Cookbookaholic

The Big Dawgs

I can’t wait to show you these next cookbooks. I’m super excited to have them!

First up, Bill Neal’s Southern Cooking:

You’re thinking…she’s already got this one. And you’re correct. I have another hardback and probably two softcover versions as well. But, it’s autographed and that’s the primary reason I snagged this one. Bill Neal isn’t with us anymore and I don’t want his legacy to be forgotten. In fact, remind me to do a deep dive on Bill Neal.

Here’s part of the inscription:

“Best wishes & hold on to this one!”

Well, they didn’t but I will.

Here’s one I never knew about until recently:

Savoring the South: Memories of Edna Lewis The Grande Dame of Southern Cooking with Recipes (Angela Mulloy). I ran across this one while checking the new inventory of my favorite used cookbook reseller on Etsy, CookbookRescueShop. Amongst her listings, she’ll have a spot for the cookbooks she’s currently reading. I clicked on it a few months back and saw this one featured.

The thing is, it stayed in that section for weeks and weeks! And if it ever moved to be purchased, then I missed it. A quick search on eBay found it and I purchased it there. Lots of info from Ms. Lewis’ niece, a history on her and memories about her from the author, Angela Mulloy.

It’s a cookbook with an eye towards seasonality and menus. I wonder how many more cookbooks are out there that had Lewis’ heavy involvement?

Speaking of the Grande Dame herself, I wanted to get a first edition of The Edna Lewis Cookbook by Ms. Lewis and Evangeline Peterson. I saw a listing on eBay and it had the correct cover image but missed it. After I had saved it on my Watch List, it was gone.

The next day, it was relisted and I swooped in and got it. How exciting!

About a week went by and it still had not arrived…now I’m worried. For the price I paid, you’d think they would sent it overnight. They did not.

After almost ten days, it finally arrived. And then I opened it.

This is not the first edition, first printing I paid quite a heavy price for…

This is, in fact, the 1983 printing.

So mad! Even though this is a very pristine copy.

I reached out to the vendor and explained that this was not the version they portrayed in the listing. They apologized and offered a partial refund if I wanted to keep what was sent. And, like I said, it was a pretty pristine copy so I took the reduced refund and kept it.

I’m still on the lookout for the original But only at a reasonable price.

And finally, I lucked up on seeing this copy of New Orleans Recipes by Mary Moore Bremer on eBay. This one is everywhere but it’s hard to find an early edition. This one is a fifth printing. It’s showing some wear and a lot of tear…but what got me was this hand-written recipe for Angel Food Pie on the first two pages.

It’s hard to read…but I wonder if I can decipher it…

More to come!

Original Cabbage Patch Cookbook

Throughout the years, I’ve seen the Cabbage Patch cookbook in eBay suggestions. If you’ve seen it you’ll recognize the white cover with the farming images within a green cabbage. Very iconic.

It’s from the Cabbage Patch Circle in Louisville, Kentucky and it’s actually called “Famous Kentucky Recipes.” I would consider this group a Junior League on steroids. Their organization is the faith-based Cabbage Patch Settlement and they formed in late 1910. A small group within became known as The Cabbage Patch Circle who seemed to be the core in making sure the Settlement’s mission of helping to meet the needs of their neighbors stayed on track.

The building they used, Cabbage Patch Settlement House, became a destination for those who needed help. And by the time they first published their cookbook, their organization had a well-earned reputation for helping the community. 

Their work is very impressive. In their first 50 years, here’s what they’ve been able to do:

• During the Depression, they remodeled a building into apartments and housed families in need
• Organized a commissary with wholesale prices to be paid by work
• Clothing League Project
• Large Garden Project: Enough crops for summer and canning for winter
• WWII: Overnight accommodations for soldiers
• Nursery School
• Cooking School
• Sewing School

Impressive, right?

Well, anyways, I spotted a version with a green cover and it got me curious about their cookbook. The green cover was the reverse of the familiar white one. But, as it turns out, wasn’t the first edition, first printing.

I did a search on eBay and found most are from a 1956 printing and after. Then, in the related searches, I found it. A first edition from 1952.

It looks absolutely nothing like the white cover with farm and giant green cabbage! And the price wasn’t too bad, either.

Who knows when another one will show up, so I decided to snag it.

And here’s what it looks like:

I love the dark green and the simple circle patch up in the upper left corner. And you’ll notice that the “Famous Kentucky Recipes” pops more.

Super excited to have found this one! The mark on the cover is actually the remnants of a price tag, but I’m sure I’d cause more damage if I tried to remove it.

Welcome to the collection!

Sparks Spree!

You know, eBay has become a great resource during this Covid mess. If you are lucky, and someone is looking to let loose of some old cookbooks, you can find some really great ones.

There was an evening when I was reading about Beth Tartan. A lot of people know that name from her cookbook, North Carolina and Old Salem Cookery. But Beth Tartan was her pen name. Her real name was Elizabeth Hedgecock Sparks.

The article was quoting her daughter and how she loved brunch. I’m a fan of brunch but I also liked the idea that a young female journalist—from North Carolina—had such a successful writing career. That spurred me to look online for other books she wrote. I found The Good Ole Days Cookbook, The Successful Hostess and Menu Maker and Party Planner.

I ended up getting all three of them! It took a while for them to all get here…but here they are:

The Good Old Days Cookbook was listed in "good" condition...but the rips and tears to the cover tell me a different story. 

The Successful Hostess as written when she was still a single gal. She’s listed as Elizabeth Stuart Hedgecock.

And unfortunately, Menu Maker and Party Planner was previously owned by a heavy, heavy smoker. It pretty much lives inside the padded envelope it arrived in tucked inside not one, but two Ziploc bags!

My copies of NC & Old Salem Cookery and Beth Tartan’s Cookbook are all housed in a bookcase just for special North Carolina cookbooks. After my Sparks spree, I think I may need to clear out a space dedicated to just  Elizabeth Hedgecock Sparks!

Very Special Copy of The Savannah Cook Book

You know, I had just finished looking over my collection of Savannah-area cookbooks and thought to myself: You don’t need any more copies of The Savannah Cook Book by Harriet Ross Colquitt. I’ve got both hardback and plastic spiral spine copies. Plenty! Plenty of copies that I’ve picked up over the years.

And for some reason, the very next thing I did was a search on eBay….and what did I find? A true first edition, first printing hardback from 1933 that was signed by Harriet Ross Colquitt herself.

WHAAAAA??????

It took a while, but I finally managed to get the funds to purchase it…and it arrived today.

Can you imagine? A signed copy from almost 100 years ago! I mean, 87 years actually, but still!

Not only was it signed, but there was a wonderful inscription to the book’s owner, which I’m assuming is a cousin to Mrs. Colquitt. It reads:

“Don’t forget while you are hobnobbing with artists that your cousin is a cook.”

                                                               Harriet Ross Colquitt  July 1933

That one line hit a personal note with me. My grandmother was a cook…not a chef, but a cook. She grew up poor in a small town and cooked for families and churches, worked as a lunch lady at the local high school and then drove to the “big city” to work in the kitchen at a local BBQ restaurant. She learned to cook to survive and provide for her family. And as I was moving to briefly live in New York after college, she relayed a similar sentiment.

It was a light-hearted “don’t forget your roots” sentiment but also a knowing that her hard-lived and fought struggles were finally resulting in a world of opportunities for a grandchild.

This copy of The Savannah Cook Book is, without a doubt, a treasure by itself; but I’m appreciating this particular copy as a grateful granddaughter of a hard-working cook.

The White House Cook Book

Got a new addition to the collection: The White House Cook Book.

It was written/compiled by Mrs. F.L. Gillette and Hugo Ziemman. She was a seasoned cook and Ziemman served in the White House as a chef. It’s a very thick book with about 500 or so recipes, cooking techniques, household cleaning tips, etiquette as well as recipes from some First Ladies of the time. 

It’s very comprehensive and, even though it’s as thick as an encyclopedia, it became a hot seller. Which is why it’s interesting to me that these are considered so “rare” and hard to find. A lot of people had a copy of this one back in the day.

Having said that: online, these tend to be a bit pricey; but, the closer you get to an original printing, the better.

I’ve been at an estate sale when someone has asked if a White House cookbook was available. (It wasn’t.) 

So I’ve never really had an interest in getting one, unless it was a) Old and b) cheap.

Not too long ago, I came across on online auction that had one. It didn’t have a lot of info. The seller just had a picture of it in his hand and just a quick note that it was an interesting old cookbook. Oh, and that he’d be willing to ship it.

This seemed like an out-of-the-way auction so I registered for the sale, saved the info and went back to it as the lot went up for sale. The opening bid was $20 and I ended up getting some competition. But after a slight bidding war, I ended up winning it for a little over $30.

Now, getting it shipped was another story. The auctioneer dropped off about two tons of items at the shipping company and it took them a little over a week to get in touch with me. They shipped it to me via Media Mail (thank you USPS for an affordable shipping option!)

About a week later, it finally arrived!

It’s definitely old, nice to learn that this is a third printing from 1899.

And look at this page with names of the previous owners written on it. What lovely handwriting!

Elizabeth Irene Dollenger and Blanche T. Chaney? Charrey?

Big Red One

If you remember back to last year, I was so thrilled when I found a first edition/first printing of Charleston Receipts from the Junior League of Charleston. Had a slight hiccup, in getting the right one, but it did finally get here.

 

But did you know there was another cookbook that the Junior League published before that famous green one? I didn’t. At least, not until The Lee Bros. wrote about it in one of their amazing cookbooks.

 

It was ultra rare from 1949, and it was only printed once. First edition…only edition.

 

And it’s called Charleston Recipes…which feels more natural than Receipts.

 

As you can imagine, once I learned about this cookbook—I put it on my list. Don’t assume it went straight to obsession (hello, original Paula Deen Lady and Friends cookbook).

 

Not too long after, the Junior League of Charleston actually re-released a new printing of that original red cookbook. Here’s how they listed it on their website:

 

Virtually lost for decades, Charleston Recipes was recently rediscovered in an attic by Josephine Humphreys, a former JLC member and daughter of the original editor Martha Lynch Humphreys. “Only one year separates the two cookbooks (Recipes and Receipts), but they can almost be seen as representing different decades,” says Humphreys in her introduction. “The 1949 book seems spare and frugal, still in the shadow of the depression and wartime privations, while the 1950 book is exuberant, celebratory, even sometimes downright lavish. And yet there are tempting and delightful recipes to be found only in the red book.”

 

Amazing! And the proceeds for purchasing this reprint went to their charity work. And yes, I did buy one. So that scratched that itch….until.

 

I logged on to ebay and went through a search for Junior League cookbooks from the Carolinas. And deep in a “Buy It Now” section was an original. THE original….the Red One. It was part of a private collection of a professional chef who collected rare and antique cookbooks. He was choosing to sell off a few from his personal library and I knew I had to act fast. I couldn’t afford the Buy It Now price, but it did have a “make an offer” option. I submitted my best offer and waited.

 

The next morning, I got a notification that the offer was accepted. Woo-hoo!!!!

 

I thanked the seller and told him that Red was coming to a good home and she’d live right beside the first edition/first printing Receipts. And a few days later, she arrived:

 

 

So thrilled!

Hard One to Write

So, the week following my mother's passing was slow and sad. I was sitting at her house, dreading going back to work. Couldn't imagine being able to sit at my desk without tearing up. Not to mention if anyone were to come up and express any kind of sorrow—even thinking of that got the waterworks going.

 

But I knew I needed to think about going home, back to my family and back to work. On Wednesday night, I got a phone call from a neighbor of Carolyn Leonard. Mrs. Leonard was having her final yard sale and wanted to be sure I came on Friday afternoon.

 

She had contacted me a few months earlier to come over and look through her cookbooks. I wasn't able to find the time since my Mom fell soon after and her passing followed a few months later.

 

Honestly, I felt guilty not being able to go over and meet with her earlier. But this was exactly what I needed to motivate me now to make the drive back home.

 

When I arrived at the house a few minutes before the start time, I noticed people were already inside. Oh boy, I hoped I wasn't too late.

 

As I walked through the house, I could tell that the sale had been going on for a while. I'd be lucky to find anything at this point.

 

In the living room, there were built-in bookshelves and I spied cookbooks. They'd definitely been picked through, but then I saw this just lying flat on the bookshelf:

 

 

Wow! Betty Feezor's Carolina Recipes Volume II?! Still here? I had a sense of relief wave through me. Now I could look through the rest feeling a little more relaxed.

 

A few more jumped out at me and I was able to snag these as well:

 

 

Tea Time at the Masters (Junior League of Augusta, GA), It’s Not Gourmet, It’s Better! (Eudora Garrison), Carolina Recipes Volume II (Betty Feezor) and The Food Lion Family Cookbook.

 

After these finds, I took a few more minutes and walked around the house. I even found this gorgeous footstool! Very Christmas-y, I think.

 

 

Now it was time to check out and finally head home. I saw Mrs. Leonard as I was leaving from the garage. She saw me from the top of the steps and said that she was hoping to see me a few months earlier. I could tell she was disappointed and a little cross with me. I struggled to find some words but the only thing that came out of my mouth was, "I lost my Mom this week."

 

The look on her face turned immediately to shock.  She quickly, but carefully, came down the steps and grabbed onto my arm. "I am so sorry," she said. Her grip on my arm was firm and shook as she said each word. We had a brief conversation and I’m relieved that I held it together without any tears.

 

A few months went by before I came across the small stack from this sale. For some reason, I found myself flipping through the Betty Feezor cookbook. Written on the inside of the back cover, I found an amazing surprise: a note from Betty’s husband, Turner.

 

 Feb. 26, 1978

To Mrs. Carolyn Leonard,

Betty asked me to send you this book and to thank you for your work on the scholarship fund. She is so pleased that young people are going to benefit from your work.

                                           Best wishes, Turner Feezor

 

I was astonished to find this note. It’s brief, touching and so unassuming…tucked away in the very back. A quiet thank you for helping his wife’s legacy live on with the Betty Feezor Scholarship program. And after doing a quick date check online, I find that this note, dated February 26, was written only two days before Betty passed.

 

I’m struggling to make a connection between my loss and finding this cookbook…but l am incredibly grateful that it found it’s way home with me.

Betty Didn't Want to Go to the Catskills

Three sales on my list for the morning. The first sale is all the way up in Concord at 7am, but it also started on Friday—so I’m not convinced I need to begin the morning up there. It listed “tons of cookbooks” but those could be gone by now.

 

The second sale is 7:30 am and it’s the same street as Voo Doo Economics. It’s a nice street and since I’m skipping the first sale, I’ll be showing up a few minutes early.

 

And guess what, it IS Voo Doo Economics’ house. There are several plastic bins of cookbooks, and I find these two:

 

 

Potsticker Chronicles (Stuart Chang Berman) and Build a Better Burger (James McNair).

 

The only sale I’ve got listed at 8am has a Matthews address and it mentioned “vintage cookbooks.” I ask Google to navigate me there and it turns out to only be 20 minutes away. I’ll be there a little before 8am, but it’s already bright out—so I’m sure I won’t be alone.

 

Sure enough, there’s already a couple of cars. I make my way up the driveway and there’s a couple talking over a set of dinner chairs. They are deciding that the chairs aren’t the right color and then wishing the lady having the sale luck on her move up to the Catskills. On a table, I spot some cookbooks. I go through them and select these:

 

 

Market to Market (Jr. Service League of Hickory, NC), Mama’s Recipes and other Cookbook (June Thompson Medlin), Seafood Cookery (Carteret County Extension Home Makers Clubs), Concord Cuisine (Jr. Charity League of Concord, NC) and The Grecian Plate (The Hellenic Ladies Society, St. Barbara Greek Orthodox Church, Durham, NC).

 

They are nice and yes, some are vintage! I pay for them and the lady mentions that she has more that need to come out. I ask, “do you mean cookbooks?” She says yes and I tell her that I’m happy to wait.

 

She spends a few minutes trying to move some more furniture out a patio door. Eventually, she comes out and says that it would be easier if I came inside and went through the cookbooks myself.

 

She leads me down a hallway and just around the corner is this bookshelf:

 

 

She tells me that she’s selling the spiral bound but that she wants to keep the hardbacks. That’s fine with me. In fact, that probably cuts down the amount of cookbooks to look through in half.

 

I’m look through the shelves and find a few. The real work is in the bottom part. I start a pile that keeps getting taller. There’s about 6 stacks of cookbooks in the bottom cabinet and I’m trying to be careful and deliberate about the ones I select. If they’re not first edition, first printing or super unique—they’re not making it to the pile.

 

And then, in the last stack; the next to last cookbook at the bottom:

next to last cookbook at the bottom:

 

Betty. Red cover. That’s the first one….grab it, put the stacks back in the cabinet, pay and go home!

 

Here’s the full haul from the bookshelf inside the house.

 

 

Top Row: What’s Cooking at Pleasant Grove (Pleasant Grove UMC, Charlotte, NC), It’s Not Gourmet, It’s Better! (Eudora Garrison), River Road Recipes II (Jr. League of Baton Rouge, LA), Perennials (Jr. Service League of Gainesville, GA), The St. Paul’s Sampler (St. Paul’s Churchwomen, Summerville, SC), Lunchin’ on the Levee (Memphis Light, Gas and Water Division Home Economists), and Bayou Cook Book (Thomas J. Holmes, Jr.).

 

Second Row: Mac Gregors Gathering Recipes 1980 (American Clan Gregor Society), A Cook’s Tour of the Azalea Coast (Auxiliary to the New Hanover, Pender, Brunswick County Medical Society, Wilmington, NC), The Quaker Cook Book (The Woman’s Auxiliary of High Points Friends Meeting, High Point, NC), Woman’s Exchange Cook Book (Memphis, TN), Out of This World Cook Book (The Cocoa Beach Woman’s Club, Cocoa Beach, FL), and Uptown Down South (Jr. League of Greenville, SC)

 

I think I pulled some back muscles lugging around the box….especially when the tape gave way and started to come apart.

 

Finally back home, I take a moment to look at Betty Feezor’s Best. I find a nice surprise on the top of the title page:

 

 

Something tells me Betty didn’t want to go to the Catskills. And I’m happy to have her at my home.

Birthday "Receipts"

So a few months back I tried to win an eBay auction for an early printing of Charleston Receipts by the Junior League of Charleston, SC. It was a fifth printing and I figured that was one of the earliest editions I’d come across. Needless to say, I ended up getting outbid right there at the end.

 

A few weeks ago, I was doing a search on eBay and came across another listing for a Charleston Receipts, but this one actually said “true first edition.” Hmmmmmmm. Really? Is that even possible? This didn’t come up in my usual search, it was listed at the bottom of the page—which meant it was listed slightly differently, enough so that I wouldn’t have come across it normally.

 

I clicked on the images and saw an inscription that was dated 1950. Unbelievable! It really looks like a first edition, first printing. The opening bid was a little on the high side, but if it’s the real deal, I could consider this a birthday present for myself and plan on a little extra padding on the maximum bid.

 

And then it happened, the auction ended and no one bid against me. Seriously? Was this listing so off the beaten path that no one else saw it? Don’t get me wrong, I’m really happy that I won it without having to blow my bank account.

 

The seller was up in Raleigh and the package arrived very quickly, within two days. When the mail arrived, I was on my way to the grocery store so I took the package with me. As I sat in the parking lot of the Food Lion, I couldn’t wait any longer. I opened up the box, unwrapped the layers of bubble wrap and tissue paper. As I opened up the cookbook, there was a smaller booklet tucked in.

 

Well…..that wasn’t in the eBay description. It’s a cool “nice to have” item, looks like a small booklet with recipes. The back cover has spaces for mailing addresses. So this is some kind of souvenir recipe booklet mailer. And then, to my dismay, I looked at the inscription:

 

My heart sank. It’s the wrong one. I looked at the page with the publication dates….not even close to an original printing:

Oh no. I bet the seller accidentally mailed out my first printing to the person that was meant to have this version. My mind started racing, that person would open up their package and notice that they got an original first printing…know exactly what it was and keep it. Ugh….

 

When I got back home, I logged on and went to the seller’s page. And there was another listing for a later edition Charleston Receipts with a booklet, the one that was at my side. So, maybe this was just an accident of shipping out the wrong one—not that both were sold and I’ll never get the one I won.

 

I sent an email to the seller and let them know what happened. They emailed back very quickly to apologize and said they forgot about having more than one copy of Charleston Receipts. And to my surprise, said to keep the one I had. What? I offered to ship it back so that they could still have the opportunity to sell it again but they said to keep it to make up for the disappointment I must have felt when I opened up the box only to see the wrong cookbook.

 

How nice, that was really generous!

 

Two days later, another box arrived and there was the inscription:

 

And when I got to the list of publication dates…I saw a lot of empty space:

 

It’s like the cookbook version of a unicorn! I didn’t think it actually existed but here it was! I feel like I’ve got a major addition to the collection here and I am so relieved to finally have it here.

Patience and the Pie Safe

If you follow me on Instagram (cookbookaholic), then you’ll remember the image I took of a Bob Timberlake Pie Safe during Easter. It’s been a fixture at one of the hotels we visit and I have loved it from the first time I saw it. Ever since, I’ve always wanted to get my own.

The only thing stopping me?  The price. And probably the small square footage in my house. It’s pretty cramped in here.

It has the look of an antique pie safe but it’s built more as a bookshelf. I thought it would make a great home for some of my cookbooks.  But, it wasn’t cheap and funds have always been tight at my house. If I was going to get one on my budget, I’d have to find it at a yard sale, estate sale or on Craigslist.

Sure, a thought did cross my mind….I could’ve tried to lift it from the hotel, but I’m sure a security camera would’ve captured it all on tape. Plus, no one from my church would’ve helped me get it in the back of my car. (side eye to you, Brad)

Over the years, I’ve kept up the vigil by doing searches in the furniture section of Craigslist. I’ve seen some very expensive pie safes listed. But I’ve never been able to find that Bob Timberlake pie safe. It was an expensive piece of furniture—some may even consider it heirloom worthy. This search may turn out to be a lengthy, decades-long quest.

Almost every week, when I do a Craigslist search for garage sales, I also do a quick search for pie safes just to see if I could ever come across someone trying to unload one. It’s been a long dry spell. The search results show the short list of familiar descriptions—all showing up in purple, noting that I’ve already clicked on them.

During this latest search, a couple of new listings showed up. One had a description with “decorative tin inserts.” I clicked on it and saw a beautiful pie safe. Then, as I looked more closely at the punched tin decoration, it looked very familiar. But the listing doesn’t mention anything about Bob Timberlake. Checking back to my Instagram photo, I compared the front panel design. This could finally be the moment…

A closer look at the info shows that the listing is 45 days old. 45 days? I’ve done the pie safe search within the past month, so why didn’t I see it before now? There’s another note that says the listing has been updated more recently—so whatever adjustments were made helped it to pop up during my search. The price tag was also a bit out of my reach, but let’s see if it’s still for sale.

After 45 days, I’m running a good chance that it’s already been snapped up by someone else. I responded to the listing and asked if it was still for sale and if there was any manufacturer info on the safe.

Within a short while, I get a response. It’s still for sale and the piece was made by Lexington. Still no mention of Bob Timberlake. The description mentions that the pie safe comes “as is,” so I reply and ask if it’s in good shape. The response: it’s all good.

My last concern is the price. I reply that the asking price is outside of my budget and offer a lower number. Not an insulting lower number, but a fair one. The email comes back: “that’s fine…can you pick it up tomorrow?”

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh myyyyyyyyyyyyyy gooooossshhhhhhhhhhhhh!

It’s almost mine.

I get the seller’s address and map it out. It’s less than 5 miles away.

Now to break the news to the guy that’s going to help me move it: the hubby.

I had already casually mentioned that I had a line on a really nice pie safe. Now I had to tell him that, not only had I committed to buy it—but that it needed to be moved. So, when I brought up the pie safe again, I said, “Remember the pie safe I’ve been looking at online? I think it’s the Bob Timberlake.”

“Oh, really? You’ve been looking for that a long time.”

The next day after church and lunch, we emailed that we were on our way. The neighborhood was very upscale. The driveway was very steep and the stairs were plenty, inside and out. The pie safe was up on the second floor in the hallway.

The lady selling the pie safe, June, was very nice. She and her partner had recently moved into the neighborhood and were looking to downsize. The pie safe was on the list of things that they were willing to let go. They had originally purchased it sixteen years ago in Atlanta and it had been a beloved part of their home together. They told me at Christmas, they would open up the pie safe’s door and display a collection of decorative bowls.

When I approached it, I opened up the top right drawer and saw the logo confirming it is the Bob Timberlake piece. It’s really here in front of me! I’m simultaneously shocked and relieved that I’ve finally found it. I think about it being listed and sitting there on craigslist for 45 days and then silently give a little prayer of thanks for keeping it there until I found it.

We check the rest of it out and it’s in almost pristine condition. There’s only a slight dent in the bottom shelf, but other than that, it looks showroom perfect.

I just need to pay for it and get it moved into the car.

Hubby and I get it down the stairs from the second to the ground floor. I guess I looked unhelpful or just plain sad because I was replaced in the moving process! The pie safe made it safely down the front steps to the car—which was probably the most crucial part of the journey. We got it into the car and off we went to the storage unit.

Ladies and Gentlemen, a quest that has been almost ten years long…the Bob Timberlake Pie Safe.

Now, to pay off a ton of credit card debt, find a house that can hold all the cookbooks and properly display this gorgeous pie safe. Talk about a quest—and it’ll probably take another ten years to get anywhere close to that!