Nick Malgieri, who taught us everything we need to know about baking in How to Bake, takes on chocolate, the world's favorite food. With the authoritative accessibility he brings to his teaching, Nick bridges the gap between the professional baker and the home cook. He knows techniques and ingredients and he teaches them with hand-holding efficiency. In ten chapters, Nick offers a primer on basics and every kind of chocolate from coca to chips and white chocolate (and why it isn't really chocolate in the strictest sense) to big dark slabs of the world's favorite luxury food and the many, many ways to enjoy it.

Information on storage, handling, and the fundamentals needed to create chocolate confections is clear and concise. Recipe sections include everything you need to know to turn the food of the gods into desserts for us mortals: cakes and cookies, creams and custards, ice creams, pies and pastries, sauces and beverages, truffles and pralines, dipped and molded chocolates, all adapted for the home cook.

Illustrated with four-color photographs throughout, all 380 luscious recipes will send a shiver of delight down the spine of every chocolate lover. Chocolate is definitive without being intimidating; it is a true home companion for anyone who wants to cook with chocolate.

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Nick Malgieri has journeyed far and wide during his thirty-plus years working as a professional baker. His experiences abroad have always informed the flavors and techniques of his recipes. Now the award winning master baker transports the world's greatest kitchens and bakeries to your home with this inspired gathering of more than one hundred cookies, cakes, breads, sweet and savory pastries, pies, and tarts, from the baking traditions of thirty-nine countries.

Look no further for chewy naan from India, rich chocolate Millennium Torte from Vienna, and crisp cannoli from Sicily. With A Baker's Tour at your fingertips, you don't have to tour Monaco for Prince Albert's puff pastry cake, Poland for the lightest, most flavorful babka, or Argentina for perfectly seasoned beef empanadas -- you don't even have to go to country-specific cookbooks.

The recipes here range from casual to sophisticated, and all have been adapted for American use, ensuring consistent, delicious results without sacrificing flavor. Supplemented by illuminating food facts and anecdotes, and illustrated with gorgeous full-color photographs, Nick Malgieri's A Baker's Tour is a satisfying and educational international collection of inviting, delicious recipes for home cooks and food lovers everywhere.

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Everybody loves dessert, but nobody loves the calories. Perfect Light Desserts offers recipes for desserts rich enough to satisfy any sweet tooth -- but with sensible calorie counts.

Master baker Nick Malgieri and healthful food expert David Joachim have joined forces to create 125 exceptional desserts without the usual quantities of fats and sugars. The focus is on flavor and texture achieved through balanced ingredient combinations and superior baking techniques. Not a single recipe has more than 300 calories per serving.

The results are nothing short of spectacular, with desserts that range from devil's food cake (complete with fluffy icing) to a lemon custard highlighted with a colorful raspberry sauce. Old-fashioned American favorites such as hermits mingle with sophisticated treats like rum raisin semifreddo and white chocolate raspberry tartlets. Best of all, while these desserts are low-calorie, they are high in flavor. Moist coconut poppy seed coffee cake, juicy blueberry pie, and fudgy brownies don't taste like “diet desserts”; they simply taste great.

All of the recipes here achieve great flavor without resorting to artificial sweeteners or synthetic substitutes. The recipes use moderate amounts of real butter, sugar, flour, and eggs in perfect proportions. Every recipe includes a complete nutritional analysis as well as serving and storage notes. Everybody loves dessert, and now no one has to go without it.

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