Description

What is the Cooks in Parks Cookbook?

Cooks in Parks is a spiral-bound, full-color cookbook of recipes contributed by the people who spend their working lives on public lands in South Dakota, Wyoming, and beyond. Park store managers, rangers, interpreters, volunteers, and regional food enthusiasts all sent in family recipes, trail favorites, and kitchen staples. The result is a cookbook that reads like a potluck table at a park staff gathering: some classic American home cooking, some Great Plains and Black Hills regional dishes, a lot of food you can actually put on a weeknight table.

The book is a joint publication of four cooperating associations: Black Hills Parks & Forests Association, Badlands Natural History Association, Devils Tower Natural History Association, and Mount Rushmore Bookstores. The publishing imprint, Stories in Stone Publication, is the shared name the four associations use for their joint projects. Cooks in Parks was nominated for the Association of Partners for Public Lands (APPL) Publication of the Year award in 2015.

What’s inside

The 160-page softcover is organized the way home cooks actually cook: appetizers and sides, soups and stews, mains, baked goods, desserts. Full-color photography runs throughout, with shots of contributed dishes and of the parks and landscapes the recipes come from.

• Recipes from park association staff, NPS personnel, and public-land supporters across South Dakota and Wyoming
• Full-color photography of dishes, parks, and regional landscapes
• A spiral binding that lays flat on a counter or cookbook stand
• 8″ x 9″ trim, roughly the size of a standard hardcover novel, easy to store on a kitchen shelf
• Contributions reflect the flavors of the northern Great Plains: game meats, cast-iron cooking, potluck staples, baked goods, preserves

Specifications

• Pages: 160
• Dimensions: 8″ x 9″
• Weight: 18.5 oz
• Binding: Spiral-bound (lays flat for cooking)
• Cover: Softcover, full-color
• Interior: Full-color printing throughout
• ISBN: 978-0-9798823-7-1
• Publisher: Stories in Stone Publication (a joint imprint of BHPFA, Badlands NHA, Devils Tower NHA, and Mount Rushmore Bookstores)
• Year published: 2014 (2015 APPL Publication of the Year nominee)

Who is this for?

Park visitors looking for a souvenir you will actually use. A refrigerator magnet goes on the fridge. A T-shirt eventually wears out. A cookbook you keep on the kitchen shelf quietly reminds you of a trip every time you use it, which for a lot of people is every week. If you are looking for a take-home from a Black Hills trip that gets handled instead of stored, this is a strong pick.

Cooks who like regional and community cookbooks. Cooks in Parks is in the tradition of church and community cookbooks: real contributors, real home recipes, no celebrity chef pretense. If you collect Junior League, Dakota homestead, or Forest Service camp cookbooks, this one belongs on the same shelf.

Gift buyers. At around $12.99 this is a solid under-$20 gift for family members who visited the parks with you, for a new neighbor, or for anyone who appreciates food with a sense of place. Pair it with a set of park mugs or with a Stories in Stone apron if you want to build a larger gift.

About the Stories in Stone partnership

Stories in Stone is the name the four regional cooperating associations use for projects they work on together: books, apparel, collectibles, and educational materials. Cooks in Parks is one of those joint projects. Pooling resources across four associations lets a small-budget publisher put out a full-color 160-page book at a price closer to a paperback than a standard cookbook.

Frequently asked questions

How many recipes are in the cookbook?
The book is 160 pages, full-color, with recipes across appetizers, sides, soups, mains, baked goods, and desserts. A recipe index and contributor list are in the back. The publisher has not published a single recipe count.

Who contributed the recipes?
Contributors are a mix of park association staff, National Park Service personnel, and public-land supporters from South Dakota, Wyoming, and the surrounding region. Each recipe is credited to its contributor.

Is this cookbook about national park restaurants or concessionaire food?
No. This is home cooking from the people who work at and support the parks, not a collection from park lodges or concessionaires. Think potluck night at the visitor center, not a lodge menu reprint.

Is the binding really spiral, or is it just glued?
Spiral-bound. The book lays flat on a counter, which is the whole point for a cookbook. No hands-free cookbook stand needed.

Why does BHPFA sell a book co-published with Mount Rushmore?
The four regional cooperating associations, BHPFA, Badlands NHA, Devils Tower NHA, and Mount Rushmore Bookstores, share a Stories in Stone imprint for joint projects. Co-publishing lets four small nonprofits produce a book that any one of them would have struggled to do alone. Each association sells the book in its own stores.

Is it still in print?
Yes. BHPFA stocks Cooks in Parks in our online store and in several of our park visitor center stores. Call ahead if you want to check a specific park store’s inventory.

Does buying this support national parks?
Yes. BHPFA is the official nonprofit partner of Wind Cave National Park, Jewel Cave National Monument, Scotts Bluff National Monument, and Agate Fossil Beds National Monument, as well as the Black Hills National Forest and Nebraska National Forests & Grasslands. Proceeds from every purchase support education programs, conservation projects, and visitor services at these sites.

Can I get this at the Mount Rushmore or Badlands visitor centers?
Yes. Because the book is co-published by the cooperating associations at Badlands and Mount Rushmore, it is sold at their stores as well. BHPFA stocks it at our own partner-site stores and ships it nationally from our online shop.