Bloggy Giveaway Winners Announced!

We have two winners, chosen by random.org and they are #1 Chocolate Queen and #2 Samsakara! 

Congratulations, ladies! Send me a private email with your snail mail address and I will get the Fiddlehead Cookbook over to you.

Here is your sequence:
18
31
Timestamp: 2008-08-03 01:49:01 UTC

chocolatequeen said...
I don't own a cookbook from Alaska. So, if I got this one the first thing I would do is read it cover to cover while soaking in the bathrub. Then I would bake some muffins, cookies or a bread from it!
July 29, 2008 11:22 AM

samsakara said...
This would be a gift I think would be great for my father inlaw. Thanks for the great giveaway!
samsakara@twcny.rr.com
July 29, 2008 5:40 PM

Thanks to all who left comments and entered the carnival.

Mo CookbooksEtc

Bloggy Giveaway Carnival is Here!

It's here! It's here! The Bloggy Giveaways Quarterly Giveaway Carnival is finally here!

I am giving away a cookbook called "The Fiddlehead Cookbook" - Recipes from Alaska's Most Cherished Restaurant and Bakery.   There are many recipes in it that you will want to try, from Crabby Eggs to Sourdough Strawberry Waffles.

 

The rules are simple:

1. Leave a comment on this post just saying "Hi!", and you are entered! To be entered TWICE tell me something about your favorite cookbook OR what you would do with this nice cookbook from Alaska.

2. Please leave your email addy or a link to your blog  so that I can contact you if you win.   I would love to know where you are from and those that tell me will be entered TWICE!

3. I will randomly draw a name early on August 2nd and will post the winner here. I will also contact the winner via email, but if I do not hear back from him/her within 3 days, I will have a re-drawing. I will pay ALL shipping costs for the winner.

4. At this time, I cannot extend this offer to those residing outside the United States.

If you like giveaways, you will find lots of them here.

Thanks and I hope that some of you will "cook" with me!

Cowboy Chow

You never know what little gems you'll find at used book stores!  

On a recent used bookshop hop, I came upon the cutest cookbook in the shape of a red cowboy boot called "Cowboy Chow" by Judy Barbour.  It was published way back in 1988 so it has been out a while and had found it's way onto the cookbook shelves at Half-Price Books on Westheimer Road in Houston, Texas.  Lucky for me!

It seems that Judy Barbour and her husband, Barry, are (were?) chef/owners of a western style restaurant in Texas  and some of the recipes in this cookbook were created for the restaurant. 

There is a tribute to the American Cowboy, as well as sections on Cowboy Equipment, Cowboy Slang, Saddle Snacks and others.  Some of the recipe titles are:  "Armadillo Eggs", "Texas Trash", "Jalapeno Jelly", "Mexican Albondigas", "King Ranch Chicken" (of course!), "Frito Pie", a 100+ year-old family recipe for "Heubner Ranch Muffins", "Navajo Fry Bread", "Pastel de Margarita" (Margarita Pie), and thirst quenchers such as "Firefly", "Cowboy Kiss", "Border Buttermilk", "El Vacquero Coffee", and biggest surprise of all for me - "Cerveza Roja" (Red Beer).  I've heard of beer and tomato juice before but thought it was someone's idea of a quirky combination but never expected to see a recipe for it!   There are lots of other delicious sounding recipes in this 77-page specialty cookbook.

There is also a section on entertaining cowboy-style with cute and interesting ideas for a truly cowboy chow experience.

I checked online to see how available it is and located a few copies at Amazon and one at ebay.  If you should run across a copy somewhere and have a special cookbook shelf reserved for cowboy style cookbooks, this one should be on it, so grab it!

If you are a cookbook collector and would like to join CookbooksEtCetera, click here.

Australia Wide Cookbook

A couple of weeks ago I received a wonderful surprise in the mail, all the way from Australia! Michelle Moon of  the Australia Cookbook Collectors Society sent me a most beautiful cookbooks with photography by Ken Duncan, a well known Australian Photographer, and recipes by Valwyn McMonigal. She said she had  picked it up at a yard sale and the condition is excellent. It is such a nice book, not only with the beautiful countryside photos but also the unique recipes throughout.

There are recipes for crocodile, kangoroo, buffalo, Wattle Seed,  Yabbies, Aussie Meat Pie, Anzac Biscuits (yum!), Barramndi with  Orange Sauce, Lamingtons (another yum!), and others. The food photos  are very appetizing and the recipes sound simple and easy to make.  There are sections for different parts of Australia, such as  Victoria, New South Wales, Tasmania, South Australia, Western  Australia, The Northern Territory and Queensland.

The photos remind me the Pacific Coast and also the Southwestern part  of the USA. Australia is a beautiful and vibrant place and I would  love to visit and try this food first hand! Between the recipes and  the photos, this cookbook is hard to put down.

Historic Texas Book of Days

"Historic Texas, Book of Days" by Yvonne Bruce & Ann Bruce Henaff, is a nice little planner, but also full of watercolors, quilt patterns, gardening and food "observances". There are a few recipes but this is not a full-fledged cookbook. The size is about 7" x 7" and it is hard cover. There is a beautiful watercolor of a Lone Star quilt pattern on the front of the book, done in red, white and blue.

Though there are no sections per se, to give you an idea of what this little book contains, here are some of the page headings, drawings, and topics throughout:

Garden Calendar (a nice little blurb about the pecan orchard near the Colorado River) and some very nice watercolor drawings of various veggies.

A page about windmills and more cute drawings of them -- they are so cute.

Plantation houses, stagecoach stops, hill country wildflowers, cattle drives, pecan trees, signs, weather events

Recipes for Pinto beans, drop biscuits, east Texas Mint Juleps, Plain Cake, egg nog, Hopping John

Gulf Coast waterbirds, white whicker chairs, gazebos, magnolias, lighthouses, seashells, the Wheelock Log Cabin

I am remembering that Cherrille was born in Texas and several others have lived here or are currently living here. I think you would all like this little "Historic Texas Book of Days".

Mar Jo and I each got a copy from Border's Bookstore at The Woodlands Market Square a few weeks ago and we are both enjoying it!

Collecting Cookbooks

It seems everywhere I look in our home I see a pile of cookbooks waiting to be read for an interesting and new recipe to try.  I pull a few off the shelves and bring to the couch where I sit with my MacBook most nights.  In between emails to CookbooksEtCetera, a group of cookbook collecting friends at yahoogroups, I like to read a little of what makes a particular cookbook unique and different to all others and maybe find a recipe or two to try the next week while doing so.  

They pile so high on the couch beside me that I have to kind of wiggle backwards as I sit down, being careful not to topple any over.  They sit there for a few days and then I'll take them back to the cookbook shelves in the spare bedroom and bring out more.  Usually they are ones that have been mentioned by one of the other collectors and I'll want to reacquaint myself with those cookbooks and see what prompted someone to mention them.  It feels like they are new again to me or that it is Christmas time and I have new presents, even though I've had many of them for years.

One of my favorites is a similar copy of a cookbook my Mother used to cook from called, "Woman's Home Companion Cookbook".  Her cookbook was black and my oldest sister inherited it from her, but when I found eBay, I also found a few copies of it for me and my other sisters.  There were 7 of us girls (and 2 boys), so it was fun to shop and hunt for more of Mama's cookbook so that all of us could have one.  The copy below is a popular one in a cream colored front with bullteted words of the recipes inside it.

Some of the recipes I tried when I first started cooking were fudge, biscuits, and yellow cake. I used to make a jelly cake that was just too easy and everyone loved it!  Even though I don't have my Mama's copy, the one I found on eBay is probably my most special cookbook in my collection of 2000 cookbooks.

Do you have a favorite cookbook too?

Audra Marie -- Winner at CookbooksEtc's Bloggy Giveaway!

Congratulations to Audra Marie for winning the Best of The Best 500 Fast & Fabulous Five Star 5-Ingredient Recipe cookbook that I gave away during the Bloggy Giveaways Carnival. Be sure to check out her cute and sassy blogspot full of sassitude.

I will be contacting you today via e-mail to let you know how to collect your prize. You'll have four days to respond to my initial e-mail with your snail mail address. If I don't hear from you by then, I will pick a new winner.

Thank you to everyone who played along! What fun! I can't wait to share my love of cookbooks with you!

If you are new here and found me via the carnival, why don't you subscribe to my feed (click that orange button on the left sidebar to add me to your feedreader) so you'll know every time I update my blog with more cookbook fun.

If you are interesting in being a member of CookbooksEtCetera, a cool group of cookbook collectors, why not join us at yahoogroups by clicking on the link at the top right hand corner of this blog.

Happy Cookbookin'...

Mo CookbooksEtc