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Johny Iuzzini’s “Dessert Fourplay” – a beautiful book filled with lucious desserts!
Last week, during the height of Christmas insanity, I headed to the Seattle Macy’s location to check out a demo by award winning Johnny Iuzzini. In our family, I would definitely not be considered the pastry chef…at all. My husband, on the other hand, is extraordinary when it comes to baking, so I knew I’d be able to come home with some tips and tricks for him (and maybe a few gifts!)
Johnny with a turtle cookie cutter
I didn’t know what to expect – Johnny Iuzzini is a James Beard award winning pastry chef and is currently the executive pastry chef for Jean Georges in NYC. (Oh, Jean Georges? Just world renowned and highly awarded, as well. Check out their wikipedia page if you don’t believe me!!) Johnny is also the head judge on Top Chef: Just Desserts. So when I think of an award winning pastry chef / judge, I don’t exactly think of someone who’s going to be cool and laid back. I envision someone who is strict, disciplined and probably slightly boring.
Let me be clear – Johnny Iuzzini is none of those things. He was super friendly, silly, down to Earth and clearly passionate about food – desserts in particular, of course. The cooking demo consisted of three cookies of Johnny’s creation, two are pictured below – the lime shortbread (which could really be used with any flavor besides lime, even savory flavors!) and sugar cookies that were made into sandwich cookies with a fabulous white chocolate orange ganache for filling. (You could also use any kind of yummy locally made sauce or jam for filling, too!)
COOKIES!
Here are some of Johnny’s expert tips for fantastic holiday cookies:
- Always sift your dry ingredients
- Buy a kitchen scale and use the weights instead of measuring cups for ingredients (it’s much more accurate this way)
- Fresh anything is always better (citrus, etc)
- Scrape your mixing bowl after each ingredient is added
- Freeze and dice your butter before mixing
- Add dry ingredients slowly
- When using refridgerated dough, allow it to warm slightly before rolling out.
- Don’t knead cookie dough scraps, simple push back together and roll slightly.
- Don’t let your cookies cool on the pan
- If you are short on time, prep your cookies before and refridgerate dough, but DO NOT refridgerate cookies once baked.
Overall, this is one of the best demo’s I’ve been to – in that I feel like I learned a lot and being able to meet Johnny was really awesome. He also stayed and answered all the questions the audience had – from what his favorite cookies were to baking questions. Macy’s had a fantastic deal, too – if you spent $35 in the housewares department, you’d receive a signed copy of Johnny’s book, Dessert Fourplay, as well as a $10 Macy’s gift card and some other goodies.
Naturally, I (selfishly) wanted the book because my husband is a fabulous baker who is capable of ‘upping his game’ so to speak, so after the demo I dashed to the kitchen department and bought two items that Johnny specifically mentioned in his demo. (A microplane for zesting citrus and an attachment for our Kitchen Aid Mixer that has a bowl scraper attached! It’s amazingly cool.)
My husband got an early gift and I’ll be eating amazing desserts like Chocolate-Filled Passion Souffle Tarts before long…mmmm….
Do you have any Cookie-baking tips you love? Share in the comments!
