Taste of Home set for Thursday here

The Taste of Home Cooking School is set for Thursday with vendor booths, door prizes, gift bags and culinary specialist Danielle Edmonds cooking up eight recipes.

The cooking show starts at 7 p.m., but Lynn Lambrecht, organizer for the Ingstad Family Media event, said the fun begins at 3 p.m. That’s when the doors open to the lobby of the Reiland Fine Arts Center with 15 area vendor booths ready with merchandise, demonstrations and door prizes. The vendors include booths from the Pampered Chef to Top Designers Salon and Spa.

“And Emma Rosie’s Home Cooking will have concessions,” Lambrecht said. “They will have food to purchase so people can eat before the cooking show.”

Lambrecht said this is the fifth time the Taste of Home Cooking School has been in Jamestown and it’s always a popular event. The first year, more than 1,400 showed up for the show in the Civic Center, she said. That was too many for the organizers. The Reiland’s DeNault Auditorium seats a maximum of 700, she said, so that will be the top number for the cooking show.

“It’s the No. 1 culinary demonstration in the country,” she said. “And the Taste of Home magazine has more subscribers than ‘Sports Illustrated.’”

Tickets are $6 and those attending get a gift bag with a Taste of Home cookbook worth $6, Lambrecht said, plus “it has all kinds of coupons, samples, recipes and merchandise from two different shows.”

Taste of Home accidentally sent gift bag items from the wrong show and didn’t want them returned, she said. So, for a $6 ticket people get a gift bag stuffed with “goodies.” Tickets are available at Lifestyle Appliance Center, Hugo’s and any Ingstad Family Media Broadcast Center.

The cooking show features Edmonds whipping up eight dishes from the cookbook in the gift bag during the hour and a half. Hugo’s is providing the groceries and Lifestyle the appliances. Lambrecht said volunteers will be doing the prep cooking on the eight dishes, otherwise the demonstration would take a lot longer.

“Four or five volunteers will be working behind the scenes,” she said.

Along with demonstrations, Edmonds will offer some cooking tips and tricks and give away door prizes. At the end of the show, even the food is given away as door prizes.

Lambrecht said she was told the Taste of Home recipes are nearly foolproof.

“But even if you don’t cook, it’s still a lot of fun to go,” she said.

Sun reporter Toni Pirkl can be reached at (701) 952-8453 or by e-mail at tonip@jamestownsun.com

Tags: in the area, community, cooking