The Last Bite: A Whole New Approach to Making Desserts Through the Year

This is a bold new take on seasonality in the pastry kitchen, one which borrows ingredients from the savory pantry, incorporates plant parts that might otherwise be destined for the compost heap, and displays a creativity and resourcefulness that we find impressive.

Anna Higham's career includes stints at NYC's Gramercy Tavern as well as at Lyle's and Flor in London, and now at the London River Cafe. Her approach is often remarkably elemental—strawberry juice with chewy dried strawberries—and treats the same ingredient in different ways to exploit flavor and texture differences.

Although the book is packaged somewhat like a home baking book and is within the reach of ambitious home bakers, it's our belief that like another book by a Gramercy alum with a similar title, The Last Bite is a fascinating statement of a professional baker's boundary-crossing imagination. 

As examples

• Cherry blossom steamed sponge with sweet and pickled cherries
• Corn ice cream with caramelized corn cake and whey cajeta
• Nebbiolo sorbet, olive oil ice cream, and roasted Fragola grapes
• Baked cream with mulberry granita and thyme

Higham clearly likes her ice creams and sorbets, but you can also find and borrow individual elements such as buckwheat shortbread, yeast caramel, and black currant leaf vinegar meringues.

Hardcover. Color photographs throughout.