Baking with Julia: Sift, Knead, Flute, Flour, and Savor... by Julia Child

Baking with Julia: Sift, Knead, Flute, Flour, and Savor... Reviews

• 
  Shan

  I've never reviewed a cookbook before but I just have to share my love of this wonderful book. It calls itself an "all-purpose how-to baking book" in Julia Child's introduction and I think you could teach yourself to bake with it if you'd never taken a class or watched anyone else bake. The flaky pie dough recipe (with instructions for making it by hand or with a mixer) is the messiest page in my copy, but oh, the delicious whole wheat bread, the challah, the walnut bread (this one's complicated and I've only made it once), and the buttermilk scones and blueberry muffins...wow.
  
  "There is an ineffable lightness about these muffins. Served while still warm, the texture is melt-on-your-tongue light; only the plump blueberries seem substantial. The next day, when they have settled down, literally, they are more conventionally muffiny and a different kind of wonderful."
  
  All the recipes have clearly written instructions with drawings and photos exactly where you need them to understand. There are two color photo sections with gorgeous pictures of some of the finished products.
  
  I live in Phoenix so I only have a short baking window every year when heating up the house by using the oven is a good thing, not a bad thing. But every November or December I pull this book out of the cookbook cupboard and luxuriate in the magic of flour and leavening.
• 
  tiasreads

  This is a much-loved book in my collection- so loved that I'm on my third copy! (Due to a series of unfortunate events to the first two.) I always love the clear, detailed instructions given when Dorie Greenspan writes a cookbook. I never feel lost when trying something new from this book, wondering is this right? or should it look this way? Dorie tells you exactly what's what. The book provides some beautiful baking foundations, like the Flaky Pie Crust. Then it builds on those basics and expands your culinary horizons with more challenging fare. I never thought to have such delicious bagels outside New York, but they turned out amazing! Two notes for anyone thinking of getting this book: 1) Many of the recipes cannot be easily done without a stand mixer. And 2) This book was not written by Julia Child herself, she was only a collaborator and the host of the companion TV series on PBS. (Which rocked!) If you keep these two things in mind, you will not be disappointed by adding this book to your shelves.
• 
  Scottsdale Public Library

  In the name of full disclosure, I have loved Julia Child since I was little and my mother and I would watch Cooking with Julia and The Frugal Gourmet on PBS. My mother gave be a battered copy of Mastering the Art of French Cooking & The Joy of Cooking when I grew up and fled the nest. I like to cook. That being said, I’ve never been much of a baker. I borrowed this book after my son asked me how bread is made so that we could make bread together, thinking it would be returning to the library soon after. I never in a million years thought I would end up making my way through almost every recipe in the starter breads section, and yet I have. I can’t wait to get into the other sections. This book is wonderful! An entire baking education! Factual, informative and easy to use- I love the indexes. There’s a recipe for gingerbread that has espresso and black pepper in it that the family decimated over the holidays. There’s another for croissants I’m working my way up to. The biggest surprise for me is that I have found baking the bread almost as satisfying as eating the bread! It has become and easy part of our weekend rituals that everyone in my house loves.
  – Alexis S.
• 
  Elizabeth

  This is a great one. Everything I have made from it (at least half the recipes) has been fabulous. I like it, though, when cookbooks explain WHY you're doing what you're doing instead of simply assuming that "this is just the way you always do it" since I like to manipulate recipes and make them my own. That is harder to do with this book, but it is still fabulous.
• 
  Nicole Lundrigan

  This book is gorgeous! When I have time to make something fancy, this cookbook is my first choice. Recipes generally time-consuming, but there’s plenty of detailed instructions. And results are consistently fantastic.
• 
  C

  Bumped this up to 5 stars. It's a keeper and I plan to use it to death.
  
  Beautifully presented book, instructions are clear and well written, pictures lovely, food selection great.
  
  It is written towards home bakers, and in some cases suggests a progression of recipes...this is fabulous. The pie doughs go from "fool proof" to advanced.
  
  The bakers tend to assume you use a stand mixer. I do not...so anything that needs kneading is done by hand.
  
  Each recipe we've tried has been good, so far, but they've required a bit of tinkering. I'm not sure if this is just our preferences, or altitude, or both.
  
  The 2 day bread is *wonderful* and now a regular feature on our household menu. Note: I use bread flour, not the all purpose flour the recipe calls for.
  
  Bagel recipe: I skipped the "5 minutes off, 5 minutes with the oven door open" as you're supposed to be working in batches here and I had another batch ready to go in. The bagels were still delicious, the pepper gave them a little kick.
  
  Pitas were great, though it took a few tries to get a real "puff" going. Onion Bialy's are next.
  
  The brownies: make sure your oven is the correct temperature (ours runs 50-70 degrees cold...the thermostat must be sitting ON an element) and you use the correct size pan (9x9).
  
  
• 
  Rebecca Dale

  I picked this one up just after my first son was born. I was still a baby in the mid-nineties, but full of an intense love for good food and a bit of baking hubris. Had I known better at the time, I would have looked at the index of recipes and run the other way. Glad I didn't... Turns out, though many of the recipes are advanced, they are presented in a way that made recipes for Finnish Pulla, Boca Negra and Mocha Brownie Cake with a memorable ganache possible, even in my inexperience. Based on the celebrated PBS series of the same name with a list of contributors to make any home baker swoon a bit, this is a jewel. It's the kind of cookbook you look through and try to invent excuses to make things from. Husband's got Friday off from work? Gosh! I guess I'll just have to make another Vanilla Chiffon Roll. Many recipes are not simple or casual, but they are reliable, delicious, and most importantly, fun.
• 
  Rhonda B

  Baking with Julia was a PBS television series of the mid 1990's (many episodes now available on Youtube). This book is a selection of some of the recipes that were shared by guest bakers on the show. If you haven't seen the show - which I haven't - the book merely represents a curation of recipes that seemingly have nothing at all to do with Julia Child. A short description with some anecdotal information about why a particular recipe was chosen - either to demonstrate in the television series or to include in the book, it doesn't matter - would have provided some relatable context. A bit of information about the contributing author would help me to feel more engaged with the book as well. Without this information, or access to the accompanying series, the creators lost an opportunity to create a cookbook with longevity and relevance beyond the 1990's - and beyond the television series. I haven't tested out any of the recipes yet, and will return to this review once I have.
• 
  Stephanie

  I love to bake more than cook and this book not only has a wonderful collection of various baked goods but is connected with one of, if not *the*, most fantastic cook/baker that has walked this earth. I bought the book a few years ago and it pretty much just sat with my other cookbooks. Recently, I have had the desire to do more baking and decided to use this book instead of just collect it and I have not been disappointed. I am finding also sorts of new or previously loved but didn't know how to make baked goods to try out. And the recipes are in total Julia style...easy to follow even when complicated or very detailed. The book is a gem just like Julia was and always will be.
• 
  Lori Selby

  I've been trying to learn how to bake bread and started with the Bread Baker's Apprentice. Unfortunately I found Peter's books hard to follow and complicated. It jumped around too much and I found that frustrating while trying to bake at the same time.
  
  Dorie's book is the opposite. While the recipes appear to be tricky, they are not. All the bases are covered. I felt like she was in the kitchen with me guiding me through every step.
  
  I would highly recommend it for anyone trying to gain an understanding of baking. It's number one on my list do far on this subject.
• 
  Jenny (Reading Envy)

  Based on the PBS series, this cookbook combines two of the best voices to have in your head - Julia Child and Dorie Greenspan - as well as all the bakers who joined her on the program. I have made simple recipes from here but where it excels is to help you through the complicated processes like laminate doughs, brioche, and wedding cakes. An essential baking cookbook.
• 
  Jackie Gamber

  Talk about "baking for dummies" - this book takes a reader through the basics! The good news is, it also respects a reader's intelligence. I've been baking/cooking my entire adult life, but haven't worked up the nerve for some of the more daunting projects like phyllo and croissants, but you know, I just might give it a whirl after all.
• 
  Nikki

  Based on the PBS television show where Julia Child met with other well-known bakers to show techniques. Well-illustrated and covers both basics and special items. I should be baking something instead of typing! But the realities of life mean that this book does not live on the pantry shelf, but upstairs where I will retrieve it when I get ambition.
• 
  Catherine Woodman

  This is a fun book to read, and the series on PBS is well worth watching--I love the one with her and the woman who owns Al FOrno's. The recipes are more the people she bakes with than hers, and you really cannot easily use the cookbook with out foreknowledge of the series--it is a strange assortment of recipes otherwise--but things I saw on the show worked when I used recipes in this book
• 
  Betsy

  LOVE. THIS. COOKBOOK!
  
  Has all the recipes from the PBS series of the same name. I've made quite a few of the recipes, and they have come out quite well. My particular favorite is the recipe for Finnish pulla, a rich, cardamom-scented coffee bread. The recipe is much easier to handle than most of the other recipes I've come across for pulla, which are usually two or three times as big!
  
• 
  Celeste Knoll

  I have owned this book for about 15 years. I remember the PBS series that featured the recipes. If you get stuck anywhere in the book, you can still find the videos online. The Challah recipe is wonderful. I made the pita bread yesterday with hummus. Dorie Greenspan, who wrote the cookbook, also has a good baking book called Baking. I am making the cheesecake recipe out of it today.
• 
  Maisy Lane

  It's a mainstay on my cookbook shelf, which is a pretty high rating in itself. I don't keep a lot of cook books around, since "just recipes" are easy enough to locate on the web. I've never made a recipe that has been less than wonderful, and the magazine look and feel, along with extra bits of narrative and nuance put up there with cookbooks my kids will inherit.
• 
  Meg

  Mine at last! Can't believe it took me this long to get a copy of this book, since I've been making the scones recipe for years since catching the episode on TV. The recipes may not be Julia's, but based on her imprimatur and the good scones experience, I expect great things! Now if only I had some extra stomachs...
• 
  Larry Edwards

  Once you have this book, go onto to YouTube and bring up the series. You will find most (if not all) of the recipes are very simple for the home cook. Not only are there some great recipes here but there are also quite a few helpful hints... and of course when you're watching the videos, you get Julia's wonderful humorous comments.
• 
  Bren Young

  My favorite baking book but just know in advance Julia never does anything the easy way; she prefers the best and hardest way to make everything. Her pie crust alone is 3 pages of instructions and it is probably the best pie crust ever but it's very involved and tedious to follow the directions!
  I still LOVE this book!
• 
  Ginny

  Excellent bible for anything baking. EVERY recipe I have ever done from this (probably over 30) has been a standout and repeat. Love it. Julia knocks another one out of the park. The book also was well awarded (which tends to be a good sign of good cookery) like the James Beard award.
• 
  Rachel

  I was so obsessed with this cookbook when it first came out, as I loved watching cooking shows when I was younger (and still do nowadays) esp ones with Julia Child. The one recipe I've actually tried out of here was the French bread, which took me six hours to make but was amazing.
• 
  Kelly

  Yes. What is it about reading cook books? I love them! You can't help but be amazed and also drool after reading this book. The next question is do I dare try to make any of these things? I wish I could bake!
• 
  Ninon

  If you have one cook book for baking in your kitchen then this would be it. The descriptions are wonderful and very precise. With Julia you never have to figure out what she meant. This is a nice sized book with terrific images.
• 
  Joye

  I watched most of this series on my iPad and then read the book. I love especially the bread recipes and can't wait to try them. Julia makes you feel like you can cook anything even complicated in your own kitchen.
• 
  Karen Mc

  Excellent book for anyone interested in learning how to bake. The blueberry nectarine pie is a must bake. If you've never tried homemade eclairs and cream puffs, the recipe at the beginning of the book is an great version for beginners.
• 
  Ellyn

  I love perusing this book and drooling over the recipes. However, I'm pretty much a baking failure- even with Julia's help. Maybe if she was next to me in the kitchen, telling me not to worry, no one will notice, just patch it...
• 
  Gail

  Classic Julia Child cookbook....many ingredients, many steps. For those who love baking both sweet and savory, this is a fantastic book. I recommend that it be used by an intermediate or very experienced baker.