Customer Reviews

Pie in the Sky Successful Baking at High Altitudes: 100 Cakes, Pies, Cookies, Breads, and Pastries Home-tested for Baking at Sea Level, 3,000, 5,000, 7,000, and 10,000 feet (and Anywhere in Between).

5 star:		(49)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I love to bake - plain and simple - I just love to bake! I never had a problem with it when I was growing up in Upstate New York or at sea level in Washington DC where I spent most of my adult life. It wasn't until I moved to New Mexico that I ever had a problem baking anything. My cakes would rise and fall like the Roman empire and my nut breads would still be undercooked after spending extra time in the oven. To my frustration, the only source of information were a few state extension service publications and that information was meager at best.

Then... along came Susan Purdy's "Pie in the Sky - Successful Baking at High Altitudes." Susan spent an amazing amount of time researching and testing scores of recipes at altitudes from sea level to 10,000 feet and everywhere in between. The result of her extensive efforts is a book that I would consider the single best reference on high altitude baking that has ever been written.

She includes a wide variety of recipes including cakes, breads, pies, cookies and pastries. All are mouth watering and very tempting such as her Daredevil's Food Cake with Mocha Buttercream Icing or the El Dorado Cheesecake with Glazed Mango Topping. The recipes are clear, concise and easy to follow. The book goes far beyond being just a collection of recipes. Each recipe begins with a story about it. She follows with a general discussion with tips on how to bake that type of item. She also includes any special notes and considerations. Aside from the discussions, the best part of the book is that it includes the differences in ingredients and techniques for baking at sea level as well as 3,000 - 5,000 - 7,000 - and 10,000 feet for each recipe! So, if you live in mountains of New Mexico or on the beach in Florida, you can use and enjoy this book.

To rate this book with only 5 stars just isn't high enough. It's clearly the high altitude baker's bible. The information is very informative, the recipes are wonderful and the theories she explains can be applied to successfully adapt your favorite baking recipes. If you love to bake and live in a high altitude this is a book that you MUST have. If you're in a lower altitude you can still find this to be a wonderful book to add to your library and enjoy using.

PIE IN THE SKY by Susan G. Purdy (HarperCollins Publishers) Thanks you for your interest in my book.
CORRECTIONS below for typographical errors in first edition. Corrections are made in reprints; I want you to have celestial results, so please check your book. Have fun baking!

pg. 119,Chocolate Buttermilk Cake, step #3:Baking SODA is correct! NOT baking powder.
pg. 196, Lemon Sponge Cake, step 6, add: ...fold in flour... "along with previously whipped whites."
pg. 250, Brownies, introduction: cross out reference to brown sugar in first line, only white sugar is used.
Pg. 123, Mocha Buttercream: Use 6(six) cups confectioners' sugar and only 5 to 6 tablespoons coffee instead of 1/2 cup . Also, make these adjustments on pg. 124 in procedure. Note that volume of frosting varies slightly depending on whether made with processor or mixer.
pg. 192, at 7,000 feet, bake coffee cake at 350 degrees not 375.
pg. 176, step #3: at sea level use 1/2 cup sugar , not 1/3 cup.

Susan Purdy, "America's Julia Child," has come up with her best idea yet. I'm sure everyone knows that baking at high altitudes sometimes leads to embarrassing and tasteless flops in the oven. Nobody except the top physicists knows why this is true, but it's one of those things many home bakers try to compensate for. Finally, a recipe book which tells you exactly what to do, no matter if you're cooking at sea level, or ten thousand feet, or five thousand feet or two.

Even experienced chefs sometimes come a cropper when trying to calculate how much or how little baking soda or sugar to include in a new oven. Purdy quotes Ross Parsons, LA Times food columnist, to the amusing effect that so frequent were his culinary screwups in Albuquerque (New Mexico--5,000 feet above sea level) that he pretty much swore off baking. "Early trauma made me a reluctant baker. I'm still afraid to bake and hardly ever try, even though I have moved to sea level in Long Beach, California." Ross, I'm sure you will be the first to purchase a copy of PIE IN THE SKY, but you won't be the only one.

Susan Purdy and her staff have cooked every one of one hundred dishes at all four altitudes and have provided a flaw-proof recipe for each one. Handy charts show you the way. At last, no matter where you live in the USA (and remember, there are 37 states which have high altutude locations), you can cook the Susan Purdy way--without a glitch or a fallen souffle. And oh, the recipes themselves! All our favorite pies, cakes and brownies, and more!

Anna's Butter Cake--a traditional Swedish favorite. All the butterfied goodness of Scandinavia in one cake.

Colorado Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Forsting--two ways to go wrong and Susan deftly avoids each one! And she even tells you the best way to fly with this cake in your lap! For when sending desserts UPS it's often not the jostling that spoils the surprise it's the altitudes of the cargo planes they send to ship your sweets with!

Susan's own favorite out of all the recipes here is her version of Flourless Chocolate Espresso Trufffle Cake. "I love it warm from the ooven," writes Piurdy, "when it is soft as a just-set pudding, and I like it even better chilled--or straight from the freezer--when it has the consistency of a velvety truffle." She reminds us all that the quality of the chocolate is essential to the success of the dessert.

And finally, if you're into biscotti, and want to make perfect biscotti every time, even though you live in Boulder or Aspen, just step this way. The "Pie in the Sky" (don't you just love that title, shared by at least fifteen other books over the years according to my copy of BOOKS IN PRINT) has the answer and the solution to all your altitude problems.

The amount of baking I did decreased when I moved from 7,300' to 9,300'. Then I quit altogether when I moved to 11,000'. Now I can bake again!!!

The recipes cover everything, from baked goods that come out wrong to things sticking to the pan to ajustments you think should work, but don't. The format of showing the recipes for various altitudes is easy to follow and it's interesting to see the various changes. It's not just a nice linear progression! But it gives you ideas so you can attempt adjusting some of your own recipes.

I applaud Susan for having the creativity, drive, patience, and knowledge to perservere with this book. Anyone who has experienced frustration baking at altitude should own this.

Finally, a book of Baking Recipes for elevations of Sea-Level/3,000/5,000/7,000/10,000 ft, with each of the Recipes collated for all the elevations in a very neat Table format... You really can't get any handier than that...

This book has turned out to be a godsend for this 'everything from scratch' successful baker, who moved from So Calif sea-level to 7,000 ft mountains, and hasn't been able to bake a thing (and have it come out right) in three years, ugh... Failing, repeatedly, in what used to be a sort-of calling card for me, (my baked goods), has robbed me of a much-too-much taken-for-granted Joy... Well, as they say, you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone... Truer words were never spoken in this case...

Alas, the only (and meager-at-that) consolation has been that I'm not the only one whose 'Joy of Baking' became as thin as the less-oxgenated air up here, *lol*, as this book, and my discussions with other High-Altitude folk, have proven...

There is a wealth of explanation just on the 'chemistry' of High-Altitude alone in this book... And I found Susan's biographical musings, (as she endeavored to perfect these Recipes), enjoyable as well...

The book doesn't contain a lot of Recipes... or 'fancy' Recipes... just your typical baked-goods fare that is pretty standard across the nation:

Muffins: Blueberry, Cranberry/Pecan, Apple/Oat, Raisin/Bran

Quick Breads/Scones/Bisquits/Popovers: Soda, Corn, Apricot/Almond, Lemon/Poppy Seed Breads; Current, Blueberry Scones; 1 Recipe each for Bisquits and Popovers

Yeast Breads: White, Challah, French Baguette, Multigrain

Cakes: 1-2-3-4 (with both Spice & Coconut variations}, Chocolate Buttermilk, Devil's Food, Butter, Apple, Gingerbread, Applesauce, Honey, Upside-Down Apricot, a variation on Pound Cake, Ginger Bundt, Pumpkin Bundt, Carrot, Cheesecake, Angel Food, Chocolate Sponge, Orange Sponge, Walnut Torte, Streusel Coffee Cake, Lemon, Mocha Chiffon, and a Flourless Chocolate Truffle Cake

(Cake Recipes include, on each page, Icing/Glazing/Sauce recipes to go with them as well: Honey Cream, Coconut, Bittersweet Chocolate, Mocha Buttercream, Rum/Lemon Sauce, Sugar Glaze, Cardamom Honey Sauce, Raspberry Sauce, Ginger/Honey Glaze, Snow White Glaze, Cream Cheese, Mango Glaze, 7-Minute Icing that takes 15 minutes at high-altitude, Hazelnut Toffee Cream, Tangerine Mousse Filling, Lemon Curd Filling, Sabayon)

Cookies: Sugar, Peanut Butter, Gingersnaps, Oat, Oatmeal/Raisin, Chocolate Chip, Mexican Wedding, Shortbread, Biscottis, Brownies, Rugelach, Trail Bars

Pies: Apple, Pecan (with variations), Cobbler, Plum Crumb, Peach Crisp, Pumpkin, Lemon Meringue, Mocha Mousse, Fig Tart

Souffles: Orange w/Grand Marnier, Chocolate

There are also sections about Ingredients, Equipment/Utensils, and Method... Nothing exhaustive, just 'good, must-know' things for High-Altitude... I found the tid-bits of information on Buttermilk in high-altitude baking a blessing... as well as the bit about Convection Ovens and Bread Machines...

If I were to state any negative, it would be that I would have liked a finished picture for EACH Recipe and, even more than that, EACH Recipe listed under the Chapter Headings in the Table Of Contents, (instead of just the Chapter Headings themselves: Muffins, Cakes, Pies, etc.)... There are only 100 Recipes in this book, so it wouldn't have taken too much more space to list them by Page Number for quick reference...

All-in-All, I'm VERY impressed with this book, and recommend it to anyone who lives in a High-Altitude... Indeed, it is a perfect take-along baking book, as well, for those who live at Sea-Level but perhaps vacation, or visit with friends/family, at higher altitudes and find themselves wanting to bake something... A paperback version of this book would be most welcome in such cases...

p.s. Yes, there's a mistake on the Brownie Recipe calling for White Sugar instead of Brown Sugar, but nothing to get too crazed about... just make the adjustment.

Thank you Susan Purdy! After my oven caught fire with the pecan pie acting like Mt. Vesuvius, I had no inclination to bake 20 more pecan pies to find out WHY and fix it, but Susan Purdy did. I was also sick of chocolate chip cookies that behaved like florentines. This book includes a spreadsheet type format for each recipe, which I found brilliant and useful. Also includes what to do with cake and brownie mix after the box leaves you hanging at about 6,500 ft.
Though there are not a lot of recipes, I have found myself able to convert my sea-level favorites using the information detailed on similar recipes she has adapted (ie: my pumpkin gingerbread turned out great using the modifications she makes to the El Rancho Gingerbread) and I've always been irritated by cookbooks with a lot of not-very-good recipes, so this is not an issue.
ONE minor complaint? issue? would like to ask Susan for help on - the Independence Pass brownies and I are having trouble. The first time, overbaking? Trying for the 'moist crumb' test meant another 7 minutes in the oven, at which time the edges were too hard. The second time around, accepted total 'raw' center at test at the max time (22 min)and this is better but not perfection, and as I reread the preface, she states "The secret: cocoa plus choc chips and brown sugar." - but there is no brown sugar called for in the recipe. So I used brown instead of granulated anyway, am hoping for clarification.
Brownie confusion has not affected my overall recommendation - this is my new baking bible and I am sincerely grateful to Susan for doing this monumental project. If you have had issues with baking and you arent at seal-level, this book has real answers.

I have lived in Denver, Colorado, for 28 years, and have tried many high-altitude baking cookbooks because I love to bake. This is absolutely the best ever. Every recipe I have tried is excellent and the texture is better then most things baked at this altitude. What is even better is that the recipes use less sugar and butter then you would normally find in recipes. I recommend this book to anyone who bakes at high altitude.

I thought all was lost when I moved and tried baking in my new hometown of Lafayette, Colorado at 5,300 feet. I said to my husband, "I'm never cooking again! If one more thing turns out badly, I'm throwing the oven out the window!" Then, I bought this cookbook for my mom for mother's day and baked her the Daredevil's Food Cake with Mocha Buttercream frosting. WOW! She and I and my hubby were thoroughly impressed. Then we baked the Independence Pass brownies - YUM, so chewy and moist. I just finished baking the Peanut Butter Cookies, and they are out of this world. Each recipe is laid out with a chart of ingredients and cooking times for sea level, 3000, 5000, 7000, and 10,000 feet. It's really easy to understand and her tips are very helpful. This cookbook is a must-have if you ever want to bake and live above sea level!

Last summer I moved to mile high living in Boulder County, Colorado, from sea level life at the Jersey Shore, and I found that some of my favorite recipes would just not work! I tried all the typical adjustments that people recommended to me (I even talked to a local baker), but my problems were not solved. Then my sister gave me Susan's book for Christmas! I have made several items from this book, and they all turned out well. I especially like the table layout of ingredient measurements, showing how much to use at any altitude. It's true that there are "only" 100 recipes in this book, but you can be confident these recipes will work! Also, Susan suggests using her recipes as guides for adjusting other recipes (e.g. adjust your dessert bread recipe according to the one she developed). This book contains great recipes and is an excellent reference for high altitude baking.

Here at last is a guide to successful baking at high altitudes which will delight cooks who reside between 3,000 and 10,000 feet above sea level and have found their breads flat and their cakes collapsed. Baking at high altitude is challenging, yet only a handful of small-press cookery titles and regional offerings have addressed the special challenges of baking at high altitude, until now. Purdy has stayed at five different locations and elevations across the country to adjust recipes to perfection: Pie In The Sky presents reliable recipes to replace questionable conversions of the past.