If you're seeking fancy French pastries or labor-intensive chocolate concoctions, look elsewhere. Jennifer Appel and Allysa Torey, the bakery's owners, offer a scrumptious selection of recipes that are as tantalizing as the bakery's window. Appropriately, Appel and Torey keep their book short and sweet, letting the recipes speak for themselves without lengthy stories or asides that clutter.
Recipes range from the very familiar to new twists on old favorites.
Standbys like Blueberry Muffins, Chocolate Chip Cookies and Lemon Bars all find their way into the Magnolia Bakery Cookbook, along with creamsicle-like Orange Vanilla Chip Cookies, a Chocolate Chip Peanut Banana Loaf combination and a lime pie with a surprising gingersnap crust. They're all as much fun to make as they are to eat.