Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I stumbled upon this book a few weeks ago and fell in love with it! I am a scratch baker myself, self taught just for the love of it! Thankfully I come from a family who helped show me the way. I love everything about this book. I've made six recipes so far from this book - Brown Sugar Banana Bread, Chocolate Chip Cookies, Red Velvet Cake, Cherry Pie Bars, Sour Cream Coffee Cake and Bacon Jam. I also had the pleasure of going to a baking class here in California with the lovely Cheryl and Griffith Day and got to sample their Chocolate Heaven Cake, Blueberry Buckle, Drunken Blondies, Coconut Cream Pie, Sweet Potato Cupcakes with Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting, and they made the Bacon Jam too. Everything that I have baked myself from the book as well as what they baked for us that day has been beyond delicious! Most to the point of incredible!! I have to say the Coconut Cream Pie was the best I have ever tasted as well as the Red Velvet Cake. I have made about 5 different red velvet recipes trying to find one that is perfect and their recipe is finally the winner! I tried Paula Deen's, Bobby Flay's, Alton Browns, etc. and their recipe blew them all away. I also have to say that I made the Cherry Pie Bars thinking they would be good but wasn't expecting anything spectacular but they were. I wound up using a mix of cherries, blackberries and raspberries from Trader Joe's and the guys that tasted it said I should enter it into a contest somewhere, it's that good! Don't even get me started on the Bacon Jam! It is one of the best things I have ever tasted! I personally thought it sounded weird and thought the bacon might be rubbery or something after all that cooking down with the liquids but it isn't. Truly this is the first book I have ever owned that I feel I could bake everything from. Everything! There is so much love in this book and the recipes are ones that you will treasure. There is nothing really fancy about it, they don't try and reinvent the wheel, these are just incredible good old fashioned American desserts that have stood the test of time and will hopefully continue to inspire new generations to get back to scratch baking rather than buying manufactured baked goods that are filled with artificial ingredients and certainly made with no love. Do yourself a favor and get this book!!! It's written for anyone, whether you bake all the time or haven't ever made anything from scratch. This is certainly one that will never sit on a dusty shelf! Update June 2014 - I've now made 30+ recipes from this book and it remains my very favorite baking book! They've all been great recipes! Many I have made several times over.