Baked to Perfection: Winner of the Fortnum & Mason Food and Drink Awards 2022

by Katarina Cermelj

Overview

"If you could buy just one book on gluten-free baking, my pick would be Baked to Perfection . . . It is that good." —Bon Appetit

Winner of the Fortnum & Mason Food and Drink Awards 2022
IACP Award finalist in Baking Sweet & Savory, Confections and Desserts

The only gluten-free baking book you'll ever need, with delicious recipes that work perfectly every time.

From proper crusty bread, pillowy soft cinnamon rolls and glorious layered cakes to fudgy brownies, incredibly flaky rough puff pastry and delicate patisserie – everything that once seemed impossible to make gluten-free can now be baked by you.

Baked to Perfection begins with a thorough look at the gluten-free baking basics: how different gluten-free flours behave, which store-bought blends work best, and how to mix your own to suit your needs. Covering cakes, brownies, cookies, pastry and bread in turn, Katarina shares the best techniques for the recipes in that chapter, and each recipe is accompanied by expert tips, useful scientific explanations and occasional step-by-step photography to help you achieve gluten-free perfection.

Recipes include classic bakes like super-moist chocolate cake, caramel apple pie and chocolate chip cookies, the softest, chewiest bread, including crusty artisan loaves, baguettes, brioche burger buns and soda bread, and mouth-watering showstoppers like toasted marshmallow brownies, coffee cream puffs and strawberries + cream tart.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781526613486
Publisher:	Bloomsbury USA
Publication date:	08/17/2021
Pages:	384
Sales rank:	6,093
Product dimensions:	7.70(w) x 9.70(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Katarina Cermelj is undertaking a PhD in Inorganic Chemistry from Oxford. After cutting out gluten from her diet, she used her scientific background to experiment with gluten-free baking, and in 2016 set up her hugely popular baking blog, The Loopy Whisk, sharing her sumptuous allergy-friendly recipes. Baked to Perfection is her first cookbook.

Editorial Reviews

03/15/2021

The Loopy Whisk blogger Cermelj debuts with a winning guide that draws on her scientific background—she has a PhD in inorganic chemistry—to develop “gluten-free recipes that are simple and give mouth-watering results.” She asserts one of the key factors of gluten-free baking is creating an ideal texture by blending starch gluten-free flours (which give baked items a crumbly texture) with protein gluten-free flours (that provide the elasticity that prevents goods from becoming too crumbly). She shares examples of store-bought and DIY flour blends, which are used in sweet recipes, such as hazelnut and milk chocolate cake and raspberry frangipane tart, as well as savory ones, including zucchini and feta muffins and rosemary focaccia. Unfortunately, the supplementary information that precedes each chapter will overwhelm those who aren’t scientifically savvy, as with a chart of mathematical formulas used to calculate the scaling of cakes sizes. Thankfully, the recipes are straightforward and loaded with plenty of accessible notes in the margins (“the extra egg whites make the cupcakes especially fluffy,” she explains for her vanilla cupcakes). Bakers who want to expand their gluten-free baking repertoire and really get into what’s happening in the baking process won’t want to miss this. Agent: Tessa David, Peters Fraser + Dunlop Literary. (May)

Publishers Weekly

If you could buy just one book on gluten-free baking, my pick would be Baked to Perfection . . . It is that good.” —Bon Appetit

“A really lovely book . . . utterly gorgeous photographs . . . an enormously helpful guide to baking in general, frankly, and gluten-free baking in particular.” —Nigella Lawson

“Gluten-free baking just got a whole lot easier! The knowledge that Katarina shares is indispensable.” —Julie Jones, author of The Pastry School

“Katarina Cermelj effortlessly combines her knowledge of both science and baking to demystify gluten-free baking once and for all.” —Erin Jeanne McDowell, author of The Fearless Baker

“Baked to Perfection contains all the recipes and scientific understanding you need to bake anything gluten-free, and for it to work perfectly every time. Katarina has produced a beautiful and inspiring book that makes me want to head for the kitchen and switch on the oven! A magnificent achievement.” —Juliet Sear, author of The Cake Decorating Bible

“Put what you know about wheat-based baking aside, and let Katarina teach you the wonders of decadent cookies, flaky tartlets, and tender cakes that all happen to be baked without gluten.” —Tessa Huff, author of Layered

“A winning guide . . . Bakers who want to expand their gluten-free baking repertoire and really get into what's happening in the baking process won't want to miss this.” —Publishers Weekly

“With humor and wit, [Cermelj] explains everything readers need to know to make their own successful gluten-free treats . . . With intelligent instruction and beautiful visuals, Cermelj shows readers that gluten-free baked goods can be moist, tasty, and satisfying.” —Booklist

From the Publisher