I have the great privilege to appear at the Emerging Authors Pavilion tomorrow (Sunday) from 3:20 – 3:30 p.m. My great thanks to Philip Rafshoon and Cindy Ellsbury for the opportunity! Why should you come to DBF during my appearance? I’m glad you asked!
1. The event is awesome. DBF is the largest independent book festival in the country, and one of the five-largest overall. I’ve attended in past years and it’s tremendously rewarding and funâeven if you’re not a book nerd. (more)
2. Free swag. I’m offering either a free t-shirt or baseball cap to the first 10 folks who buy a signed copy of “Pizza for Good” in print. For more on what these look like, go to my Etsy store. Just after my presentation, I’ll be signing books at the signing table.
3. Learn about “Chowfunding.” In the brief time I have on stage, I’ll retell the moment when I explainedâon a tennis court no lessâhow “Pizza for Good” is a new combo-model of fundraising and chowing down. Hence, “Chowfunding.” I wrote a whole post about it here.
4. Mingle with great peeps. The atmosphere at DBF is friendly, vibrant and inviting. You’ll make new friends and have the opportunity to see some very cool up-and-coming folks, as well as some established authors and writers.
5. Digital bonus. Buyers of the print edition also will get a 75% coupon on the PFG digital edition, which has embedded video, additional professional photography (by me and Lorikay Stone). I’ll include a card with the coupon right there on-site. Here’s a video with bloopers in the making of the embedded video:
6. Hugs. You get a BONUS sixth reason to come see me: hugs. I’m darn good at them, and I want to thank everyone for supporting me through this crazy ride of first-time authorship. Come and get ’em!
(Cartoon courtesy of Buzzhunt)
Click over to my profile on the DBF website, or have a look at the Explore tab on this site. Both will give you great background as we go in to the fall seasonâwhich will be chock full of PFG events and news. Hope to see you tomorrow!
I joined a terrific networking site called Stage32.com, which is specifically for film and TV creative types. And I picked up this gem today from Twitter that I wanted to share:
Life shrinks or expands in proportion to oneâs courage. â Anais Nin
Chef Bradley in the kitchen at Lure (photo credit: Will Pollock for Stone Four Media)
The very talented executive chef of Lureâpart of Fifth Group restaurantsâis leaving the restaurant to join Atlanta Neighborhood Charter School as chef and nutrition director. Bradley was quoted within the pages of Pizza for Good, making common-sense suggestions on how to eat fresh and plan ahead when cooking at home. Here’s the passage from the book:
For your Pizza for Good party, try to think of it this way: choose local where it counts, and fill in with readymade items that can make your life a lot easier. There are ways to create an authentic experience pizza experience without killing yourself over the minutiae (see also Chapter XX).
David Bradley, executive chef of Lure in Midtown Atlantaâpart of Fifth Group restaurantsâurges Pizza for Good readers to build relationships with local purveyors, whether at a green market or another local establishment, to buy local, then fill in where you have to with easy-to-buy stuff.
âNot every single thing on a plate or in a dish has to be 100 percent local for me,â he says. âI’d much rather use a canned tomato than a fresh one, probably nine months out of the year. If I’m going to make sauce I’ll make it with canned tomatoes and then try to buy locally made mozzarella. Or buy some really nice milk and make my own ricotta or something like that.
âYou can still have that element and a handmade feel to it, but again it goes back to quality,â he adds. âThe ambitious and proper thing would be to make it at home. But that’s probably not most people’s reality.â
And it might not be yoursâyou can decide that as you go. The main thing to remember is that this is an ambitious project that will suck quite a bit of your time. A labor of love, to be sure, but you can save some energy here and there and still endeavor to search or locally sourced ingredients.
“How would you like to be a better parent? Or a better citizen?” Rocco DiSpirito asks pointedly in an appearance on CBS Sunday Morning. It was a compelling segment on the myriad reasons to cook fresh and at home, and since Pizza for Good, at its core, is about making America’s favorite food at home, his thoughts resonated greatly.
“That take-out pizza you order every night? It’s costing us some real dough.” Amen, we sayâamen! Whether you buy PFG for the recipes or to host your own party for charity, consider making your next meal out of locally sourced ingredients at home. The impact is less on your world, and greater on your family. đ