Webmaster Yvan Huneault. An underground favorite when it was launched four years ago, BetterBaking quickly blossomed into a resource praised by the New York Times for its superior design, fail-safe recipes, and entertaining, informative essays. With over 150 recipes and a bounty of the kind of practical baking advice that has earned the site its devout following, THE BEST OF BETTERBAKING.COM captures all the flavor and charm that make BetterBaking such an engaging, dynamic depot for bakers. Country-loaf classicists and exotic cheese-and-sundried-tomato-bread enthusiasts alike will find recipes to add to their repertoire, along with Marcy's expert, and cheerfully opinionated, insight into ingredients, equipment, and techniques.

"The Book of Bread . . . is a treasure. Written by two of the best-known food authorities in the U.S., the book makes the baking of bread a true labor of love."--San Francisco Chronicle