Books like Nick Malgieri's Perfect Pastry by Nick Malgieri

A practical reference of 200 essential baking formulas covering breads, pastries, desserts, and sauces, updated for modern kitchens.

What does it take to perfect a flawless éclair? A delicate yet buttery croissant? To pipe dozens of macarons? The answer is: an intimate knowledge of the fundamentals of pastry. In The Art of French Pastry award-winning pastry chef Jacquy Pfeiffer, cofounder of the renowned French Pastry School in Chicago, gives you just that. By teaching you how to make everything from pâte à choux to pastry cream, Pfeiffer builds on the basics until you have an understanding of the science behind the ingredients used, how they interact with one another, and what your hands have to do to transform them into pastry. This yields glorious results! Expect to master these techniques and then indulge in exquisite recipes, such as: brioche, napoléons / Mille-Feuilles, cream puffs, Alsatian cinnamon rolls / chinois, lemon cream tart with meringue teardrops, elephant ears / palmiers, black forest cake, beignets, as well as some traditional Alsatian savory treats, including: Pretzels, Kougelhof, Tarte Flambée, Warm Alsatian Meat Pie. Pastry is all about precision, so Pfeiffer presents us with an amazing wealth of information—lists of necessary equipment, charts on how ingredients react in different environments, and the precise weight of ingredients in grams, with a look at their equivalent in U.S. units -- which will help you in all aspects of your cooking. But in order to properly enjoy your "just desserts," so to speak, you will also learn where these delicacies originated. Jacquy Pfeiffer comes from a long line of pastry chefs and has been making these recipes since he was a child working in his father's bakery in Alsace. Sprinkled with funny, charming memories from a lifetime in pastry, this book will have you fully appreciating the hundreds of years of tradition that shaped these recipes into the classics that we know and love, and can now serve to our friends and families over and over again. The Art of French Pastry, full of gorgeous photography and Pfeiffer's accompanying illustrations, is a master class in pastry from a master teacher. - Publisher.

After 30 years of teaching and eight cookbooks, Nick Malgieri is finally writing the book he's meant to - a collection of 20 essential techniques, with three to five variations thereof - outlining the easiest way to learn the essentials of baking. The 20 chapters cover all the main techniques of fine baking, starting with simple pastry dough and moving through puff pastry and Danish pastry, all sorts of breads, cakes and biscuits.

Over the years Nick Malgieri has shared many pastry dough recipes, from ridiculously easy (mix with a fork and press into the pan) to quite elaborate (classic puff pastry, croissants, etc.). In this book, he gives you a range of all types of doughs, step-by-step photos (and videos on his website) about how to prepare them and also how to roll them, shape them and bake them. If you have a bad case of 'fear of pastry' or 'fear of rolling' he can promise you that if you follow the simple instructions here you'll be able to tackle any pastry project you like. Starting off as usual with a quick tutorial on ingredients and equipment, Nick then delves into sweet tarts and tartlets; sweet pies, cobblers and crisps; savoury pies and tarts; strudels and puff pastries, including those with cream, and brioche. With over 125 recipes and beautifully photographed every step of the way, 'Pastry perfection' is the new definitive pastry bible.