"Seasonal Fruit Desserts" by Deborah Madison (Broadway, $32.50).

Give someone a lovely fresh fruit basket and they'll eat for a day. Give them Deborah Madison's new "Seasonal Fruit Desserts," and they'll know how to make the most out of fruit for a lifetime.

The award-winning Madison (multiple prizes from the Julia Child, James Beard and M.F.K. Fisher organizations) is the best-selling author of "Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone" and eight other savory vegetarian books. This is her first foray into fruit desserts. It's a lush journey we're all lucky to take along with the acclaimed chef, who early in her career founded Greens Restaurant in San Francisco.

Madison is on a mission to show how to best utilize local fruit while it's in season, rather than after a long plane ride wrapped in cartons from another part of the world. She laments that much of today's eating of fruit has come down to guilt.

"Over the last 60 years we have completely transformed fruit, making it into a duty food you're supposed to eat because the government and your university health letter say so. So many servings a day — all that lycopene, all those antioxidants, fiber. Yes, it's good for us to eat fruit, but real fruit isn't about its components.

"Real fruit is dazzling, seductive and gorgeous. Poets write sonnets and poems about fruit. Artists paint pictures of it. That real strawberry, red throughout — small perhaps, but oh so sweet; an apricot that smells of honeyed nectar; a white peach that caused a young girl I met to turn and say after her first bite, 'This is like eating a flower!'"

Madison's recipes are bursting with just that kind of excitement. Her rhubarb tarts, garnished with violet petals, with their rhubarb puree and syrup made from the produce poaching liquid is an unforgettable way to experience rhubarb, especially for the first time. The fresh tangelo juice, orange-flower water and finely grated tangelo zest create a pudding that puts others to shame; it deserves the "electric" tag Madison has given it.

Madison's super strength is her palate and ability to mix-and-match fruits together — like peaches and blueberries in a cobbler — or with other ingredients, such as her fresh dates and green pistachios with goat cheese and fleur de sel.

Surprising to many, it is often cooking that brings out fruits' most dynamic flavors, such as the elephant heart plums that have been baked in wine with orange, the black raspberries that pepper a tart, or the fresh-squeezed juice that explodes within the tangelo pudding.

Fruit also can have unexpected effects on other ingredients, like when Madison advises to, "Smash the tangelo zest with the sugar to moisten the sugar with the fruit's aromatic oils" in the standout tangelo pudding recipe.

TANGELO PUDDING

1 heaping teaspoon finely grated tangelo, tangerine or other citrus zest

1 tablespoon (preferably organic) sugar

3 tablespoons (preferably organic) cornstarch

2 cups fresh tangelo juice (from 10 to 12 tangelos), or mixed citrus juice

Tiny pinch of salt

1 tablespoon unsalted butter

1 tablespoon orange-flower water or 1 teaspoon bottled yuzu juice

Stevia, orange blossom honey or agave nectar, to taste

Whipped cream, for serving (optional)

Yields 4 (1/2-cup) servings.

Smash the zest with the sugar to moisten the sugar with the fruit's aromatic oils. Transfer to a 1-quart saucepan along with the cornstarch, juice and salt. Stir to dissolve the cornstarch.

Turn on the heat, bring the mixture to a boil and cook, stirring, until the juice has thickened, after just a few minutes. Cook for 1 minute more, then turn off the heat and whisk in the butter and orange-flower water or yuzu. Taste, and if extra sweetener is needed, add a few drops of stevia, orange blossom honey or agave nectar.

Divide among juice glasses or champagne glasses. Refrigerate until set, about 2 hours. Serve with a dollop of whipped cream, if desired.

RASPBERRY COULIS WITH MUSCAT WINE

3 tablespoons granulated or organic sugar

3 cups frozen unsweetened (preferably organic) raspberries

3 to 4 tablespoons orange Muscat wine or Beaumes de Venise

1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice, or more to taste

2 teaspoons arrowroot or cornstarch dissolved in 2 tablespoons water (optional)

Yields about 1 2/3 cups.

Bring 2/3 cup water to a boil in a small saucepan with the sugar, give it a stir, and simmer until the sugar is dissolved. Add the raspberries, simmer for 1 minute, and then turn off the heat and let the fruit stand in the syrup for 5 minutes. Force the juice through a sieve with a pestle or a rubber spatula. Stir in the wine and the lemon juice and let cool.

For a sauce with a little more body, add the diluted arrowroot to the juice, simmer while stirring until clear, after a few minutes and cool. Add additional herbs and spices to your liking, if desired.

Good as a sauce for chocolate cake, baked custards and fruits like poached peaches.

Lisa Messinger is a first-place winner in food writing from the Association of Food Journalists and the author of seven food books, including "Mrs. Cubbison's Best Stuffing Cookbook" and "The Sourdough Bread Bowl Cookbook." She also writes the Creators News Service "After-Work Gourmet" column. To find out more about Lisa Messinger and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.