Cookbook Giveaway - Winner!

I've decided that what I love best about doing a giveaway, besides actually giving cool stuff away (duh) is reading your stories. Those tidbits of your lives that you share with me in the comments is like gold.

If you just leave a comment and run (thank you, for commenting!), that's fine. But if you have a moment, please go back and read the beautiful little slices of life that are shared in the comment section.

I love your reminiscences of sitting with your moms or grandmothers in the kitchen. I love your favorite cookbook memories: from bridal shower gifts (BFF) to mom's handwritten recipes (Wow, Angela G. - I seriously got teary eyed).

I am thinking I may have to start a feature here at MBFCF for you to share your stories. *puts on Thinking Cap*

I entered the number of comments in the True Random Number Generator at Random.org (allowing for those of you who commented twice or replied to someone in the comment section - you know who you are, but that's not important right now).

Congratulations to today's winner of the RED Betty Crocker Cookbook and Red logo Serving Spoon. 

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Maria Soto Robbins said...

Hey Marta...great giveaway, again!

Actually no one taught me to cook. :(

My mom was always too busy painting and my dad would do most of the cooking and so, I've taught myself how to do that (too!:). My go-to book is the Better Homes & Garden Cookbook from the 1990's which is falling apart! So I could really use this new one! Thanks

{{{Hugs}}}

Maria 

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Red BC cookbook 

Congratulations, Maria! You're going to love this cookbook!

Please shoot me an email with your snail mail address and HEY, MARTA! I WON STUFF ON YOUR BLOG! in the subject line and I will get your beautiful cookbook right out to you.

Thank you all again for your participation. If you didn't win today, please come back next week when I'll have some more really fun giveaways. 

And thank you for trusting me with your stories.

Besos! and Happy Friday!

Chipper Chicken Recipe and a Giveaway

My mom taught us girls how to cook when we were very young.

During the summers, when my sisters and I were out of school, she devised a rotating system of teaching us Homemaking, the Cuban Way.

My older sisters were already married and gone, but the three of us younger ones, Miriam, Alina and myself still needed to be groomed to be Perfect Cuban Wives (or PCW).

I think our education began with the Making of the Perfect Cup of Cuban Espresso. From there we ventured on to Table Setting and Party Planning, with a minor in Clearing and Dishwashing. (<--I was never any good at this one, and I still haven't quite gotten the hang of it, but that's not important right now.)

The Meal Planning portion of our PCW Education consisted of pulling out all of the cookbooks in the house, finding two recipes that sounded good to us, making a list of ingredients, checking the cupboards for what we already had, and then adding what we needed to the weekly grocery shopping list.

Can you believe I still plan my weekly meals this way? (The whole Clearing and Dishwashing thing is still problematic for me, but again, that's not important right now.)

I always like trying new recipes and I love cookbooks. But every now and then, I remember that we girls made some pretty delicious meals during our Summers of Cuban Home Ec. And I still have a few of my mom's original cookbooks from back in the day. 

Exhibit A:

BC cookbook 

The publishing date on this beauty is 1962. Based on my love of All Things Betty these days, I decided to pull it out and see if one of our favorite recipes still held up. (I love old, grease-stained cookbooks. They make me happy somehow.)

Recipe 

It was called Chipper Chicken. It was a lot like the Oven-Fried Chicken (notice that they still used shortening unapologetically - I love that!) but it was made with crushed potato chips. (<--Brilliant!)

I made it a few times when my older kids were little and it was always a hit, so I thought I'd give it a shot in 2010, with a few personal revisions.

Chipper Chicken Recipe

  • 2-3 lbs. chicken pieces
  • 1 medium bag potato chips
  • 1/4 cup butter (<--YES!!)
  • 1 Tbsp. Garlic powder
  • Coarse ground pepper

1. Heat the oven to 350 degrees.

2. Crush potato chips finely.  (I put them into a ziplock and just crush with my hands.)

Crushed chips

3. Melt butter in frying pan and add the garlic powder. (The garlic salt that it originally called for made the thing too crazy-salty.)

Melt the butter
4. Pass the chicken pieces through the seasoned butter, then in the crushed chips.

5. Place chicken in oblong baking pan.

6. Bake for just over an hour or until potato chips are golden and juices run clear.

Ta-da! The Chipper Chicken is just as delicious as I remembered. (Umm....yeah....butter and potato chips. Hello?!!)

Chipper chicken 

I have a few more Betty Crocker cookbooks that I've collected through the years. (I think it's those eye-catchingly RED covers that get me every time.)

So, today, I'll be giving away one of Betty Crocker's newest (and elaborately detailed) cookbooks along with a beautiful RED logo serving spoon: (I confess that I loved this book so much that I was tempted to keep it, but happily for you, I'm a giver. *sigh*)

Red BC cookbook 

To be entered in the drawing for the cookbook & spoon, just answer one or all of the following questions in the comment section of this post:

  • Who taught you to cook?
  • Do you have a favorite "go to" cookbook or recipe?

I'll choose a winner on Friday, September 10th at 11:00 AM Pacific Time.

[Disclosure: General Mills provided this cool stuff because I asked to do these giveaways. They've asked nothing in return. It is my pleasure to write about this stuff because I genuinely want to. Thanks, General Mills, for your generosity!

*And a reminder, if you haven't already voted, please vote for My Big, Fat, Cuban Family for Best Personal and Family Blog in the Just Spotted 2010 Orange County Blog Awards. Here's the link. Please vote before Sunday, September 12th at 11:59 pm, because after that, the “polls” will be closed* Thank you!

Que Rica Vida Goodies Winner

Thanks to all of you lovely commentors commentators folks who left a comment for the Que Rica Vida goodies. I truly like knowing what General Mills products you use. (I'm genuinely curious about these kinds of things...or maybe stalkery? But that's not important right now. =D)

As usual, I entered the names into a list on Random.org and it gave me a winner.

So, congratulations to:

jackie said... Cheerios! I have a toddler! :)

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Jackie, please send me an email with the headline: HEY, MARTA! I WON STUFF ON YOUR BLOG. (So I don't accidentally delete it.) Include your snail mail address so I can get the package of cool Que Rica Vida stuff out to you ASAP.

Querica stuff
By the way, I totally get the whole toddler-love-affair-with-Cheerios-thing. With four kids, I made sure I had Cheerios with me at all times. Seriously, I was always armed and ready with my Cheerios ziplock. ;-)

In fact, someone I know was all uber-excited to have won this Cheerios tshirt, because she had such happy childhood Cheerios memories. In fact, we had to very purposefully hunt down the Cheerios Bee for this photo op...

Amy&thebee

As a mom, I seriously loved this moment. (I know. Shut up.)

Que rica vida, right? ;-)

3 Things

Wow!

Okay, three things...

  • I am amazed and grateful and a little overwhelmed at the generous outpouring of kindness and good wishes from all of you.
  • I am sad that I can't give something away to every single person.
  • I am excited to send stuff to three of you. =)

I made a list of all your names in order of comment and plugged that into Random.org List Randomizer. I hit the "randomize" button three times to give me three winners. (Yes, I suppose I could have just taken the first three names, but then I would have missed out on all the excitement of randomizing. In fact, I'm kind of a dork when I do these drawings. It's like a little ritual. I type all the names in and I wish you all good luck, and I press the button and then announce, "We have our first winner!" And....umm...so maybe that was all kind of an overshare?)  ;-)

Congratulations to the winners and thanks to all of you for playing with me. You're the reason I love doing this so much.

Drum roll please.....

1) This beautiful MBFCF mug goes to (this totally cracked me up, but that's not important right now):

6a00d8341c89e653ef0120a5af508b970b

Amy Arnaz said...
I hope I win the mug!

xoxo Amy Arnaz

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2) The MBFCF BBQ Apron goes to:

6a00d8341c89e653ef0120a60628ac970c-320wi

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3) The MBFCF Cookbook goes to:

6a00d8341c89e653ef0120a6062ac1970c-320wi

Elizabeth said...

look at how you're loved! You are amazing! That's not a real cover? Shut up!

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To the winners: Shoot me an email that says HEY MARTA! I WON STUFF ON YOUR BLOG! in the subject line (so I don't accidentally delete you) along with your snail mail address so I can get your goodies out to you. And again, congratulations! I hope you enjoy your gifts!

Love you all.

Thank you for making all the hours I spend here worthwhile.

Besos,
Marta