Desserts: More Than 140 Of Food & Wine's Most Beloved Recipes
Food & Wine is one of the foremost authorities on food, drink, travel, design, and entertaining. Since 1978, the magazine has delivered recipes, cooking tips, wine pairings, reviews, and so much more to its readers.
Desserts is a curation of more than 140 of Food & Wine's all-time favorite desserts from the past 30 years. The recipes come from many of your favorite chefs, from Ina Garten and Jacques Pepin to Tom Colicchio, Dorie Greenspan, and Stephanie Izzard. The resulting cookbook is like a master document, filled with the best recipes some of the cooking world's foremost experts have to offer. The editors of Food & Wine teamed up to compile this selection of the most memorable recipes ever featured.
Christine Quinlan, deputy editor of Food & Wine, came to New York City with a background in finance and no specific job prospects. In 2005, after taking communications classes at The New School and internships at two Italian food magazines, Quinlan landed a job at Food & Wine, eventually working her way up through the ranks to her current position. Below, she answers The Daily Meal's questions about Desserts.
Recipes featured in the cookbook include:
— Brown Butter Pecan Pie With Espresso Dates
— Chocolate Chunk Cookie for One
— Chocolate-Buttermilk Snack Cakes
To purchase Desserts: More Than 140 of Food & Wine's Most Beloved Recipes, click here.
The Daily Meal: What is your philosophy of cooking (and/or eating)?
Christine Quinlan: Relax and have fun. With cooking it can be hard to find the joy when a bunch of people are staring at you waiting to eat, but it's in there. When I cook I prefer to wing it, versus following recipes to the letter, and I especially love baking. Part of what's so great about it is that it forces you to slow down and to be patient. When it comes to eating I'm all about being in the moment and focusing on what's on my plate and who I'm with. I suppose it's why I'm not the best on Instagram.
How did it inspire the recipes you chose to include in this book?
Dessert is just inherently fun, so it fits right in with my philosophy. A lot of my picks for this book are classics with a twist. You can only wing it so much when it comes to baking, but there's usually room for a few surprises.
What is your favorite recipe in the book and why?
At Food & Wine we get to taste so many amazing things in our Test Kitchen, so it was hard enough to narrow my picks down to a handful of recipes, never mind just one. But I can tell you the two I make more than any others are the Chocolate Brownie Cookies — bring them to a friend's and they'll definitely get you invited back over and over — and the Back-to-School Raspberry Granola Bars — so easy and such a satisfying nutty-buttery-brown sugary treat. I especially love them for breakfast.
What are some of the foods you can't live without?
A perfectly roasted chicken, blistered pizza with fresh, creamy mozzarella, spicy dandan noodles, crusty kouign-amann. Oh, and chocolate and bourbon.
Would you rather dine out or cook at home?
It really depends. Dining out is an important part of my job, and I love the feeling of community it creates. I can get a little lazy when it comes to cooking for just me but I love to cook for a group — the bigger the better.
What is your favorite go-to meal or drink?
For years my go-to cocktail has been a Boulevardier (bourbon, sweet vermouth, and Campari), so I love that they've become popular the past couple of years. Food-wise I love so many things. When I crave something soul-nourishingly delicious, it's usually pasta: carbonara, amatriciana, bolognese... I could keep going.
How do you hope readers will use this book? What do you hope they take away?
We want them to inhabit the place we were coming from when we ate all of these desserts and put the book together: joy! There is such a broad range of recipes in here, so I hope people use it for everything from bake sales to dinner parties to holiday gifts.
Is there anything else you'd like to share?
I hate to admit this, but making dessert is actually a little selfish because it often seems more impressive than it really is. It pretty much guarantees oohs and aahs and just makes people happy. What's not to love about that?
