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VALENTINE'S DAY SWEETS

The recipes are HERE! Join as a PREMIUM MEMBER!

  "I'm always looking for something that tastes good and is good for you and I know anything that comes from this site is tried and true and delicious!"

VOL-AU-VALENTINE'S DAY TUTORIAL
"The pastry cream is just so yummy...the combination, with the puff pastry is killer-good! The strawberry on top makes it FABULOUS! I imagine that they would be great with raspberries too."
PALMIER TUTORIAL!
Also known as palm leaves, this crispy delicacy is made from PUFF PASTRY dough that is sprinkled with granulated sugar, folded and rolled several times, then cut into thin strips. After baking, these golden brown, caramelized pastries make a delicious treat to have with tea or coffee and the cinnamon sugar variation taste like all the very best bits of a cinnamon bun...buttery and luscious!
FRESH STRAWBERRIES & CREAM CAKE TUTORIAL
COOKIES FOR VALENTINE'S DAY!
LOVE NOTE COOKIES!
Send a sweet message to someone you love! How fun!
STAINED GLASS HEART SUGAR COOKIES, STEP-BY-STEP
Beautiful Linzer Cookies!
Give someone special
homemade crisp buttery sandwich cookies
KELLY CA: Sarah's version is yummy.
I had a hard time finding hazelnuts, so I used almonds instead. DE-LISH!

mom2kate: I made these again this year. I really love them. they have such a great texture!...the cookies really look beautiful and are very yummy!
MMMM....MARBLE CAKE TUTORIAL!
Learn OUR new and very easy mixing techniques
for a better results!

"I love your tutorials. They really help me turn out great baked goods. And having your personal feedback, as well as feedback from the baking911 community, is what makes your site unique. I'm very happy to be a premium member!"

"Just Sarah's advice ALONE is well-worth the price! Her knowledge and helpfulness with solving any problems are priceless and she can tell you, almost to the T, how to fix a recipe that you may be having problems with, thus saving you much more than the cost for the membership for wasted ingredients."

WHO IS SARAH PHILLIPS?
New York City, New York

Sarah Phillips has been an innovative force in the food business for over 20 years. She is Founder and CEO of the popular website www.baking911.com, one of the top 100,000 sites in the world (Alexa.com), started in 2000.

Baking911.com informs bakers what cookbooks are too often remiss in explaining:  “what is room temperature butter”, “what is a prepared pan?” Prior to that, she founded the baking mix company, Healthy Oven Baking Mixes (“Bakes with Applesauce instead of Butter”), that were distributed nationwide from 1989-1999 in top grocery store chains, Wal-Mart and natural food chains (Whole Foods).

Before starting Healthy Oven, Sarah was a gourmet and specialty food broker in the Northeast. While demonstrating and promoting these food products and her own product line in such stores, people would ask her these very questions, and she found there was no place to look for answers. baking911.com was born.

The baking911.com site contains thousands of pages of unique content and research, and a growing base of 1,500 recipes for PREMIUM Paying MEMBERS – for cakes, cookies, candy, chocolate, pies,  yeast breads, quick bread, pastry, fillings, frostings and glazes, custards and more – developed by Sarah, many of which provide answers to vexing baking problems such as,  “How come my chocolate chip cookies are flat?” -  Sarah developed a Thick-with-a-Chew Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe, the dough which needs no refrigeration prior to baking.  She developed the recipe so it bakes puffy every time!  She believes that the recipe should do most of the work within its formula –  instead of the baker doing the work (such as special chilling, special ingredients to make it work or having to form it into special shapes prior to baking). Her recipe results have proven that it can be done with everyday ingredients.

Another example are recipes for cakes which do not dome and require little trimming – “the way layer cakes should bake if properly balanced” – with moist textures. Sarah advocates the use of ingredients right from the fridge for baking,  because she has proven that the friction from today’s electric stand mixer attachments quickly warm the ingredients to the proper batter temperature during mixing; she feels that cookbook’s instructions for use of room temperature ingredients for baking is old-fashioned and no longer necessary.

Most of the recipes are presented in step-by-step fashion, accompanied with up to over a hundred color photographs, with detailed and the hows and whys of baking information included.  

Sarah, a baking expert, is constantly quoted, the website mentioned or her recipes published worldwide in magazines, newspapers and books, for her expert knowledge, such as the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Washington Post, Gourmet Magazine, Saveur Magazine, and many others. She was named last year by The Guardian Newspaper in the UK as one of the 30 of the world’s greatest bakers!  "baking911.com, home to some of the best baking know-how on the net..." Sarah is a contributor to the New York Times Online Food Topics, “Cake: The Essentials”,  http://www.nytimes.com/info/cake/

Sarah teaches and lectures.  She wrote Baking 9-1-1, Simon and Schuster, 2003, advocating the use of ingredients cold from the fridge for use in baking, and recipes which solve common baking problems.

Sarah specializes in creating new innovative techniques and working on specialty baking recipes for food allergies, sugar-free and special diets – she is currently working on gluten-free recipes, having recently been self-diagnosed as gluten-intolerant – and, she could not find any suitable baked goods that were not gummy with a bitter aftertaste.

Sarah found she had to develop  new gluten-free mixing methods to be able to provide great texture and flavor in cakes, cookies, brownies, recipes etc; because she discovered that” the traditional mixing methods used just do not work as well in the absence of wheat flour and gluten”. Sarah believes that there is room for gluten-free products, which taste and look good, for the everyday mainstream person with celiac disease!  The recipes can be further substituted with other allergy-free ingredient replacers, if necessary. She hopes to publish a book on the subject.

Prior to that, she wrote the Healthy Oven Baking Book, Doubleday, 1999, and pioneered low-fat and fat-reduced baked goods with new mixing methods using fruit purees as fat substitutes; she expanded the use of the muffin mix method in reduced fat and low-fat recipes by combining the sugar with the wet ingredients for better aeration of ingredients in the absence of fat.. Her recipes and product line have appeared in magazines and newspapers with rave reviews. 

Sarah also solves baking problems from baking911.com and serves as a consultant to industry. On her ASK SARAH FORUM, she answers baking questions from over 53,000 (and growing) registered members on her current, three- year-old forum, on a daily basis. Before that, she has estimated that she has answered hundreds of thousands of baking questions from home and professional bakers on earlier discussion forums.

Sarah has developed recipes for and has consulted with Chicago Metallic Bakeware, Clabber Girl / Rumford /Davis Baking Powder, McCormick Spice Company, to name a few.

Sarah just filed a patent pending for a new cupcake liner, Baking Petals ™, that she feels is an answer to so many baker’s complaining about failed liners, which she hopes to market in the near future.

Sarah's mother was a great baker and cook, who served as an early inspiration and teacher. At a young age, Sarah started collecting cookbooks and using recipes from them, plus inventing her own.  Sarah has augmented her at home experience with numerous classes in baking and cooking at the Culinary Institute of America, the French Culinary Institute and the Institute for Culinary Education, in New York. She was granted an honorary PhD in the Humanities from Marymount College, New York, 2000, for her extensive research and contributions to the baking industry.

Vintage Photo ~ My love of baking started early! Sarah Phillips
(far left), age 6
 photos © Sarah Phillips, baking911.com

BE A BETTER BAKER! JOIN TODAY!
It's like having a personal baking expert in your home kitchen, with recipes that work.....
"I never had a dry cupcake or cake using any of Sarah's recipe or any of the recipes here in b911. They're pretty reliable to be moist, soft and yummy!"

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FREE RECIPE TUTORIALS
Selections change all the time
Check back here often!

FREE FOR A LIMITED TIME!

ITALIAN STRAWBERRY TARTS (CROSTATA DI FRAGOLE)

How to make, step-by-step!

YUMMY!

VALENTINE'S DAY LOVE STACKS!
FREE FOR A LIMITED TIME!
WITH MARSHMALLOW FONDANT  RECIPE TUTORIAL!
How-to with photos!
Perfect for Valentine's Day!

Take a look at what we do best!

Ok, so you bought a cookbook from a well-known baking professional or found a highly ranked recipe on the internet or from your favorite blog, and followed the instructions to a tee!

The recipe ended up a disaster!

 What happened?

You swear you measured everything right, you just had your oven checked and it is in perfect working condition, you mixed everything according to the recipe, used the best pans and equipment, and timed everything right!

What happened is classic!

It is not a simple matter of just following the recipe’s instructions from a professional or your favorite website – it is your understanding how baking works and what to look for as you are making a recipe, no matter what it instructs.

baking911.com teaches you all you need to know about the how's and why's of baking, so you won’t fail - no matter what the source of the recipe. Plus, we give you foolproof step-by-step recipes, with color photos and lots of detailed information, so you can learn how to bake all "classes" and types of recipes!

baking911.com is a complete online baker's resource you can come back to, again and again! We WANT you to be a better baker, no matter what skill level you start with!

In addition, baking911.com provides online EXPERT ADVICE from Sarah Phillips - you can ask as many questions as you like and get EXPERT advice with input
from a community of bakers!

Or, how about that recipe you have baked for years, and it suddenly fails? Now, who do you turn to for advice?

baking911.com gives you expert results!

There are two levels of membership on the
Ask Sarah Forum:
FREE or
PREMIUM MEMBERSHIP!
Money Back Guarantee!

TO ACCESS THE RECIPES, TUTORIALS & EXPERT ADVICE, YOU MUST BE A PREMIUM MEMBER! 
START HERE>
  R
egister and select upgrade to a
PREMIUM MEMBERSHIP 

Login Not a Member? Register

"I thought about not renewing my membership. I just wasn't doing that much baking any more, I am trying to cut back on all sorts of extraneous expenditures just like everyone else. I am letting all of my print food & cooking magazine subscriptions lapse. But I DID renew my Premium Membership to Baking911. I'm all about value these days...and Baking911 delivers!"

SARAH SAYS:
baking911.com is unique!
The website is filled with recipes I have developed and techniques that help solve and improve your everyday baking!

Every recipe is well-tested. There's no more guessing whether it will work, saving you money and time!  Wasting ingredients today are very costly!

There are step-by-step recipe tutorials that are detailed, with tips and techniques that work!

WHAT MEMBERS ARE  BAKING & SAYING:

sukamakan: I am a big fan of Sarah Phillips from Baking 911. Have tried out many of her recipes and most turned out perfect (or near perfect) at first attempt. Otherwise, she will help me to solve any of my baking blunders, almost instantly....For $19.95 (premium membership) per year, baking911 is worth subscribing to.

skeedaddler: WOW!!! I LOVE this website! It just saved me from dumping out 8# of butter, 12 cups of sugar, 48 egg whites...... I have no idea why my beautifully fluffy Swiss Meringue Buttercream (haven't checked to see how this differs from Italian BC), but after sitting out on my back porch for an hour or so (temp in the 20's), I went to ice a cake and it was back to being greasy butter! I was ready to cry but remembered notes in the forum about saving buttercream and went straight to my computer, pulled this site up from bookmarks and searched the forum for what i remembered seeing. I did as told, cut on the mixer and went off to do other things, coming by for a peek once in a while. Magic happened! Thanks Sarah for being here! You are my hero!! Lisa

mconfections: I was searching my posts tonight and noticed something. Seriously, I can look at all of my posts and see that Sarah has said something nice to me in reply to each one of them. She is helpful, encouraging and gives compliments. LOL, I'd pay for that without the recipies!!!
TTFN, Elyssa

kake: Thank you, Sarah.
I have learned so many new things from B911 this year.
Thank you very much all of the members and Happy New Year!!

AmandaRG: I have MORE than paid for my subscription with the delicious treats that I have been able to make.


Sarah's Chocolate Cream Cheese Pound Cake by Sarah Phillips
Kelly CA: Sarah's chocolate cream cheese pound cake is my favorite cake!

Scratch Yellow Cake with Box Qualities by Sarah Phillips
CYNDI65: I baked regular-size cupcakes with this recipe last night. It makes a lot. I think I made 36 cupcakes, and one loaf pan size. The only reason I didn't make more cupcakes is because we wanted something to snack on last night and the first batch of cupcakes smelled soooo good!

Banana Bread Recipe, Low-Fat by Sarah Phillips, Moist and flavorful
dillonsmimi: Spur of the moment craving for comfort....I guess I was due some luck as all those subs not only worked, but they are pretty darn tasty!
LMR123: Sarah, this is the best banana bread I have ever had!!



Italian Strawberry Tart (Crostata di Fragole) by Sarah Phillips
Kelly CA via email: YUMMY
!

Banana Bread Recipe, Low-Fat by Sarah Phillips, Moist and flavorful
dillonsmimi: Spur of the moment craving for comfort....I guess I was due some luck as all those subs not only worked, but they are pretty darn tasty!
LMR123: Sarah, this is the best banana bread I have ever had!!

Coffee Pecan Mini-Eclairs 
vel2x: Your website definitely help me w/ the variety of dessert I should make. I'm planning to this eclairs recipe and your tres leches cake wink.gif I'll try to remember to take picture so that I can share it w/ you. Thanks for your fantastic website and recipes!

Ultimate Chocolate Butter Cake by Sarah Phillips
SAEMike: Thank you very much for the information, Sarah!! ...OMG they taste amazing!! So moist and flavorful! I LOVE this recipe! :-)The cake is a nice consistency and so incredibly moist and fragrant....I didn't have milk to use for the Easy Chocolate Icing recipe, as I used it all last night for the cake. And I didn't feel like venturing out into the 22 degree weather to go to the grocery store to get some. However, I did have some heavy whipping cream that I substituted for the milk. I don't know if that's a proper substitution, but I CAN tell you that the icing tastes incredible too! It's so light and fluffy and rich.

Ultimate Butter Cake (UBC) by Sarah Phillips
kglee: If you use Sarah's Ultimate Butter Cake you will have a cake that bakes up more level and you won't have to cut off so much.

Canuck: Well, I was telling my neighbour on New Year's Eve that I made the great UBC from this site, but that it was difficult and tedious because I have this pathetic little KA hand mixer that is over 20 years old. She thought the cake was great nonetheless. So I told her about this site and how I wanted to start looking for a stand mixer. She said, "Really? I have a KA mixer that I will give to you because I just got a new Viking." So, thanks to Sarah, her delicious cake and all the advice I received from you all, I am the proud owner of a KA Ultra Power stand mixer! Wheeee! 

"I know my membership fee is small in comparison to the great information I receive from this site. The recipes alone are worth their weight in gold. I seriously recommend joining if you are like me and just beginning to learn about baking. This has been a great learning tool for me."

"I am a new premium member and so far LOVE IT! (it has only been a day though, this site is slightly addicting!)"

"I must say becoming a Premium Member was worth every penny. I don't think I would have gotten the attention and expert information anywhere else especially so quickly. Thank you again Sarah"

"With Sarah's recipes, you don't have to worry about erroneous directions messing up your cakes, etc. That's the great thing about her recipes! They are detailed, and they WORK AS WRITTEN."

"And I'd like to thank you Sarah because there is not one single recipe here that failed me. Whenever I fail, it's because there is something that I did wrong and you were always there to answer my questions."

How are our tutorials different?
We go into much more depth than other websites!
We explain every single baking step and where you can go wrong! We show your pictures where it matters!
Most of our tutorials have 40 or more color photos each!
We take the time to explain in detail, the how's and why's of baking!
We show you how to fix your mistakes and what the batter or dough should look like at every single mixing stage!
~

YOU CAN ASK QUESTIONS AND GET ANSWERS EVERY STEP OF THE WAY!
I offer you a money-back guarantee!

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ASK SARAH FORUM

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Ask questions about any recipe or technique and get EXPERT advice!
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JOIN US AS A MEMBER!
baking911.com contains over 1,500 essential
recipes developed
by SARAH PHILLIPS, Cookbook Author &
World Recognized Baking Expert!

The recipes include
STEP-BY-STEP DETAILED INSTRUCTIONS
with COLOR PHOTOS for today's home baker...
The recipes solve common baking problems and the detailed tutorials teach you essential baking techniques....
New recipes are added every month.


You can also ask Sarah Phillips questions online and get professional answers, supported with over
53,000 member Ask Sarah baking community with
over 59,000 posts of information!

"...this is the only place that I have ever come across that offers REAL advice from a REAL, LIVE expert...!"

"(this) is the best place to get excellent recipes."

There are two levels of membership on the
Ask Sarah Forum:
FREE or
PREMIUM MEMBERSHIP!
Money Back Guarantee!

TO ACCESS THE RECIPES, TUTORIALS & EXPERT ADVICE, YOU MUST BE A PREMIUM MEMBER! 
START HERE>
  R
egister and select  upgrade to a
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baking911.com named "the best of the web"
Saveur Magazine

baking911.com named as one of
Gourmet Magazine's
 
top 95 favorite food websites and blogs!

Guardian, UK: Sarah Phillips named ONE of the 30 World's Greatest Bakers.
"
baking911.com, home to some of the best baking know-how on the net..."
Washington Post: "...this is one useful Web site"
Chicago Tribune: "baking911.com: an excellent resource for home cooks".
Los Angeles Times:  "baking911.com (is) filled with good information and is easy to use. It (has) solid baking information..."
 
New York Times: "...directions can be found at baking911.com".
CNN NEWS: "...visit baking911.com".

MORE RECIPES...

BREAD RECIPES - HOW TO, STEP-BY-STEP

Balsamic Strawberries Cobbler

ITALIAN APRICOT JAM TART (CROSTATINA MARM, ALBICOCCA)
Homey Blueberry Streusel Muffins 

You actually SAVE MONEY by using proven recipes developed here by a professional!
You no longer have to experiment and throw away expensive ingredients testing
user-generated recipes,
which have a very high failure rate! baking911.com's recipes
work over and over, again!

We also help you find exactly
what you are looking for!
No more guessing and expensive trial and error!

"It's all your fault Sarah. I went from baking the occasional cake mix to little miss Susie Homemaker. If it wasn't for you and all the support I have gotten here from everyone else I never would have attempted anything like I have done. I am now the designated family baker but I do love it.
I sincerely appreciate everyone that has given me their advice.
Well I guess I have gone on long enough so I'll close with one last note.
If anyone is debating about joining as a Premium Member just know that any questions you may have can be answered here. There is a wealth of information and if Sarah doesn't have the answer she will get it for you. This has been an investment worth every penny. Her recipes alone are worth their weight in gold.
Thanks again and Happy Holidays to everyone."

 

"Thanks, Sarah! You are awesome. I consider the membership fee a steal for all the advice and recipes I receive from your website. I've yet to see any cookbook or decorating instruction manual that is as tried and true as the information I receive at Baking 911 for even close to the same value."

WHAT MEMBERS ARE  BAKING & SAYING:

Croquembouche by Sarah Phillips and Kelly CA; Food Styling and Photos by Kelly CA, New, innovative and easier instructions!
KELLY CA SAYS: For this croquembouche, I made a butterfly topper out of the caramel, and added some fondant flowers for decoration.
I dipped a spoon in the caramel and traced out two wings and a body. When they were hardened, I "glued" them together with molten caramel, holding the wings with my fingers, till they hardened in place.

Potato Bread by Sarah Phillips
sukamakan: Sarah...look at my lovely bread...It came out lovely and fluffy and went perfect with our dinner soup.

Nut-Free French Macarons (Macaroons) by Sarah Phillips; Tutorial by Sarah Phillips and Kelly CA
Kelly CA: Sarah was SO right on when she suggested using...to replace the almonds for nut-free macarons!
These are delish!
 

My Family's Chocolate Fudge Brownies by Sarah Phillips
rasputin: hi sarah! I have made this recipe and everyone likes it! Its really good indeed!

White Cake Cupcakes with a Chocolate Cake variation by Sarah Phillips- They dome nicely!
RFT: Dear Sarah: I tried your White Cake Cupcake recipe today and they came out with a nice dome just like the picture.

Eggless Cake, Egg free recipe for Vegan cake bakers
CAKEFAN123: hello! i am new to this baking911. i tried this recipe and it came very well.thanks for posting this recipe.

Wacky Chocolate Cake
meg: Well, it's certainly no luscious deep dark chocolate layer cake coated with ganache, but for a simple snack cake, it's perfectly fine. It comes together really quickly & easily, you can make this even if you don't have any eggs or butter in the house - and it would probably taste really really good with a nice fudge sauce poured over it! Try it!

Pina Coloda Cake
PBM: I made this cake the other day, using some extra coconut, a handful to be in-exact. And I subbed pineapple juice from the frosting recipe for the rum suggessted. They tell me it was the 'moistest' cake they ever had....Oh, it was sooooo good. Delish. Fab. Wicked. I doubled the icing, I used the above pineapple buttercream...I was pleasantly suprised by the lightness of the icing....
Overall, it was a huge success!

Chocolate Angel Food Cake by Sarah Phillips
zaxmom: Next time I want a chocolate angel cake, I'll make sure I have enough egg whites to make your cake, which works every time. It's interesting to see how you and she differ in technique and ingredient quantities. You do such a nice job explaining the science, too. Thanks for the comparison and your invaluable help, today and always.

Red Velvet Layer Cake with Traditional Cream Cheese Frosting by Sarah Phillips
kjz: The final product tasted great. It was moist and tender.

Scratch Yellow Cake with Box Qualities by Sarah Phillips
lynne956: I just made these into cupcakes, and I really liked this! And I hardly ever pop dessert-types one after another but this one made me Thank you again, Sarah!

"I Heart Strawberries" Cupcakes Tutorial by Kelly CA, Uses Sarah's Fresh Strawberry Ultimate Butter Cake
kake: I have made strawberry UBC cupcakes last year and love it.

Basic Genoise Cake Step-by-Step by Sarah Phillips
James Iskandar: Hello Sarah, I just want to say a BIG thank you to you! My genoise finally came out the way I want it. Lesson learnt...

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© baking911.com, Inc., 2000- 2008. Founded October, 2000. All Rights Reserved. All material on baking911.com's web pages is the express opinion of its authors. baking911.com is not responsible for any direct, incidental, consequential, indirect or punitive damages arising out of its pages or those accessed through this Site. baking 911 is a registered trademark and "bake like a pro" is a trademark of Sarah Phillips
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