Chicken Spaghetti.  My mom made it when we were growing up and it was always so delicious and comforting. I wanted to try Ree’s version.

I have two pictures of it…

….one, the broken spaghetti noodles,

….two, the unbaked dish.

There are no more pictures because we DEVOURED it immediately.  My son actually got up out of his chair and bowed to me.  BOWED!!!

Next, we moved onto the chocolate sheet cake.  Around these parts, cakes like this are called “Texas Sheet Cake,”  and it took me several times of reading the recipe before I realized Ree did not use the word Texas in the title.

Just to be fancy, I toasted the pecans for the icing before baking the cake.

For this recipe, you make the frosting while the cake is baking and pour it on the hot cake.  One word of advice, wait until the cake has been in the oven about 5 minutes or so BEFORE starting the icing….or you may end up like me.  Like me as in, grabbing every clean spoon in the house and “testing” the icing straight out of the pan.  I’m actually surprised we had any icing left for the actual cake.

No surprise, Ree knows her stuff.  My husband who “doesn’t like cake” ate two pieces of this per day for several days.  We also took a platter of it to a junior high event where it was loved by students, teachers and parents alike.

Now that we’ve happily gained 10 pounds, the book is moving on…to Teresa of Blooming on Bainbridge.  You’ve not lived until you’ve spent a day with Teresa on Bainbridge Island.  I can’t wait to see Teresa work her magic on the Traveling Cookbook!

Bridget has been decorating cookies for over a decade and eating them for as long as she can remember.  A self-taught decorator, she shares her secrets and tutorials on the blog, Bake at 350.  Her first book is due out in the fall of 2012.

Today’s post comes from Wendy at Wenderly’s. She is the third stop for The Traveling Cookbook. It’s last stop was at Add a Pinch and also She Wears Many Hats. Follow it’s journey HERE. 

From the moment I had received the beautiful package from my sweet friend Robyn that contained The Traveling Cookbook I knew just what I wanted to make. Breakfast on the weekends has always been a special family time at our house. One can always wake up to smell the warm earthy aroma of coffee brewing and hear the heavy cast iron griddle banging on top of the stove for pancakes. This past weekend was particularly special since it happened to New New Year’s! What a better way to kick off the New Year than to make a couple of Ree’s hearty and delicious breakfast recipes, right?

We started with Edna Mae’s Sour Cream Pancakes. I had so much fun decorating the recipe.

Let me just tell you that these little gems will make your heart flutter.

They are light & fluffy and…

so quick and easy to make.

Mouthwatering little slices of heaven I tell you.

As if the pancakes weren’t enough we also indulged in the Basic Breakfast Potatoes. OH MY! Golden cubes of hearty potatoes sautéed with onions and topped off with a smattering of paprika.

It was sublime. The perfect way to begin the day not to mention the New Year. You can bet that these pancakes and potatoes will become a staple at our breakfast table!

So guess what? The fun and delicious adventure continues as The Traveling Cookbook is on its way to the so sweet and super talented Bridget, from Bake at 350! Bridget is a baking queen! You’ve never seen cookies so adorable in your life and she is as darling as her confections. I just can’t wait to see all the deliciousness that she’ll create.

I was so honored to be a part of this special project! I can’t wait to watch the exciting journey that The Traveling Cookbook will take as it graces the doorsteps and kitchens of many!

Hi there! I’m Wenderly! I’ve got an overly zealous passion for entertaining, decorating, cooking and basically anything creative! I have an Art History degree but never made it to Soho so instead, I’m “Perfecting the Art of living in Suburbia”. I’ve turned my own life into a constant parade of home makeover projects, daily cooking & baking endeavors (I’ve even been known to pretend that I have my own cooking show while making dinner a time or two) and I’m endlessly vignetting throughout my home, whether it be for a seasonal decoration, a holiday or friends and family for dinner.

Today’s post comes from Robyn at Add A Pinch – She is our most recent The Traveling Cookbook blogger.  To follow the journey, visit HERE.

My friend Amy invited me to participate in a fun The Traveling Cookbook project and I couldn’t wait to hear more about it. In a few days, she sent The Pioneer Woman’s Cookbook to me all wrapped up in a handmade bag with ribbons and bows. I have to admit I was a bit awe struck just in the unwrapping of the book and seeing the cute and special inscriptions from Amy, as well as from Chris Ann and Kristin from The LoveFeast Table.

Now I have to tell ya, I knew just the recipes to make from Ree’s cookbook. A while back I’d tried her BBQ Jalapeno Poppers and just sat back and watched them disappear. Everyone loved them and kept asking me about them after they were all gone.

So, I knew when I made them again to just go ahead and triple the recipe for our get-together just like Ree tells you to do in her helpful hints.

Boy, was that a great decision!

I also knew that I would make Ree’s Olive Cheese Bread. Her bread recipe is great for making ahead in large quantities, wrapping tightly, and keeping in the freezer until you are ready to pop it in the oven to serve. I knew with Christmas and New Year’s fast approaching, having olive cheese bread prepped in the freezer would be a good thing.

A very good thing indeed!

So now the fun continues as The Traveling Cookbook is headed to the home of the very talented Wendy, from Wenderly. With her artistic and mad cooking skills, I just know she’ll have something remarkable to share!

I’m excited to watch the journey The Traveling Cookbook takes and know that the home it finally resides in will have a one of a kind cookbook indeed!

Robyn is a seventh generation Southern Mom who loves to share simple, fresh, and delicious family recipes. Robyn shares her Cooking, Living, Homeschooling and Travel experiences at Add a Pinch.

When Chris Ann and Kristin contacted me about The Traveling Cookbook coming my way, I couldn’t wait to participate in such a fun project. The Pioneer Woman’s Cookbook showed up at my door, in a handmade bag, with trimmings and such. The LoveFeast Table ladies sure do know how to add that special touch. So cute.

Trying to decide what to cook first wasn’t the easiest thing to do. Ree’s cookbook is chock full of tempting things. I finally chose the Hot Artichoke Dip, and Ree’s famous Cinnamon Rolls. It was the first time I tried that Hot Artichoke Dip recipe, and it certainly turned out yummy. I served it for a get-together with some of my friends. The Cinnamon Rolls were a no-brainer. I picked them because not only were they the first recipe I made from Ree’s cookbook, but they were the first cinnamon rolls I had ever made from scratch. I remember that day well.

My kitchen was a disaster, but the cinnamon rolls weren’t.

I made other batches to freeze for friends for holiday gifts. It’s so nice to share homemade goodies. I sure know I like to receive them!

I’m not all that good at scrapbooking, but I can doodle. So I got to doodling on those recipes pages, then added a few comments and notes. Doodling is fun y’all.

Speaking of homes, The Traveling Cookbook is headed just down the road to the home of Robyn, from Add a Pinch. She can cook up a storm, so I’m looking forward to seeing what she whips up.

I can’t wait to see how the book turns out, and where it finds a home in the end. Be sure to keep following The Traveling Cookbook, who knows where it will be headed next?

 We want to thank Amy for sharing in The Traveling Cookbook journey.  Visit Amy at her table, She Wears Many Hats.

When we first came up with the concept of The Traveling Cookbook – Kristin and I were only looking for an interesting way to build a conversation.  We were looking for a way of engaging with our readers and other bloggers in a way that shared experiences, friendship and stories.   We know that coming together at the table is often where a good conversation takes place.

We chose to start with Ree Drummond’s The Pioneer Woman Cooks – for a few reasons.  First of all both of us had met her in real life.  A real life connection is important to us.  If we were going to use anyone’s cookbook, well, why not someone we’ve met?  The popularity of Ree’s cookbook is helpful, because it is a cookbook that many all ready know about and are interested in.  As we thought through the plan for the cookbook’s journey we realized that in the end, this cookbook would be scrap-booked into it’s own unique work of art – holding treasured tales, recipe hints and changes and memories from all sorts of table.  This would be a treasure too wonderful to keep for ourselves.  It was then we decided to turn The Traveling Cookbook into something more.  It would be an opportunity to raise money for a charity we knew of called, Feed My Starving Children by auctioning off the re-created cookbook.

After contacting Feed My Starving Children in search of a donation link, a conversation started.  That conversation became an invitation to do a little more.  We decided to take on the challenge to raise $24,000 for a Feed My Starving Children MobilePack^TM unit.  This MobilePack^TM unit brings everything needed to create a volunteer packing event anywhere in the US.  (Ey yi yi!  We pinched ourselves – – were we crazy?  Where will we find the money, the site, the 500 volunteers needed to pack this semi truck?  And, where will we find a FORKLIFT??)  Well ~ these questions didn’t deter us!  We decided the adventure was definitely worth the cause.  As mother’s of 9 children total, how could we not!  So, to begin with I took a field trip to a Feed My Starving Children packing site learn more.

Feed My Starving Children sends food to starving children all over the world.  They reach to the poorest and most dangerous parts of our world to get food to those that need it most, starving children.  Each one of these Manna Packs contains 6 cups of specially formulated rice.  Just 1 cup of this rice can sustain a child for a day and is created to be easily digested by a starving malnourished child.

The rice contains dehydrated vegetables, soy protein and flavors that were formulated by scientists from General Mills and Cargil especially for Feed My Starving Children.  The food is vegetarian and contains rice which is a universal staple.

I had a sample and was surprised to find it tasty.

It would be tastier than a dirt biscuit that many mothers make to satisfy their hungry childrens’ bellies.

Getting these MannaPacks out to children can make a difference.

It’s hard to look at such a sweet baby in such dire condition.  But, look at the results after receiving healthy meals from Feed My Starving Children.

Here’s a view of the shipping board in the Feed My Starving Children warehouse that I visited.  The MannaPacks are going to Kenya, Haiti, Somalia, Nicaragua and other places of need.

All the meals are packed by volunteers at warehouse sites or via a MobilePack unit like the one being sponsored by us here at LoveFeast Table.

The meals created by volunteers will then be shipped to the parts of the world that need it most.

We definitely took on a challenge bigger than ourselves or the size of this blog when we agreed to set our goal on  $24,000 for a LoveFeast MobilePack^TM unit.  We are hoping that you, our readers and friends will help us in getting the word out.  We would like to invite you to email your friends, share a badge on your blog or spread the word in any way you can think of to help us reach our goal.  It’s going to take a whole bunch of us to come together at the table to make this a possibility.

What an amazing journey for us all to be on – let’s see if we can do it!!  A big goal like this is a little scary but a little thrilling too, right?  We hope you join us on this exciting journey to see if we can provide this LoveFeast MobilePack^TM to make a difference in our world!

Following The Traveling Cookbook journey – here!

Grab a badge – here!

Donate to the LoveFeast Table MobilePack – here!

Today is the day.  We are sending The Traveling Cookbook on it’s way.

We’ve wrapped it up, added ribbon and bow…

tied on a message, not knowing where it will go.

There’s some added direction to help navigate the way,

not knowing where it will travel from day to day.

So, we say goodbye with a little pat-pat

and send The Traveling Cookbook on it’s way to She Wears Many Hats.

To follow the journey of The Traveling Cookbook, stop HERE.

To grab a badge and join in on the fun, visit HERE.

To help us raise $24,000 for Feed My Starving Children, grab a badge HERE.

On August 23, we shared with you a project we were kicking off…The Traveling Cookbook.  Over a year ago, we came up with this idea and it has been marinating and developing until we were just about bursting at the seams to share with you what The Traveling Cookbook is all about.  Here’s the gist, a blogger receives the cookbook, The Pioneer Woman Cooks, and chooses 2-3 recipes to make.

He/she makes the recipe and then “scrapbooks” on those recipe pages, sharing tid-bits about how the recipe turned out, or who they shared the recipe with.  They can include a sketch, a poem, added ingredients, a clipping, etc…to make the page their own.

Then they wrap the book back up and send it on it’s way to a blogger of their choosing.  We don’t have a plan or a clue as to whose table The Traveling Cookbook will visit.  It’s serendipitous.  But, once the cookbook is full, it will come back to us. We will then auction it off to raise money for Feed My Starving Children.  You can read all about the launch of The Traveling Cookbook HERE  and keep up with it’s journey under the LIFE category – The Traveling Cookbook,  HERE.

The book starts it’s journey in Baltimore, at my (Kristin’s) table.  I had so much fun deciding which recipes to make…it was hard really.  I finally landed on the Mocha Brownie recipe…’cause I have a thing for coffee.  My husband and I once owned a coffee shop for the sheer fact we would be able to support our caffeine habit.

The other recipe I chose, was Marlboro Man’s Favorite Sandwich.

I have a house full of boys…18, 17, 14, 12, 4 and my husband…plus 1 very athletic, gymnast daughter.  Meat sandwiches always bring a smile to their faces…not to mention, every plate, and pan it’s cooked on, is licked clean.

But, when I started making this recipe, I had no idea it would give me such a story to share with you.

I started by trying to find cubed steak.  I’ve prepared a lot of types of meat, but I must confess, I’d never made any recipe calling for cubed steak.  I’m a city girl.  I thought it was just me, but I had a hard time finding it in my grocery stores.  And once I did, it was pricey.  So, I made this recipe with a mixture of cubed steak and pounded out, “extra tenderized”, skirt steak (’cause I already had some on hand.)  I also bought something new for my pantry, Lawry’s seasoning.

Now, Ree loves her butter.  So, to honor her, I bought the best butter I could get my hands on, kerrygold Pure Irish Butter.  If you’ve never cooked with, smeared your bread with, or even stuck your finger in this butter…you should.  It’s amazing.

And what it did to the caramelized onions was beyond heavenly.

I could’ve stopped right here and just eaten that whole pan of onions. Oh my!  But, I didn’t. I pressed on.  I think at this point my Urban Man stepped into help.  Now, my husband, Devon, has cooked in 4 star restaurants and was even chef of our cafe…so, recipes tend to take on a little more character when he is around.  He pushed this recipe into a painterly realm.

The grill was fired up.

The fresh basil was picked.

The fruity and delicious Laconiko olive oil  and balsamic vinegar came out, to gently pull the roasted, tossed, veggies together into a yummy side salad.

The meat was browning on the stove and the smell drawing all the boys into the kitchen.

Then the lights went out.

A storm cut out our electricity, for what went on to be a 24 hour period.  But, in true pioneer fashion, we lit a bunch of candles and finished dinner over the gas stove.

The meal was devoured by candlelight.  The sleeping bags came out and the boys set up camp on the front porch.

The Traveling Cookbook, The Pioneer Woman Cooks, brought a bit of the pioneering spirit to our hood, Baltimore.  And now, I’ll be wrapping it up and sending it on it’s way to the next blogger.  I can’t wait to see what story it brings to her* table.

(*Come back in a few days…we’ll let you in on who is next on The Traveling Cookbook’s stop.)

Collaboration thrills us!  There is something about the synergy of bringing a bunch of different people to the table to create and watch what will emerge from coming together.

We want to introduce you to a project we are embarking on called The Traveling Cookbook.  The Traveling Cookbook is a project that will gather stories from many blogger’s tables around recipes and food shared from a featured cookbook.  We chose The Pioneer Woman Cooks (with Ree Drummond’s blessing) as our first book to send on it’s journey.   Kristin is right now, busy working on three recipes in the cookbook.  She is cooking, whisking, serving and sharing up those recipes to her friends and family.  When she is done, she will “scrapbook” in the cookbook  The Pioneer Woman Cooks on the pages of the recipes she prepares.  She will share snippets of the conversation, or photos, sketches or notes.  After she is finished, the cookbook will be carefully wrapped up, slid into a box and mailed to a fellow blogger. (Who will it be?  Well that’s a secret for now!)   That fellow blogger will then repeat the steps and send the book on again.

This adventure will be filled with serendipity.  We will not know where The Traveling Cookbook will go, who will receive it and who will gather around a table and celebrate with it!

While we are not sure where the journey will take this cookbook, we know where it will end up.  When the last blogger is finished, the book will end up back at LoveFeast Table looking a little bit differently than it did when it first went out.  We will have a piece of art and really,  a piece of each person’s heart.  At this point the book, will be auctioned off with all the proceeds going to benefit the LoveFeast Table’s MobilePack^TM Project we are hosting for Feed My Starving Children.

We will be posting more about this project as it unfolds.  There will be a badge you can grab that will be linked to a donation page directly for our project with Feed My Starving Children.  Our goal is to raise $24,000 dollars needed to pay for a Feed My Starving Children MobilePack^TM unit.  This mobile unit, will make 100,000 meals to be given to children who are starving around the world.

We are bubbling with excitement as we launch The Traveling Cookbook Project into the world.  We invite you to follow it’s journey, the bloggers that share their stories and we hope that we can all gather around the “virtual” table and offer up  meals to children in need.  We hope you participate ~ you’ll end up being a part of the story.

Please join us at the table ~