My first baking teacher as a child was Betty Crocker. My second, as an adult, was Maida Heatter. The above admonition is one I ignored often and it is only through years of experience, success and failure that I have learned that there are some cookbook authors on whom you should not riff. Maida Heatter is one of those. She really did test her recipes over and over again before publishing them. That doesn’t mean that I didn’t substitute dried cherries for raisins in the loaf of chocolate bread. It does mean that I followed the processes she describes to the letter. If you are looking for foolproof books to guide you through baking, you could do a lot worse than Maida Heatter and not much better.

Chocolate is Forever, and Cookies are Magic are being released this Spring, I assume in honor of Maida Heatter’s death at age 102 last year. The new forwards by David Lebovitz and Deb Perelman were not available in the advance reader copy, so I don’t know what they say. The recipes collected are not trendy or fashionable. In many of the short anecdotes before the recipes, Heatter talks about picking up a local recipe as she was travelling. She was interested in the foods that gave a city or area it’s flavor, and that’s reflected in the recipes gathered in these cookbooks. The recipes are traditional, but not, in the modern parlance, basic.

In Cookies are Magic, you really get a sense of Heatter’s love of discovering a local dessert. In just a couple of sentences, Heatter identifies where the cookie recipe comes from, or how she discovered it, or how she serves it. it’s a charming sweet glaze on the recipes.

I made the tropical sour cream cookies in this book. They are lovely, soft, and flavorful. I did not feel like struggling with rolling out this soft dough, so after I chilled the dough over night, I scooped the dough and flattened it slightly before baking. The cookies were reminiscent of muffin tops.

If I had to choose between the two books, I would choose Chocolate is Forever. But they are both worth your time if you want a solid dessert cookbook or cookie cookbook.

I received this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Fun cookie cookbook. Every kind of cookie you can imagine, bars drop cookies. Easy to follow instructions so book is perfect for a new Baker or an experienced one. Wish the book had actual pictures of the cookies instead of drawings. Chocolate Aggies were delicioud

I can't wait to try many of these recipes. I don't do a lot of baking but I love cookies and these recipes seem great and easy to follow!

another good book i was looking forward to reading but sadly wouldn't load to my tablets yet again. baking books are one of my favorites.

Cookies Are Magic by Maida Heatter is an awesome book that contains all you need to know to bake an awesome sheet of cookies! The book starts with a section of tips to read before you bake and then goes into a general list of ingredients and a little information about each ingredient. She walks you through equipment needed, technique, timing and storage. Then begins the Fun! You will start with drop cookies! The author says these are the easiest to make and then gives several different recipes for drop cookies. Each recipe is laid out in an easy to follow way. You are told step for step what is needed and how to do it. The book has sections for bar cookies, icebox cookies, rolled cookies, hand formed cookies, and more! I highly recommend this book to anyone who likes to bake!

A fun book! Full of great suggestions, explanations, and yummy recipes that I can use in my monthly cooking class in my preschool class. The kids will love it!

I’m not a fan of cookbooks that don’t have actual pictures of the recipes. I can’t really put my hand on why but I just think it looks nicer to see what you’re aiming for when you’re baking.

This cookbook is way more than just cookie recipes!

The "Before You Bake" section is chock-full of helpful tips about ingredients and cooking techniques, like sifting, measuring, removing from racks, storing, etc.. So when you encounter anything in the recipe instructions, you know exactly what you need and why.

The recipes themselves are unique and so varied, and the origin stories and the description of how you should expect each to turn out (soft and chewy, or crisp and delicate) are fantastic! I do wish that there were actual pictures of the finished cookies, but the illustrations seem pretty accurate, though.

I know I'll be using these tips and trying these recipes for years to come!

Maida Heatter's recipes are among the best I have ever read. Unfailingly delicious, her instructions are clear and easy to understand. They are also full of the kind of advice and tips that make you feel as if she was in the kitchen with you.

It's great that her recipes are being republished for a new generation of cooks. This volume focuses on cookies and has enough to keep any baker happy for years. Plus the variations will be a springboard for your own creativity.

This cookie cookbook basically has every cookie you can imagine! You could basically have a cultural experience through cookies with this one! My daughter and I chose to make chocolate-chip pillows and they were delicious!! I can definitely imagine referring back to this cookbook again and again. My only negative is that I want real, mouth watering pictures of the cookies and not illustrations.

Cookies Are Magic by Maida Heatter is a book that every person with a sweet tooth needs in their life. The book is filled with delicious recipes for every possible cookie and bar imaginable. The format and layout of the book is simple and the graphics are cute. The recipes are easy to follow with notes and helpful tips and variations for the reader.

Maida Heather was a magician in the kitchen, ,this lovely cookbook will make you hunger for her cookies.The recipes for her cookies wil have me spending time in my kitchen baking pretending she is next to me guiding me step by step. This also will make a lovely gift.#netgalley#littlebrown

Cookies are Magic is chock-full of delicious cookie recipes. Some of the recipes are simple and some are more complex, but they all sound amazing. The cookies being divided into types such as drop cookies, bar cookies, etcetera, is brilliant. I also enjoyed the tips, tricks, instructions, and advice given at the beginning of the book. I found it very valuable.

I really love it! I’m big fan of the cookies, I really love them, every day a baked cookies and those recipes are so amazing.

Maida Heatter, aka "The Queen of Desserts" died last year and during the 70s and 80s, she published several titles that are now considered classics. Her precise instructions taught a generation of bakers and eased their fears about entering the kitchen. The recipes in this book have been assembled from Maida Heatter’s previously published books, including Happiness Is Baking, Maida Heatter's Cakes, Maida Heatter's Cookies, Maida Heatter's Book of Great Chocolate Desserts, Maida Heatter's Book of Great Desserts, Maida Heatter's New Book of Great Desserts.

Last year, a compilation of her recipes appeared in Happiness Is Baking. This book follows the same format and is again illustrated by Alice Oche's colorful drawings. A preface by Deb Perelman was not available in the preview galley. Maida Heatter's notes on equipment, ingredients and how-to's are included in the opening chapter. The book appears to be designed exactly like Happiness Is Baking, which has a very attractive layout. My only gripe with it was that it is impossible to keep the book open so you have to use a weight to hold the pages down.

There are chapters on Drop Cookies, Bar Cookies, Icebox Cookies, Rolled Cookies and Hand-Formed Cookies. A More! chapter includes recipes for macaroons, crackers, marshmallows and other items that don't necessarily fit into any of the previous categories.

The book includes some of the recipes that I have tried such as Palm Beach Brownies, Pennies From Heaven, Pinwheels, and Positively the Best Chocolate Chip Cookies. The large majority, however, are recipes that I haven't tried so I have my work cut out for me. Some of the ones that I need to try are Mrs. L.B.J's Moonrocks, Norman Rockwell's Oatmeal Wafers, Johnny Appleseed Squares, Lebkuchen, Vienesse Marzipan Bars, Maxines and the list goes on.

Award winning (James Beard Award three times and James Beard Hall of Fame Member) author and baker, Maida Heatter, has been dubbed “The Queen of Desserts,” and anyone who bakes is not only familiar with this classy lady, but has love and respect for her. She is an American baking icon, and over the years has written dozens of bestselling cookbooks. Cookies Are Magic: Classic Cookies, Brownies, Bars, and More is a compilation of some of Heatter’s best cookies, and is a cookbook worth putting on the cookbook shelf. Heatter died at the age of 102 in June of 2019, and has left a legacy of baking wonderful desserts without apologizing for the calories or time spent baking.

This excellent cookbook includes Heatter’s philosophy on baking, as well as a primer on ingredients, equipment, and hints for cookie baking success. Unfortunately, there are no photographs of the recipes, but there are cute illustrations. The recipes are such that most bakers will want to photograph the recipes as they bake them – there are no bad cookies, so baking every cookie in this book may be doable over a few months. Favorite cookies (so far) from this book include Positively-the-Absolutely-Best-Chocolate-Chip Cookies (and they really are!), Savannah Chocolate Chewies, and Coconut Grove Cookies. Many of the recipes are old-fashioned, and take us back to when food actually tasted good and was made from scratch.

This cookbook is well organized, and each chapter has a dozen or so different recipes for Drop Cookies, Bar Cookies, Icebox Cookies, Rolled Cookies, Hand-Formed Cookies, and More! (miscellaneous). Each recipe has Heatters personal notes for success, as well as vignettes regarding the recipe, and the instructions are easy-to-follow.

All told, you can’t go wrong with this excellent cookbook. Cookie aficionados will love the variety and ease of baking Maida Heatters best cookies.

Special thanks to NetGalley for supplying a review copy of this book.

This is a really fun book if one loves to bake cookies. It has a great layout which makes it easy to find the various recipes and there's a few recipes I'd love to try.

It's Maida Heatter, so of course the amazingness of this is a given. I wish she'd lived long enough to see her work showcased as well as it is but I am glad her wonderful cookie recipes are now going to be easily and readily available. For those who want to make and eat cookies, this book is a joy.

So I’ve been on a baking binge lately and this book comes in really handy specially because of the recipes that look familiar and new at the same time. The recipes are easy to follow and have some handy tips and side stories about how each recipe originated. It’s a fun book to actually own in print!

How fun was this book! I loved the personal stories of many of the recipes as well as finding new twists on old classics. I found a few recipes that really excited me and I am eager to try them soon. The general "baking for new bakers" section was really straightforward and full of nice reminders for the home baker. I particularly loved the assurance that she had tried every recipe to make it "no fail". YES! I love not failing at new things!

If you're purchasing this for home use, you'll definitely want the paper copy instead of digital. There are plenty of variations and encouragement to add your own twists. You'll want to keep track of those!

My only wish is that the book had used actual photos rather than illustrations of the baked goods. Partially because I"m a visual learner and partially because you eat with your eyes, it would have really taken the whole book up a notch for me.