Baking Illustrated

Packed with 350 recipes and 500 illustrations, Baking Illustrated brings you inside America’s Test Kitchen, where the test cooks and editors have exhaustively examined every ingredient, technique, and piece of equipment that is critical to your baking success. Have you ever wondered how long you can keep that can of baking powder in your cabinet or what brand of chocolate will yield the best brownies or flourless chocolate cake? Or puzzled over the key to making pizza crust that is thin and crisp or cookies that bake evenly? The editors at Cook’s Illustrated have pulled back the curtain on the seemingly complex world of baking to give you the answers to these and thousands of other questions.

Recipes range from quick breads and yeast breads to pizza, cookies, cakes, pastry, crisps, and cobblers to all manner of pies and tarts. And they feature American home classics (including Southern Cornbread, Pecan Sandies, and Sour Cream Coffee-cake) as well as more contemporary favorites (such as Rosemary Focaccia, Orange-Almond Biscotti, and Chocolate Truffle Tart) and European baked goods (such as Brioche, Black Forest Cake, and Tarte Tatin). Every recipe has been exhaustively researched and tested to bring you the "best" recipe (we’ll let you be the judge), along with detailed and precise explanations from everything from why you should use unsalted butter to what is the best oven temperature and why it all matters. We’ve also tested every kind of baking equipment available, from mixers and food processors to the humblest spatulas and loaf pans, and the results of our experiments are described throughout so you can benefit from our trial and error.

And because we know that good baking depends on understanding basic techniques, Baking Illustrated features a 16-page, full-color insert that shows you how to avoid some of the most common pitfalls in baking, such as overmixed egg whites, cheesecakes that crack, and bread dough that has overproofed. (We know a lot about mistakes – we’ve made them all.) We don’t want you to take the time to bake a layer cake from scratch only to settle for the "homemade" look. The visuals in this insert show you how to do it right. Color photographs demonstrate good results as well as bad, and hand-drawn step-by-step illustrations help you to perfect your technique for fail-safe baking.

Baking Illustrated also gives you the handy tutorials on baking basics, including how to stock your pantry and how to store and measure ingredients, cream butter and roll out pie dough. A master baking class between two covers, Baking Illustrated takes the guesswork out of baking and will expand your repertoire without ever losing sight of your ultimate goal: making family favorites that taste better than ever.