Synopses & Reviews
Dramatic, seductive, playful, infinite in its variety, otherworldly in its taste: It's chocolate, and here's all the impetus you need to indulge your passion for it every day of the year. The beloved Alice Medrich, renowned for impeccable recipes that produce stellar results, has written
Chocolate Holidays especially for people who love to bake but don't have enough hours in the day. Without compromising on flavor, texture, or ingredients, she pares down the preparation steps, teaches us resraint, and comes up with fifty amazing recipes, each a little jewel of elegance and simplicty.
An ideal year in chocolate might start with a New Year's brunch starring Chocolate Blini with Berry Caviar. Then there are Valentine's Day chocolate scones and St. Patrick's Day Irish Coffee Chocolate Mousse. And of course any "holiday" your imagination can conjure up is a perfect reason to indulge: perhaps a decadently rich hot chocolate served in demitasse portions to exorcise those end-of-February blues.
Spring might whisper chocolate Giant Krispy Easter Treats or a Passover Chocolate Nut Sponge Torte, or white chocolate-glazed Apricot Orange Cupcakes for a wedding shower. Summer suggests fruit and ice cream desserts such as the Independence Day red, white, and blue sundaes, followed by autumn's pies and tarts laden with chocolate and nuts. And no matter what you've been putting on the table for Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays past, it will be out-chocolated by Alice's Chocolate Cranberry Pudding and her Chocolate Hazelnut Roulade—both unequivocally year-end musts.
In Chocolate Holidays, Medrich unlocks the secrets of our favorite sweet, offering chocolate desserts for every season, for every reason.
First published in hardcover as A Year in Chocolate (Warner Books, 2001)
Synopsis
Chocolate Holidays is the ultimate chocolate indulgence—any time of year. Fifty simple, elegant, amazing-tasting chocolate desserts—for New Year's Day or Mother's Day, Passover or Christmas, or any day worth celebrating.
Chocolate secrets and her very favorite festive recipes—from the award-winning "queen of chocolate," Alice Medrich.
Includes Chocolate Notes to help bakers who want to substitute the new higher-percentage chocolates, as well as extended sections on ingredients, techniques, equipment, and innovative decorative touches.
Chocolate Holidays has everything necessary to sweeten any occasion—for passionate dessert makers and once-a-year holiday bakers alike.
First published in hardcover as A Year in Chocolate (Time Warner, 2001)
Synopsis
Chocolate Holidays is the ultimate chocolate indulgence— any time of year
Fifty simple, elegant, amazing-tasting chocolate desserts— for New Year's Day or Mother's Day, Passover or Christmas, or any day worth celebrating.
Chocolate secrets and her very favorite festive recipes— from the award-winning " queen of chocolate, " Alice Medrich
Includes Chocolate Notes to help bakers who want to substitute the new higher-percentage chocolates, as well as extended sections on ingredients, techniques, equipment, and innovative decorative touches.
Chocolate Holidays has everything necessary to sweeten any occasion— for passionate dessert makers and once-a-year holiday bakers alike.
Synopsis
The beloved Alice Medrich, renowned for the impeccably written and tested recipes that have three times earned her Cookbook of the Year honors—most recently from the IACP for
BitterSweet—offers fifty stellar, amazing-tasting chocolate desserts, each a little jewel of elegance and simplicity.
Chocolate Holidays unlocks the secrets of our favorite sweet.
Turning her attention to the year’s most special occasions—New Year’s Day, Valentine’s Day, birthdays and anniversaries, Hanukkah and Christmas, and every day in between—Medrich has created dozens of memorable desserts that will help to make the traditions and memories of your celebrations all the more unforgettable.
Whether your holiday festivities are large or small, whether you tend to the homey or the glitzy, you’ll find everything you need in this boutique collection. This revised edition of the previously published A Year in Chocolate includes an extended section on ingredients, equipment, and decorative touches and detailed notes on how to customize the recipes to use the chocolate of your choice.
First published in hardcover as A Year in Chocolate (Warner Books, 2001)
About the Author
Alice Medrich has won more cookbook-of-the-year awards and best in the dessert and baking category awards than any other author. She received her formal training at the prestigious Êcole Lenôtre in France, and is widely credited with introducing the chocolate truffle to the United States when she began making and selling them at her influential Berkeley dessert shop, Cocolat. She has since left the retail world, devoting much of her time to sharing her expansive knowledge about baking through teaching classes and writing Food52’s Rogue Baking Tips column. Medrich lives in Berkeley, California.
She is the author of Flavor Flours, Seriously Bitter Sweet (a complete revision of her 2003 IACP-prize-winning BitterSweet), Sinfully Easy Delicious Desserts, Chewy Gooey Crispy Crunchy Melt-in-Your-Mouth Cookies, Pure Dessert, and Chocolate Holidays.
Table of Contents
Contents
Recipe List (x)
Introduction (xii)
Details Make a Difference (xiv)
Fall (1)
Winter (27)
Spring (61)
Summer (85)
Dressing up Desserts (108)
Tempering Chocolate (112)
Ingredients (114)
Chocolate and Cocoa for Baking and Dessert Making (116)
Equipment (120)
Resources (124)
Index (125)