200 Posts, a King Arthur Giveaway, and Some Fun Links!

If you know my blog, you know that in any given post there's likely to be some math lurking somewhere, ready to pounce on you and make you scream or break out in a cold sweat. So, I'll just cut to the chase and give some numbers and calculations right here at the front end, but there are some rewards here too!

(a) - This is my 200th post.

(b) - I've been blogging just over 40 weeks, so that works out to a steady rate of just under 5 posts per week.

(c) - I will give one of you lucky readers a gift certificate to King Arthur Flour., in an amount equal to one dime per blog post since the inception of The Dogs Eat the Crumbs - yep, that's $20.00 for you to spend on anything King Arthur sells. My blog has spent a bunch of time lately exploring yeast recipes, and I'll credit King Arthur with getting me started with bread baking - with some delicious and easy recipes, and with ingredients and equipment to ensure success. But you don't have to bake with yeast to love King Arthur! They have a cool print catalog and an online version - including the latest sale items. You could choose one (or more) pieces of bakeware (the bake-and-give disposable pans are very cool) or an assortment of ingredients, or a few fun gadgets!

There is nothing tricky about this giveaway. No hoops to jump through or stories to recount. No math whatsoever! Just leave me a comment before 11:00 PM EDT, May 1, 2009. Include your name and a way to contact you (a blog url or an email address). I'll assign one entry for each different person who comments, and will use a random number generator to come up with a winner. I have an actual gift card that I can mail to you, but - and here's the best part - you can start using the certificate immediately after winning - once I email you the certificate number!

OK, so when I figured the amount of this gift certificate, I though it was cool that a dime for each blog post equals $20.00. Of course, being me, there were a few more calculations. What if I got paid by the post? Hmm, a dollar per post - I'd have $200 in my pocket. $5 per post would leave me $1000 richer. Wow, what if I were to get an hourly wage for my blogging time? Given how much time I've sunk into writing 200 posts, that would be real money! Which sort of brings the question of "opportunity cost" (and "waste of time") into sharp focus...


Well, while I'm on the subject of wasting time, just in case you are looking for some food-related sites to explore, here are some of the ones that I've found interesting lately:

---The 50 best British recipes, as solicited by the Guardian:
Simple recipes
Medium recipes
Difficult recipes

---The oh-so-talented baker Rose Levy Berenbaum was commissioned by epicurious to write an article called "how to cook - bread"

---The Times Online lists the Top 10 Blogs for Home Cooks.

---Check out "blogs with bite" - a semiregular listing of really interesting food blogs. Here are the last 3 editions:
blogs-with-bite-9
blogs-with-bite-8
blogs-with-bite-7

---Here's a cool link to 39 recipes by Suzanne Goin

--- Saveur has a fascinating glimpse of what cookbooks are on the shelves of professional chefs.

Cookie dough makes us happy!