Writing a Baking Cookbook

 

March of 2023, I ventured on a baking cookbook journey. My motivation was three fold. I wanted to share some of the recipes from the summer market at the Heritage Farm in Cole Harbour. It was a wonderful 2-3 hour market held Wednesday afternoons during the summer months. Usually from early June to late September. We had only a few vendors, preserves, veggies and baking along with farm market items sold by https://coleharbourfarmmuseum.ca/ . This is a true gem right in the middle of Cole Harbour, It is a working farm in the summer with gardens, animals and farm memorabilia to learn about the history of farming in the area. There is a blacksmith who comes and forges items sold in the Tea Room gift shop. Visitors are welcome to wonder about, enjoying the surroundings, having a snack at colourful picnic tables or inside where the culinary skill of the chef is something to make sure you taste while there. 

Secondly I wanted to share the processes I learned along the way after taking the plunge into the outdoor market world. I went in by invitation of the previous chef who also ensured you had wonderful food while dining at the Tea Room. She wanted to focus on the Tea Room food and not a bake table. We both did our training at Nova Scotia Community College (NSCC) and this common bond aided in my invitation. You get excellent training and I recommend anyone who has interest in continuing education to consider one of their programs. The market also allowed me to donate a bit to the Cole Harbour Heritage Farm Museum and fundraise for the Ride for Cancer, which I participated in for 5 years. 

The third reason for thinking about writing a cook book was I needed a project to keep busy. Sitting idle bothers me terribly. I tried to get my boss from the bakery to collaborate on a baking book with me but he didn't bite on the project. I have loads of photos from the baking over 5 years and the recipes. You would think you could just match them up with a recipe, which were not well written (for the bakers eyes only)and and get a publishing company to be excited about rewording your recipe, putting a manuscript together for you, and ask for a cover page. Poof it is done!!

You think as a person new to this process, that it cannot be so hard or time consuming. Humm, think again my dear ambitious self. This whole idea of a baking book came about after going through a cookbook a friend of mine put together. She is a musician, and a local community celebrity. At least I think she is. 

She enlisted her friends from the Maritime music world and invited them to contribute a recipe. A fun recipe book was created with a donation from each sale going to support mental health. She shares personal stories throughout the book which also make it a fun and engaging read. I had the book for a while before going over it. Then I sent her a note to tell her how much I enjoyed it. Knowing I had gone to baking school in retirement she replied with, "When are your going to write a cookbook?" "Not likely",  I replied back. Even though this was my first thought, the seed was planted. You can find her book here. https://lanagrant.com/books. I love this lady. You feel so comfortable in her presence. 

Decide on a publishing Co.

The first step was deciding on a publishing company that will help you self publish, because why would you think in a thousand years, that you are worthy of some company wanting your work as a lowly baker with 5 years experience, when you are not famous, not planning to becoming famous, haven't broadened your skills beyond the baking you are comfortable with. Guess what, you need to invest in yourself my friends. Do something you are interested in and hope there will be an audience that shares your love of baking, or whatever you want to share, with some passion and interest. 

For me the self publishing route had to be the way to go. The baking book is about so much more than the recipes. It is about sharing knowledge in a way that readers will understand and appreciate the information while taking some of that knowledge and applying to their own project, whether it be a market or some other venture.

I asked a friend how she went about finding a publisher for her children's books. She mentioned a few local companies and what they offered. She also mentioned Friesen Press. I searched local publishers websites, which I really wanted to go with, then looked to Canadian publishers. For some reason I was drawn to Friesen Press. https://www.friesenpress.com/ .They had a self publishing sale package at the time and because I was born and lived in Western Canada for a while, I chose them. I liked that the book can always be available and doesn't have to go out of print. Having said all this, I really do not have much research knowledge about publishing companies and am sure they all have amazing qualities worth checking. I went with a feeling which usually serves me well. If you are interested in writing a self published book through Friesen Press use this code  FPA48536RP and say I sent you.

Meanwhile:

I am compiling all the recipes and photos I was hoping to use and putting them together in a word document called, Cookbook Recipes. I even categorized them as you see in other baking books. I reviewed all the cookbooks I have collected over the years. We have the fundraiser books, the big weighty cookbooks published by Home and Garden, Readers Digest and such. Then there are the classroom books we had to purchase for the NSCC course and last but not least the favorite and famous, chef bake-books. 

The recipes are organized by breads, cookies, muffins, biscuits and scones etc. Brilliant, easy, copy, paste, and insert. I wrote a little cover note and put together a bunch of equivalents that are convenient and easy. Equivalents are so important when you need to substitute or switching from imperial measurements to metric.  How many times have you been frustrated trying to search and look up equivalents and substitutes?

Next I thought, since this is a book I want to share what I've learned, then it needs a "tips" section. I began writing all sorts of tips down in random order and they were all over the place. One of the things I did as a nurse during my 30 year career was work on a few research projects. The projects that helped most me during this endeavor were the qualitative studies. It seemed these random tips had to be categorized to be more readable and appealing to an audience.
Three themes evolved from the tips. Money saving tips, time saving tips and baking hacks or bakers tips. Funny, I didn't use the word "hack" in the book. After realizing the tips could be categorized, it was easier to put them together in an organized manor. 

Not only while wanting to share the tips, I also wanted to share how I organized and prepared for the market. There really is a process for planning, implementing, evaluating and reviewing for each and the next week. This process is one we do in nursing when making care plans for patients. We make a plan of care, implement the plan, evaluate for effectiveness and review to make changes to the plan to ensure the best outcome for our patients. Although I could only write on my experience, this process is transferable to anyone's market or even helpful for small business planning. This process is similar in some ways to the S.M.A.R.T. rules for reaching goals (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timely).

Here we go! 

Send your information to the publishing company to make a contact with them. this means, the site has a place where you plug in your contact information and they can then reach out to you. The person who contacts you will review what you have and help you decide what your next steps may be. This actually can take a few months. Everything is done on-line and through several phone conversations. you review what is available to you and then you decide how you want to proceed. Then of course you must pay upfront for the services you decided on.

You will never again speak to the initial person. You now are assigned a publishing specialist. You are also instructed to upload your work to the their website. It is reviewed by an editor. the editor explains what corrections you have to make in order for them to work on your piece. They also noted that it would need a "complex copy edit". For me it means, this work is so unprofessional that the author needs to go back a make an extreme amount of corrections before they can even work on your manuscript. (Hey it is a manuscript and that really is cool).

I started this post Feb 29, 2024, one month ago as today is March 29, 2024, and back at it again. Just two days ago, I sent in the final corrections and have no more energy to reread the book until the real copies come in the house. The final copy still requires approval. You can read something 50 times and not notice an error, until it matters and cost almost 500.00 for the correction. Which I almost said, leave the errors! But you cannot leave the errors. One of the last spelling errors was "Lemmon" when it should have been "Lemon". It happened because of a change midway through, that was not caught during the 8th or 9th review. As a self published author, at this point you don't get to use spell-check. There was plenty of opportunity to correct it but easy to miss without spell-check. According to an article in Science and Nature, our brains see what we expect it to see due to a predictive brain trained to see what it thinks it should see. 

Our predictive brain can be costly. In health care this can also be a problem. for example, a healthcare provided is experienced and sees many of the same conditions over and over in their many years of practice. Then one day a new patient comes in with the same symptoms as so many before them and gets misdiagnosed because of a predictive brain situation. Yeah! It happens to experts! Probably everyone. I imagine teachers, store clerks, business people etc. 

Twice now when I had the e-mail that the book was print ready, I got so very excited. Pride built up in me like a blooming bowl of yeast. Reading the recipes and seeing the photos all taken by my cell phone with a cracked screen. The designer made them look more than ok. There wasn't one thing in this baking book that hadn't come from my work. Then, sheer let down when you catch an error and you know another week is going to pass before it will be print ready again. 

They said, you will have to sell about 500 copies to break even financially. Now it will be 520 books. 

Here's the thing. I am a baker and a pretty good baker. I know what I know. There are so many things to learn in the world of baking. I don't feel super comfortable with cakes and buttercream and haven't even made a creampuff yet. The basic macaron took me many tries and many cake bakers haven't perfected the skill of baking a macaron.  Now that my first baking book has been completed, there will be time for attempting new baking skills. Who knows maybe another version of The Great, Bake, Take and Go Baking book is a seed waiting to be planted. 

Friday April 12, 2024 the email came in to say the final proof copy is ready for print. they suggest taking 7 days to ensure all is ok. I might be crazy, but all I had energy for was looking for the corrections sent in March 29, 2024. they were done to perfection. I clicked the approval button on the publishing companies web site and feel a huge load off my back. 

What still disturbs me most is flour equivalents. You try so hard to ensure a recipe done in metric is transferable to imperial and vice versa. For the most part it is. The problem lies in the amount of flour in a cup. You almost always need to adjust flour when switching. Oh well, as long as you bake often, your end bake will turn out just fine with minor adjustments.

To summarize the contents of my book, it is full of recipes you are most likely to use regularly, many recipes that are called low risk foods (baked goods that haven't uncooked dairy or meat product. In other words less chance of food poisoning). Content is all in one book that you are going to find a few items in each chapter to bake. Of course there is also a mini-outline in how you can organize and scale up for larger crowds as well as tips to lighten your load.

Please leave a comment if you are interested in purchasing the book. 

The published book date was April 27, 2024. Here is the link for purchase through Friesen Press. 

https://books.friesenpress.com/store/title/119734000365277607

I just looked on Amazon and it is selling for 51.00. I would rather see people order from me, or FP, and I can send through Canada Post. Shipping will be less.

Leave a note on this blog or At My Home Bakery Facebook page. We will figure out the best way to get one to you. Thanks for all the support and encouragement.

Love Kathy

Here is a note from a friend who bought Bake Take and Go Baking book,

I have been given permission to share this heartfelt email. Thank you Marge for reading the baking book all the way through, and your kind comments.

"Enjoyed your visit last evening, nice to sit and catch up.

We will plan an outing to the Nine Locks Brewery when Bud the Spud is there next and to Colleen’s Pub when music is playing.

I just finished reading your cookbook from cover to cover.

Wow and wow. I’m blown away by all your comments, advice and tips. What a book. It’s more than just a cookbook filled with so much, lovely pictures and easy to follow recipes.

So well written and well thought out. Love it.

Be very proud of yourself as this is a huge lifetime achievement!