Julia Child's Recipes Baking Cookbook Review

Baking With Julia by Dorie Greenspan and Savor the Joys of Baking

Feb 11, 2010
Donna Diegel

Julia Child's Challah Bread Recipe - Donna Diegel

PBS Master Chefs television series inspired the book Baking With Julia. Wedding cake recipes by Martha Stewart, guarantees this magnificent baking book is sure to please.

Dorie Greenspan is the author of Baking With Julia, a baking book that accompanied Julia Child's PBS television series Master Chefs. Julia Child wrote the forward which starts out, Baking With Julia is the third book based on our Master Chefs television series and is a book written in everyday language for home cooks using family proportions and baking in home ovens. As with our previous series, it all does actually take place in my kitchen..." Julia goes on to explain how her kitchen is set up, what her new ovens are like, how the studio lights and cameras are placed, and how her cellar is used as prep space. Julia Child fondly talks about her rolling pins, half-dressed cakes, naked ladyfingers and melted chocolate as if they are her children.

Baking With Julia by Dorie Greenspan

The recipes in Baking With Julia come from twenty seven bakers, some of whom are mentioned here. They all contributed their expertise and wisdom, and worked right alongside Julia Child and Dorie Greenspan to produce the amazing Baking With Julia baking cookbook. Professional bakers include Lora Brody, Marion Cunningham, Marcel Desaulniers, Gale Gand, Nick Malgieri, Alice Medrich, Nancy Silverton and Martha Stewart.

Julia Child's Sponsors

The seven weeks of baking and taping with twenty seven bakers, numerous crew members and experts, worked together endlessly perfecting each recipe for home cooks in their kitchens. Because the project was so enormous, as well as time consuming and the consuming of products, Julia Child was very grateful to her sponsors. The most notable were King Arthur Flour Company, Land O Lakes Butter, Farberware, Williams-Sonoma, Wilton, KitchenAid and Thermador.

Martha Stewart's Glorious Wedding Cake

While most of the recipes in Baking With Julia can be accomplished by home bakers, some of the more intense recipes need a lot more experience. The three-tier Glorious Wedding Cake by Martha Stewart is not for the faint at heart. With five individual recipe components – Dense Almond Cake recipe for the base, the Almond Daquoise (nut meringue disks) rests between the almond cake layers, Rum Laced Buttercream recipe for decorating the majority of the wedding cake, Apricot Glaze recipe, and homemade Marzipan using almond paste for the homemade Marzipan Fruit – it's a tremendous effort for the novice baker. There's an entire section called Constructing and Decorating the Cake, and altogether, the Glorious Wedding Cake recipe becomes a full-length novel of fourteen pages.

Baking with Julia Savor the Joys of Baking with America's Best Bakers

This large, over-sized cookbook is based on the original television series "Baking with Julia" on PBS. Greenspan worked closely with Julia Child on this project, taking down recipes and formatting them into the classic cookbook, Baking With Julia. There are many full size color photos done by professional food stylists within its pages. Likewise, there are plenty of smaller black and white step-by-step how-to photos interspersed amongst the cookbook recipes. Any baker would be thrilled to have their own personal baking course taught by Julia Child and her chefs on their kitchen counter.

Baking With Julia Chapters Include:

Baking Basics
Batters and Doughs
Breads: Daily Loaves; Artisinal Breads; Flatbreads
Morning Pastries and Quick Breads
Cakes: Everyday Delights; Cakes for Occasions; A Glorious Wedding Cake; Cookies
Pastries: Homey Pies and Tarts; Grand Pastries; Savory Pastries
Sweet Fillings and Savory Spreads
About the Bakers

Baking With Julia Child Recipes

Some truly magnificent recipes that stand out in Baking With Julia are; Challah Bread Recipe, Popovers, Pecan Sticky Buns, Espresso Profiteroles (Cream Puffs), Chocolate Truffle Tarts, Homemade Blueberry Pie, French Apple Tart, Savarin, Babas, Heirloom Tomato Galette, Chocolate Ruffle Cake, and of course the stunning Glorious Wedding Cake by Martha Stewart. Some of the cake recipes would make very cute cupcakes.

Dorie Greenspan

Baking guru, cookbook author and blogger, Dorie Greenspan is also the author of Baking: From My Home To Yours, another impressive best selling cookbook. All told, Dorie Greenspan has produced nine best selling books, with the tenth, Around the French Table, due in bookstores sometime during 2010. She spends her time living between New York, Connecticut and Paris, France.

Cookbooks by Dorie Greenspan

Baking with Julia
Desserts by Pierre Herme
Baking: From My Home To Yours
Chocolate Desserts by Pierre Herme
Pancakes: From Morning to Midnight
Waffles: From Morning to Midnight
Paris Sweets, Great Desserts from the City's Best Pastry Shops

PBS Master Chef Series

Although Baking With Julia is a companion book to Julia Child's Master Chef PBS series of thirty nine television shows, and Julia would have loved for her audience to have the two mediums side-by-side to go through her full baking course, it's not necessary to do so. Baking With Julia is a stand-alone cookbook, as is her PBS baking series. Even though it would be helpful to watch the methods of croissant making being performed start to finish as the home baker is following along in his or her own kitchen, the recipes in the book can be accomplished without the hands-on television series.

Title: Baking with Julia Savor the Joys of Baking with America's Best Bakers