“All you need is love. But a little chocolate now and then doesn’t hurt.” Charles M. Schulz
A 9x13x2” baking dish is the only pan you’ll need to make every sweet recipe in Edd Kimber’s latest book, “One Tin Bakes.” For those of you who may not know, Edd Kimber is a British baker, food writer and the winner of the first Great British Bake Off competition. With this book, home bakers can create Raspberry Cheesecake Streusel Squares, Peanut Butter Brookies, ‘Coffee’ Coffee Cake with an espresso swirl and Apple Fritter Monkey Bread. Chocolate lovers will want to bake Edd’s favorite dessert which is the Milk Chocolate Caramel Sheet Cake sprinkled with nuts and cacao nibs.
On the front cover of this next book is a gorgeous layer cake adorned with multi-colored pastel buttercream flowers. It is the first of many luscious cakes, cupcakes and other confectionery delights in Bobbie Lloyd’s “The Magnolia Bakery Handbook.” Bobbie is very generous with her baking knowledge, instructions and techniques so that home bakers have opportunity to achieve picture-worthy results. Besides dazzling cakes, there are cookies, bars, muffins, scones and a chapter dedicated to banana pudding. This pudding chapter features flavor combinations such as Java Chip Banana, Peanut Butter Banana, Salted Caramel Banana and Pumpkin-Gingersnap Banana Pudding.
Of all desserts, ice cream is the most accommodating and versatile. A scoop dresses up a serving of cake or pie, it can be sandwiched between two cookies, doused in hot fudge or scooped into a waffle cone and eaten before it melts. Rose Levy Beranbaum, who is best known for her baking books, has confessed her love for ice cream. “Rose’s Ice Cream Bliss” contains the secrets for making super creamy frozen desserts without any iciness. Flavors range from the familiar vanilla, strawberry, and cookies ‘n’ cream to the more unique Silken Black Sesame, Turkish Stretchy and Red Wine ice cream.
If you were to choose a favorite pie, what would it be? Maybe it’s banana cream, chocolate silk, pecan or deep dish apple. Whichever it is, you’ll find it and many more within Ken Haedrich’s book, “Pie Academy.” Creating a pie crust from scratch is easy when you follow Ken’s clear and simple directions provided at the beginning of the book. There are 25 different pie doughs including crumb crusts that don’t involve a rolling pin. For variety, there are 255 delicious fillings to place in those crusts like Blueberry-Peach, Maple Pumpkin, Sour Cream-Blackberry, Snickers Brownie and Coffee Mud Pie with an Oreo Crust. January 23rd was National Pie Day. However, it’s not too late to make one in honor of Pi Day on March 14th.
These cookbooks and many more are available now through A.K. Smiley Public Library’s “Books-To-Go” program. For more information, please visit our website at www.akspl.org or call 909-798-7565.