Brooks Headley's Fancy Desserts: The Recipes of Del Posto’s James Beard Award–Winning Pastry Chef

Great as a coffee table book for the baking and/or punk-rock enthusiast. Also can be used as a cookbook, I suppose. 5 stars!

Great book for people who have experience in the Industry but if you’re not then it can be a little scary

A hard book to rate with stars but easy to review: the recipes I've tried have not worked out, perhaps because of the errors and omissions mentioned in other reviews, perhaps because of my skills--these seem to depend on a crucial balance of conceptual freedom and rigorous execution (the author's freedom, our rigor, alas). But the writing! Oh! just superb. It's funny, opinionated--and on things that matter in the kitchen, not just persons, places, things; knowledgable--helpfully so, and creative in its turns of phrase, mimicking the recipes, which are rich in unexpected ingredient. Blockbuster writing, helped immensely--though it didn't need any--by the ball buster design, gaudy with ironic ugliness. I'll have to try a few more recipes.

Best Drummer, sick with sweets and decent in collaboration with the design for this book. 666 stars. dec read.

loved

Punk rock and culinary insight. My absolute favorite pastry book on the market. Better than your typical BS soufflés and such. Great insights in to quality cheese (Caputo Brothers in PA) and quality chocolate. More important he places a huge emphasis on using olive oil in desserts.

I do not consider the recipes in this book to be fancy desserts. Towards the end of the book, there are some classic recipes, but they are nothing you can't find in another book. In the beginning, there are strange recipes for using vegetables, like eggplants, in desserts. Not to my taste. Some of the recipes interested me, like rhubarb gelato, but that is not worth buying the whole book for. The plating of the desserts is horrible, in my opinion. Just tear up the cake or whatever the base is into random chunks, throw it on the plate, and strew the other ingredients around it. What a mess. Again, not to my taste.

This is, without a doubt, one of the best cookbooks I have ever read. That is, if it even qualifies as a cookbook. What is it, exactly? I'm still not sure, but I find myself with the unstoppable urge to spend time in the kitchen and experiment with verjus. If that isn't the mark of a successful cookbook, I don't know what is.

Completely happy with this purchase

I'm a 25 time consecutive winner of the michelin star and I declare this book brilliant!

Non credevo di poter amare un libro così. Si allontana parecchio da i libri di cucina che solitamente compro. Sono stato piacevolmente stupito. Ricette bellissime, presentazione super e con un tocco di irriverenza.

Dieses Buch möchte ich jedem Freund radikaler und außergewöhnlicher Küchenkunst empfehlen. Und jedem Freund wunderbarer Texte über Essen, Musik, Lebenseinstellungen. Und jedem, der außergewöhnliches Grafikdesign schätzt. Ein Buch, ein Konzept solcher Art ist mir noch nie begegnet und ich möchte die Aufrichtigkeit der Darstellung dahinter zu 100% loben. Ich wünschte, es gäbe mehr solcher Positionen, mehr Mut, mehr Freude an der Verbindung der Künste Essen/Musik/Kunst.

Very cool and different pastry cookbook written by a true punk-rocker which also happens to be a sweet tooth fairy. The whole thing is completely original, graphic and recipe-wise. I laughed out loud reading it because it's so well written with great tongue-in-cheek humor. About the recipes, it's technical (as always with pastry) but totally doable so don't be scared... Start with the cucumber granita & yoghurt sorbet for instance, it's fantastic and made in a snap. Just go (& pogo) !