Community Cookbook
Thank you for your interest in submitting to the Adult Groceries community cookbook! Please read all of the guidelines below.
Submissions are due April 30th.
What We Want
We want your back pocket homemade ice cream recipe, your dinner-for-half-the-town roast chicken, the recipe you created out of thin air after making eyes at someone on the pasta aisle, the ugliest thing you’ve ever made, the thing you burnt, a doodle of your favorite dish or market, the recipe you make when you’re trying to get laid, a dish you don’t even like to eat but are really good at making (it happens), the weirdest thing that’s ever happened to you that’s even remotely relevant to food or cooking, the first time you tried a new fruit or veg, the thing you puked and can never eat again, the dish your dog ate off the counter, etc. Oh, and drinks are welcome too. Even just your favorite glass to drink water out of. And the window you prefer to look out of while you do it.
We want your back pocket homemade ice cream recipe, your dinner-for-half-the-town roast chicken, the recipe you created out of thin air after making eyes at someone on the pasta aisle, the ugliest thing you’ve ever made, the thing you burnt, a doodle of your favorite dish or market, the recipe you make when you’re trying to get laid, a dish you don’t even like to eat but are really good at making (it happens), the weirdest thing that’s ever happened to you that’s even remotely relevant to food or cooking, the first time you tried a new fruit or veg, the thing you puked and can never eat again, the dish your dog ate off the counter, etc. Oh, and drinks are welcome too. Even just your favorite glass to drink water out of. And the window you prefer to look out of while you do it.
Roots of the Community Cookbook
The community cookbook came out of early american women’s folk organizing—first created and sold to raise funds for those suffering during the civil war, circa 1860s, and later as a tool for other social, historical, and political groups. These collaborative books contained recipes, poetry, advice, and other homesteading information; were often fully typewritten by hand, and decorated and designed by local artists.
Now these books serve as an archival source, preserving local histories through food-ways, much like Renee's own grandmother’s bright yellow “Our Iowa Heritage Cook Book” with a recipe on how to make corn vinegar from scratch. We aim to capture and share our unique community’s food imprint with our own version of the community cookbook.
Sources:
Humble and Historic Community Cookbooks and Their Ability to Preserve a People and Place in Time, Erica Lovelace Cooks, Medium, 2021
Long Before Social Networking, Community Cookbooks Ruled The Stove, Jessica Stoller-Conrad, The Salt, NPR, 2012
Community Cookbooks as a Socio-Historic and Cultural Documents, Janice Bluestein Longone, What America Ate
A Poetical Cook-Book, Maria J. Moss, The Project Gutenberg eBook of A Poetical Cook-Book
New Jersey's Charitable Cooks: A Checklist of Fund-Raising Cook Books Published in New Jersey (1879-1915), Margaret Cook
The community cookbook came out of early american women’s folk organizing—first created and sold to raise funds for those suffering during the civil war, circa 1860s, and later as a tool for other social, historical, and political groups. These collaborative books contained recipes, poetry, advice, and other homesteading information; were often fully typewritten by hand, and decorated and designed by local artists.
Now these books serve as an archival source, preserving local histories through food-ways, much like Renee's own grandmother’s bright yellow “Our Iowa Heritage Cook Book” with a recipe on how to make corn vinegar from scratch. We aim to capture and share our unique community’s food imprint with our own version of the community cookbook.
Sources:
Humble and Historic Community Cookbooks and Their Ability to Preserve a People and Place in Time, Erica Lovelace Cooks, Medium, 2021
Long Before Social Networking, Community Cookbooks Ruled The Stove, Jessica Stoller-Conrad, The Salt, NPR, 2012
Community Cookbooks as a Socio-Historic and Cultural Documents, Janice Bluestein Longone, What America Ate
A Poetical Cook-Book, Maria J. Moss, The Project Gutenberg eBook of A Poetical Cook-Book
New Jersey's Charitable Cooks: A Checklist of Fund-Raising Cook Books Published in New Jersey (1879-1915), Margaret Cook
Reciprocity & Transparency
In alignment with it’s mutual aid roots, the funds raised from this community cookbook will be split equally and donated in full to Tampa Food Not Bombs, Queer Expression St Pete and the Louisiana Abortion Fund. We will offer all contributors a free copy of the community cookbook. It will also be available to the general public for reasonable additional cost in order to raise the funds.
Adult Groceries is NOT for-profit, and it’s very important to us to provide full transparency to our contributors and the broader community. As an independent publisher, run soley by two editors with other day jobs, we offer our limited time and resources as a service to the community.
Despite our own capacity, we strongly believe in reciprocity and that you should always be compensated for your work in whatever way that you see fit. Understanding that there is no monetary compensation upon submitting your work to us is your right, and our responsibility to communicate. We appreciate your trust in us as we work to create more accessible and communal spaces.
Please reach out to adultgroceries@gmail.com with any questions or concerns. We may have slight delays in answering emails, but we will always get back to you!
In alignment with it’s mutual aid roots, the funds raised from this community cookbook will be split equally and donated in full to Tampa Food Not Bombs, Queer Expression St Pete and the Louisiana Abortion Fund. We will offer all contributors a free copy of the community cookbook. It will also be available to the general public for reasonable additional cost in order to raise the funds.
Adult Groceries is NOT for-profit, and it’s very important to us to provide full transparency to our contributors and the broader community. As an independent publisher, run soley by two editors with other day jobs, we offer our limited time and resources as a service to the community.
Despite our own capacity, we strongly believe in reciprocity and that you should always be compensated for your work in whatever way that you see fit. Understanding that there is no monetary compensation upon submitting your work to us is your right, and our responsibility to communicate. We appreciate your trust in us as we work to create more accessible and communal spaces.
Please reach out to adultgroceries@gmail.com with any questions or concerns. We may have slight delays in answering emails, but we will always get back to you!
Working Towards Equity
We are particularly interested in hearing from unpublished and amateur writers and artists; especially those who identify as queer, trans or non-binary; are neurodiverse; are Indigenous, Black, or people of color, or are a part of communities that have historically been under-represented in the publishing world of food and cooking.
Ethical Recipe Sharing
Please don’t submit any copyrighted material that you don’t have the rights to. Do your own work and reference your sources. If you are submitting a recipe that is not your own (for example: your grandmother's recipe that she passed on to you), please make that clear in your submission. We encourage you to incorporate that history into the recipe itself.
Please don’t submit any copyrighted material that you don’t have the rights to. Do your own work and reference your sources. If you are submitting a recipe that is not your own (for example: your grandmother's recipe that she passed on to you), please make that clear in your submission. We encourage you to incorporate that history into the recipe itself.