Wonderful dessert book! | Great Good Desserts Naturally!: Secrets of Sensational Sin-Free Sweets

Good, but not always great. | Great Good Desserts Naturally!: Secrets of Sensational Sin-Free Sweets | Fran Costigan

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	• Great Good Desserts Naturally!: Secrets of Sensational Sin-Free Sweets Fran Costigan Good Cakes Publications, 2000 - 144 pages average customer review:based on 22 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

I am simply blown away

This book is brilliant. Of my myriad vegan cookbooks, it's recipes are consistently the best and most thoughtfully presented. Every single recipe I have tried has been mouthwateringly good. Fran (if I may use her name so informally, which only feels natural since I use her cookbook so much) leaves out no details when it comes to baking delectable desserts and provides tons of background information on healthy sugar substitutes and the like. I have made many of these desserts for my family and peers and they too have been shocked that there are no animal products or refined sugars in them. I wholeheartedly recommend this book to vegans and non-vegans alike. I am delighted each time I get the opportunity to make something from it.

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Wonderful dessert book!

Although I am not a vegan, I do try to limit my dairy. However, dessert is my major weakness. This book is nothing short of fabulous. It taught me how to make healthier desserts, make appropriate subs., etc. She explains all of the uncommon ingredients for those we are new to vegan desserts. I have made a ton of recipes from this book and have not been dissapointed by any! I highly recommend this book.

Good, but not always great.

Fran has really broken some important ground here and offered helpful tips for substitutions and alternatives to the nutritionally pathetic traditional method of dessert making. DO NOT come to this with the expectation of everything tasting like grandma made it -- vegan baking cannot taste exactly like double fudge cake with butter cream icing, nor should it have to. It is tasty in its own way, and once you get used to it, other desserts are overwhelming and unappealing.

Before you read further, however, know that I am not sold on the 0% refined sugar routine because I don't like everything to taste like maple syrup and barley malt, and would rather not spend an arm and a leg to purchase these items over plain old sugar. Fran refers to everything that does not have white sugar as "sugar-free" which is very misleading, inaccurate, and confusing if you don't know what she's referring to. For example, "sugar-free lemonade" (which I thought must just be frozen lemon juice and water?) actually meant organic lemonade sweetened with juices. If the viscosity of the syrup she calls for is necessary, then I will use it, but I ration them out so as not to break the bank.

If you share this mindset, don't dismay -- it is easy to tweak the recipes to allow for some refined sugar. I was seriously impressed with the boston creme pie/cake, which I fed to many dairy-eating carnivores that didn't know it was vegan (and my husband went crazy over it). I was disappointed that the only sugar cookie recipe was wheat-free and nearly inedible (I threw the remainder away after I served them, and vowed never to make something out of here for others without trying it first!). Brownies were amazing, oatmeal cookies were very good (and I tried those using no white sugar), chocolate sauce/glaze made me want to sing and dance.

The "great" recipes in this book are reason enough to buy it, but the good information about successfully baking using the prescribed methods is invaluable (minus the scientific claims and warnings that are presented without reference to any empirically valid source, yet printed as fact).

It is not the most professionally made book (several typos and not aesthetically pleasing), but that doesn't matter to me as long as it's useful. Buy it, peruse it carefully, adapt the techniques, and then use that as a springboard for fashioning your own great good desserts!

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Amazing!

These are some of the best desserts ever. I served the blueberry slump at a dinner party, and my guests were blown away that it was all natural. Go Fran!!!

do you really want to make vegan desserts?

If you really want to make vegan desserts at home, this is a good reference. However, be prepared to shop for hard-to-find, expensive ingredients like arrowroot, kuzu, and agar. Also, I wish the author included approximate times for each recipe, like some of my other cookbooks do. I made the tofu frosting, and even though it was good, it wasn't good enough to justify the two hours it took to make. I think this book is good enough to give it four stars, but I've discovered that, personally, I'd rather just go to a vegan bakery than bother doing it myself.

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Now you can eat sumptuous desserts that are as healthful as they are delicious, using more whole grain flours, nutritious oils, organic ingredients, and natural sweeteners, without eggs or dairy products. Enjoy sinful chocolate cakes and brownies, comforting fruit pies, baklava, dessert creams and sauces, heavenly frostings and fillings, and refreshing dairyfree ice creams.

reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

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