Antje Helma: Sweet Invention: A History of Dessert by Michael Krondl

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From the sacred fudge served to India?s gods to the ephemeral baklava of Istanbul?s harems, the towering sugar creations of Renaissance Italy, and the exotically scented macarons of twenty-first century Paris, the world?s confectionary arts have not only mirrored social, technological, and political revolutions, they have also, in many ways, been in their vanguard.?Sweet Invention: A History of Dessert?captures the stories of sweet makers past and present from India, the Middle East, Italy, France, Vienna, and the United States, as author Michael Krondl meets with confectioners around the globe, savoring and exploring the dessert icons of each tradition. Readers will be tantalized by the rich history of each region?s unforgettable desserts and tempted to try their own hand at a time-honored recipe. A fascinating and rewarding read for any lover of sugar, butter, and cream,?Sweet Inventionembraces the pleasures of dessert while unveiling the secular, metaphysical, and even sexual uses that societies have found for it.

About?Michael Krondl

Michael Krondl?is a food historian and the author of?The Taste of Conquest,?The Great Little Pumpkin Cookbook, and?Around the American Table. He is an award-winning cooking instructor, food writer, and former chef. His writing credits include?Gastronomica, New York?Newsday, and?Nation?s Restaurant News?as well as multiple contributions to?The Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America. For more information visit www.sweetinvention.net

Editorial Reviews

?Michael Krondl writes about the history of desserts with grace, wit, and a considerable sweet tooth.? ?Nick Malgieri, author of?BAKE!?and?The Modern Baker

?Frosted with eye-catching detail, layered with the rich and mouthwatering history of all things sweet, and leavened by inspired scholarship, Michael Krondl?s history of dessert is a lush confection in its own right. . . . This is a must-read for all of us who care about food history, or have a sweet tooth.? ?Ian Kelly, author of?Cooking for Kings: The Life of Antonin Careme, the First Celebrity Chef

?Sweet Invention is a captivating journey of dessert travel. Beautifully written and fun to read, Michael Krondl manages to take us on a ride as kid in a candy store throughout the ages to modern day.? ?Elizabeth Falkner, chef/pastry chef and author of?Elizabeth Falkner?s Demolition Desserts

Quest For The Holy Doughnut, And The First Dessert

NPR Book Review ? October 9, 2011 (Excerpt)

OK, forget the vegetables. It?s time for dessert.

And not just any dessert ? the oldest dessert in New York City. No, not those rock-hard doughnuts from the corner coffee cart. We?re talking about the kinds of sweets people would have been eating 500, 1,000, even 2,000 years ago.

Veniero?s Italian pastry shop is a good place to start. It?s got pignoli cookies, cannoli, and most importantly, biscotti. ?Now, biscotti were not invented in Seattle to go along with Starbucks,? author Michael Krondl tells Robert Smith, guest host of weekends on?All Things Considered.

Krondl is the author of a new book,?Sweet Invention: A History of Dessert. He says biscotti are descended from ship?s biscuits, those twice-baked bits of bread designed not to mold on a long sea voyage.

?The first real recipes for what you could identify as biscotti come from about 1550 or so,? he says.

Those historical cookies weren?t strictly what we would call a dessert. Back then, people hadn?t yet decided to put the sweets at the end of the meal ? that?s a more recent invention. [Read the full article...]

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