Cookbookaholic

Buffalo Chicken Dip: The Recipe

A few years ago, we visited with our friends Gregg and Donna up in Lynchburg, Virginia. Donna served up this awesome Buffalo Chicken Dip and shared the recipe with me. I’ve made it for every “Big Game” menu since. (Lock your doors because Sportscaster Jim Szoke is a HUGE fan of this stuff!) So thank you Donna for sharing the recipe with me!

  

Remember, you can adjust the amount of hot sauce to suit your taste. Believe it or not, I actually use the full amount.

 
Buffalo Chicken Dip 

1 8oz block of cream cheese

½ cup bleu cheese dressing (ranch can be substituted)

1 cup (or more) of finely chopped cooked chicken

¼ - ½ cup Frank’s Red Hot Sauce (what’s your heat tolerance?)

1 cup grated Monterey Jack cheese (or favorite white cheese)

salt & pepper to taste

 

1 cup grated sharp cheddar cheese (for topping)

 

Heat the block of cream cheese and bleu cheese dressing in microwave for about one minute or, until the mixture is easy to stir. Add in the chicken, hot sauce, white cheese and salt/pepper. Blend together ingredients. (It’ll look more like pimento cheese quite honestly.)

 
Transfer the mixture to a casserole dish. I like to use a larger dish (or spilt into two smaller dishes) and have a thinner spread of the dip. Top with the grated cheddar cheese and place in oven. Bake at 350 degrees until the cheddar topping is bubbling and beginning to brown, about 20 minutes.

Remove from oven and serve immediately. Be sure to use chips that are more sturdy for this dip. The regular tortilla chip isn’t manly enough for this dip. Or, if you’re like me, I like to burn the cheese topping until it’s good and brown. For that, we like to use the thicker Fritos Scoops! Corn Chips. If you want to pretend that celery sticks will make this more healthy, then, by all means, knock yourself out.

The taste is an awesome tangy, ooey, gooey, cheesey goodness. The cheese and dressing really subdue the bite of the hot sauce into a kind of creamy tanginess. It’s quite addictive, so watch out!! 

 

The Last Mercedes

One of the many benefits from organizing the bottom shelf was finding an old post-it note. This orange sticky note had the names of Mercedes Vidrine cookbooks as well as the year of their original publication.

Of the five cookbooks listed, I had check marks next to four of them. The only one without a check mark was “Demi-Tasse” and it had the year 1964 written next to it.

If this was the last cookbook I needed from its original printing, why not do a quick search on eBay? Who knows!

I sat down and searched “Mercedes Vidrine” and saw several of the “Demi-Tasse” cookbooks for sale. Two of them were from printings in the 1970s. One said first printing and listed the year 1964. I clicked on it and looked at the pages. Luckily, they had an image of the copyright page…and 1964 was the only year listed.

I think that’s exactly what I need! It had a Buy It Now option and I quickly snapped it up.

After a few days, it showed up in the mail and here it is:

Quelque Chose Douce avec une Demi-Tasse (Something Sweet with a Cup of Coffee) by Mercedes Vidrine.

And it really is a first printing!

Organizing that shelf is the gift that keeps on giving! This should be the last first-edition Mercedes cookbook in the collection! 

Bottom of the Pile in Chester

I was looking through a gallery of photos for an estate sale down in a nearby city. And when I say nearby, it’s about 30 minutes away…in another state.

The auction company is out of Rock Hill, which is just over the border in South Carolina. So as I was going through one of their estate sales, I spotted a listing for a “cookbook collection.”

Clicking on the image, I see two small shelves of cookbooks and a cookbook stand inside a cabinet. The description read:

Cookbook Collection

Includes three cookbook stands & recipe card holder

SC First Lady Cookbooks from 1976-1991 & 1993

Better Homes & Garden, Chester County, SC

And more!

Interesting in that the image didn’t show much. When you have community cookbooks with plain plastic spiral spines, you’re not showing me anything when you photograph them from the side. Who knows what those cookbooks could be!?

The description was calling out a significant number of SC First Lady cookbooks. But what else could be in there? Was this collection old enough to have a Betty Feezor?  Should I take a chance and place a bid?

So far, there was only one bidder, so the price was super low. I kept my eye on it for a few days and then placed my bid.

As the days passed, I wondered if I should have bid at all. The estate sale company was in Rock Hill but it turns out the pick-up was not going to be there but at the home in Chester. Not too much further down the road, but a 30 minute trip was now looking to be closer to 45 minutes. And on top of that, the pick-up date was a weekday—Tuesday, my busiest day! If I won, I’d have to work ahead, clear out a chunk of time and try to sign-up for an early pick-up slot.

There were a few more bids, but I eventually won the lot. It topped out at my max bid of $15. As quickly as they would let me, I reserved a 10am pick-up and made it there in time.

I took two reusable bags and walked up to the house. There were tables set up outside and I see two stacks of cookbooks. I double-checked and the estate sale team had brought out all the items. No need for me to go inside and retrieve the items myself. Nice!

It will probably take me at least two trips. I can hopefully get the cookbooks in the reusable bags and then I’ll come back for the plastic bin of newspaper clippings.

And as I was loading up the bags, guess who showed up at the bottom of the pile? Click on the link to see the video I took:

Guess Who Was Waiting in Chester?

What a welcome sight! Glad I decided to place that bid! And I love that I was asked, “Are you the cookbook lady?” LOL! Why yes, I am!!

The gamble paid off…that is Betty Feezor’s Best,1962 Enlarged Edition, Fourth Printing. How about that? Betty was waiting for me on that shelf in Chester the whole time!

Here’s another thing about that little video…I saw my Mom’s hand. Looks like I need to moisturize more often.

Let’s take a look at the rest of the cookbooks!

Here are the South Carolina First Lady Cookbooks that were fundraisers for the American Cancer Society:

Here are the area church and community cookbooks:

I just don’t have the energy to list them all out. Forgive me.

But I will give a special shout out to Eudora, who was also uncovered in the pile! And, as it turns out, is an autographed copy!

And this one is pretty interesting as well:

Tried and True Recipes of the Clover Women’s Club (Clover, SC) all the way from 1956!

The big plastic bin of newspaper clippings is still in the back of my car. I think I’ll post about that separately…if I find anything interesting. 

Backup Cookie Jar

One of my favorite Christmas gifts from my husband is a Moravian Cookie Jar. It was from a collection called “Moravian Blessings” by Patty Bailey Sheets. In fact, there was an entire table setting…but I was too late to the party on that. Once upon a time, you could find the plates and other items at the Moravian Book & Gift Shop in Winson-Salem.

Sadly, they stopped stocking those items…and I didn’t know that. And for one of my Christmas gifts that year, I asked for a Moravian Star Cookie Jar.

At some point, my husband travelled up to the Moravian Book & Gift Shop looking to pick one up. When he got there, he couldn’t find any on the sales floor. He asked one of the employees and they looked up their stock in the system. It read that they had one cookie jar left but no one knew where it was.

Now, let me tell you that this is the one time where my husband’s OCD for straightening and organizing came in handy for me. LOL!!

He asked permission to go into the storeroom to help locate it. And they let him…

I’m sure he took his time but their inventory probably ended up with items in straight lines and stacks. And, at some point during the organizing, he found the last cookie jar!

I was so thrilled when I opened up the box on Christmas morning!

Have you ever reached a point in marriage where you start to get gifts you ask for and not what they think you should have? This cookie jar was that point for me and it was such a relief.

A few months ago, I came across another one on Facebook Marketplace. I saved it because I knew it was such a rare find! Did I need another one, no. But I wanted to keep an eye on it.

After a few months went by, I noticed that it was still listed. And knowing how rare it is, I decided to buy it. We arranged for a Saturday morning meet up and I drove up to Clemmons to get it.

See the recipe for the Molasses Cookies?

It needs a bit of cleaning up but I’ll put it on the shelf as a backup cookie jar!

Trip to the Trading Post

As I was scrolling through my Facebook newsfeed, I saw a mutual friend’s posting about her booth at the Carolina Trading Post down in my hometown. After looking through a few pictures, I recognized many of the items from a recent estate sale. This mutual friend had been helping organize the sale and several of the items were now in her booth.

For those of you from the Charlotte area, the Carolina Trading Post is exactly like Sleepy Poet or Black Lion or just about any other large antique store with multiple vendors selling their wares out of small booths. Rows and rows of booths!

Like I said, I was scrolling through pictures of items in her booth, and I saw these:

I thought these were the most gorgeous pieces! Also, I need some small items to help add interest to the bookshelves in the cookbook room. The price tag was not visible, but I sent her a direct message to see if they were still available along with the price. The next morning, I called the store and asked if they would put them on hold for me.

They were super helpful and put them to the side. After a two-and-a-half-hour drive down to the store, I decided to walk through the entire store to see what kind of antiques were there. Of course, I immediately spied cookbooks in several booths. And, it wasn’t long before my pile of cookbooks started to weigh me down!

Here are the first ones I found in booths on the left side of the store:

The Screened Door Pantry: Stories and Receipts (Two Bored Women, Hartsville, SC). There seems to be names for the two bored women: Harriett Courtney Lemke and Fran Wall Weaver. They had a catering and design business by the same name. This is part family history/reminisce and cookbook. I want to spend more time on this one but there’s a strong mothball odor courtesy of the previous owner. Funkadelic in the extreme so it’ll take time. Don’t Forget the Parsley (Mrs. Wille S. Berry, Orangeburg-Calhoun Technical College Foundation, Inc.). Looking through the Acknowledgements section, I’m guessing that these recipes are from the Berry’s-on-the Hill Restaurant. I don’t think it’s still in business so getting this cookbook is a great way to capture a bit of history. Louisiana Cookery (Mary Land): I think I’ve got a hardback version of this one? But I couldn’t pass up this paperback copy.

‘Pon Tip Edisto: Cookin’ ‘Tweenst the Rivers (Trinity Episcopal Church, Edisto Island, SC) was a no-brainer, straight into the pile. Cooking in the South (Johnnie Gabriel) was very, very affordable and a bonus because I found that it’s personalized/autographed! Celebrating 170 Years: 1827-1997 (Darlington Presbyterian Church, Darlington, SC) seemed a good grab because of the history. I bet there’s a few really good family recipes in there. And finally, Hors d’oeuvres (Mimosa Garden Club, Atlanta, GA) is one of my all-time favorite finds. I will pick up a copy of this one every time I come across it!

So when I finally check out at the register, I’m pleasantly surprised as many of the cookbooks were on sale. That was an unexpected and nice destination for shopping. I’ll keep my eye out for the posts on Facebook and wouldn’t hesitate to return the next time I’m in town!

We Ride at Dawn!

The One After a Robbery

There was an estate sale over on the south side of Gastonia that had cookbooks listed. Pictures were posted and there was a small bookshelf that had some good selections. I reached out to the lady running the sale and got on the list as it was going to be a controlled entry. I was second in line!

Here’s the deal…it had a Friday 7am start. I had worked and knocked a bunch of things of my to-do list at work and decided that I could get to the 7am sale, get in, get out and back home before 9am. I’d still have plenty of time left to finish out everything. Great plan!

When I said south side of Gastonia, I was not kidding. I ended up on a country road and the neighborhood looked like it was built in the 1970’s and then promptly forgotten. It was getting close to start time and I was getting nervous as the GPS kept adding turn after turn.

As I rolled up and found parking, I noticed that some people were milling about and several cars were leaving. For a hot second, I wondered if they had opened up early and let people in (not using controlled entry)? As I got closer to the driveway, I see a chalkboard/message board announcing that the sale was cancelled. What?

The lady running the sale was outside talking to people in the driveway. She announces that the house had been broken into during the night and items had been stolen. She said the sale would not happen as she was waiting for law enforcement to show up and begin their investigation.

What in the world?! I’m not sure if I’ve ever heard of this happening? But, we were way out in the country and if the address was published….an empty house could be an easy target.

I asked if they will open up the sale later in the day and she says she’s not sure. So, with nothing happening here…I head back home.

Later in the day, all who had signed up for a place in line received a text message that the sale will happen on Saturday.

So, back at the location the next morning, the lady running the sale announces that she is not going to let the previous day’s activity stop her doing the sale. I can’t imagine how scared she must have been…especially if she was the one who discovered the break-in. I spoke up and said, “Good for you.”  Then, she says that she will honor the sign-up list from Friday. Woo-hoo! There’s only two of us and she tells us to go on in.

The other customer makes a beeline straight to a shelf of what I will call “vintage” Pyrex dishes. I guess that’s a thing now? Good for her. I locate the small bookshelf, take my time looking through the cokbooks and put a small selection into my bag. I didn’t grab them all as I’m trying to tell myself to concentrate on quality, not necessarily quantity.

As more people are entering the house, I’m hearing the lady running the sale say that the robbers targeted the electronics in the house. Which is interesting because the photos that were posted didn’t show any “new” electronics.

Well, it doesn’t take too long before I’ve gone through the cookbooks. Not wanted to leave so quickly, I decide to take a look around. I’m right there at the kitchen and up on a shelf I see two orangey-yellow mixing bowls. I remember seeing them in the listing but no one has picked them up yet. I reach over, look them over and don’t see any cracks and then I turn them over: they are stamped “Emile Henry/France for Williams Sonoma.” Yep, they’re both going in my bag!

And here they are:

Nice!

And here’s the stack of cookbooks that came home with me:

From the bottom up: Y’All Come Eat (The Deen Bros.), The Deen Bros. Cookbook (The Deen Bros.), The Lady & Sons Savannah Country Cookbook (Paula Deen), Christmas Gems (Garden Club of Georgia; 1^st Edition, 1^st Printing), Old North State Cookin’ (Telephone Pioneers of America: Old North State Chapter 79), Recipes and Reflections (Bethel Presbyterian Church, Clover, SC) and Manna from Maylo (Maylo UMC, Gastonia, NC).

Those were easy to photograph in a stack because the titles were printed on the spines. Here are the other two:

Carolina Cooking II (Pioneers BellSouth/Nortel Volunteers, NC Chapter No. 35) and South Carolina First Lady Cookbook: 1986 Palmetto Treasures (American Cancer Society).

Nearing the End on Hilton Head Island

I’m making another valiant attempt to get through that pile of cookbooks that I stashed on the bottom shelf of a bookcase last year. The previous blog post was part of that. But this post is focused on the cookbooks I bought during one of our last weekend getaways.

Sadly, the in-laws sold the Harbour Town condo in Sea Pines last fall. Hilton Head Island has been where my family has gone for vacations since 1999. That’s a long, long time.

And as it was all gearing up to be listed, I was able to get in this trip to The Book Lady, my favorite Savannah used bookstore, Back in the Day Bakery and a few thrift stores on Hilton Head.

My new favorite thrift store on the island has become the St. Francis Thrift Store. I’ve had some really good cookbook finds there since my beloved Hospice Community Thrift closed down. Here’s what I was able to find:

Judie’s Cookbook (Judy Teraspulsky and others) looks to be recipes and menu suggestions found at Judie’s Restaurant in Amherst, MA. Sweet Potato Recipes is one of those seemingly authorless  cookbooks…no one is listed so I guess it just self-published? Intriguing. But, it does have a Sweet Potato Biscuit recipe, so there’s that. Finally, I come across Unbearably Good from The Junior Service League of Americus, Georgia. Nice…first edition, first printing!

A day trip into Savannah involves a trip to Back in the Day Bakery. It’s been so long, but this was actually my very first trip to the bakery. There was a line of people outside, which I thought was the line to get in. But after a quick conversation with a few people, it turned out that they were waiting to pick up their orders. I didn’t see any other customers inside so I went in…and saw her. Cheryl Day was there! I thought I was going to die. And if I bought something or placed an order, I would have a chance to actually talk to her!!! OMG!!!!!

Also, one of the benefits of shopping inside the bakery? You can purchase autographed copies of Cheryl Day & Griffith Day’s cookbooks!

The Back in the Day Bakery Cookbook (Cheryl Day, Griffith Day). I love that you can see the shelves that are in the background of the cover photo inside the bakery. So cool! And…they’ve got other cookbooks for sale as well. I spotted Coconuts & Collards: Recipes and Stories from Puerto Rico to the Deep South (Von Diaz) and decided to pick it up. It had been featured in a flyer from the University Press of Florida and caught my eye. This was the first time I’d seen this cookbook in person…so glad I picked it up!

When I went to the register to check out, the word “excitement” is such an understatement. I wanted to get a cupcake so I asked for one with all the icing. You heard me, I wanted one with as much icing that could be slathered on top of it.

While we were waiting on someone to bring a cupcake to the register, Cheryl Day rang me up at the register. She told me that her new cookbook, Cheryl Day’s Treasury of Southern Baking, was due to be published soon. I told her that the publication date was very close to my birthday, and I would treat myself to a copy as a present to myself. She was so nice! I was walking on air the rest of the weekend after that!

Want to see the cupcake with all the icing? LOL!!!

Now was time to settle in and look through the cookbook section at The Book Lady, my favorite used bookstore in Savannah. Here’s a look at a stack:

Going from the bottom up: Savoring Savannah: Feasts from the Low Country (Foreward by Nathalie Dupree, Introductions by Martha Giddens Nesbit) features menus with recipes by featured chefs from the area. Vertamae Cooks in the Americas’ Family Kitchen (Vertamae Grosvenor) and Vertamae Cooks Again: More Recipes from The Americas’ Family Kitchen (Vertamae Grosvenor). I had noticed these cookbooks before and wanted to make sure I got them this time around.

From Black Tie to Blackeyed Peas: Savannah’s Savory Secrets (St. Joseph’s Foundation of Savannah, Inc.) Why did I think this was from the Junior League of Savannah? I have another copy of this one somewhere? I’ve thought this was a Jr. League cookbook this whole time! Hmmm…oh well, this one is a first edition, first printing which is way cool and worthy of inclusion in the collection.

Southern Tables (Pinewood Christian Academy, Bellville, GA). This totally looks like a fancy private school cookbook which means there’s potential for the rich fancy parents to include their best family recipes. Plus, it’s a first edition, first printing.

Grace Hartley’s Southern Cookbook: Over Forty Years of Recipes from The Atlanta Journal. It’s been a hot minute since the Atlanta Constitution and the Atlanta Journal merged but I don’t think you can go wrong when the newspaper’s Food Editor pulls together several decades of recipes. This is dated 1976, so I’m thinking forty years puts this at mid-1930’s and forward. So you know what I’m thinking…congealed salads! And it doesn’t disappoint: Congealed Asparagus Salad, Tomato Aspic and Cottage Cheese Salad, Horseradish Ring with Vegetable Salad, and Spiced Peach Mold.

Cornbread Nation #1: The Best of Southern Food Writing (Edited by John Egerton for the Southern Foodways Alliance). Until recently, I’d been a dues-paying member of the Southern Foodways Alliance. I became a member of the SFA after attending a symposium in Birmingham, Alabama about six years ago. It had recently taken over/merged with Food Blog South which I had wanted to attend the previous year. My hope was to attend that year’s conference and get some tips and actionable ideas to help this blog improve: do giveaways, do interviews and expand into video. Now that SFA had taken over, there weren’t any speakers or sessions devoted to blogging or vlogging.

What I did find was a group of professional writers who were intentional in their focus to help record Southern traditions as well as its continuing evolution through the lens of food. I did feel a form of kinship, after all, this blog was intended, in some ways, to be my contribution to collecting recipes, traditions and celebrations of Southern cooking/cuisine. But I’m not a professional writer and it was getting harder for me to keep pace with blogging….so I let my membership expire. No more quarterly issues of Gravy. No more online access to the website and the Gravy podcast. But….now that I have this copy of Cornbread Nation, I can keep my eye out for more issues and maybe come across more copies of Gravy. Now that’s a good plan!

And now the final find from The Book Lady:

The Art of Cooking! (The Connoisseurs’, Lawrence County, Mississippi). The first section of this cookbooks is entitled, “VIP Recipes.” As you can imagine, there are a ton of recipes from various wives of southern state Governors. But what caught my attention was the response from Liza Minelli:

              Thank you for your interest.

               I’m having my secretary copy one of my recipes for you.

              I’m on my way to Europe – work in London and Paris.

              My best to you and the “Connoisseurs”

                                                                                      Liza

Then, on the next page is a recipe for Boston Prune Cake. Essentially, two yellow cake layers with a chilled vanilla pudding, spiced with cinnamon/nutmeg/allspice and “chopped, uncooked, pitted prunes” in the middle and topped with confectioner’s sugar. And the recipe is credited to…wait for it: “Mrs. Peter Allen (Liza Minelli).” Interesting! There’s no date that I can find for this cookbook….but if we use Liza to help narrow the timeframe, this cookbook could be from 1967 to 1970.

So that’s it! It’s been so sad to come to terms with the sale of the condo…so many happy family memories; but now we’re closing that chapter of our lives.

This just can’t be my last trip to Hilton Head Island and Savannah! I’d even be game for a very long day trip... 

Stacked Up

So, this is really sad. As the holidays were approaching last year, in an attempt to “clean up” the cookbook piles…I stashed a ton of cookbooks on the bottom shelf of a cabinet. And I’ve left them there!

So, in this year’s attempt to “clean up” AND be better with the blog…I wanted to go through the packages and write about them. Now, I’ve also got my stash from my very last trip to the used book store and thrift stores in Savannah and Hilton Head in this pile…so there’s another potential blog post in all this stacked up, backed up mess.

Most of this pile started out as a list of cookbooks that I saw on Amazon but there’s also a couple that I specifically wanted because of the authors. And then there’s one that..well, you’ll see.

Here’s the stack!

Let’s start from the bottom and go up.

Whole Hog BBQ: The Gospel of Carolina Barbeque with Recipes from Skylight Inn & Sam Jones BBQ (Sam Jones & Daniel Vaughn). So this one was a “suggestion” by Amazon as I was pre-ordering Rodney Scott’s World of BBQ cookbook. Now, I’ve never been to the Skylight Inn or Sam Jones BBQ, but I just think it’s great to have these books as a way to preserve the many different ways of cooking BBQ.

Think of how many amazing BBQ joints have been in business and closed over the past century. Family recipes, regional flavors, whole hog, charcoal, pit-cooked, dry-rubbed, sauced….how many ways of BBQ-ing have been perfected and then lost to time? That history of feeding families/communities via  seasoned and roasted meat is as deep and varied and as long as time itself.

Jubilee: Recipes from Two Centuries of African American Cooking (Toni Tipton Martin). This purchase was definitely to help fill out my collection with more from this author.  She has emerged as one of the great respected food writers on Southern cooking. My hope was to get a First Edition of Jubilee as I think I’ve seen more than one cover for this book (or is that my imagination?). This copy does say First Edition and it has the image of the Louisiana Barbecued Shrimp (I think) on the cover. So happy with this as I don’t think it was listed as a First Edition….I was banking on the publication date and a whole lotta luck!

Next up is Tailgreat: How to Crush It at Tailgating (John Currence). I’ve already got another cookbook by Currence (autographed, thank you) and he’s one of the go-to chefs in Oxford, Mississippi that John T. Edge adores. Plus, I’ve noticed him taking part in events hosted by the Southern Foodways Alliance—so he’s definitely legit. And, I’ve always wanted to be the one who has amazing food for Super Bowl parties. Perhaps this will get my game elevated beyond just Buffalo Chicken Dip?

Brown Sugar Kitchen (Tanya Holland with Jan Newberry). I think this one was another suggestion by Amazon’s algorithm when I was looking for Jubilee. I promise you, I ended up with a whole list of new cookbooks that weren’t even on my radar just because of that “suggested for you” section! LOL!!! And you know how much I love breakfast for lunch and/or dinner…who wouldn’t want this cookbook? It has chicken & waffles and then more waffles on the cover!

Now, you may be wondering, “Why does she have two copies of Brown Sugar Kitchen in her stack?” Great question and it has a very simple answer, take a look at how this copy made it to my house:

Unbelievable. My local post office delivered it to me like this. The person literally tried to curl it up and shove it into my mailbox. I was livid! Livid. Liv-id.

So, I bought another copy. It arrived in much better shape.

Brunch @ Bobby’s: 140 Recipes for the Best Part of the Weekend (Bobby Flay with Stephanie Banyas & Sally Jackson). What more can I say? I love breakfast any time of the day: brunch, lunch, dinner…I’m there. I think I watched an episode of him putting together several brunch items? An online search quickly revealed this cookbook and I found it on eBay. Definitely not a first printing but I’m glad it’s here.

Pantry and Palate: Remembering and Rediscovering Acadian Food (Simon Thibault). Once again, thanks to Amazon’s suggestion, this one came home to me as well. If memory serves, this one was served up after a search for more Mercedes Vidrine cookbooks. Of course, when it popped up I assumed it was associated with Cajun cooking but when it arrived I found that it was focused on the regional community in Nova Scotia, Canada.

Last but not least in this pile is Breakfast for Dinner: Recipes for Frittata Florentine, Huevos Rancheros, Sunny-Side-Up Burgers, and More! (Lindsay Landis & Taylor Hackbarth). This one made it here based entirely on seeing it in a photo on the bookshelf behind Michael Twitty in a Twitter post. I love when food authors have their bookshelves in a photo because I will totally zoom-zoom up on that and find out what’s missing from my collection! And, who could miss that it is entirely devoted to my favorite: breakfast for dinner! LOL!!!

Well, that was fun! And it covered a lot. I think I look at my piles of cookbooks and overthink things. Should I wait and grab a few more cookbooks to make a post more interesting or lengthy? Have I missed the window on talking about this trip or this garage sale find? Questions like that end up with me suffering from analysis paralysis….and then nothing gets written. And the piles stack up and back up.

Luckily, I’ve been able to find some awesome bookshelves and cabinets (future cookbook room tour?) to house the growing collection. And…big helper here…I’m on vacation this week. I’m hoping to devote time each day to work my way through some piles with blog posts. Only once I’ve written about them (or forgotten how I got them) do I feel that I can help them find a place amongst the shelves. Wish me luck!

Jan's Gift

I’ve attended church with a lady named Jan and her family for many years now. Covid came along and we all went remote for two years. We’ve been slowly moving back to attending worship service in person, but not as often as we should. It’s so easy to sit on the couch in your pajamas and watch online.

During one of the times we made it to church in person, Jan said that she had some cookbooks for me. Her mother had to transition to a memory-care facility, and they cleaned out and sold her home.

Jan had kept the cookbooks and thought I would enjoy having them.

As I mentioned, we weren’t great about making it to church in person every Sunday. But then there was a service where we were both there. Jan told me to wait while she ran out to her car. She brought back a paper bag with a nice collection of cookbooks.

I’m so honored when someone thinks of me and gifts me their loved ones’ cookbook collection.

Did I mention that her mom was also a member of a Moravian church? There were a couple of Moravian church cookbooks that I’m so happy to add to my collection.

And every cookbook has her mom’s name on the inside cover page. Thank you, Peggy, I’ll take good care of them!

Friedberg Moravian Church Cookbook (Winston-Salem, NC) and Leaksville Moravian Church Cookbook (Eden, NC).

Spray Garden Club Recipes (Revised 1959 edition, Leaksville/Spray, NC) and Cooking Up to Par (Deep Springs Garden Club, Stoneville, NC)

A Taste of Heaven: Treasured Family Keepsakes (Trinity Friends Meeting, Lewisville, NC), Seasoned with Love (Belews Creek Ladies Auxiliary, Belews Creek, NC) and Knollwood’s Cooking (Knollwood Baptist Church, Winston-Salem, NC).

Quick Trip to Myrtle Beach

After a long, long time, my brother and I are finally selling the house in which we grew up. It’s been over six years since our mom passed and it’s time to let it go.

I’m not sure how or why, but the closing is in Myrtle Beach…not even the city or county in which the house is located. So, I’ll take a few days off from work….which are desperately needed anyways and I’ll spend a day to focus on the closing and then a day for relaxation. I can’t spend a long weekend there because we’ve got a bookcase being delivered from Ikea and it’s showing up on Saturday.

Honestly, I’m not even looking for cookbooks during this trip but we end up at a few thrift stores. The back of my car is still filled with the collection I won in an online auction. I don’t need to go crazy and pick up another load until I get the new ones situated! LOL

Let me tell you about our first meal in Myrtle Beach! We went to brunch at a restaurant called Lulu’s Café. I ordered the Banana Bread French Toast…two slices of French toasted banana bread topped with banana slices, pecans and my generous pour of syrup. It was so amazing and delicious, I didn’t even wait to take a photo. Sorry. And there were no leftovers.

After the closing, hubby had found a nearby church thrift store and I appreciated the activity of just getting out and walking around. It was a set of two small rooms but staffed with five people…but they were very busy with their own conversations.

As I walked in, I saw a hand sanitizer dispenser and I took some into my hand. As a began to rub my hands together, I realized that it wasn’t hand sanitizer but hand soap. And now, I had a thick layer of sudsy-soap on both of my hands.

Casually, I walked back to the area that displayed towels and found a basic dark beige hand towel and wiped my hands. I guess this is coming back home with me?! LOL!

Hubby found a shirt and I came across a collection of three bread baskets. I’ve actually been looking for one and really liked the large basket on the bottom. But the three were taped together for a grand total of only $1.50. I’m super excited to find these! As we are checking out, I ask about cookbooks but when I look over their small selection, I don’t see anything that thrills me.

Next, we head to a Goodwill. Again, I’m not looking for a haul so I’m not disappointed when the selection isn’t great…but then, I spot this:

Southern Living Rotisserie Chicken Cookbook. I love the rotisserie chicken that I get from Food Lion. I use it when I make a Moravian Chicken Pie….so much easier and quicker to just slice and chop up. I hope this can inspire some additional dinners instead of a meat and two sides.

We call it a night and the next day we start off at another brunch spot. Croissants Bistro & Bakery is our choice and I order their Bananas Foster French Toast with a side of crispy bacon. Another stellar decision!

Before we head out of town Hubby had found another thrift store to visit. It got a lot of great reviews so we’re on the way.

When we get there, we see a line of people waiting outside. Is this thrift store that popular? We walk inside and know immediately why people are waiting outside…the air conditioning is broken. And it’s significantly cooler outside! I do a quick assessment on each aisle, nothing. Of course, the small bookshelf there are only a few cookbooks and I see this:

Buen Provecho, Junior League of Mexico City (1980). A quick look at the title page shows that this is a special 50^th Anniversary for that organization. What a great find! My Junior League collection is now officially international.