Classic Home Desserts: A Treasury of Heirloom and Contemporary Recipes from Around the World - Hardcover

In chapters covering every conceivable homemade dessert type, which, besides those listed above, includes sweet pancakes and dumplings, cookies, creams, fools, jellies, tarts, and more, Sax offers a repertoire that's both old-fashioned, and, where desirable, innovative. (But discreetly so: he likes to add a little fresh ginger to his plum crisp, for example.) The recipe titles tell all: Southern-Style Peach and Raspberry Cobbler, Peanut Butter Pie with Fudge Topping, The World's Best Lemon Tart, Double Chocolate Pudding, and Split-Level Lime Chiffon Pie are representative American offerings. Old World specialties include Sephardic Walnut Cake with Honey-Lemon Syrup, Ricotta Strudel from Trieste, and Custardy Prune Pudding or Far Breton, one of Brittany's best-loved sweets, among others. A full repertoire of cookies, from New Mexican Anise Christmas Cookies to 1950s Pecan Puffs, makes the book a great holiday baking resource. With information on techniques, historical and anecdotal notes, and reprints of old recipes, the book is a trove of good information as well as great dessert-making direction. --Arthur Boehm

For the better part of a decade, Richard Sax has searched out 350 of the most treasured home desserts from around the globe. The result is the most comprehensive collection of its kind yet assembled.

'These are the desserts made at home by mothers and grandmothers rather than by professional pastry chefs,' Sax writes. 'Those included are only the best in each category-the things you can bring to your table with confidence, knowing they will be eaten to the last crumb.'

Every dessert you've ever wanted to make is here:
--Fruit cobblers, crisps and compotes
--Puddings, creams and souffls
--Pies and tarts of every description
--Sauces and ice creams
--Simple pastries
--Plain cakes, fancy cakes and coffee cakes

Recipes include: Southern-Style Peach and Raspberry Cobbler, Frozen Cappuccino, New Orleans Bread Pudding with Whiskey Sauce, The World's Best Lemon Tart, Claremont Diner Coconut Cream Pie and Schrafft's Hot Fudge Sauce.

Although many of the recipes are delightfully old-fashioned, Sax has put his own innovative touches on others without compromising their ease or authenticity, adding a little fresh ginger to a plum crisp, or white chocolate to a banana cream pie.

But this is far more than a collection of recipes. Profiles of cooks and their recollections, essays on the evolution of classic desserts, and literary quotations make this as much a valuable historical and cultural exploration as a cookbook.

Also includes:
--Tips on how to avoid common mistakes in dessert-making
--A glossary of essential baking equipment, cookware and gadgets
--48 full-color photographs by noted photographer Alan Richardson