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Rating: 
Summary: The most-used book in my kitchen
Review: This cookbook is wonderful - get your hands on a copy! It made a dessert chef out of me. I'm now known for my annual Cranberry Chocolate Cheesecake that I make every Thanksgiving. The author explains in easy terms how chocolate behaves in the kitchen and how to handle it, so your work looks like it came out of an expensive bakery.
Rating: 
Summary: Mediocre Chocolate Dessert Cookbook
Review: This was a rather disappointing cookbook. The author is a professional baker, and this book is very good collection of recipes. Due to the incomplete/wrong recipe procedures, however, I advice you to avoid this one.When it comes to ingredients, there are several errors. Cocoa powder is usually not 25% cocoa butter (though it can be; American ones tend to be 10-20%). USDA grade A eggs are hard to find in my area, but AA eggs can be substituted without problem, though the author does say anything about this. "Unbleached flour" is not 14% protein; he is probably thinking of bread flour. The advice to line baking pans with wax paper is bad; sometimes you can do it, but it depends on the brand; it is better to use just parchment paper (if you do not have it and do baking, then you need to buy some before you do any more baking). Several recipes require peanut butter, but he does not state if he is using salted or unsalted; the taste of the final product changes dramatically depending on which one you use. The procedures for the recipes are also problematic. Many recipes require folding, but the author does not have a description on how to do this critical step. He sometimes advices adding liquid to "reach the desired frosting consistency", but does not say what this means. His pound cake recipe is the goofy one that uses a French meringue (even though he does not say so, that is what the recipe is attempting to describe). His instructions for melting chocolate are not detailed enough for the beginning home cook. He says to bake several recipes to a "moist crumb", but never describes what this means. Sacher torte should never be refrigerated. The instructions on baking a Dacquoise (meringue disk) are too vague. Ganaches and puddings that use cream should never be stored at room temperature overnight; either use them that day, refrigerate them (they can always be warmed up to soften the next day), or throw them out. The recipe for Rigo Jansci is missing a step, and also uses a non-standard size jelly roll pan, and the author does not state how to convert the recipe amounts to a standard size. Tart crusts that have chocolate are almost impossible to tell if they are "lightly browned" by just looking at it, and the author does not give an alternate method of testing doneness. Chocolate Walnut Torte filling is a caramel, but the author does not give adequate instructions or precautions for this dangerous step. It contains chapters on: old fashioned cakes, miscellaneous sweets (including a couple of candy recipes), european things (my personal favorite chapter), recipes that made the author a famous caterer (some of these I plan to put into my personal private repetoire), and soda fountain treats (the most valuable, as the author was a soda jerk at the legendary and now defunct Blum's). It contains many of my personal favorits, like rocky road and a chocolate cake that you mix right in the baking pan (look, ma, no dishes!). In the end, I like this collection of recipes very much. The ones I tried were very good, and there were only a couple of outright failures. Because the instructions are not reliable, however, I recommend that you avoid this book. If you are an experienced home baker or professional, then go ahead and get it; the mistakes the author makes are fairly obvious and easy to correct. You will also end up with a paperback book filled with many recipes that you will want to try.
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