What inspired you to write your book?
It was inspired by my husband, who is just ridiculous about his love for hops – he’ll snack on them, right off the bine!
Over the past few years, I’ve played around with the use of hops in cooking, but there’s not really a ton out there on it… so I had to experiment, develop my own techniques, etc. It’s been a lot of fun, and really tasty – hops are a great way to add unique flavour and interest to food.
So, I ended up writing a whole book on cooking with hops – the first of its kind. It covers everything from buying the various forms of hops, to growing your own, to the organic chemistry involved in the flavours of hops, and how to extract them. There are recipes for hop shoots, leaves, and – mostly! – the flowers.
It’s a great book for anyone who likes to experiment with new flavours – you don’t even have to like beer, to benefit from the use of hops in cooking!
About your Book:
Hops are prized for their ability to impart varied, complex flavours to beer… but did you know they can also be used culinarily?
As a recipe developer / cookbook author married to an enthusiastic hophead, Marie Porter has created many amazing recipes featuring the bitter flower. These recipes have been wildly popular not only with her friends and family, but on her food & lifestyle blog, Celebration Generation. Now, she has developed an entire cookbook of hop recipes – the first of its kind!
While hops may seem like a bizarre or exotic item to cook with, it’s the same as using other herbs and spices in your kitchen… you just have to know what to do with them!
From condiments, sides, and main dishes, to beverages and desserts, Porter shares delicious recipes utilizing hops of various flavour profiles – playing up their unique characteristics – to create recipes full of complex flavour. . Much like salt or lemon juice can be added to dishes to perk them up, a small amount of hops – used wisely, and with specific techniques to do so in a balanced fashion – can really make a dish sing.
Even those who are not fans of beer will love the unique flavours that various types of hops can bring to their plate. Floral, earthy, peppery, citrusy… Cooking with hops is a great way to expand your seasoning arsenal!
“Hedonistic Hops” includes helpful information on growing and harvesting fresh hops at home. Hops are easy to grow, look beautiful, and provide even more bounty than you’d expect: The leaves and shoots are also edible, and delicious! Hedonistic Hops includes recipes for using not only the cone/flower of the hop plant, but also the leaves and shoots. Spoiler: Hop leaves taste even better than grape leaves!
In addition to home grown hops,“Hedonistic Hops” contains straight forward information on how to obtain and use the various forms of commercially available hops – Fresh, dried, pellets, etc.
Hedonistic Hops: The HopHeads’ Guide to Kitchen Badassery includes over 50 recipes, and feature gorgeous full colour photography for each recipe. Measurements are provided in both US and metric units.
Cuisine Style or Food Genre
General
Sample Recipe or Food Advice
Hoppy Citrus-IPA Glazed Wings
Vegetable Oil for deep frying
4 lbs chicken wings & drummies
Salt
1 cup IPA of choice
1/2 cup fresh hops, divided (We used Centennial) OR 1/4 cup dried hops, divided
1 cup liquid honey
1 jalapeno, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, pressed or finely minced
Juice and zest of 1 orange
Heat oil 375 degrees F. You can use a deep fryer, or a heavy pan. If not using a deep fryer, use a deep, heavy pot, filled to at least 3″ deep. Sprinkle chicken generously with salt, allow to air dry while preparing glaze.
In a medium saucepan, bring IPA and 1/2 of the hops to a boil. Turn heat down to medium-low, simmer until it has reduce to about half the original volume. (Just eyeball it!).
Once IPA has reduced, add honey, jalapeno, cloves, orange zest/juice, and a pinch of salt. Bring back up to a simmer, simmer for about 10 minutes. Add remaining hops, simmer for 5 more minutes. Pour glaze through wire strainer, discarding solids left behind. Return to pot and keep warm while preparing chicken wings.
Fry chicken wings in batches of about a dozen pieces each – allowing oil to come back up to temperature between each batch – until golden brown. (About 10-15 minutes per batch). Transfer fried wings to a large bowl, toss with glaze, and serve hot!
What formats are your books in: Print
How do you see writing a food/cookbook as different from writing other genres of books?
As someone who’s also written a disaster memoir (“Twisted: A Minneapolis Tornado Memoir”) and several sewing manuals… I’d say that the process of writing a cookbook is far more exacting.
With my sewing manuals, it’s about photos, and describing what’s in the photos. It’s talking in generalities, so that the reader can best apply your information to their situation.
With cookbooks, you need to pay a lot of attention to the information, conversions, formatting, and accuracy. Especially with baking books, you need to be incredibly specific – there’s not the level of adaptability that I have to write into sewing manuals, for example.
Advice to someone that is thinking about or currently working on a food book or cookbook
Know your voice, and use it. Cookbooks are part of a VERY saturated market, so standing out is important. Know what sets you, your voice, and your recipes apart from others out there.
How did you decide how to publish your book and where is it published through:
My book is published through my company – Celebration Generation – and distributed through Ingram.
I did a lot of research before I settled on how I wanted to publish. From everything I came across, I decided that traditional publishing was not for me, for myriad reasons: Control, lifespan, and profitability, mostly.
I did cave in and accept a contract with a reputable publisher at one point, though… and that just served to confirm my decisions about self publishing. I will likely never see a dime in profit from my work on that book, while they continue to profit from it.
Author Bio:
Marie Porter is an Aspergian polymath, which is just a fancy way of saying that she knows a lot of stuff – and does even more stuff – with a brain that runs on a different operating system than most.
Because of that OS, her career has spanned across many facets: She’s a trained mixologist, competitive cake artist, professional costumer, and – last but not least – author. As of 2016, her written works include 6 cookbooks, 6 specialty sewing manuals, and a tornado memoir.
Her work has graced magazines and blogs around the world, she has costumed for Olympians and professional wrestlers, has baked for brides, celebrities, and even Klingons. Marie is now proud to share her wealth of multi-disciplinary knowledge and experience with cooks and seamstresses around the world.
Website(s)
Author Home Page Link
Link To Book On Amazon
Link to Book on Barnes and Noble
Link to Book for sale via other sites
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