The Family Cookbook Project

Category: Cooking Contests

  • Fun Food Competitions: From Pie Bake-Offs to Taco Challenges

    Family food competitions are a fantastic way to bring everyone together, and while chili cook-offs are popular, there are so many other types of food contests that can be just as fun and delicious! Whether your family loves baking, grilling, or making savory soups, there’s a food competition for everyone.

    Here are some fun food competition ideas and tips on how to host them:

    Types of Family Food Competitions:

    • Chili Cook-Off: A classic. Family members bring their own twist on chili—whether it’s spicy, meatless, or packed with a secret ingredient. Use blind tasting to determine the winner.
    • Pie Bake-Off: For families with a sweet tooth, a pie contest can be a hit. Encourage variety with fruit pies, cream pies, or even savory pies.
    • Soup Showdown: Perfect for cooler months. Have participants bring their best homemade soup, from hearty stews to light broths.
    • Barbecue Battle: Get those grills fired up! Whether it’s ribs, chicken, or burgers, everyone can showcase their best barbecue techniques.
    • Cookie Contest: This one’s a hit for families who love baking. Have everyone bake their favorite cookies, from classics like chocolate chip to more creative combinations.
    • Taco Challenge: Let participants create their own taco masterpieces. Provide a variety of tortillas, proteins, and toppings to get creative.
    • Pasta Potluck: A pasta competition lets family members try out different sauces, pasta types, and even stuffed varieties like ravioli.
    • Salad Smackdown: This healthy competition lets everyone show off their best salad recipes, from fruit salads to savory grain-based ones.
    • Pizza Party: Have a DIY pizza competition where each person makes their own pizza from scratch or uses pre-made dough, competing for best flavor combinations.

    Pre-Competition Planning

    Regardless of the type of food competition you choose, preparation is key to making the event fun and seamless:

    1. Invite Guests: Ask each participant to bring their dish fully prepared and ready to serve. Encourage them to bring their recipe, especially if you plan to compile a family cookbook later.
    2. Set a Limit on Entries: To avoid overwhelming everyone’s palate, set a maximum number of entries, like 10 dishes.
    3. Supplies: Ensure you have enough plates, bowls, or cups depending on the competition, and provide disposable utensils for easy cleanup.
    4. Name Tags: Label each dish with a name and a rating for spiciness, sweetness, or heat level if applicable.
    5. Ballots: Create ballots for guests to score each dish on taste, creativity, and overall impression. You can also include a space for comments.

    Food Tasting Set-Up

    For any competition, here’s how to create an easy and enjoyable tasting experience:

    1. Toppings or Add-Ons Bar: Whether it’s chili, tacos, or pizza, set up a toppings bar to let participants personalize their tasting experience. For chili, offer toppings like shredded cheese, onions, sour cream, or jalapeños. For pizza, consider extra cheeses, sauces, or veggies.
    2. Drinks: Offer a variety of drinks, from soft drinks to signature cocktails that match the theme of the competition.
    3. Power Strips for Slow Cookers: If you’re hosting a soup or chili cook-off, have power strips ready for multiple slow cookers to keep the dishes warm.

    Suggested Rules

    1. Keep the Cooks Anonymous: To prevent bias, keep the identity of the cooks secret until the winner is announced.
    2. Palate Cleansers: Provide water or crackers between tastings to help participants cleanse their palates and fairly assess each dish.
    3. Scoring: Ask guests to rate each dish and collect their ballots. Points can be tallied to determine the winner.
    4. Prizes: Offer fun prizes, such as “Best Overall,” “Most Creative,” or “Fan Favorite.” You can find themed prizes online or create your own homemade awards.
    5. Cookbook Creation: After the event, gather all the recipes and create a family cookbook. This can become a cherished tradition, with new entries added each year.

    Post-Event

    After your competition, consider creating a family cookbook that includes photos of the event, all the recipes, and funny or heartwarming memories. It’s a great way to preserve the moment and give everyone a lasting keepsake.

    No matter which type of food competition you choose, the goal is to have fun, enjoy great food, and make lasting memories!

     

    Bill Rice is Founder and Co-Publisher of the Family Cookbook Project, the leading online cookbook publisher with a website that helps families and individuals collect, preserve and share food memories by creating their own printed custom cookbooks. He is the author of The Wellfleet Oyster Cookbook and the Cape Cod Cocktail Cookbook (Available on Amazon), both created using FamilyCookbookProject.com. He is also editor of the Donovan Family Cookbook, now it’s third printing and is an avid genealogist tracing his family back to the 1600’s.

    Follow Family Cookbook Project on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter TikTok, YouTube and Pinterest!

  • Get Your Recipes in The Best of the Family Cookbook Project Cookbook!

    Get Your Recipes in The Best of the Family Cookbook Project Cookbook!

    Oct October 4th, we celebrate 20 years of helping families preserve treasured recipes, we are thrilled to announce a special project that will highlight the best of the best from our community. The “Best of the Family Cookbook Project” cookbook will be a collection of standout recipes from the thousands of family and fundraising cookbooks that have been created using our website. This cookbook aims to become a cherished addition to kitchens nationwide and online, and we need your help to make it a success!

    Why Participate?

    Participating in this project is not only a fantastic opportunity to showcase your culinary talents, but it’s also a way to make your family proud. Imagine your family’s cherished recipes being shared and enjoyed by people all over the country. By contributing, you will be part of a legacy that preserves and celebrates family traditions for future generations.

    Who Can Participate?

    Whether you have published one cookbook, multiple cookbooks, or have yet to see your masterpiece in print, we want your help. We are inviting all our cookbook editors to contribute your best recipes to this worthy project.

    How to Submit Your Recipes

    Submitting your recipes is simple and straightforward. Here’s how you can be part of this exciting project:

    1. Log into your Editor Account: Look for the Green Button and click on it to be taken to the Best Recipe Selection Tool.
    2. Select Your Best Recipe: Choose the best recipes from your cookbook. Remember, we are looking for recipes that are special to your family. They don’t have to be complex; they just need to be tried-and-true favorites that hold a special place in your family’s heart.
    3. Categorize Your Recipe: Once you have selected your recipe, choose the appropriate category. We have our standard eight categories to choose from:
      • Appetizers & Beverages
      • Bread and Muffins
      • Soups, Stews, Salads, and Sauces
      • Main Courses: Beef, Pork, and Lamb
      • Main Courses: Seafood, Poultry, Pasta, and Casseroles
      • Vegetables and Vegetarian Dishes
      • Desserts, Pies, Cakes, and Cookies
      • Miscellaneous
    4. Enter Your Recipe: Click on the “Enter this recipe!” button and move on to the next category. You can select a maximum of one recipe per category from your cookbook. If you have a photo of the dish, you can upload that to your recipe before selecting it. You can always come back later and change your selection if needed.

    What Makes a Great Submission?

    When choosing which recipes to submit, consider the following tips:

    • Special to Your Family: We are looking for recipes that are more than just delicious. They should have a special meaning to your family, perhaps a dish that has been passed down through generations or one that is always requested at family gatherings.
    • Personal Notes: Tell the reader why this recipe is important to you and your family, the source of the original recipe or events that this recipe was served.
    • Exciting Names: Try to pick recipes that have exciting or unique names. A catchy name can make a recipe stand out.
    • Visual Appeal: If you have a photo of the dish, please upload it. A picture can say a thousand words and make your recipe even more appealing.

    Deadline for Submission

    The deadline for recipe submissions is July 30th. Make sure to get your recipes in before this date to be considered for inclusion in the cookbook. Once we have received all the submissions, our editors will select the best of the best. If your recipe is chosen, you will be notified, and the contributor’s name and the name of the original cookbook will be included in the nationally released cookbook. You will also recipe a discount on pre-ordering the cookbook in September!

    Join Us in Celebrating 20 Years

    This cookbook is more than just a collection of recipes. It’s a celebration of 20 years of preserving family traditions and creating culinary heirlooms. By participating, you are contributing to a project that honors the essence of family and the joy of cooking together.

    We thank you for your continued support of the Family Cookbook Project. Over the past two decades, we have worked hard to create a website that is easy to use and helps families create treasured heirlooms. This cookbook is the culmination of that effort, and we couldn’t have done it without you.

    So, what are you waiting for? Dive into your collection, pick out your best recipes, and submit them today. Let’s make this 20th-anniversary cookbook a celebration of family, tradition, and the love of good food.

    Don’t miss out on this opportunity to be part of something truly special. Submit your recipes by July 30th and join us in celebrating two decades of family cooking and traditions. We can’t wait to see what you bring to the table!

    Thank you for being a part of our family and for helping us create a cookbook that will be cherished for generations to come.

    Happy Cooking!

  • Family Cookbook Project’s 20th Anniversary Membership Giveaway

    Family Cookbook Project’s 20th Anniversary Membership Giveaway

    In celebration of Family Cookbook Project’s 20th anniversary, we will be giving away at least 20 Lifetime Memberships to followers of our social media accounts.

    To enter, please follow the rules of that specific post. Generally, it will include commenting on or posting a photo in connection with that specific giveaway. Each giveaway will also include the opportunity to upgrade the prize to include free printed copies of your finished personal cookbook or Lifetime Memberships for friends or family members that you have tagged in your response post.

    Giveaway opportunities will be posted on Tuesdays with a entry deadline of the following Monday at noon EST. Winners will be announced on Monday afternoons online and on this blog post.

    To participate, follow Family Cookbook Project on social media:

    Facebook Company Page

    Pinterest

    Instagram

    X (formerly Twitter)

    Facebook BBQ Recipes Group

    Facebook Cool Cookie Recipes Group

    Here are the complete rules of 20 anniversary familycookbookproject.com membership giveaways on social media.

    • Winners will be selected at random from those who enter unless otherwise noted in the post. Decisions of the judges are final.
    • Winners will receive a message from familycookbookproject.com containing a link and voucher code for the stated prize. Winner’s names will be posted on our social media once selected.
    • No purchase necessary: you do not need to make a purchase to enter, and purchases don’t increase your chances of winning.
    • Any image submitted as an entry for the giveaway remains the property of its copyright owner. Family Cookbook Project receives right to use those photos for its marketing efforts.
    • This promotion is not endorsed, sponsored, or administered by Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest or X (formerly Twitter) and that none of these social media networks are associated with it.
    • Taxes, if any, are the responsibility of the winner.

    For prizes that include printed copies of a cookbook, winners will receive a print credit for 1, 3, 5 or 10 printed copies of a custom cookbook! This covers up to 50 recipes averaging two per page (about 40 pages total !!) with dividers and 10 color photos. Winners can print as many personalized cookbooks as that want and will receive a credit for $41 (1 book), $123 (3 books) $186 (5 books) or $236 (10 books). To be applied toward the total Printing Calculator price to add more. The credit must be used on one order for at least the number of cookbooks stated in the credit.

     

    Winners List

    Here are the winners of the Family Cookbook Project 20th anniversary Lifetime Membership Giveaway.

    July 15 Winner: Alex S. on Facebook

     

  • How To Hold A Family Cook-Off

    How To Hold A Family Cook-Off

    Chili is always a family favorite and most families have many chili recipes depending on the branch. A fun event for bringing the family together is to host a chili cook off where everyone brings a crockpot full of chili and a blind tasting is used to determine which chili will win the prize that year.

    Here are some rules and guidelines we at Family Cookbook Project use when our family has a chili cook off.

    Pre-Chili Cook-Off Planning

    • Invite guests to bring their best chili in a slow cooker, hot and ready to serve. Encourage a variety – meatless, spicy, white, or surprise ingredient. Have them bring their recipes as well.
    • Not everyone has to bring chili but make sure you have no more than 10 options for people to try otherwise they will get overloaded and not be able to tell the difference between each participant.
    • Make sure you have enough bowls and spoons or buy disposables so everyone can have a separate spoon for each chili.
    • Make Chili Name Tags with the name of each chili, a rating for heat level and the entry number.
    • Make enough ballots so each guest has a ballot for each chili. The ballot should have entry numbers from 1 to 10, a space where the taster can rank them from 1 to 10 and a third column for notes.

    Chili-Tasting Set-Up

    • Just before the guests arrive, set up a Chili Toppings Bar—offer a variety of chili toppings and “go-withs “. Include shredded cheese, chopped onions, tomatoes, olives, bell peppers, sliced jalapenos and sour cream for toppings. You can get these ready the day before. Just cover and refrigerate until needed. Great go-withs include crackers, corn bread, tortillas and corn chips.
    • You may want to invest in several power strips to plug-in the crockpots spread out among among several outlets, so you don’t pop a circuit breaker.
    • Offer a variety of drinks; soft drinks, beer and maybe even a signature cocktail. You can also add a tossed green salad and dessert to round out the meal.

     

    Suggested Rules of the Cook-Off 

    • Keep the name of the cook of each chili secret—as to not throw the vote!
    • Invite your guests to taste a spoonful of each chili and fill out a ballot for their favorite before eating it as a meal. Disposable spoons makes this more sanitary. Have them clean their palate between tastings with a little water or soda cracker.
    • Have guests rate each chili on the ballot. The chili with the most points wins!
    • Announce the maker of each chili and then announce the winner.
    • Award prizes – grand prize, hottest, most creative, or easiest for just a few ideas. Amazon.com has some great chili contest recipes that you’ll find here.
    • Add each of the recipes to your family cookbook. You can even create a stand-a-lone chili cookbook to share with family and friends.

    If in doubt you can always check with the experts at the International Chili Society. They have a whole laundry list of rules and regulations for how a chili cook-off should be run.

    Post-Chili Cook-Off 

    Gather all of the recipes from the event, along with photos of everyone having fun and put together a small Chili cookbook for everyone who attended so that the event can be relived for years to come.

    At the end of the day, you want everyone to have fun and enjoy the food.

     

    Bill Rice love chili is Founder and Co-Publisher of the Family Cookbook Project, the leading online cookbook publisher with a website that helps families and individuals collect, preserve and share food memories by creating their own printed custom cookbooks. He is the author of The Wellfleet Oyster Cookbook and the Cape Cod Cocktail Cookbook (Available on Amazon), both created using FamilyCookbookProject.com. He is also editor of the Donovan Family Cookbook, now it’s third printing and is an avid genealogist tracing his family back to the 1600’s.

    Follow Family Cookbook Project on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter TikTok, YouTube and Pinterest!

  • How to Host a Chili Cook-off

    How to Host a Chili Cook-off

    Chili is always a family favorite and most families have many chili recipes depending on the branch. A fun event for bringing the family together is to host a chili cook off where everyone brings a crockpot full of chili and a blind tasting is used to determine which chili will win the prize that year.

    Here are some rules and guidelines we at Family Cookbook Project use when our family has a chili cook off.

    Pre-Chili Cook-Off Planning

    • Invite guests to bring their best chili in a slow cooker, hot and ready to serve. Encourage a variety – meatless, spicy, white, or surprise ingredient. Have them bring their recipes as well.
    • Not everyone has to bring chili but make sure you have no more than 10 options for people to try otherwise they will get overloaded and not be able to tell the difference between each participant.
    • Make sure you have enough bowls and spoons or buy disposables so everyone can have a separate spoon for each chili.
    • Make Chili Name Tags with the name of each chili, a rating for heat level and the entry number.
    • Make enough ballots so each guest has a ballot for each chili. The ballot should have entry numbers from 1 to 10, a space where the taster can rank them from 1 to 10 and a third column for notes.

    Chili-Tasting Set-Up

    • Just before the guests arrive, set up a Chili Toppings Bar—offer a variety of chili toppings and “go-withs “. Include shredded cheese, chopped onions, tomatoes, olives, bell peppers, sliced jalapenos and sour cream for toppings. You can get these ready the day before. Just cover and refrigerate until needed. Great go-withs include crackers, corn bread, tortillas and corn chips.
    • You may want to invest in several power strips to plug-in the crockpots spread out among among several outlets, so you don’t pop a circuit breaker.
    • Offer a variety of drinks; soft drinks, beer and maybe even a signature cocktail. You can also add a tossed green salad and dessert to round out the meal.

    Suggested Rules of the Cook-Off 

    • Keep the name of the cook of each chili secret—as to not throw the vote!
    • Invite your guests to taste a spoonful of each chili and fill out a ballot for their favorite before eating it as a meal. Disposable spoons makes this more sanitary. Have them clean their palate between tastings with a little water or soda cracker.
    • Have guests rate each chili on the ballot. The chili with the most points wins!
    • Announce the maker of each chili and then announce the winner.
    • Award prizes – grand prize, hottest, most creative, or easiest for just a few ideas. Amazon.com has some great chili contest recipes that you’ll find here.
    • Add each of the recipes to your family cookbook. You can even create a stand-a-lone chili cookbook to share with family and friends.

    If in doubt you can always check with the experts at the International Chili Society. They have a whole laundry list of rules and regulations for how a chili cook-off should be run.

    Post-Chili Cook-Off 

    Gather all of the recipes from the event, along with photos of everyone having fun and put together a small Chili cookbook for everyone who attended so that the event can be relived for years to come.

    At the end of the day, you want everyone to have fun and enjoy the food.

     

    Bill Rice loves Chili and is Publisher of the Family Cookbook Project which helps families and individuals create personalized cookbooks to preserve recipes for future generations. Learn more at FamilyCookbookProject.comyCookbookProject.com

     

  • Make Money With Your Recipes

    Make Money With Your Recipes

    Are you really creative when it comes to creating interesting new food combinations? Would you like to make some money cooking, not to mention earning some fame and recognition for your abilities in the kitchen?

    Then maybe entering recipes contests might be for you!

    Each year hundreds of companies host competitions for creating recipes using their products. It’s a great way to raise awareness of a particular food, like the Gnarly Head Ribs Recipe Contest or a cooking style, like the Healthy Your Way Recipe Contest.

    Here are some tips on how you can become an “Award-winning” recipe creator:

    Know the deadline: Most recipe competitions have a specific deadline that you have to submit before. Miss it and your recipe won’t even be considered.

    Make sure you’re eligible: Some cooking contests are only for individuals of a specific state, age group or subscribers of the sponsoring magazine. Know who can win before you spend the time creating.

    Don’t submit something you found on the Internet: If it is not yours, don’t enter it. If you started with a standard recipe and changed it, you should be ok.

    Include a photo: Food always looks better in a photo than on a list of ingredients and directions. Show your food off for the recipe judges and you’ll increase your chances to win.

    Know what the prize is:  A recipe contest with a $5,000 first prize will have a lot more competition than one with a $500 prize or a Kindle for the winner. All are fun to win, but expect the bigger the prize, the more work you will have to put in to have a winning recipe entry.

    Have fun: At the end of the day, you want to have fun making new recipes and entering recipe contests. Remember, I don’t know anyone who makes a living at winning recipe competitions.

    Save your recipes: You might only select one of two recipes to submit to a particular recipe competition, but you might stumble across several recipes that your family and friends may love. Use FamilyCookbookProject.com to store your recipes and pull them up later when it’s time to feed your family something new!

     

    Bill Rice is Co-Publisher of the Great Family Cookbook Project, a website that helps families and individuals collect, preserve and share food memories by creating their own printed personal cookbooks. He is the author of The Wellfleet Oyster Cookbook (Available on Amazon) and the Cape Cod Cocktail Cookbook, both created using FamilyCookbookProject.com. He is also editor of the Donovan Family Cookbook, now it’s third printing.

    Follow Family Cookbook Project on Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest!

     

  • $10,000 Burger Contest

    $10,000 Burger Contest

    The Food Network is holding a contest to see who can create the best Blended Burger and the winners gets $10,000. Create your original spin on a blended burger using at least 25% chopped cultivated* mushrooms in the patty and upload your recipe and a photo of the burger to the competition website and if you’re burger is selected, you’ll be $10,000 richer!

    Wendy Tien of Saint Paul won the home cook division with the Buffalo Chicken Blended Burger, a mushroom-chicken burger topped with celery salad and blue cheese mayo.
    Alison Fagan of New York City created Bánh Mì Blended Burger, a pork-beef-shiitake burger loaded with pickled veggies and fried mushrooms to take top honors in the professional category.

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

    Bill Rice is Co-Publisher of the Great Family Cookbook Project, a website that helps families and individuals collect, preserve and share food memories by creating their own printed personal cookbooks. He is the author of The Wellfleet Oyster Cookbook (Available on Amazon) and the Cape Cod Cocktail Cookbook, both created using FamilyCookbookProject.com. He is also editor of the Donovan Family Cookbook, now it’s third printing. He also loves to grill hamburgers!

    Follow Family Cookbook Project on Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest!

  • The 2022 Old Farmer’s Almanac Bananas Recipe Contest

    The 2022 Old Farmer’s Almanac Bananas Recipe Contest

    Every year, The Old Farmer’s Almanac invites readers to enter a recipe contest. The topic for the 2022 edition is recipes using bananas.

    Your challenge is to go beyond banana bread. Bananas are so versatile—and a delicious ingredient in many breakfast, dinner, dessert, and drink recipes.

    Great taste, creativity, and uniqueness are all appreciated.

    One recipe per person.

    Entries must be yours, original, and unpublished.

    Open to amateur cooks only.

    Entry Deadline: January 28, 2022

    How To Enter

    Contest Rules

    Prizes:

    1st Place – $300.00
    2nd Place – $200.00
    3rd Place – $100.00

    Winners will appear in The 2023 Old Farmer’s Almanac.

     

     

  • 2021 Call Me Betty Crocker Recipe Contest

    2021 Call Me Betty Crocker Recipe Contest

    You could win your very own Betty Crocker packaging featuring your unique recipe on pack!

    Just submit your favorite recipe featuring an eligible Betty Crocker product, a photo of your finished baked good, and tell us the story of why this recipe is special to you and who or what you’re celebrating.

    Will it be the deliciously delightful brownies you whipped up for kindergarten graduation? Or your famous “just because it’s Friday” chocolate pie recipe?

    We want to celebrate Bettys everywhere – and encourage everyone, from novice bakers to seasoned pros, to try on the title.

    Entry Deadline: December 31, 2021

    How To Enter

    Contest Rules

    Grand Prize (3) – A personalized Betty Crocker Cake mix box that includes winner’s Photo Submission on back (no cake mix included) and a Betty Crocker prize package.

     

  • How To Win Recipe Contests

    How To Win Recipe Contests

    Here are a few tips for increasing your chances to win a recipe contest found on Cooking Contest Central.

    Follow the rules.
    You don’t want to miss out because you took a short cut. This is probablyhttp://www.recipecontests.com/tips.html the most important. If you omit something because you don’t think it’s important, it could disqualify you.

    Play the name game.
    A creative and unusual name will get the judges’ attention. Descriptive words that capture the feeling of your dish add to its overall interest. A catchy name is good except if the rules specify no catchy names, of course.

    What is currently a hot food topic?
    Check out some food magazines and see what everybody is talking about. If southwest flavoring is hot, then think about adding a southwest twist to your recipe. Even if you are submitting a tried-and-true dish from your favorite family cookbook, you might want to give it a trendy new twist. Judges seem to favor recipes that have a popular twist.

    Keep it simple.
    Make sure your ingredients can be found at most markets. Complicated recipes don’t often win.

    Appearance is very important.
    It might taste delicious, but, if it doesn’t look good, it doesn’t have a chance .

     

    Bill Rice is founder and Co-Publisher of the Great Family Cookbook Project, a website that helps families and individuals collect and share food memories through customized printed cookbooks filled with treasured recipes. Follow us on Facebook and Pinterest!