Dominique Ansel is the creator of beautiful, innovative, and delicious desserts, from the Frozen S'More to the Cronut (R), the croissant-doughnut hybrid that took the world by storm. He has been called the world's best pastry chef. But this wasn't always the case. Raised in a large, working-class family in rural France, Ansel could not afford college and instead began work as a baker's apprentice at age sixteen. There, he learned the basics; how to make tender chocolate cakes, silky custards, buttery shortbread, and more. Ansel shares these essential, go-to recipes for the first time. With easy-to-follow instructions and kitchen tips, home cooks can master the building-blocks of desserts. These crucial components can be mixed in a variety of ways, and Ansel will show you how: his vanilla tart shell can be rolled out and stamped into cookies; shaped and filled with lemon curd; or even crumbled into a topping for ice cream. This cookbook will inspire beginners and experienced home cooks alike to bake as imaginatively as Ansel himself.

Everyone wants to know: How does Dominique do it? Dominique Ansel is the creator of the Cronut pastry, the croissant-doughnut hybrid that has taken the world by storm. But he's no one-hit wonder. Classically trained in Paris, leader of a three-Michelin-starred pastry kitchen in New York and now the proprietor of New York's highest-rated bakery, Dominique has become a modern-day Willy Wonka: the creator of wildly innovative, extraordinarily delicious and unbelievably popular desserts. Presented here are some of Dominique's most coveted recipes, organised by skill level and catering to both amateur and professional bakers. Beginners can conquer the Chocolate Pecan Cookies with the molten chocolate centre; more experienced bakers will learn the secrets to the exquisite caramelised crust of this Cannel de Bordeaux; and the most adventurous will tackle The At-Home Cronut. In this, his first cookbook, Dominique reveals not only the secrets to his hit desserts but he describes the stories of inspiration behind each of them. The most important element in any dish is not a particular brand of chocolate or a type of salt but rather the spark of imagination. At heart, Dominique Ansel is a book about innovation: how a cook can transform flour, sugar and butter into memories that last a lifetime; and how anyone, from any field, can try to add a little magic to their work.

This book proposes, from a cross-disciplinary perspective, an original reading of current work on residential choice and the decisions associated with it. Geographers, social-psychologists, economists, sociologists, neurologists and linguists have worked together in the context of collective research into evaluation, choice and decision-making in the use of urban and periurban spaces. A synthetic outlook has been constructed from these complimentary scientific references. The book, which is designed as a handbook, also provides the opportunity to set out the different approaches to deal with the models which have been developed in this field.