Americans may be eating low-fat yogurt instead of lunch and snacking on fat-free rice cakes, but when it comes to dessert, they want it all.
They want it sweet, indulgent and full of flavor -- especially when entertaining and dining out this summer.
Ninety-five percent of all restaurant diners order desserts. The top selections include ice cream, chocolate cake and cheesecake, according to a recent survey by the Alden Group in New York for Martini & Rossi, the maker of Asti Spumante sparkling wine.
Trendsetting restaurants across the country go one step further by putting all these options on one plate.
"The hottest thing is the composed dessert plate -- containing three or more elaborate miniature desserts," says Nancy Ross Ryan, food editor of Restaurants & Institutions magazine. "These compositions show off the skills of the pastry chef, and the restaurants, in turn, can charge more."
Also popular, says Ms. Ryan, are updated versions of home-style favorites. Shortcakes, cobblers, crumbles, crisps and brown bettys surface in restaurants with lighter touches, exotic fruits and flavor additions such as fresh ginger.
"Of course," adds Ms. Ryan, "chocolate is forever."
With a minimum of effort, restaurant and bakery dessert recipes can be translated for home entertaining.
The home cook can reap praise by employing a couple of simple pastry-chef presentation techniques, Ms. Ryan suggests. The easiest idea is to use a pastry bag for piping out whipped cream or thick sauces in pretty designs on the plate. Or, unmold a simple fruit mousse or pudding over a thin, crisp store-bought butter cookie and garnish the plate with fresh berries.
Here are a few summer dessert recipes perfect for entertaining.
This simple poundcake, topped with a fresh berry sauce and garnished with more berries, is from Judy Contino, owner of the Chicago bakery, Bittersweet.
Vanilla-sour cream pound cake
Yields 6 to 8 servings.
Preparation time: 45 minutes.
Cooking time: 50 to 60 minutes.
FRESH BERRY SAUCE:
1 pint each: raspberries, hulled strawberries
1/3 cup sugar, or to taste
1 to 2 pinches ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
CAKE:
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) plus 1 tablespoon unsalted butter, softened
2/3 cup sugar
3 large eggs
1/2 cup sour cream
1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
seeds of 1 vanilla bean, see note
