Deep South Dish

Best of the Best has published another winner in "Deep South Dish" by Mary Foreman.  The cover photo alone is enough to make you homesick for the south and all the summer veggies that many southerners plant in their summer gardens -- peas, corn, butter beans, turnip greens, a chunk of buttered cornbread, sweet tea in a mason jar and sliced tomatoes with dollops of sour cream dusted with black pepper!  Did I say, "heaven on a blue plate"?

I first saw this cookbook on QVC, but it was in sold-out status within minutes of it coming on air and it would be a while before  they could get more.  One of the recipes QVC's Kitchen King, David Venable, sampled that day was Chicken and Dumpling Casserole.  It sounded delicious, easy, and simple that I knew I wanted to try it.  David did the "Happy dance, happy dance!" when Mary Foreman gave him a taste of chicken and dumplings.  I could only imagine what it tasted like, until a few days ago when I found a copy of "Deep South Dish" in my mailbox!   Now I was the one doing the happy dance, happy dance! 

The first recipe I tried was that Chicken and Dumpling Casserole and while my mother-in-law never used a can of soup in her version of the recipe, the taste of Mary Foreman's recipe came close to the same taste of my mother-in-law's.  It was delicious and we all loved it here.

The second recipe I tried  was the Wedge Salad with Comeback Dressing.  For a long time now I've wanted to try a Comeback sauce recipe, so this was the logical recipe to try next.  I had the Wedge Salad 'down pat' as we sometimes say here in the south, but I've always bought salad dressings ready-made.  Never again will I buy a salad dressing when this one tastes so much better.  We have used it up as dressing on that lettuce wedge, sandwich spread, and dip for corn chips and it just got better and better as the days passed by.  I made a second batch today and will probably keep some in the fridge at all times.  It's that good!

There is something southern for everyone in this cookbook.  There are only four beverage recipes but they are for southern tastes such as sweet tea, watermelon margaritas, hurricanes, and lemonade.

Southern breads include buttermilk biscuits, ham and cheese biscuits, hushpuppies, cornbread, pecan pie muffins, just to name a few.  Garlic cheese grits and sausage gravy are covered also.  There are soups, stews, gumbos, and chili recipes.

Every southern dinner table has a version of Fire 'n Ice Summer Salad on it, or seven layer salad or coleslaw.  This cookbook delivers on salads and dressings!  It also delivers on side dishes like Maque Choux, Creamed Corn, Fresh Corn Casserole and countless recipes for fried okra, collard greens, fried cabbage,  and squash casserole.

There are even recipes for Cajun Dirty Rice and yellow rice, bacon and egg fried rice and many pasta recipes.  There is a whole chapter of chicken recipes -- again, something for everyone.  Many recipes for seafood, beef and pork are also included.

I've saved the desserts for last, even though there is a southern saying that says to "Eat dessert first, life is short".  Pies, cakes, cookies, galore!  Red Velvet, Caramel,  1-2-3-4 Yellow Birthday Cake, Mississippi Mud Cake, Snickerdoodles, Sugar Cookies, Bourbon Balls, Hello Dollies, Southern Bread Pudding, Baked Custard, Banana Pudding -- where do I even start in picking out one or two to try?  Heck, I'm going to try them all.  I need new favorites anyway!

I don't believe I've ever looked forward to a trying out a new cookbook as much as this one. I just need to decide which recipes I want to try next and get my inner southern girl into the kitchen.

Mary Foreman has a wonderful food blog at www.DeepSouthDish.com  Go check it out and make friends with a style of cooking that you may have been missing out on.   No more excuses that you can't cook that way because you aren't from the south.  Once you open Deep South Dish, there is no turning back!

Quail Ridge Press publishes the Best of the Best series of cookbooks and have graciously offered to let me host a "giveaway" of Deep South Dish on my cookbook website.  I'm offering it here and all you have to do to be in the drawing is leave a comment about why you’d like to have it at my website www.knitncook.com.  With my retirement looming in the near future, it's time I got that blog going again!

Cake Ladies - Celebrating a Southern Tradition

by Jodi Rhoden

This beuutiful cookbook not only has loads of cake photos and recipes to try, but also a bit of history of some of the south's best cake ladies.  No less than 15 of them!

These ladies are known in their communities, for their cake baking skills, and are called upon often to contribute their specialty cakes for momentous occasions.  Evofery celebration in the south calls for a cake of some kind to mark the occasion.

Being from the south myself, I can confirm that the local cake ladies seem to have the best recipes for Pound Cake, Pineapple Upside Cake, Lemon Cake, Italian Cream Cake, Caramel Cake and Carrot Cake -- a few of the recipes featured in "Cake Ladies".

Jodi Rhoden started out learning to bake from her mother in Georgia but not really getting into the joy of it until she was out on her own in Boston where she learned to bake artisan breads, branching out later to include wedding cakes for her friends .  She eventually started a baking blog and it wasn't long until she knew she wanted to write a cookbook about other cake ladies.  She searched out the "back roads of the south" to find other cake ladies like herself and started writing their stories down.

It is well-written with a little history, traditional southern cake recipes and gorgeous  photos of cakes, cake ladies, and their countryside.

"Cake Ladies" is a must have for southern ladies or just anyone wanting more good and rich southern cake recipes!

A Biblical Feast

"A Biblical Feast" by Kitty Morse, though a smallish paperback cookbook, has much to offer inside the beautiful red themed cover. There are red grapes, red pomegranates and red wine on a red striped cloth for a very striking eye-appeal on the front cover. The photo just begs the cookbook to be opened to see what else might look so good within.

The taste appeal arrives when the book is opened to a nice collection of Mediterranean recipes, sprinkled throughout with mouthwatering photos of the food! In fact, the photos alone are so enticing and makes the reader want to try the recipes just to taste the goodness!

If you've ever wondered about the foods mentioned in the Bible, you'll be pleased to read a little history about them--how they may have been prepared back then. With Morse growing up in Casablanca, Morocco's commercial capital, she had the perfect opportunity to experience the same types of foods that Jesus and the disciples dined on.

Morse actually takes you into the upper room with her description of how it might have been at  that last Feast of Unleavened Bread. The first few pages of the book has a lot of history that is a must read before continuing on to the recipes.

Most of the recipes include a great photo of the food, which really gets the mouth watering.  The photos are of such high quality and the food looks so good that you just want to reach for a bite before turning the page. Every recipe has a Bible verse at the beginning and then a paragraph before the recipe with history of the food or occasion that was celebrated.

The recipes range from Bitter Herb Salad, Squash with Capers & Mint, Lamb & Fresh Fava Bean Soup, Barley with Lentils & Onions to Ezekiel's Bread and Abigail's Fig Cakes, plus many more to choose from. Anyone on a Mediterranean diet will find many recipes to try in "A Biblical Feast".

The cookbook is small enough that it won't take up a lot of space on your cookbook shelf but the recipes will definitely add a lot of color and flavor to your dinner table.

Go to www.KittyMorse.com or www.ABiblicalFeast.com to learn more about Kitty Morse, the other nine books she has written, and the gourmet tours she arranges.  

Camp Loopy in June- Can you hear the Whippoorwill?

My cookbooks are getting a rest this month. They're still piled all around me as I sit on the couch or sleep in my bed and I still glance through them when I need one of those 45-second vacations. But they are not my focus this month.

I decided to take a little break from everything else going on in my life and go camping. For a whole month! But this is the kind of camping where you never leave the house for the itchy woods, and where you can stay fairly cool under the AC instead of battling 100+ degrees outside in the shade. 

My couch has become my campsite -- my cabin, so to speak. I've got the makings for those great and wonderful by-the-campfire S'Mores and they're on the menu tonight!  I am really camping, y'all! 

I joined The Loopy Ewe's "Camp Loopy" for the summer and our first project is to knit a shawl, a shawlette, or a scarf -- in a month's time! There will be other projects in July and in August but it will be one big miracle if I get this shawl finished before the as-yet-unnamed July camp project.  I thought if I joined the June shawl camp project, maybe I would have the pressure/motivation to get it finished by then, but one thing I've learned is that I am definitely a slow knitter. 

We were given several options and patterns were suggested. After looking at all of them several times, searching out the easiest and fastest one, I decided I would knit Whippoorwill designed by Carina Spencer and available for purchase at  www.SweetMamaSmallSugar.com 

I bought the Sanguine Gryphon Skinny Bugga yarn (handpainted sock yarn) at The Loopy Ewe, of course, and am really loving the way it is knitting up. My colors are Northern Green Frog (brownish-green) and Beyers Jewel Scarab (lime green).  Don't you love the color names! It is really pretty, so far, and I'm keeping fingers crossed that I'm going to like the contrast color (Northern Green Frog) when I get to those rows. 

Well, I'd better get back to some knitting  I've only got 182 stitches on the needles right now and am working my way up to having a total length of around 400 or so.  This will definitely take a while so I need to get going on it. 

The photo above was made last week when I first got started so it's a little bigger now.  More photos soon.

The Redneck Gourmet

It seems odd to use "Gourmet" (Gor-may) and "Redneck" in the same title to describe a good cookbook, but it really is the name of my newest cookbook from "L.A.", and that would be "Lower Alabama" -- not Los Angeles.

What started out as a joke recipe for John Paul Richardson turned into a cookbook of almost 500 recipes, some of which are real recipes and others that are not-so-serious (I hope!).  For instance, there is a recipe for Roasted Camel (recipe # 135) and another for Roasted 'Possum (recipe #123).  Some of the more serious recipes are for Mississippi Mud Cake; Rum Cake; and Granny Richardson's Peanut Brittle which I will make very soon!

Richardson got pretty creative with some of the recipes, renaming a pork and mushroom dish as "Psychedelic Pig".  I know that recipe will have some of the hippie types searching out THAT one.

This cookbook had my full attention right from the get-go!  How could it not with a 4-page introduction.  I started reading aloud to my hubby and we were both in giggles and tears within a minute. It is so different from all the other cookbooks in my collection, but this one is a one-of-a-kind that should be in every cookbook collector's library.

Two things that set it apart:  the paragraphs in the 4-page introduction are not separated by a space as they usually are in other cookbooks.  I felt compelled to continue reading to see what else was different.  I then noticed there is no index of recipes though there is a table of contents broken into sections that are familiar, such as "Barbeque", "Meats, Meat Dishes, and Chili" and "Beer, Wine, and Shine", just to name three of the 15 sections.

Most intriguing of all is that each recipe has a number in the title such as 208 Seafood Gumbo; 209 Alabama Gumbo; 210 Chicken Gumbo; 211 Mumbo Gumbo (no meat); 212 Cajun Gumbo, etc.  If you find a recipe you want to try or go back to later, you'll have to write down the number somewhere or page through until you find it again! I've never noticed this indexing method in any other cookbook.

As you can see in the photo, this cookbook has a coil binding so will easily lay flat while cooking from it.

If you're wondering if there is a recipe for snake, you are right -- there is!  But I won't be trying that one, or the one for Chitlins and Hog Maws, or Mexican Swamp Rabbit.  There are plenty of good-sounding recipes to try though and I will try them.

If you would like to order one for the Redneck Gourmet in your life, (this would make an excellent Father's Day gift) just go to www.paulrichardsonbooks.webs.com for the ordering info.

Happy Easter Cinnamon Rolls

Grab a cup of coffee and have a cinnamon roll with me! It's been a while since I made any of these and wanted to make something special for breakfast this morning. They were very yummy and since we have a few left over, it looks like we'll be enjoying them again, maybe for lunch and dinner!

It's a beautiful day here in Katy, TX. If it would only rain a few drops.

Orange Hibiscus

 

Photo by RB

Hooks, Lies & Alibis

Hooks, Lies & Alibis by Chef John D. Folse and Michaela D. York is one of my newest acquisitions that I will be reviewing here shortly.

It is a giant collection of fish and seafood recipes and has a world of wonderful photos and stories to enjoy as well. This is a book you'll have to place on the table to read as it is so big and heavy that you could never read it in bed.

Watch for more on this book -- coming soon!

RECIPE: Hershey's Cocoa Can Fudge

Make a Smilebox recipe

Lemon Curd

Make a Smilebox recipe

The New Portuguese Table

The New Portuguese Table

By David Leite, 2009

Anyone who has ever read any of David Leite’s food writings must have hoped he had a cookbook of his own doing a slow simmer on his foodie horizon.  This man has a way with words, as evidenced at his award winning web site, http://www.leitesculanaria.com and now he has revealed he also has a way with “slivers of whisker-thin kale” and “slices of sausage” as well.  It was just a matter of time before he served up  “The New Portuguese Table”, and that he has now done!

Born of Portuguese immigrants and raised in the US, it wasn’t until he lost his Grandmother that he begun to pay attention to the food being cooked in his Mother’s home.  He was concerned that when she passed on as well, so would all the Portuguese recipes he grew up enjoying.  He knew he did not want that to happen so went on a quest to watch her cook and documented her recipes. 

To get in touch with his ancestral culinary heritage, he visited Portugal on vacation several times through the years before deciding to live there for a year to experience the food and the country.  While becoming friends with local chefs and learning their secrets of improving old, traditional flavors with exciting new ones, he translated these techniques into how he could take his own recipes to culinary heights achievable by all cooks.

It was during that year in Portugal that his cookbook began to come together and he found that even though his mother’s recipes had the same names as those he experienced in Portugal, they didn’t taste quite the same.  There was a food revolution going on and he was in the middle of it -- in the right place, at the right time and Leite had the finesse to convey it to all of us in The New Portuguese Table.

The recipes he captured and preserved are excellent!  We’ve tried several of them and I know they will become family favorites that we will make over and over again.   Dishes such as his Lemon-Mint Chicken Soup, the Pumpkin Soup with Spicy Seeds, Smoked Paprika Oil, and my favorite - - Eggs Simmered in Tomato Sauce.  It is a simple dish, but so full of flavor that there is a risk of it replacing some old Southern favorites as my new comfort food.  The Azorean Kale, Sausage, and Bean Soup (sopa de couve) he included in the cookbook was his Mother’s recipe and that alone made me want to try it.  Like his Dad, we also tried it for breakfast one morning and found it to be just as flavorful, comforting and sustaining as it was at dinner the evening before.

The “to try” recipes waiting for me are Sweet Lemon and Black Olive Wafers and the Green Olive Dip.  The combination of those flavors in the wafers has to be as delicious as they sound and the photo alone is enough to whet the appetite.  The dip is made with milk and that intrigues me enough to try it with green olives.

Regarding the photos, The New Portuguese Table is full of engaging photos, a feature that is sure to appeal to those who like to see how the food looks when prepared.  The plus here is that there are many photos of the Portuguese countryside also – an open invitation to experience the Portuguese food heritage.

Beautiful food, charming countryside, delectable recipes, great cookbook!  What could be better?  Volume 2?  The New Portuguese Table will be as important to your cookbook collection as it is to mine!

Reviewed by Monita Olive for CookbooksEtCetera on September 3, 2009

Best of the Best Fast & Fabulous Party Foods and Appetizer

Quail Ridge Press has once again published a cookbook that will be dear to those who like to make party foods and appetizers for their family or friends who gather 'round them.

"Best of the Best Fast & Fabulous Party Foods and Appetizers" is 274 pages of recipes that are delicious, easy and quick to prepare and will have your guests asking for the recipe so they too can make it for their next party.

As they usually do, QRP has placed the title of this cookbook on the plastic comb spine so it will be easy to spot on the shelf. Being comb bound it is also easy to lay flat while cooking from -- a feature cooks love.

This cookbook is all about parties and there is an alphabetical listing of parties in the front, such as Bunko or Bridge Party, Father's Day Cookout, Mardi Gras Madness, Super Bowl Party, Wine-Tasting Party, just to name a few. Then there is another index of Monthly Parties with 2 menus for each month with listing of recipes and page numbers included. There is yet another index of Quick Fixes -- recipes that are super quick, as well as fast and fabulous.

Some of the chapters that catch my attention are:

"Wet Your Whistle"
includes shakes, floats, smoothies, slushes, teas, punches, coolers, wines, and wassails.....WOW!

"Crunchy Munchies" include recipes for crackers, chips, toasts, wafers, nuts, popcorn, and snack mixes.

"Some Like It Hot" include recipes for hot dips, chafing dishes, fondues, and hot bread bowls.

"Cheese, Please" includes recipes for cheese balls, squares, cubes, crisps, nachos, quesadillas and spreads. This is the section where I found a winner called "It's a Snowman Cheese Ball" and was a huge hit over the holidays when family gathered for Christmas dinner at my house. This held them over until I could get it all on the table and everyone was asking for the recipe (copied below for you).

This cookbook is filled with celebration recipes as well it should be since it was published to celebrate Quail Ridge Press's 30th anniversary (1978-2008). Gwen McKee and Barbara Moseley have never let us down with their BoB cookbooks and they haven't this time either.

Congratulations to McKee, Moseley and Quail Ridge Press on their busy, but exciting 30 years of giving the cookbook reader what they want -- exciting, delicious, easy, quick, challenging, unusual, wonderful recipes in wonderful cookbooks.

I believe it's time to celebrate and have a party and I know where we can get some more recipes like the one below:

"It's A Snowman Cheese Ball"

2 cups shredded 4-cheese blend
1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup finely chopped fresh chives or green onions
1 (2-ounce) package slivered almonds, toasted
1/8 teaspoon ground red pepper, or to taste
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
Peppercorns
1 baby carrot

Mix cheese, cream cheese, chives, almonds, and red pepper well. Cover and refrigerate 1 hour. Divide mixture into 3 balls -- small, medium, and large. Roll in Parmesan cheese. Arrange on serving dish small to large, like a snowman lying down. Decorate with peppercorns for eyes, mouth, and buttons, and carrot for nose. A green onion skin strip around his neck makes a scarf. Surround with crackers or cut-up fresh vegetables. Serves 16-20.

Reviewed by Monita Olive for CookbooksEtCetera on January 4, 2009

Cinagro Farm Family Favorites

Cinagro Farm Family Favorites is a 20-years-in-the-making personal

cookbook compiled by Carol Engan Borrelli to honor her Norwegian,

Dutch, German, Czechoslovakian and Italian ancestors. With that kind

of lineage, there have to be some good recipes in it and there are.

Carol Borrelli's background in federal food inspection gives her an

appreciation for the organic lifestyle and her love of cooking and

gardening lets her practice it as well. You can view the beautiful

cookbook at her website at www.cinagrofarm.com

The first thing that catches my eye with this cookbook is the name of

it. Cinagro is "organic" spelled backwards. I love it! Borrelli's

philosophy is to use fresh, organic foods when possible. There are

about 500 recipes within the 250+ pages of the comb-bound book. We

love the comb binding which makes it easy to stay open when cooking

from it.

The recipes range from breakfast breads like Blueberry Orange Tea

Muffins (absolutely wonderful on a chilly Sunday morning like today),

and Homemade Yogurt that uses goat milk, Norwegian Breakfast Crepes

("Jeg elske disse crepes") to appetizers and beverages like

Angloasian Rum Punch and Tangy Orange Cheese (yum).

In the soup section I've marked Cream of Broccoli Soup to try

(probably will be dinner tonight) and I'm sure to try the Sausage &

Lentil Soup Borrelli also. There is also a great section on sauces

and salad dressings that I am pleased as punch to have to find new

favorites. They sound just delicious.

The miscellaneous and unusual section has recipes for seasoned salt,

Cinagro Farm Skin Cream, and Donna's Downeast Biscuits (for the dog),

just to name a few.

There are so many yummy sounding recipes that I can't name them all,

but I see very many I will be trying -- especially those blueberry ones!

The divider pages between the sections have artwork by Sharon

France. Her Americana style is quite attractive, Most of the old

barns in the paintings are set at a distance, showing big sky, green

fields, and an orange strip in the foreground that I believe depicts

a fall harvest. France's artwork can be viewed at http://

www.francegallery.net/ The cover art work chosen by Borrelli was

perfect for this cookbook!

Cinagro Farm Family Favorites is listed at www.amazon.com and also at

www.target.com, but is currently showing as out of stock on both

sites. Since this cookbook would make a nice gift at this time of

year, you may want to go straight to http://www.cinagrofarm.com to

place your order.

I will be watching for the sequel and I'm sure it will be just as

good as this one.

Mo

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