Book Review: Rose's Ice Cream Bliss by Rose Levy Beranbaum

Rose’s Ice Cream Bliss
by Rose Levy Beranbaum (641.862 Ber)

After 50 years being known as a baking master, and author of such books as The Cake Bible, The Bread Bible and The Pie and Pastry Bible, Rose Levy Beranbaum has finally created a cookbook celebrating her own favorite type of sweet dessert — ice cream! Her opening 30 pages include her basic techniques, her base recipes (that most of the rest of the book builds upon), and her advice about the types of equipment she and others use to make ice cream.

 

Then, the rest of this relatively small book is recipes, recipes, recipes. Beranbaum breaks them down into categories: Flavorful Ice Creams; Berry, Fruit, and Vegetable Ice Creams; Chocolate and Nut Ice Creams; Toppings, Adornments, and Add-Ins for Ice Cream; and Ice Cream Socials (how ice creams can be paired up — cones, and other ice-cream partners). The recipes in each section range from classic simple flavors (vanilla, strawberry, chocolate), to quite exotic and challenging (Bust My Bourbon Balls Ice Cream, Candy Cane Peppermint Ice Cream, Dark Brown Sugar Ice Cream with Black Pepper, Royal Velvet Lavender Ice Cream, Pear Ice Cream, Ginger Ice Cream, Peanut Butter and Chocolate Fudge Ice Cream, Silken Black Sesame Ice Cream, True Coconut Ice Cream, and so many more).

 

Beranbaum’s instructions are easy to understand, though occasionally complicated. The illustrative photos by Matthew Septimus are beautiful and make your mouth water, but unfortunately only about 1/4 of the reviews include photos of the finished product. None-the-less, this is a marvelous cookbook, and I strongly recommend it, especially if you’re a fan of both ice cream and Beranbaum’s past books!

[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try The Cake Bible, The Bread Bible and The Pie and Pastry Bible, all also by Beranbaum.]

[ Rose’s Ice Cream Bliss page on the official Real Baking With Rose web site ]

 

See Kim J.’s review of Rose Levy Berenbaum’s The Cake Bible in the February 2005 Staff Recommendations on BookGuide!

 

Recommended by Scott C.
Bennett Martin Public Library — Public Service

 

Have you read or listened to this one? What did you think? Did you find this review helpful?

New reviews appear every month on the Staff Recommendations page of the BookGuide website. You can visit that page to see them all, or watch them appear here in the BookGuide Blog individually over the course of the entire month. Click the tag for the reviewer's name to see more of this reviewer’s recommendations!