Michelle Blanchard Ardillo

You had me at rye-chocolate shortbread! 

I love to read and I love to cook, so it is only natural that I read cookbooks like some people read novels: devouring them and savoring every last headnote, ingredient list, recipe, footnote, and photograph. Baking with Dorie by Dorie Greenspan is no exception. I can't wait to purchase a copy of this glorious compendium for my very own, and bake my way through it. 

I enjoy apple pie and chocolate chip cookies like the rest of us, but I really love cookbooks that have great recipes for the all-American standards combined with favorites from other parts of the world. This brings me to the rye and chocolate shortbread. In a recipe named "Tenderest Shortbread Four Ways," Greenspan pushes us way out of our comfort zone (and what could be more comforting than a piece of buttery sandy shortbread with a steaming hot cup of tea) into a recipe for "The Rye-Chocolate Shortbread." I love rye bread, and during the pandemic have spent some time trying to copy the Harvest Loaf from my favorite farmers' market. I know it's part rye and has lots of other seeds and grains in it but I'm not there yet. Now I know just what to do with one cup of the rye flour I ordered for those experimental loaves. I can almost taste that Rye-Chocolate Shortbread now!

Since the pandemic has all but frozen us in place, I loved being able to dream about all the places I'd love to travel to, where I could eat all of the goodies from those places that are detailed in Greenspan's book, like the "Biscuits Rose" sold all over the Champagne region of France, the "Glenorchy Flapjacks" straight from New Zealand, or the "Szarlotka" apple dessert from Poland. 

This is a beautiful cookbook, with gorgeous photos of almost every recipe in it, but what I really appreciate is what Greenspan includes at the end of each recipe: Playing Around. Here she details how to add/delete ingredients to make the recipe your own, or to bring it back to what it was originally, like the updated World Peace Cookies 2.0 recipe on page 160. In the Playing Around section at the end of the recipe, she gives instructions on how to go back and make the original World Peace Cookies. But, hey, since the 2.0 version calls for 1/2 cup of rye flour and a pinch of cayenne pepper, I'm going to start with the updated one!

The publication date for this beauty is October 19, 2021. Being a Libra, I think this would make a wonderful birthday present that I will gift to myself!

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an advanced copy of this in exchange for an honest review.