I’ve wanted to write this post for over a year. There were so many times I wanted to tell you what I was doing and how I was up to my eyeballs in 17 jars of peanut butter almost every day.
But I decided that rather than drag out the suspense for a year, and long before my book was even going to be in stores or that you could buy it, that I’d just surprise you when the timing was better.
Well, surprise! My first cookbook, Peanut Butter Comfort: Recipes for Breakfasts, Brownies, Cakes, Cookies, Candies, and Frozen Treats Featuring America’s Favorite Spread
The book features more than 100 recipes and they all use peanut butter. Yes, there’s peanut butter in every single recipe. I cannot even tell you how much peanut butter I went through in 2012. I was literally buying it by the gallon while recipe testing.
In some recipes, peanut butter is bold and in your face like in old-fashioned peanut butter cookies.
And in other recipes, it’s subtle, hardly noticeable, and binds ingredients or lends moisture to biscuit dough.
It’s primarily a dessert cookbook, with a focus on comfort food desserts that stick to your ribs like Marshmallow Fluffternutter Butterscotch Bars.
Or a Caramelized Peanut Butter and Banana Upside-Down Cake that will make your soul sing.
There is one chapter devoted to savory and salty-and-sweet combinations like Cheesy Peanut Butter Crackers, a homemade riff on Peanut Butter-Filled-and-Flavored Cheez-Its.
There’s Fresh Spring Rolls with Thai Peanut Sauce. You can’t have a peanut butter book without peanut sauce.
There are a handful of recipes that have appeared on my blog because I have over 50+ recipes on my site that use peanut butter. 35 Peanut Butter Recipes are here, and all of the Peanut Butter Recipes are here. A few recipes I love too much to not include and so in they went.
The irony is that since writing the book and turning in my manuscript last July, I’ve come up with more peanut butter recipes that I wish I could have included but with books, there’s no Edited To Add function like with blogging, and now they’re posted here.
I did all the photography. 100 recipes, 100 photos. Actually, more than 100 photos because at the beginning of chapters and interspersed throughout the book there are accompanying images. You never notice how many photos are in the margins, corners, and sides of pages in a book until you’re the one responsible for making them happen.
I believe there are only two recipes and some frosting recipes that don’t have accompanying photos. It was important to me to really show you what the food looks like when it’s done. It’s a peeve of mine in cookbooks when every fifth or seventh recipe gets a photo and the rest don’t, and I made sure to avoid that.
They say that writing a book is like being pregnant and birthing a baby. Well, I’ve done both and there are striking parallels. In the beginning, I was so full of anticipation, excitement, and so eager. Ready to get on with it, and for the fun to begin. Midway through, the novelty wears off and that initial energy rush has dwindled and it’s hard work to stay on track and keep the other aspects of life humming along, too. Toward the end, you’re dead tired, fatigued, and wonder how you will go on. And in the last week or two before the due date, life is a blur, awake all hours of the day and night, just trying to finish and stay strong.
And then, after all the edits, revisions, changes, going up and back time and time again, you hold your baby in your arms, or in my case see a PDF of my baby on my computer screen, and it’s suddenly all worth it. And I want to do it again because it was the most rewarding and fulling experience.
And I am. But that’s a whole other post.
Here is the front and back cover with jacket flaps. I didn’t design the cover but had input. The photography is mine, but my publisher has a design team who created it.
Although there are similarities to writing a food blog, it’s definitely different. The recipe development, cooking the food, trialing it, photographing it, writing about it, learning about the publishing process, and experiencing it all has been the hardest work, but the best work. And I’m grateful to the Skyhorse team for their support.
And I’m eternally grateful for my husband’s support. I could not have done it without him. Both from helping me parent our daughter to eating his weight in peanut butter in 2012. I could not have blogged 365 days last year and clocked in 370 posts, written a book, taken care of our house and child without him being Daddy Dearest. That said, it’s amazing how little sleep I got last year and I’m about to do it again.
You’d think I would have gotten sick of peanut butter in this whole process but I haven’t. My recipe yesterday included it and I adore it just as much as ever.
I hope you love peanut butter and Peanut Butter Comfort as much as I do.
Thank you for your support!
OMG AVERIE!! CONGRATULATIONS!! THIS IS SUCH A HUGE HUGE ACCOMPLISHMENT AND YOU DD IT!! I REMEMBER FOLLOWING YOUR BLOG YEARS AGO AFTER COMING ACROSS IT BY CHANCE AND WITNESSING HOW MUCH IT HAS EVOLVED IT AMAZING!! NOT ONLY ARE YOUR PHOTOS PHENOMENAL, BUT RECIPES AND CONTENT IS AMAZING! I AM SO PROUD OF YOU AND KNOW YOU ARE DESTINED FOR GREAT THINGS! I WILL SURELY BE GETTING MY COPY!!
MUCH LOVE,
NEIKO :)
I remember your name and email address extremely well, Neiko! Thanks for sticking around all these years and for your support!
So proud of you! I can say, “Oh, I have emails from her when she was just an almost unknown blogger, you know, before she was a famous author!”
That’s so fantastic!! I was wondering if you were ever going to make one! Can’t wait to buy it :)
Amazing. Congratulations. Much success.
Congrats Averie! Such an exciting time for you. Must admit I don’t stop by here really anymore due to the obvious, however I saw on Facebook that you had brought out a cookbook and wanted to share my glee with you.
Also I don’t know how you do it! Being a mum, wife, blogger and cook book writer is more than 24 hours a day work I reckon! Well done you xxxx
Love from Saudi xx
Averie, that’s so exciting! Congratulations, I bet you’re so excited. :) I cant’ wait to find it in stores, yay for peanut butter! :)
Congratulations Ms. Averie. I’ll have to pick this up. Is it wrong to say my FAVORITE peanut butter recipe is a good ole fashion peanut butter and jelly sandwich on soft wheat bread. Grape jelly at that and a nice glass of cold milk :O)
Congratulations!! I am so excited for you…and for me–I am can’t wait to read and bake from your cookbook! I absolutely love your blog–your recipes are absolutely delicious, you explain everything in such a clear way, and your writing “voice” is so friendly. Your passion for cooking and baking is inspiring! The only hard part is going to be waiting until May when amazon finally mails me my copy of your cookbook!
Oh Kelly, what a sweet comment and nice things to say – I appreciate it! And thanks for the preorder :)
Congratulations, Averie!! I’m so excited for you (and for those of us who will soon have some new peanut butter recipes to play with!). How on earth were you able to keep this a secret for so long? And, more importantly, how did you have time for Everything? I hope you included some of time management tips in your book too. ;)
Thank you for sharing your new adventure (and recipes)! And *Thank You* for including photos for each recipe- it’s always good to have an idea about what to expect at the end of the rainbow. :D
Can’t wait to get my hands on this! xo
Thanks for the kind words, Valerie! I am glad you’re surprised and excited! :)
Congratulations Averie! I have been reading your blog religiously for years! Even since your high raw yoga lovin days!! Not sure I’ve ever come out and said hi or commented but I was too busy in the kitchen! I’ve probably made 100 of your recipes and look forward to your posts every morning! I always wondered when you would put out a cookbook since your recipes are so unique and delicious and your photography is impeccable! So proud of your success and you are definitely someone I look up to in creating a living out of their passion! Your my idol!!! Wish you all the success in the world!
Theresa hi and thank you for your support over the years! I don’t think you’ve ever actually said hi b/c I’d remember someone who told me they made 100 of my recipes. WOW and thank you! Thanks for the high praise and compliments and your loyalty over the years; watching my blog change and evolve to where it’s at today. Thank you and I appreciate it!
Congrats!! The cookbook looks wonderful! I love peanut butter, I really do! I can’t wait to check out all of these delicious recipes.
WOWZERS!!! What an awesome surprise! Congratulations Averie!
OMGOMGOMGOMG!!!!! CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!!! I am so ridiculously over-the-top excited for you! Writing a cookbook is something I have only dreamed about in the back of my mind, and I’ve seen a handful of bloggers get there, and I am SO GLAD you have too! I can’t wait to buy your book and eat my weight in peanut butter! What an amazing accomplishment, Averie!!
Well thank you so much, Ari!
Though I’m one of your newer fans my heartfelt congrats to you, Averie! I think you definitely hit a home run on this one!
Congrats Averie!!! Peanut Butter is an amazing book topic. Totally buying it!
YAY and thank you!
what a wonderful surprise and how lovely a book it looks!
cant wait to get a hold of a copy
:)