Dessert Person: A Cookbook Review

There are many cookbooks in the world. Millions of them all telling you how to make a perfect dish or dessert. But what if I told you that there was one cookbook with recipes and findings that would make your mouth water? What if I told you it had pictures for every recipe and even some great tips as well? This is not just any cookbook though – It’s a Dessert Person Cookbook!
Our review of Dessert Person by Claire Saffitz will give you an overview of the book, as well as an overview of two recipes we baked from it. We hope you enjoy the next edition of our Friday Food Reads series.

About The Author, Claire Saffitz

Anyone that believes every meal should end with something sweet is my kind of person! Claire Saffitz is a dessert person. Not only does she love eating them, but she also loves making them. She wants to empower home bakers to work with new ingredients, attempt new techniques, and bake with more confidence. All the same things we strive to do at our Sweet Academy. I love that she spends the time to explain the hows and whys in the recipe. She doesn’t go fancy with the desserts, and I like that she prefers sharable desserts.

Recipe For Success

Each recipe in the book comes with a difficulty rating of 1 to 5. One being very easy, and five being very challenging. The recipes in each chapter are organized by easiest to most difficult. So if you are new and nervous, start with the first recipe in the chapter and work your way through it.

I also love that she gives baking times, but also gives you an indicator of how it should be looking to test for doneness.

There are lots of great techniques and tips for something as simple as filling a pastry bag or how to brown butter.

How The Book Is Broken Down

The book has seven chapters. Six are broken out in categories like loaf cakes, pies and tarts, bars and cookies, layer cakes, etc. The seventh chapter is full of her foundation recipes which get used throughout the book. I think every recipe has images of the final product and also a few with process shots. I love when they include the final product shot. It really does let me know what I’m striving for.

Speculoos Babka

This was the first recipe I made from the book. And I will say it was delicious. I’m someone that could eat speculoos daily, although I don’t, I could. The babka was made with the base recipe of sweet yeast dough. I’m a big fan of chocolate babka, so I figured why not. She provided some do ahead tips, what to do if I only wanted one loaf and not two…really?!? Of course I wanted two!

I’m going to say she warns you that this will rise in the oven, and boy did it ever. If I were to make any changes to this recipe, I would reduce cinnamon. It felt a bit overpowering, and I was missing more of the speculoos flavor. Be sure to follow her instructions for the rising size, and you will have a loaf you love.

Rhubarb Cake From Dessert Person

The second recipe we made was this gorgeous rhubarb cake. I am a rhubarb person! I know there are rhubarb haters out there, but I can’t resist that delicious tart flavor from cooking with the vegetable in desserts. The cake is moist and light on top of being sweet enough to satisfy anyone’s tastebuds who crave something more than vanilla or chocolate flavors all the time. This dessert got two stars for difficulty because you had to cook the rhubarb first before adding them into your batter – which as any experienced baker knows takes up some extra time and energy.

This would be rated as one of our favorites since she gives clear visual cues about how done everything should be when checking on them, so there’s no guesswork involved… My finished cake was completed about 20 minutes less than her cooking time suggested. So be sure to follow the visual queues.

Should You Buy Dessert Person?

The Dessert Person Cookbook is a great addition to any cook’s library. It has recipes for every occasion and even some helpful tips on how to get through those pesky recipe steps without losing your mind in the process! If you are looking for a new dessert book or just want something that might make your mouth water, this could be it. I would recommend giving it a try if you have been searching high and low for an amazing dessert cookbook with tons of tasty recipes-because the Dessert Person Cookbook should definitely satisfy both cravings!

Other Friday Food Reads

• Pie Camp
• Friday Food Reads – The Good Book of Southern Baking
• Now For Something Sweet
• 100 Cookies

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