Viewer Discretion Advised by Cindy Roesel

June 1, 2012 by Fifi Flowers 

A little background about Cindy...

CINDY ROESEL is an Emmy Award-Winning anchor, reporter and producer. She has worked on both sides of the camera interviewing politicians and celebrities. She was an intern at CNN in NYC when they first started in 1985 before landing her first reporter position in Tyler, Texas. Cindy then went to KLAS, Las Vegas where she was news producer. She moved on to WGGB, Springfield, MA and then WTNH, New Haven, CT where she won an Emmy. Cindy joined WSVN, Miami in 1991 as a senior producer. She reformatted the local evening news/entertainment show, "7:30" which consistently beat "ET" in the ratings. She returned to the front of the camera in 1995 at WPLG as their Style Reporter. In addition, she has worked for Fox News Channel as a Features Reporter and the All News Channel as Weekend Anchor. She lives in Miami.

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Let's ask Cindy a few questions to learn more about her and her NEW book...

Made from Books

May 24, 2012 by Wikipedia

The Kansas City Library District Garage "Community Bookshelf" The Central Library's parking garage has a distinctive facade on 10th Street, using images of 22 9-meter-high bookspines to create a "community bookshelf." The garage was created by design firm Dimensional Innovations, and local residents got to choose which titles would be represented in the bookshelf. The Wyandotte Street facade includes enlarged historic postcards with images of 10th Street and 9th Street from the early 1900s. The Baltimore Avenue facade next to the Kansas City Club includes giant banners with images of the Great Hall of the Library of Congress' Jefferson Building and a fanciful image of a gathering of famous Kansas Citians in an architectural fantasy by local artist Bob Holloway.

A Teeny Bit of Trouble by Michael Lee West

May 11, 2012  by Fifi Flowers

Time for a TEENY bit of FUN... actually A LOT of FUN reading... here is YOUR chance... YOU can ENTER TO WIN a copy of this book...

In this hilarious follow-up to GONE WITH A HANDSOMER MAN, Charleston pastry chef, Teeny Templeton, witnesses a murder and her sleuthing stirs up game-changing revelations and heaping scoops of trouble.

"It’s not every day that I bake a dozen Red Velvet cakes, learn my boyfriend may have a love child, and I witness a murder." Life is peachy for Charleston pastry chef, Teeny Templeton, until the night she witnesses a murder. That same evening, she discovers that the victim's ten-year-old daughter may be Coop O'Malley's long-lost child. Teeny might be 5' 1 3/4", but she's got a heart as big as the Savannah River. She just can't resist helping Coop with the little girl, but that means returning to Bonaventure, Georgia, a zany “little Savannah,” where the crime log is penned by MFA graduates and restaurants serve "nose-to-tail" cuisine. Once Teeny gets settled at the peach farm, she must outwit a stalker, decode an encrypted diary, and fend off advances of an ex-beau, a handsome plastic surgeon who’s crazy-in-love with her.  Teeny’s life gets maddeningly complicated by a gossip-mongering tarantula breeder, a wise-cracking Southern Belle with early Alzheimer’s, and Coop’s loveable Chihuahua-toting granny. As the body count rises, more lies come to the surface, and Teeny must use her wits to stay alive.

Synopsis via TEENY's SITE... oui oui oui... YOU can get to know Teeny a bit better!!!

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Simply leave a comment with your email if you do not have a website. 

 Deadline to enter is May 18, 2012 @ noon California time... 

Bonne Chance - Good Luck!

If YOU cannot wait to see if you are the winner...

YOU may purchase the book via HERE

CLOSED - WINNER ALERTED

My Book Stack

May 15, 2012  by Suzanne Moore

My formal education and my education at the dinner table was in economics and politics. With that background came a foundation that in order to understand anything you had to fully research the subject of your interest. When I decided I wanted to become more proficient in the kitchen I embarked on years of culinary school in both cooking and pastry and bought and read untold numbers of books and magazines. One closet in my house is dedicated to all the cookbooks and magazines that I have amassed over the years. The books above are my "go to" books. There are books of baking chemistry, technical instructions, theory and recipes.

"The Professional Pastry Chef" by Bo Friburg is an encyclopedia for pastry chefs. The technique instructions are easy to understand for the home baker and the last 180 pages has all the answer to those pesky questions including conversion ratios (metric to US equivalents), proper equipment and definition of terms. "On Food and Cooking" by Harold McGee is a chemistry book for cooking. Chapter 12 is excellent for a description of the properties of 'Sugars, Chocolate and other Confections'. "Cookwise" by Shirley O. Corriher is another book that deals with the chemical properties of food. The chapter on sweets in enlightening - every wonder why your caramel has crystals in it? This chapter will teach you how to avoid the most common problems in using chocolate and sugar in your confections. "Kitchen - the best of the best" by Michael Cranston has a wonderful chapter on 'Afternoon Tea' which gives some simple recipes with great photos of the finished products.

Maida Heatter's books on cakes and cookies are fail proof as are the many Rose Levy Beranbaum's books. Of course there is Martha - Stewart as if there was another one - all of her books are an excellent resource for recipes. There are many cookbooks dedicated to cookies, cupcakes and brownies. In addition to the "textbooks" there are so many magazines, internet sites and blogs that I could spend all my time reading and never make it into the test kitchen. So, while I will continue to research I will also be "testing".

But it all starts with the research.

SMOORESINTHEKITCHEN

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Email us photos and information about YOUR book stack!

Make a Book

May 7, 2012  by James Darrow

These photos do NOT show all of the steps... please visit THIS SITE for step-by-step directions

alsooooo...

Be sure to visit Metamorphosis Monday to see what others are creating!

The Ritz of Paris by Stephen Watts

May 4, 2012 by Fifi Flowers

Recently I saw this bookcover on Pinterest and repinned it immediately  to my Reading is Fashionable section...   then I looked up the book... I thought it was a NEW book... BUT noooooo... it was first published in 1964... (perfect cover with PINK for Beverly and her pink friends, non?)

The elegant hotel on the Place Vendome receives a rather formal bow in this book about it. We are introduced to Cezar Ritz, the man who started it all, and follow him from his Swiss origins through waiterships in Paris- (at Voisin, he ministered to great names), the managership, at 27, of the largest and most luxurious hotel in Switzerland, on to the Savoy in London and to his own enterprises--of which the Ritz in Paris was to be only one star in a cluster of hotels throughout the civilized world. Unfortunately M. Ritz was forced to retire midway in his career at fifty-two; then the story of the Ritz becomes that of other men, including his son Charles, now President, and Mr. Auzello, ""the anchor man"". There is a sprinkling of anecdote here, a toast to some famous characters such as Olivier, the maitre d'hotel who was the original for Antoine in Le Sexe Faible, and for such institutions as the Ritz Bar. But regrettably the stance is official, with much referring to Mme. Ritz' diary, and the result is a portrait too stiff to project any joie de vivre. (synopsis via HERE)

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Can you still purchase this out-of-print book?

Apparently YOU CAN via a few sites... here is a link to Alibris

Fashionable Reading Accessories

May 3, 2012  by Fifi Flowers

PERFECT for YOUR reading table!

You can purchase these dishes HERE and YOU can see what others have of their tables HERE