Publisher's Weekly Review
In this wonderfully indulgent cookbook, Karmel, the founding executive chef of New York's Hill Country Barbecue, matches red meat entrees with decadent desserts. Home cooks will be tempted by, for example, steak Diane cooked in shallots, brandy, and butter, which is followed by retro chocolate cupcakes with a sweet mascarpone center; as well as individual servings of beef Wellington that share the table with a chocolate-coconut candy bar cake. Karmel relies mainly on recipes from her friends and family: the POTUS carrot cake originated with her cousin Carol, who was once Gerald Ford's chef (the cake is paired with a New York strip steak). One-time Spiaggia pastry chef Cece Campise contributes a cast-iron lemon steak with a sauce of wine, lemon juice, butter, and shallots to go with a Houston banana loaf cake. Butter is the common denominator among many of these dishes, though, with an Irish flank steak sandwich and its accompanying double-chocolate Guinness bundt cake, stout beer is the shared ingredient. Karmel's teaching skills truly shine in the book's final 50 pages, where she presents excellent primers on the basics of steak and cake preparation. Whether smothered in onions or covered in frosting, Karmel's offerings are as rich as they are satisfying. (May) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
Everyone knows how to cook a steak, and the best cakes come from a bakery box, right? Karmel (BBQ&A, 2014) proves these assumptions more than wrong with these 100-plus recipes pairing, you guessed it, steak and cake. Throughout, she shares her expertise and knowledge of the culinary world, whether that means lessons from chefs like Jean-Georges Vongerichten and David Lebovitz or a deep-veined précis, covering everything from cuts of meat to slick baking techniques. Dieters, step aside: every dish is decadent; every match of meat and sweet, delicious. Try beef tenderloin kebabs and Palooza cake walk, or cumin-rubbed flank steak and Tex-Mex chocolate sheet cake, for starters. She adds even more variety with accompanying variations after the initial duet has been presented, and includes more than a few secrets of the art, such as why steak knives matter and I don't think seasoning on the steak adds anything except visual appeal. Anticipate other forthright opinions and a pretty serious photographic glossary of steaks, each with names, muscle group, flavor intensity, texture, defining characteristics, prep notes, and approximate prices by dollar signs. Includes conversion tables.--Barbara Jacobs Copyright 2019 Booklist
