I am publishing a cooking book under a Creative Commons license. All of April and most of May I’ll be on the road, cooking and promoting the book in independent book stores and cooking supply stores around the country.

A little more than a year [...]]]>

I am publishing a cooking book under a Creative Commons license. All of April and most of May I’ll be on the road, cooking and promoting the book in independent book stores and cooking supply stores around the country.

A little more than a year ago I started writing longer posts on this site and spent considerable time on websites such as eGullet and Quora writing and answering questions about food. Soon people started telling me that I should write a cook book. There’s only one snag – I don’t like cook books. Food and cooking are too cool to be reduced to recipes.

But the idea kind of stuck and I started dabbling with the idea of writing a book about cooking I would want to buy and read. Or give people as gifts. Heck, I thought, if I strike it rich one day I might become a culinary Gideon and leave them in drawers in hotels. And then I woke up and realized that not only was I a rotten writer, I also didn’t know jack crap about marketing a book or selling it to a publisher.

Yet, I started writing. Every chapter, I decided, would start with a story from the back of the house of one of the restaurants I had worked in. Something to illustrate a point. Or a contemplation on the history of the grilled cheese sandwich. Maybe a survey of tools and their maintenance. A funny story about fish. Or that one time we had to make 700 merengue pies in one afternoon. Following the story was a chapter on techniques and cooking. Not a cook book, a book about cooking was what I wanted. And then, to round it up, some recipes and tricks.

I sent the first chapter, on stocks, soups, and sauces, to a few friends. They seemed to like it. And I received corrections, additions, and stories in return. Their stories? In my book? “Why not,” I thought. And then it struck me.

Instead of writing a book, running to find a publisher, compromising on quality and content, I would write a Creative Commons licensed work. Want a cook book? Take out the stories and reduce the techniques. Want a story book? Take out the recipes. Want to turn it into a vegan or raw food cooking book? Just replace the recipes. With a Creative Commons license everyone would be able to remix, rewrite, add, and subtract. And make it better.

There’s only one issue with such an idea. It’s never been done before in the cooking book sector. Since recipes themselves can not be copyrighted, cooking book authors and publishers guard jealously everything else. Presentation, methodologies, pictures, words. And trying to sell the idea of all this being “open” to a publisher is, frankly, about as futile as trying to sell ice cream in December.

So I had to print it myself. And do all the other things good books do. Go on a book tour. Market. Call independent book stores and whomever else would be willing to carry the printed version of a book that is available for download online.

That’s when the book tour morphed into something bigger. While I was out, I thought, driving the country and reading from the book, I might as well stop and cook. Call old friends and make new ones to cook underground dinners in the cities I passed. Visit farms and ranches and write about the food that we eat, every day, from the source to the plate. Peek around the urban farms in San Diego and LA and Salt Lake City, the community agricultures in Colorado and the rehabilitation projects for former inner-city wastelands in the Midwest.

Come April I’ll be going on the trip of a lifetime. And I’d love to meet you along the way, chat, maybe have coffee or cook with you when I am passing through. I want to meet that chef or cook you admire, read from the book at your favorite cooking book store, and explain to as many people as possible why they should download and remix The Book in June. And together, you, me, and everyone else, we might be able to write the cook book of a century. You in?

What you see here is the first incarnation [...]]]> Will you look at that map. What kind of mentally unstable individual would willingly subject themselves to 16,000 miles of open American road without being paid millions in return? Me, of course.

What you see here is the first incarnation (7,000 miles) of my planned spring food tour. Sometime around the first I will be jumping into my trusty 2009 Cooper Convertible, roll down the roof, turn on the Ramones on my radio, and drive.

It all started in 2010 when we (a few friends and myself) finally applied for and were awarded the hilariously funny WTF brand. For those who haven’t been to a ranch, cattlemen “brand” their steers and cows with a simple logo to make sure the animal is returned when lost and not stolen. Like a microchip only, you know, 1740s tech. As the proud owners of the Wild Thorns Farm we hoped against hope to find the one Texas official who didn’t blink over the acronym – and we found him.

That year we started a small run of BBQ competition presences as “WTFBBQ” because the name was just too cool to pass up. We lost every single one of them but we had more fun than anyone else and definitely were the most fun to be around, too.

We decided to make 2012 our “big” year and compete everywhere. Then two got married (to each other), one opened a successful restaurant in DeSoto, IL, and another one started dating and isn’t allowed to travel. But, hey, let the wimps stay at home, Jonas is going on that trip come hell or high gas prices.

The map above is in flux. You might notice a slight left coast slant which isn’t intentional, just the result of knowing more people on that side of the world. My trip will, hopefully, be much more even centered.

Along the road I hope to be cooking a lot. And that’s where you come in :)

Have a couch or bath tub I can crash in? Even though I plan to be frugal on my trip, $1400 in gas alone is nothing to sneeze at and if there’s a couch I can rest my weary head I’d prefer it over a night at Motel 6, even if they leave the light on for me.

I’ll do cooking demos and small dinners for scraps wherever I am. My price for a cooking demo is low – the equivalent of a night in a hotel and breakfast. That’s the cheapest you’ll ever get this kind of spectacle.

I am hoping to host a dinner in every city I stop. Many places such as LA, SF, Seattle, Salt Lake City, and Vegas already have one planned but more is always in the cards. Dinners are either hosted by someone (in which case you get to decide who comes) or organized by friends (in case you want an invite). I’ll stop anywhere and drive anywhere we can get 12 people to break bread at. The cost of a dinner? Ingredients, nothing else.

I am doing this as a fun tour and to promote the print version of my Creative Commons licensed book on cooking. If you know a cooking book store in your town I’d be forever grateful if you could get me in contact with people there, either by sending me their contact info or making an intro. I’ll stop anywhere they’ll let me do a book reading.

Just holler and we can have coffee as I pass through.

I admit it’s a crazy idea and half cocked at that. The notion of traveling the States, seeing things, and meeting people has been there for a while, even before WTFBBQ, but never came to fruition. Now with everything else in place and some money in the bank I can finally do it. And do it I will.

Send me a message or join the American Food Nomad group (https://groups.google.com/forum/…) if you’re interested and we’ll chat more on Skype or Google Hangouts or in email. 110 days until trip-off, I can hardly wait.