Cookies (Hardcover)

~ Editors of Reader's Digest (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This hulking volume impresses with its breadth—home bakers could make a different cookie every weekend for 19 years and never repeat a recipe—but that range does come at a price. All kinds of cookies are represented: drop cookies, rolled cookies, brownies, icebox cookies, tea cakes, macaroons and more, with a strong showing of European favorites, and there are umpteen variations on standards (e.g., 12 versions of madeleines, small spongelike cookies baked in shell-shaped molds, and 27 orange-based cookies). However, small print and a lack of introductory notes to most recipes will deter some readers. Without a header, how are readers to know what Bran Cookies might taste like? Brandy Butter Shortbread's introduction says it's "A wonderfully rich Christmas treat," yet the following two recipes—Almond Shortbread with Blackberry Topping and Chocolate Chip Shortbread—offer no explanations on when bakers might opt for them instead, or what they might pair these desserts with. The copious photos are inspiring; the cookies—especially the Smiling Face Cookies and Cookie Hands—look homemade and attainable by most bakers (each recipe has a level of difficulty, and most are fairly easy). Helpful sidebars show progressive photos of the steps involved in such processes as making biscotti and rolling sugar cookies. This vast confection catalogue will motivate serious bakers. Casual cookie-makers, however, might be overwhelmed.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

If there were any cookie-baking book that could claim the title of "the only recipe collection you'll ever need," this Reader's Digest edition is it. After all, who could resist selecting from dozens of cookies representing global baking sweets, from the Scottish shortbread to the Italian biscotti? Each of the 14 sections centers on one type--drop, rolled, bars and brownies, icebox, shortbread, piped and shaped, meringues and macaroons, wafers and thins, Italian biscotti, tea cakes, festive, no-bake, fried, and decorating and serving--with specific illustrated direction for making rolled cookies, fingers, rosettes, French almond tuiles, and chocolate-dipped pirouettes. More than 500 full-color photographs help bakers visualize the tempting results, while the levels of difficulty, from the easy "1" to the complicated "32," will guide the selection. Among the way-too-many choices are the exotic mascarpone spritzers, friands, mint pryaniki, and rice-olive oil cookies, to mention only a few. Thank the anonymous Dutch baker-inventor of koekjes ("little cakes") who created the cookie by dropping cake batter onto oven shelves to test the temperature. Barbara Jacobs
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 360 pages
• Publisher: Readers Digest (November 4, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0762105933
• ISBN-13: 978-0762105939
• Product Dimensions: 11.2 x 9.5 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #751,994 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Italian Cookie Encyclopedia, October 13, 2005

By	jerry i h (Berkeley, CA USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

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This book is both fascinating and frustrating. It is not for the beginner, but experienced cookie bakers will find hundreds of interesting cookies, mostly Italian. Despite the Reader's Digest moniker, it is not a collection of All-American cookies, so take the sub-title of this book seriously.

If you are learning how to bake cookies, you should probably avoid this book. There is absolutely no information on ingredients, equipment, or techniques, nor are there hints or suggestions in the individual recipes. The instructions can generously be described as terse and unhelpful. There is no informational or educational information on making cookies.

If you know your way around a cookie sheet, there are more cookie recipes that you will want to try in this book than all the rest of your cookie books combined. I found literally hundreds of cookies that I wanted to try. The lion's share of recipes are rare, hard to find Italian ones; they are significantly different from american, british, french, german, austrian, etc. cookies (the editorial page lists Florence, Italy as the progenitor). On the down side, many of the recipes require adjustment; I found problems like: doughs that were crumbly and never really came together, too much spreading, seemingly under-baked cookies, dry and crumbly cookies, etc. The recipe titles were also a problem; I am reasonably sure that many of these cookies have popular or traditional names, but an awful lot of them have been given generic names, e.g. "date cookies" or "lime and sunflower seed cookies". I suspect that most problems relate to variable methods of flour measurement; Europeans, like Italians, measure flour by weight, but all recipes in this book list flour by volume in cups. Here, I suspect that the recipes were edited at the word processor and not in the kitchen.

People who already know how to bake cookies will find, in this veritable encyclopedia of mostly Italian cookies, a lifetime of appealing cookie recipes.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Cookie Monster, August 26, 2005

By	Anonymous "booksandcookies" (Charleston, IL USA) - See all my reviews

This is a great cookie book and I should know because I am a "cookie monster" and love cookie cookbooks! Wide variety, beautifully presented. Like all Reader's Digest books, this is a good quality book - well done in every respect. It is a large book but not "hulking" as the editorial reviewer said; it's just one of the large-size cookbooks of which there are many. This one is not freakish or anything, just large because there are so many great recipes. Terrific photographs and instructions.Easy to read. Some reviewers of its counterpart,Cakes, said the print was too small to read but that is NOT true at all. Both of these books are VERY easy to read - unless you require extremely Large Print books or something. These are just normal size print. A great buy for cookbook or cookie lovers!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Interesting but not all the recipes work, July 27, 2009

By	Rana Spada "Love to bake" (NY, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Has some great ideas for different cookies, but not all the recipes work and you need to know how to fix or change the recipes for the cookies in order to get an actual cookie you can eat. Some of the recipes for the cookies are too crumbly, some spread too much, the temperature is wrong in some, not enough flour in some recipes, cook time is too long, etc... Editing for this book definitely not done in the kitchen. Wouldn't recommend this book if you are looking to just bake a cookie and take it somewhere. Need to know your way around the kitchen to get these recipes to work.