Nick Malgieri is one smart cookie. He opens Chocolate with information about all the basics on our favorite sweet"s history and production. He then moves right into 360 recipes. Chocolate provides recipes for every intensity of chocolove and all levels of culinary skills. There are simple mix-bake-cut cakes, a mud-rich fudge sauce that hardens on ice cream, a collection of ice creams to go with it, and a killer Rich Chocolate Mousse. Any comfortable cook, particularly one who"s mastered the techniques in How to Bake, Great Italian Desserts, and Malgieri"s other equally clear and precise works, can turn out Cream Puff Truffles, Chocolate Brownie Tart, a French Buche de Noel, and most of the other recipes in this dessert-lover"s dream book. Dedicated amateurs and professional cooks will appreciate Malgieri"s explicit guidance for the process of tempering, which is necessary for making certain chocolate confections, and the recipes for European-style molded confections such as liqueur-filled cordials, and hand-dipped masterpieces, including Raspberry Tricolors. Less ambitious chocoholics might attempt the 26 kinds of truffles or play with Chocolate Plastic for making decorations. And no one should miss Chocolate"s final chapter, the over-the-top "Showpieces and Decorating Projects." This book is lavish with color photos. The chapter openings, shot with the artistry of Irving Penn still lifes, are so breathtaking you can taste them. --Dana Jacobi