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What’s in a name? Brand recognition for one . . .

25 Nov

A while back I put out a call for names for the Passover cookbook. There were lots of great suggestions and my advisory team (mom and dad plus friends on Facebook ad Twitter) and I debated titles for weeks. We were looking for humour, for creativity, and for the best descriptions; we let each title stand alone, then we tried mixing and matching. There were a few finalists. And then, finally, we realized that we were over-thinking it.

We finally decided on: Passover – A Kosher Collection.

It’s simple and to the point. Hopefully it will let those who enjoyed Soup – A Kosher Collection know that this book is from the same author. And finally, when I started writing Soup, I hoped that it would be the first in a series. I planned on Salads, Mains, Desserts, etc. — all with “A Kosher Collection” attached. Passover deviated from the plan. It wasn’t a course. But I realized it didn’t have to be a course — this holiday book is still a kosher collection.

I would like to thank everybody who contributed suggestions. They were all appreciated and given consideration before we realized we shouldn’t fix what wasn’t broken.

Editing and Pictures

24 Nov

Over the last few weeks I’ve spent all my free time editing and working on photos. I mean all my free time — plus a lot of time at work, where I’ve been hiding out in my office trying to get stuff done.

I keep telling myself that I just have to get this one section done, then I’ll have some free time. Ha! What I meant is that I have to get this section done so I can get to the next one.

Anyway . . . I decided to take the pictures myself for this book. By myself, I mean with the help of my mother and sister. Lisa (the sister) helped by building the ‘studio’ for me. We got some lumber and a roll of backdrop paper, and ended up with this ‘photo studio’.

It worked well, and while I cooked and cooked and cooked, Mom and Lisa took turns as stylists/photographers (though I couldn’t help but take a couple of pictures of each dish myself — can we say control freak?). Every Sunday for a month or so, I’d prep 6-8 recipes and we’d snap dozens of pictures.

There will be 16 colour pages in the book (for those of you who have Soup, it will be the same) and we took over 1200 pictures. Do you know how long it takes to go through 1200 pictures? A long time. But I’ve eliminated close to 1000, and now I’m trying to choose the best out of the ones that are left.

The pictures are getting done in between editing the book. So far I’ve had three people (and me) editing and proofing. We’re on edit #4 now, and we keep finding things to change. We’re in the middle of this round, and I think it will take just one more. I hope.

Next up: formatting.

What’s in a name? Help name my book!

23 Sep

I’m not yet done writing my Passover cookbook, but with self-publishing comes a whole bunch of tasks that I didn’t have to worry about with the first book. I need to get an ISBN number, get it registered with certain sites and libraries and take a look at how I’m going to distribute it or get it sold.

As I look through guides that my printer sent and try to navigate Amazon’s Advantage program (it allows self-published authors to list their books), I’m beginning to realize that I have to figure out what I’m going to call this one. When I talk about it, I call it ‘the Passover (or Pesach) cookbook’. Not very catchy.

I’ve gone through a long list of titles, but nothing really seems right. This book has a real mix of traditional Ashkenazi recipes and what I would call non-traditional recipes. So “Passover Recipes From My Bubbe’s Table” isn’t an option; nor is “New Age Passover Cooking”.

So what I’m going to do is ask you to come up with some suggestions. Send me a title (or several) via email, a comment here, on twitter @pamreiss or Facebook. When I’ve chosen a title, the person who came up with it will get my gratitude and a copy of the book when it’s printed.

Difference of Opinion

12 Aug

I’ve been talking to everybody I know about Jewish food for the last few months. (A lot longer than that, but really focused on it now.)  The most interesting thing to me is that my sister and I have opposite views on the important things.  We grew up in the same house and had the same parents and grandparents cooking for us, so how did our preferences diverge so widely?

For instance:

  • Matzo Balls – I like them fluffy.  Not super-fluffy so they’re falling apart, but fluffy so it’s not like I’m eating a cement ball.  My sister feels that they should be firm enough that they’ll bounce off the floor and hit the ceiling if you toss one.
  • Fried Matzo #1 – I like it sweet with syrup drizzled on top. She likes it savoury with butter and salt or some sautéed vegetables.
  • Fried Matzo #2- I prefer using the pancake method – one single pancake of fried matzo, nice and brown on both sides.  She’s of the “scrambled eggs” technique. You mix it up as it cooks and it doesn’t form that nice crust (“I don’t like it crusty!” says she. “Oh, I do” says I.)
  • Even though we’re (both) Ashkenazi, I like to say that I have the taste buds of an Ashkenazi and her taste buds are Sephardi. A chicken dish I made last week was liked by all, but my lips went a little numb and I made the comment “cut back on the chili powder a little”. Her response “no, it’s good.”

This is just a sampling, I’m sure I could go on.  Check back later for a new  post, potential title “My Mother Prefers More Salt – I Prefer More Pepper”

Cooking & Tasting

11 Aug

Last week I took a few days off of work so I could spend the time at home, working on recipes for the cookbook. I got a lot done, but not as much as I had planned.

I’m going through my lists of tested recipes and to-test recipes, trying to figure out what’s left to do.  The problem is that I keep thinking of new ideas, so the to-test list isn’t really getting any smaller.

In the last week or so I’ve worked on:

  • potato latkes (not just for Chanukah!)
  • zucchini/leek latkes
  • sweet potato ginger latkes
  • matzo balls
  • zucchini/spinach/chicken soup (needs a good name)
  • brownies
  • meringue cookies with toasted coconut/almonds/chocolate chips
  • sautéed eggplant & roasted pepper salad
  • an old-school beef flanken recipe
  • blueberry coffee-cake
  • sweet potato/apple side dish
  • roast chicken with roasted vegetables – a little sweet, a little spicy
  • matzo brei (can’t have passover without one recipe — will do at least two — one sweet, one savoury and maybe a couple of other variations)
  • strawberry/blueberry conserves for the matzo brei ( it would also be good on matzo)

Some of the recipes I’ve been making for years and just needed to be written down.  Some are new for me and have to be tried a few times, tweaking things here and there.  Some recipes (like a brisket I cooked on Sunday) just don’t work at all and aren’t worth tweaking.  Those are the most frustrating.

While I normally count on immediate family members for taste-testing (don’t worry, there are no critiques more honest — sometimes brutally honest — than those of your parents and siblings), I was lucky enough to have some extended family visiting from out-of-town.

tovina latkes

This little 2-year-old thought the sweet potato and ginger latkes were just fine . . . and she stopped eating them after latke #4 or 5.

The 6 dozen latkes made that afternoon were gone quickly. And it was a lot of fun having the kitchen full of family, grabbing the latkes as soon as they came out of the pan.  It’s true — these Chanukah treats are as good in April or August as they are in December.

So I’m moving along in the kitchen, and getting as much typing done as I can between customers.  It’s almost time to start thinking about what has to happen when the cooking is all done.  Just not yet.

It’s all about the recipes.

4 Aug

For me, the best part about working on a cookbook is the recipe development and testing. Well, that’s usually true. Sometimes the testing can be less than fun — when I’m trying something for the 6th time and it’s still not right. At that point I’m no longer enjoying myself.

The part I’m not as fond of is typing up the recipes. I procrastinate and can’t do a long stretch without checking the eG forums and then Twitter and Facebook multiple times. When I wrote the last book I didn’t have these distractions — in fact, I spent a good chunk of time up at the lake doing nothing but typing.

Again, I think this probably has something to do with the self-publishing vs. using a publisher. No one’s setting deadlines for me but me. So I’m trying to figure out how to lay down the law — with myself.

I’ve been pretty good with the testing. Every day that I haven’t been at work, I’ve been working on recipes. I’ve put all of my recipes into a spreadsheet so I can see what I have and what I still need. It’s looking good and the end is in sight. I’ve made arrangements to take the rest of the week off from the family business. I’ll spend the next few days working on recipes and there won’t be much left on my recipe to-do list.

I’d like to take a couple of weeks cooking/baking the recipes that I wrote a few years ago. I haven’t made some of them in 2+ years and I’d like to include weights — something I didn’t do then. Then it’s on to typing.

I’ve tried to keep up with the typing. Typing as many recipes as possible between customers at the store. But I still have a stack of 20+ recipes that need to be typed, plus whatever I get done in the next couple of weeks. Then on to editing and writing the bits that go before and between the recipes.

There are so many things that I have to think about this time that I didn’t give a thought to with the last book. I’ve started researching printers and shipping, layouts and photos — but I can’t devote a lot of time to these other areas until the recipes are done.

The good news is that I’m still on track and should be able to have the book done for Passover 2010, but there’s a lot to do.

It’s all about the recipes.

4 Aug

For me, the best part about working on a cookbook is the recipe development and testing.  Well, that’s usually true.  Sometimes the testing can be less than fun — when I’m trying something for the 6th time and it’s still not right.  At that point I’m no longer enjoying myself.

The part I’m not as fond of is typing up the recipes.  I procrastinate and can’t do a long stretch without checking the eG forums and then Twitter and Facebook multiple times. When I wrote the last book I didn’t have these distractions — in fact, I spent a good chunk of time up at the lake doing nothing but typing.

Again, I think this probably has something to do with the self-publishing vs. using a publisher. No one’s setting deadlines for me but me.  So I’m trying to figure out how to lay down the law — with myself.

I’ve been pretty good with the testing.  Every day that I haven’t been at work, I’ve been working on recipes.  I’ve put all of my recipes into a spreadsheet so I can see what I have and what I still need.  It’s looking good and the end is in sight.   I’ve made arrangements to take the rest of the week off from the family business. I’ll spend the next few days working on recipes and there won’t be much left on my recipe to-do list.

I’d like to take a couple of weeks cooking/baking the recipes that I wrote a few years ago.  I haven’t made some of them in 2+ years and I’d like to include weights — something I didn’t do then.  Then it’s on to typing.

I’ve tried to keep up with the typing.  Typing as many recipes as possible between customers at the store.  But I still have a stack of 20+ recipes that need to be typed, plus whatever I get done in the next couple of weeks. Then on to editing and writing the bits that go before and between the recipes.

There are so many things that I have to think about this time that I didn’t give a thought to with the last book.  I’ve started researching printers and shipping, layouts and photos — but I can’t devote a lot of time to these other areas until the recipes are done.

The good news is that I’m still on track  and should be able to have the book done  for Passover 2010, but there’s a lot to do.

Self-Publishing

29 Jul

For a variety of reasons I’m trying the self-publishing route with this book. There are a lot of pros and cons either way, but after giving it a lot of thought (read: sleepless nights), I decided that the potential pros outweighed the cons.

Doing this myself means that things are a lot different. First of all, I don’t have a publisher (two actually) giving me deadlines or telling me how they think the book should look. I get to decide if the book will have metric or Imperial measurments, if I spell things like a Canadian or American (lots of u’s being used), how many pictures will be included, etc.

It also means that I have to set my own deadlines and enforce them. This is much harder. If all goes well, the book will be completed in time to have it printed and available before Passover. If all doesn’t go well, I’ll have to rethink the plan.

Add the editing, photographing, printing, marketing, distributing, listings and anything else that I’ve forgotten to my list of responsibilities and doing it myself is a lot more work. Thankfully I have friends and family who are ready to pitch in.

The next few months should be interesting; learning as I go. It’s also exciting and nerve-racking. All sorts of questions keep coming up and I’m trying to find the answers.

Self-Publishing

29 Jul

For a variety of reasons I’m trying the self-publishing route with this book.  There are a lot of pros and cons either way, but after giving it a lot of thought (read: sleepless nights), I decided that the potential pros outweighed the cons.

Doing this myself means that things are a lot different.  First of all, I don’t have a publisher (two actually) giving me deadlines or telling me how they think the book should look. I get to decide if the book will have metric or Imperial measurments, if I spell things like a Canadian or American (lots of u’s being used), how many pictures will be included, etc.

It also means that I have to set my own deadlines and enforce them. This is much harder. If all goes well, the book will be completed in time to have it printed and available before Passover. If all  doesn’t go well, I’ll have to rethink the plan.

Add the editing, photographing, printing, marketing, distributing, listings and anything else that I’ve forgotten to my list of responsibilities and doing it myself is a lot more work. Thankfully I have friends and family who are ready to pitch in.

The next few months should be interesting; learning as I go.  It’s also exciting and nerve-racking. All sorts of questions keep coming up and I’m trying to find the answers.

New Book Coming

6 Jul

Wow. I can’t believe I posted in September of 2007 that I was working on a new book and it’s now July 2009 and there’s been no book.

Not long after posting, I got an interesting freelance job, working on dinners that were held across Canada. Add to that, the regular job gets busier and busier, I neglected the new book for quite a while.

But since Passover of this year, I’ve picked up the book work with a vengeance. When I was writing food columns, the ones that always got the largest response were the Passover recipes. Readers and customers always wanted new ideas for Passover. Newer cooks often asked how to make traditional recipes. So that’s what I’m doing for the next book. Passover. A great selection of traditional recipes with a lot of modern recipes thrown in.

It will be a push to get it ready and out in time for Passover 2010, but I’m going to do my best to get it done.

I’ll be sure to update this when I have a better idea of when it might be available.

Hope you’re having a wonderful summer,

Pam

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