Tuesday, March 26, 2013

My 15 Minutes

Well, the Sacramento Bee published two pages today about the two years I was involved in testing recipes for the newly nominated James Beard Award for Best Cookbook.."Mastering the Art of Southern Cooking" by Nathalie Dupree and Cynthia Stevens-Graubart.  (was that sentence too long?) I and 29 other people across the USA tested recipes..for the second time.  Very thorough those two are!

Gumbo


I am thrilled for the media coverage, as the co-authors will be here April 3, 4, and 5th..very soon!

Of course, I am absolutely gorgeous in the photos (camera adds 40 lbs).  I had a blast with the photographer and the journalist....who I enjoyed in my kitchen for 4 hours the other day!

The article says I am an AVID blogger...so I best start blogging again, eh?

The beautiful photos of the food...which I didn't know I'd be making until Manny arrived and said, "so what are we eating?", are beautiful online.  I was making "fake stuff" for photos...ya know, onions and peppers in a hot saute pan for the photos.  Good thing I can think fast on my feet and had a FEW of the REAL ingredients to make the seafood gumbo from the cookbook!

Refer to article about their schedule.  They will be on TV Thursday morning, Good Day Sacramento/channel 31 with Chef Jon Clemmons of The Porch...9 a.m. hour.

So..FED EX is here to deliver the 75 copies of Mastering the Art of Southern Cooking.  Luckily, American River College is getting their own shipment today!  Elaine Corn and I will be merrily schlepping escorting books and authors around town soon. 

P.S.  This is so cool.

P.S.S. I used to watch Nathalie on PBS all the time.  Nathalie and Julia.  Cynthia produced the shows!  I still use Nathalie's advice when it comes to big dinners.  Fill a very large cooler (or two) with soapy hot water, hide em, and throw the dirty pots and pans in there ...so you can enjoy company and do em later!  If you read her recipes, you will notice that she often mentions things like.."why dirty another pot?"  She also admits to hating to empty the dishwasher...I do too, and so does my DIL.  Sisters from another mister.

5 comments:

p said...

Congrats on the lovely article in the Sac Bee. I know nothing of southern cooking except "fried" and "canned." Able to cook and bake almost anything, I'd never fried anything until I made beignets this weekend. Oh, my, were they easy, good, and not greasy. I'd love to learn more about southern as well as other regional and cultural cooking and plan to follow your blog. May I add you as a friend on FB? I live in Fair Oaks and am a retired PhD scientist. Congrats again!

Pat said...

Congratulations Mel. I was in Reading Terminal the other day and browsed through the beautiful cookbook. I told the bookstore owner you had tested recipes for Nathalie. She said it's a great story to help sell the cookbook. She had it prominently displayed.
Best of luck with getting back into blogging. It will be fun to read.
Love Pat

Unknown said...

Thanks!!! We are still finding a few errors in the baking section but they will be corrected for next printing. No matter how many test seems like errors still occur.

P..sure, send me a friend request on FB.

Anonymous said...

Melly
Congratulations on your picture and article in the Bee. You've made it to the big time, girl!

Testing recipes is great fun, isn't it? I did it for another cookbook writer and loved it.

Glad you are well and cooking away!
dimsumgirl

Taradharma said...

a great piece in the Bee. Your stylish hair-do looks very nice in the photos. As does that pot of jumbalaya! (sp?)

Thank you so much for inviting me to their biscuit demo - it was great fun AND I got to see you two weeks in a row -- a record!

xo