Three Hundred and Sixty-Five Great Chocolate Desserts

I am skeptical about most of the "365" recipe series, but I like this one very much. I especially like the way the spiral-bound book rests open flat on the table while you are doing the recipes. The author seems to have thoroughly kitchen tested all of the recipes, unlike many other chocolate cookbooks, and the procedures are mostly of good quality. I had no trouble with any of the recipes I tried. This cookbook is an interesting, all-purpose collection of chocolate recipes that I enjoy using. It is a useful addition to your bookshelf, and one that you will use often. In the cake section, there are several interesting, old-fashioned recipes: a mayonnaise cake, the infamous Tunnel of Fudge, and a pudding cake where the sauce migrates to the bottom of the pan during baking (yes, it really works that way). Of course, some recipes were only mediocre: the Blackout Cake did not really live up to its name, and the Chocolate Gingerbread was off a little. On the other hand, there are a number of fascinating desserts I plan to try. The chapter on showstoppers contains several restaurant quality desserts that are still current. There are also several interesting variants on truffle torte and chocolate decadence. It also has a number of very good chocolate cookies. There is a welcome lack of recipes based on whipped egg white, the bane of many home cooks. It also does not eschew the many wonderful chocolate recipes based on raw egg white, as do many current chocolate cookbooks, causing many of these nice recipes to vanish. As a practical manner, you can use the many pasteurized eggs in a carton or egg white products available in most supermarkets for these recipes. The book contains the standard warning about raw eggs at the bottom of each recipe that uses them. Some of the instructions are a little too facile, such as working with filo, rolling out marzipan, cooking sugar syrups, or mixing melted chocolate directly with cold, whipped cream. Each recipe lists preparation times, and the author is diligent about noting time-related steps, like chill or rest times, in each recipe as appropriate, as well as logical stopping points. It also has its share of frumpy, old time recipes that you would never do, such as baked tortilla chips in chocolate sauce, or s'mores. It has numerous, convenient recipes for busy cooks, including a few god-awful dishes, like Quick Crème de Menthe Pie. On the down side, most recipes do not have storage instructions for the finished, leftover desserts. It has chapters on cake, cheesecake, pies and tarts, fancy desserts, commercial mixes, ice cream, microwave, kids, puddings, yeasted breads, frostings, candy, and cookies.

If you want to cook chocolate desserts lika a pro, this is the book for you. I have found all the recipes that I have done so far, easy to do and well written. Everyone wants to know where I bought them. I love this book. Sunshine

The most important thing I can say about this book is that with very few exceptions, all the recipes that I have tried from this book have worked. I was a complete novice in baking and chocolate when I started with this book, yet I have never had to worry about the outcome of a recipe. There are very clear instructions - the introduction at the beginning of the book and the subsequent introductions to each chapter (cakes, pies, rises, etc.) are very well done and quite adequate. The author uses plenty of cheap and readily available ingredients, such as chocolate chips, and uses the microwave for melting instead of worrying about double boilers, and this makes it very easy for a novice like me. I found it rather surprising that a book like this, without photos, could be so useful to me. The only negative thing I can think of is that the preparation times that the author estimates are often way off. But the baking times are usually quite accurate. Whether it is something spectacular like "Black Bottom Tiramisu" or the amazing "Blackout Cake", or something quick and easy like "Easy Sour Cream Chocolate Chip Cake", or a nice coffeecake, this book will take you to the heights of chocolate ecstasy and delight you and all your friends. In short, I enthusiastically recommend this book to fellow chocolate lovers!