Charlie Trotter's Desserts [Hardcover]

Charlie Trotter (Author), Michelle Gayer (Author), Paul Elledge (Photographer)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 1998

1999 James Beard Award Winner

Cooks, book buyers, and food lovers have come to expect the lavishly unexpected from master chef Charlie Trotter, and his fourth large-format, gorgeously photographed cookbook, Desserts, delivers the ultimate indulgence. Chapters focus on ingredients ranging from the delightfully familiar (berries, custards, and spices) to the unusual (vegetable- and grain-based desserts), including 100 show-stopping desserts, such as:

• Huckleberry Tuiles with White and Golden Peach Compote and Huckleberry Sherbet

• Cranberry and Walnut Tart with Cranberry Ice Cream, Cranberry Sauce, and Caramel-Lime Sauce

• Chocolate Macadamia Nut Cake with Coconut Froth and Sugar Cane Ice Cream

With over 125,000 copies of the first three books in print, Trotter's series has seduced amateur and professional cooks everywhere, and Desserts is the icing on a most enticing cake.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

"I have always considered desserts to be of equal importance to the savory food," Charlie Trotter writes in the opening pages of his lavish Charlie Trotter's Desserts. "My approach to desserts celebrates a fruit-driven style, where flash and visual pyrotechniques [sic] are shunned in favor of celebrating the glorious flavors of a perfectly ripe piece of fruit at the height of its season." The illustrations for this book (which won the James Beard award for Best Food Photography) don't quite square up with that statement. It's hard to imagine more pyrotechnics and more visual flash. It's also a little hard to imagine how many hands went into the creation of any single dish. These are not simple desserts for the everyday cook. Rather, this is a catalog of the kinds of desserts that can be created when fabulous food products and fantastic culinary talents all converge at a single kitchen. It's a coffee-table document of possibility.

Two Watermelon Soups with Frozen Yogurt Soufflé and Chocolate Seeds is certainly a "doable" recipe for the home cook, and the assembly makes no big demands. The real trick with this dessert, as with most of the desserts in this book, is finding the "perfectly ripe piece of fruit at the height of its season." If you are a cook with access to such fruit, have at it. If your grocery store or supermarket buys the usual picked green fruit found in the commercial fruit pipeline, then take a copy of this book to your produce manager and complain loudly.

Charlie Trotter's Desserts is divided into Soups and Sorbets, Citrus Fruits, Berries, Tropical Fruits, Tree Fruits, Vegetables and Grains, Custards, Nuts, Spices, Chocolate, and Chateau d'Yquem. Combinations are stunning. Surprises are endless. You'll discover such delights as Meyer Lemon Pudding Cakes with Persimmon and Tarragon Anglaise, Pineapple Tarte Tatin with Ginger-Hokkaido Squash Ice Cream, Rosewater Crème Caramel with Primrose Sauce and Black Pepper Tuiles, and Macadamia Nut Chocolate Cakes with Coconut Emulsion and Sugarcane Ice Cream. After living with this book you'll never look at a dessert menu in quite the same way. --Schuyler Ingle

From Booklist

Of all Trotter's books, this newest volume in the series produced out of Charlie Trotter's Chicago restaurant is the most attractive and accessible to the home cook. Despite the celebrated chef's continuing call for items such as satsuma oranges and Meyer lemons, unavailable to all but the most determined shopper, plenty of these recipes make smashing ends to meals. Whole-wheat carrot cake can stand on its own without the lovely but nonessential additions of black walnut praline and carrot sorbet. Blackstrap molasses, seldom seen outside health food stores, figures in several of Trotter's desserts, notably as a flavoring in an idiosyncratic pecan pie with a novel curry crust. Cooks burdened with excess primrose petals can toss them into sauce for rosewater creme caramel topped with black pepper cookies. Trotter's reinterpretation of German chocolate cake produces multiple layers formed into upright triangular slices that challenge any pastry chef's skills. Mark Knoblauch

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: Ten Speed Press (November 1, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 089815815X
• ISBN-13: 978-0898158151
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 1 x 11.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (17 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #137,542 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fabulously inspiring recipes; not-so-great editing., May 13, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Charlie Trotter's Desserts (Hardcover)

This is a fantastically beautiful book that dismays me. I appreciate the suggested substitutions- when they're provided, but I don't understand the lack of sources. I don't understand why "caramelize" and "filo" make the glossary but "feuille de brick crepe" doesn't. Is that the wafer you find on Italian nougat? I guess so, but I have no idea where to get it.

I also don't understand the "basic recipe" selection process. I kind of think that sweet pie dough is more basic than honey-chickpea ice cream. Call me crazy. This section needs an overhaul.

For somebody as admirably obsessed with perfection as Charlie Trotter seems to be, the proofing errors and dumb editing decisions littering this book make me think that the authors just don't care as much about empowering me to stretch my limits and learn as they do about providing a showcase for themselves and selling books. If not, then what's the explanation? I just wish I could spend my energy exploring the recipes instead of having to painstakingly look for sources for ingredients. I know that sources change. How about posting them on the web site?

Sigh. Buy it anyway.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Charlie Trotter's Desserts, November 26, 1999

By 

jack fisher (San Diego, California) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Charlie Trotter's Desserts (Hardcover)

This is a great book to draw inspiration from , but the recipes are not always accurate. I have enjoyed the book for over a year. The pictures alone are worth the price. The book may be better suited for those who are professionals and not the home cook.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars visually stunning, would be great if only...., May 30, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Charlie Trotter's Desserts (Hardcover)

When I recieved this book I was very excited. Looking through it the photography and presentation of the desserts is magnificent. Unfortunatly after numerous attempts on atleast 3 recipes I have decided to put this book on my coffee table and not my cookbook shelf. I found the recipes to lack clarity and some just don't turn out right even with following the directions to the letter. I have used it only as picture reference since the last fiasco. A beautiful book but a sad dissapointment as a cookbook.