Cookbook Giveaway!

While I’m away at the beach this week, I wanted to get ready to celebrate the blog’s 3rd birthday!  26 May will be three years since my first food post.  The blog has changed a little over the years, hopefully for the better, but I often come back to the same cookbook over and over again, the source for my first post. Although the Muffin Cookbook is out of print, I managed to procure three copies in very good condition to give away at the end of the month. All you have to do is a leave a comment telling me the name of your favorite muffin at the end of this post and you will be entered to win! I’ll use a random number generator to select three winners. Thanks for reading!

Just Call Us ‘The Apple Dumpling Gang’

Hopefully you’ve see the movie, but I’m talking about something else. Saturday night Lisa of Champaign Taste, under the sponsorship of FoodBuzz for their 24, 24, 24 event, hosted a dinner for a few Champaign food bloggers at The Apple Dumpling in Urbana.

I had never been to the Apple Dumpling before, so I was looking forward to trying out a new place. They specialize in Midwestern home-style food. I had the fried chicken, a baked sweet potato (with brown sugar, mmm!), the salad bar, and, of course, the name-sake dessert, which was oooh, so gooey and delicious but I couldn’t finish either the main course or the dessert and even The Husband was too stuffed to help me out, as he usually does.

So, go check out Lisa’s post, complete with videos and photos (I’m hiding in the back and The Husband is sitting at the end of the table). You may find yourself saying, “Mr. Donovan, I gotta goooooo!” (get an apple dumpling, that is!)

Just Like Grandma’s

Today I point you toward How To Cook Like Your Grandmother for an interesting blog visit. Drew has lots of step-by-step instructions for basic foods, detailing the recipes and the techniques.

Wandering West

Vegan Lunch Box is a blog I used to frequent and even listed on my blogroll for a while, but then Schmoo stopped going to school and the lunches stopped being packed, but this summer Jennifer is back with all sorts of beautiful things. I know I’m NOT a vegan (in case you thought I was confused about the definition), but I don’t have to eat meat at every meal and, even when the food isn’t something I’d choose for myself, Jennifer packs a beautiful bento.

Southern Wanderings

This week I wandered to the southern hemisphere. I recommend you visit Arfi’s blog HomeMades. Her photography is gorgeous and her recent post on chocolate orange custard is droolworthy.