Filled with great recipes, but the background stories on each one makes everything more entertaining.

controlled-release to bookpatch at Long Beach Bookcrossing meeting

Caught at the Bookcrossing MeetUp at Fendi's Cafe in Long Beach 9/14. Went out and bought cream cheese today so I can try The King's Cheese Cookies, as made by the Sweat Scarves of Elvis fan club. Will let you know how they turn out. Thankyouverymuch, nitelyfe.

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9/23: Baked the cookies today. Flavor is good, but they are crumbly and don't keep their shape well (not unlike the king himself there towards the end). Sent the offspring out to the store for Spam tonight to make Spam in the Hole Rolls.

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9/25: Offspring "forgot" (okay, flat out refused) to buy the Spam, although he got the other ingredients. So went to the store myself today, only to find them sold out of regular Spam. Settle for "Lite" Spam, (yes there is such a thing, although not sure it is really in the true spirit of The Trailer Park Cookbook). At any rate, this dish was easy to make, and although rest of household was initially suspicious when I served it, they ate every bit on the plate.

Well, as much I as I would like to try Tipper Tater Tot Casserole ("every time Al Gore visits, he requests this dish!" claims Ruby Ann), I need to get this book moving on. A controlled release to dancing-dog. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

hee-haw, what will I make? this is hilarious, thanks ;)
Some of the comments & trailer park lot bios are really a hoot!

Have decided to make this a bookray so everyone who wants to can enjoy the humor and down-home cookin'.
Speaking of cooking, I better make something before I send it - off to the kitchen!
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11/10 - Okay, last night I made "Graham Cracker Puddin'".
When it came out of the oven it looked like a piece of cardboard! It's kind of like bread pudding, if you used graham crackers - flavor is not bad - I used pecans for the nuts, so it's rich tasting. Ruby Ann recommends topping it with whipped cream which I didn't get but I think it would be better with it. :)

Was going to also make the "Honky Tonk Husband Bread" but discovered it called for self-rising flour and I just have the regular kind. May try it in the future since it's so easy.

BOOKRAY INFO:

Please make a journal entry when you receive the book and again when you mail it off so I can keep track of it.

Please keep the cookbook for no longer than 1 month. While the cookbook is in your possession, feel free to write comments directly on the page about the results of each recipe you've tried. Feel free to rate the recipe any way you'd like, but do write down what you thought of it. Screen name and country can be entered as well, if desired.

It would be great if you would journal your comments about the recipe as well, so we can all see what you tried and how it came out!

Please don't add any slips of paper to be put into the book as that would prohibit the cookbook from being mailed at media mail postage.

Have fun! Hope you enjoy the book & the recipes :)

Participants, shipping order & what we made:

• me, dancing-dog (TN)-made Graham Cracker Puddin'
  
• SqueakyChu (MD)-made Hello Darlin' Cookie Squares
  
• Megi53 (VA)-made Lulu Bell's Chessy Crackers + Sweet & Sour Hot Dogs
  
• lilmztaz (SC)-made Devil in the Blue Dress Eggs + Banana & Sourcream Cake
  
• maddog1404 (GA)[skipped]
  
• mysterylady36 (MO)-made Skillet Spaghetti, Momma's Meat Loaf + Ruby Ann's Chicken Dish
  
• HallieK (TX)-made Granny Verlina's Apple Fritters + Slut Puppies
  
• labmomnm (NM)-might try the Dr. Pepper Eggnog around Christmas! :)
  
• tnkbl (CA)-made Sloppy Sloppy-Joes
  
• crrcookie (US APO)-made Dr. Pepper Cake
  
• eatsletters (Germany) <--rec'd September 29th
  
• day-zee (Canada)
  
• to be decided by day-zee at that point!...

it's off in the mail to SqueakyChu today!

Well, the book arrived.

Are these recipes for real?! I wonder!!!

At first glance, I can't find anything in the book I am willing to try. Give me a few more days. Let me see what I can find. I promise to have this book back on the road in 30 days (hopefully, with a few more written comments about dishes I've tried).

Thanks for sharing it!

I am mailing this cookbook to Megi53. The recipes were really not the kinds of things I like to make. I finally ended up making the Hello Darlin' Cookie Squares. They came out overly sweet and never became firm. I never got into the cookbook's humor. I'm passing it on to others who may appreciate both the recipes and the humor more than I did.

This is great fun! I'm not sure exactly when the book made it to Danville, but I picked it up at the post office late this afternoon and immediately sat down to choose some recipes. Submissions by Ollie White (lot #10) look the tastiest, but they all serve hundreds! (I flipped through the hilarious introduction and I see she's a school cafeteria lady -- no wonder!)

I'll tell everybody on this bookring something right now: I'm not making anything that calls for imitation vanilla flavoring or margarine! Just call me Megi the food snob.

I thought the character bios added terrific fun to the book. Juanita Hix and Lulu Bell Boxcar were the most sympathetic park residents IMHO, so I made a recipe by each of those ladies:

Lulu Bell's Cheesy Crackers: I've always made this "recipe" a lot but I only heat it for 20 seconds in the microwave. After a full minute, the cheese had permeated the crackers and fused with them inside and out.

I used Cracker Barrel Sharp Cheddar(only got Gov't cheese once in my life, at a church program, and it was moldy) on Ritz and Low Sodium Triscuit crackers. The Ritz taste was far superior.

Juanita's Honey Roasted Peanut Clusters: easy and tasty. No more need for corn-syrup laden Snickers bars now that I have this recipe. Until I read it, I didn't realize there was such a thing as Honey-Roasted Cashews. At $6.99, it'll be awhile 'til I try them (I don't play bingo).

I also made the Sweet and Sour Hot Dogs. I used a crockpot for 3 hours on high. They were very basic and bland compared to, say, Beanee Weenee. My son loved them. If I were to make them again for myself, I'd spice them up considerably.

For what it's worth, the kids and I lived in a trailer home for about 3 years when they were babies. The trailer sat all by itself on several country acres, so we didn't get to enjoy the busybody comeraderie and recipe tradin' described so uproariously in the book. Ruby Ann sure was right about those flimsy kitchen countertops, though!

Off to lilmztaz as soon as I write my notes in the margins.

Before I sent this book off, I made Strawberry Pie. Anita Biggon will have to add something to this recipe to make it sliceable (like Jell-O or cornstarch or somethin') because when I cut the poisonous-pink pie, it slithered into a messy blob. I did substitute Looney Tunes Strawberry Dream puddin' for the boxed variety, which wasn't available at my Food Lion store; I also had to use frozen strawberries, it bein' January and all. The pie tasted very sweet, but I probably wouldn't make it again.

Book mailed to lilmztaz yesterday -- thanks for the idea; I thoroughly enjoyed this bookray!

can't wait to start using some of these recipes

i have picked about 4 recipes to try. already tried the one.
devil in blue dress eggs. i didn't like,but my husband did.
bananna and sourcream cake is so yummy.

Yay!!! It's here. I am really enjoying the humor in this and have seen several recipes that look interesting. I'm not sure if I'm brave enough to try anything with Spam though.

Last night I made the Skillet Spaghetti. I was a little disturbed that I had to cook the hamburger and onions in a tablespoon of shortening and then NOT drain it before adding the water and other ingredients. It did work out ok, although the sauce was a little more runny than we like it. The flavor was pretty good, but a little on the sweet side. If I make it again, I think I will tweak it just a little.

I made 'Momma's Meat Loaf' and it was great. I don't think my grandma ever lived in a trailer park, but this tasted just like her meat loaf. I am allergic to green peppers, so I didn't use those, but it didn't seem to matter.

Ruby Ann's Chicken Dish. This was pretty good, but the rice ended up sticking to the bottom of the dish pretty bad. I think this was my screw up though because I used Minute Rice and it called for cooking it for 2 hours total. I will have to try it another time with regular rice,

Life kind of got in the way of me trying as many recipes as I wanted, but I copied the interesting ones down for later.

I mailed this out yesterday. Sent it first class since it took me so long. Sorry!

Got this in the mail yesterday and I cannot wait to try some of the recipes. It's too funny!

I made Granny Verlina's Apple Fritters last weekend. Super easy to prepare and make. You have to watch out when you flip them over, though. I made the first one too big and it was hard to flip over without spattering hot grease everywhere. (This may have something to do with me being a little clumsy!) They turn out sort of like fried dough cakes with apples. The dough isn't very sweet, but it is tasty! When I made the last one, I added some more sugar and some cinnamon to the dough. I liked it better that way. Overall, it's a great, easy, not too sweet dessert.

This weekend I made Slut Puppies. They were very easy to mix up. I couldn't really get them to roll into balls, so I just dropped a spoonful of batter into the grease. It was a little messy and I almost burnt the kitchen down twice, but in the end the puppies were pretty good. I thought they were kind of bland, so I added some salt and pepper to the last few that I made. Overall they were pretty tasty!

Mailing this off to the next in line on 4/20/05.

Arrived in the mail - thanks! I'm kind of scared....I was thumbing through this last night and the first reciep I saw was the lemon cheesecake one - sounded reasonable. *Then* I wandered into beverages and saw something that sounds too awful not to try: Dr. Pepper eggnog. It really is eggnog with Dr. Pepper added.....I'll report back :-)

1 June '05 - mailed to tnkbl. I decided against the Dr. Pepper eggnog - I'll wait until this winter when I can buy pre-made eggnog at the grocery store and then dump some DP in and see how it goes.

Okey-dokey, it's here! Will study it carefully and let you all know how my culinary masterpiece turns out.

OK-- sorry it took so long, but I finally had an opportunity last week to try something out. I chose Sloppy Sloppy-Joes, and it was VERY yummy! I would definitely make this again. I left out the bouillon cube because I didn't have any, but I hardly think it made a difference. mmmm.

I've photocopied the recipe for Amazin' Secret Cocunut Pie to try later.

Thanks for sharing this book! I'm putting it in the mail for crrcookie today.

This arrived in the mail today in Kaiserslautern, GERMANY!

I elected to stay in the car while my hubby went into the store and I have read all of the introduction parts. Some of it is just too comical. DId anyone else read between the lines on some of the biographies of the "characters"? I don't know about you but I think that there is something a little "funny" going on in Lot #15 with Donny Owens and Kenny Lynn.

I tried RubyAnn's website for a tour of the trailer park and it didn't work so I did a search and found a different website ... while touring the trailer a spyware alert came up ... so I'll offer a beware to any other users.

There are very few recipes that I will probably try (hubby refuses to eat SPAM and was starting to get scared with some of the recipes that I was reading). But I haven't gotten to the desserts section yet so I guess I will just have to see.

I am going to reconfirm with a friend some of the facts about RubyAnn herself. Someone that I know in Oklahoma has actually met RubyAnn and I joined this ring because of the friend of a friend link. This all came up in conversation one day as we were at a meeting because Dakota had brought some fabulous food to share and the recipe had come from a different one of RubyAnn's cookbooks and he mentioned that he had indeed met the somewhat strange RubyAnn in person.

The last comment that I want to make is that I love the pictures. The photo retouches are absolutely hilarious ... those wigs just don't fit in but are lots of fun to look at.

I'll take a little bit to try out some of the recipes and let everyone know what I tried and then get this book moving along its happy way.

YIKES! OK first I have to say that I am truly sorry that I have had the book for almost a month now. It is totally now my style. But when it became apparent that I was going to have to wait until payday (the 15th) to do all my mailing I decided that I may as well try a couple more recipes.

The first recipe that I tried was right after I got the book. I had scared my husband with so many of the recipes that I just knew that he wouldn't try anything from the book unless I tricked him. So while he was out I made the Dr. Pepper cake. The only problem was that I didn't have any buttermilk here in the house so I just used regular milk in its place. I don't think that it affected the flavor any but it did change the texture. Needless to say the cake was not going to come out of the pan in one piece and was very moist but also very crumbly. The cake was pretty sweet too. Not what I usually like in a cake. And to top it all off neither one of us could taste the flavor of the Dr. Pepper. So I don't think that I would ever make the recipe again. It is much easier to just use a box mix. :)

I wrote down the recipe for the Sloppy Sloppy Joes since they were recommended. I have not yet gotten the chance to make them. It is a recipe that hubby did not completely turn up his nose at so I think that I might get away with that one.

I also wrote down the recipe for Spamaroni but I don't think that I will ever make it. Once I have the mac and cheese made and the SPAM warm I don't see any point in putting it in the oven. I think that I would just rather eat it as is. My hubby has a big adversion to SPAM but it doesn't scare me. Maybe it is because I never had to eat it and when it was served it was almost a treat. (Like a grilled SPAM and cheese sandwich.)

I know that Ruby Ann has out some more cookbooks and I may take a look around for them but I think that I got everything out of this one that I really wanted. Ordinarily I would have chosen several of the cake and pie and cookie recipes but since it is summer just the thought of baking makes me tired and hot and cranky so I will just pass for now.

Mailed to eatsletters on 16 Aug 2005.

oh wow. that book is absolutely stunning. The cover alone makes your gums ache and your toenails roll up.

That is so over the top that I LOVED it!

I am not that familiar with the concept of Trailer Trash, but that book provided an insightful introduction ;-)))

The only thing is with the recipes that they use lots of ingredients that - for a non-American - are difficult to figure out what the *** that might be. Especially with brand names or generic names. I might have to google a few things... And convert things into the metric system...

Most of the cooking is probably way too substantial for me, I do prefer light cooking. With my current job, I hardly ever cook because we get free food at work. Nonetheless I will make copies of the most promising or interesting parts to try them out one day. The tomato soup cake for example. Or the interesting fish dishes. I love fish.

THe most interesting thing was, how the book got to me. I was so surprised to find an envelope with a US stamp and a US customs sticker with an address from Germany - from an army base. I never thought about the fact that that might count as mail from abroad. I kept the envelope because I thought it to be interesting...

I've kept the book for a while and haven't got round to cooking not once, so I'll just make copies of the pages send it off to the next person.

What a perfect day for this little gem to arrive!!

I rolled into town on the Greyhound bus last night and found this book waiting for me at MyDaddy's (yes he REALLY is my Daddy) place on my birthday! (well it was past midnight, so TECHnically it WAS my birthday.) My Mom, brother, his girlfriend and I had a great time flipping through it and reading all the little side notes from other bookcrossers telling what they thought about the recepies. I can see I'm going to have a tough time trying to choose only a few and send it on.

I figure I'll let my hubby Tjaiden pick a recepie, and just cuz I have to, I'm going to pick something that I would NEVER try by looking at the ingredients. I'll let you all know how it goes.

When I am finished with it, I think I will pass it off to my buddy jurraffe, as she has expressed some interest in hosting her first bookray. I think she would really enjoy the humour of it as well.

Off to pick some favourites, and make a shopping list!

Well!
I have never read a cookbook front to back before!
This hilarious book has some great recepies (and some strange ones...). I read every word and dog-eared 16 different pages. I don't usually do that, but considering the nature of the book I figured it was okay. I'll try a few recepies before passing it on, and photo copy a bunch to use them later. The only reason I didn't give it a 10 was because I was a bit disappointed that there was no conclusion.
(not that that sort of thing is usually expected in a cookbook...) I also would have enjoyed a few more laughs from Me-Ma's recepie files.
I'll let you all know how my choices go.

Well, I might have this a bit longer than the alloted month that everyone else had it for... But here's my story.

I went out the other day to the grocery store and bought ingredients for 9 of the recepies that I chose, got them all home, and then realized that my oven doesn't work. *fume* Also, it is Christmas time, and we are pretty darn near broke; both making it tough to get someone over here to fix it. Poo.
Soooooo, I got the chance to make the 2 recepies I picked that don't require the use of the oven, copied a few for later, and planned to make 3 of the recepies for various Christmas parties. :)

I copied the recepies for Sanctified Sour Cream Frostin', which looks like a nice fluffy icing, Sweetened Condensed Milk, who knew that you could make your own?, and No Bakin' Cookies, which made my husband Tjaiden ask: "why would you put bacon in cookies anyway?".

The ones I tried were South of the Border Beef Skillet La Lois, and The Kathy Lee Gifford Tribute Cheese Dip, both of which were absolutely fantastic!

I chose the Skillet because I make this sort of thing all the time, so I figured it was a good one to start with. I love to just throw my whole meal in a bowl and maybe just add some bread. This turned out great! I would recommend however to use the uncooked minute rice instead of pre-cooking regular rice as a substitute. Tjaiden and I both loved it, and as I said in the book: 'Looks boring, but a great taste!'.

The cheese dip was the 'something that I would NEVER try by looking at the ingredients'. But HOLY COW is it fantastic!! Great party recepie, although I made it just for me and hubby to snack on while we watch movies (if I did this again I would half the recepie). Pecans, tomato soup, onions, lemon jello... Who knew?? I will DEFINETLY make this again. Very rich and tastes great with Triscuits.

I plan to make The Devil in the Blue Dress Eggs, El Loco Log-O, and Cheery Cherry Cobbler Pie for the holidays, and 7 more recepies when my oven works again. I'll let you all know how it goes!

oh, and sorry about my long-windedness, I get overly excited about things sometimes...

Well, I believe it is time for me to pass this book along. The oven still doesn't work, and we're moving (again) so I don't think I'll have the time to make any of the other recepies I wanted to any time soon. So,,,,, I copied a bunch and I'll pass it on to jurraffe, who incidentally has been waiting for a surprise!

Over the Christmas holidays I made:

For Mommy's Xmas eve party:


Devil in the Blue Dress Eggs (in red and green, with dill sprinkled on the red ones, and paprika sprinkled on the green ones). These were a HIT! There were none left to package up for later!


and El Loco Log-O. I made 2 thin logs with this recepie, and I used red and green peppers instead of jalapenos and chillies. It wasn't as much of a hit, but I think that was because my Famous Taco Dip (shown in back) is a favourite at the Xmas Eve Party (PM me for the recepie if you like). However, I gave the second log to my brother's girlfriend for her Xmas party, and they all loved it! *shrug* Just goes to show ya.

Christmas Day:

The remainder of the (quite large I might add) cheese log was put out before dinner on Christmas day, and it was gone in seconds! *mental note-logs for hubby's side, dips for mine.
Also, I had planned to make Cheery Cherry Cobbler Pie for dessert, (which is neither a cobbler, or a pie) but no-one would let me! We stuffed them too full of Christmas dinner! However, I made it for hubby and me a few days later, and it was DEEEE-LISH!! Really simple, and REALLY good! Just a bit of a problem with a small microwave--oops! We ended up having to spoon it into bowls before heating it up.

and finally Boxing Day!

I made a party batch of the Kathie Lee Gifford Tribute Cheese Dip to put out before dinner, which was thouroughly enjoyed, and everyone had a good laugh at where the recepie came from, and what was in it!

Well, off it goes to jurraffe, and I copied down the BCID so that I can let you know how the rest of my picks turned out (eventually).--if you haven't heard enough of me already.

Stay tuned for: Banana Nut Bread, Ollie's Award-Winning Corn Bread, Billy Ray Cyrus Tribute Mashed Potato Cake, Ruby Ann's Tomato Soup Cake, Sour Cream Noodle Bake, Cornflakes Tuna Pie, and Taco-Roni Salad

Bye for now! :D

Sent to me as a surprise book from awesome BCer day-zee! (Thanks day-zee!) This book is so funny. I wasn't even sure it was genuine, but yes, there are actual recipes in here and some of them look good. (Some of them really, really, don't...)

I've already had the book for about 3 weeks and I haven't made any recipes yet, but I'm going to try a few and make notes about them before I release it.

I've already had 3 people (BCers to be!) who have asked to be put on the list, so the journey of Ruby Ann's cookbook will continue!

I found it!! I found it again!!!

Yes, it's been lost in the black lagoon of office boxes. Now the lagoon has spread across my living room but in the process I have unearthed treasures galore, including this very... interesting... cookbook.

So, my apologies to day-zee who was kind enough to release this my way. I'm sending it back to her so it can continue it's journey with a more conscientious bookcrosser. ;-)

Thanks for returning this great little book jurraffe!

I'll be bringing it to tonight's meeting at The Park Theatre to pass on to another bookcrosser - just after I have the chance to copy some of these recipes again!!

Brought home from the November meet-up at Winnipeg's Official Bookcrossing Zone at the Park Theatre Cafe loft. Looks interesting :o)

Just flipping the pages I can see the notes made by previous bookcrossers about recipes they have tried, and what they thought. I can't wait to add a note or two myself!

Thanks Day-Zee!