When I decided to write my own cookbook back in 2013, I figured I’d sell a few hundred. I didn’t even know where to begin on this. It was quite the project. Took me over six months to write, then publish. To get it printed took another few months. I guess I thought that would be the hard part.

I still remember the night I put them up for sale on my Andrea’s Country Home Cookin Facebook page like it was yesterday. Now, remember, my page was just getting big. When I started writing my cookbook, I only had about 3,000 fans. When my book was ready, I had hit over 200,000 fans. They were newer fans, so I didn’t expect to sell to folks who were newbies. So when I placed my first order, I got a few hundred. That sounded like a good number. The day they finally arrived, I put them up for sale through my Paypal, and my phone just went crazy. I remember how hot it was because my husband was outside prepping the land for his new dream garage to go on. Nothing could have sidetracked him from all that. He was glowing! Well, nothing could have prepared him for what I was about to tell him. I watched every few seconds as cookbooks sold. From 50 to 350, to 700 within a few hours. It was unreal!

I ran out on the front porch with the sun feeling like it was melting my face, yelling, “Chris!! You aren’t gonna believe this!”

He said, “How’s the sale going, babe!?”

I said, “Guess.”

“Um, a couple hundred?”

“Try again, pal,” I said.

“Seriously!?”

I giggled, “Yup! Would you believe I almost sold 1,000!?”

We were both just in shock as we watched the numbers climb. In those moments, he forgot about his future garage. Jiminy Fright! 1,000 cookbooks?! How in the world am I going to do this!? That’s when I called my mother.

“Uh, you ready for a packaging day?”

She had already told me before that she would help me mail out the ‘few’ I would need to mail. Welp, that sure wasn’t the case!

“Mom, I sold almost 1,000 cookbooks!”

Pretty sure there was a long pause, then she responded with “Are you on crack!?” (You have to know my mother’s lovely sense of humor. )

She was excited for me but knew we had a lot of work ahead of us. God bless her, and my Gram Liddick who helped me for a good solid few days packaging cookbooks for that first order and shipping them all over the world. Over the next few years, I sold a few thousand more. It was a dream come true, and the ladies at the post office named me the “Cookbook Lady.” They knew when they saw me coming, they would be busy for a while!

I’ve had a lot of you ask about my cookbook personally and in more fan mail! Thank you so much for this! Y’all make my day! I haven’t ordered anymore because it got to be so much work shipping them. I have many asking for my cookbook, and sometimes I’ll find one or two here and there, but they are gone within minutes of posting them up for sale. In the next few months, I will figure out a way to be able to sell them in a local store or something. I appreciate all the interest in my cookbook! It has 100 pages and over 160 recipes. It includes some colored photos of recipes and cooking tips and hints with some extra little goodies in the back.

I remember being so worried about feedback. Let’s face it — I mean, after all, selling a few thousand, someone won’t be happy. I watched my emails, went through them, making sure everyone was happy — only one person folks. One person complained.

She thought it was too “Country Cookin.” Too many casseroles and comfort foods.

Uhhh, duh! It’s Andrea’s Country Home Cookin sweetheart! There’s nothing but country cookin in my book. I offered to give her money back with a shipping label to send it back to me, but she never did. Guess she enjoys some bangin’ casseroles now and delicious desserts? Haha. Had another lady say she threw out all her Rachel Ray cookbooks after having mine. That made me giggle. Sorry, Rach!

I’ll keep you updated on the cookbook future! In the meantime, who likes ice cream!? Cheers!

Homemade Oreo Ice Cream

Ingredients:
• 1 box of Oreo Instant Jello Pudding
• 1 sleeve of crushed Oreos (I used the winter edition ones, so that’s why I have pretty pops of red in my ice cream.)
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 – 12 oz cans of evaporated milk
• 1 – 14 oz can of condensed milk
• 1 pint of heavy whipping cream
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• Milk
• **Ice and Rock Salt for ice cream maker

You will need a 4 QT ice cream maker. Mix pudding, eggs, and sugar together. Mix well until it gets to be like a fudgy substance. Then, add evaporated milk, condensed milk and vanilla. Stir well; then add heavy whipping cream. Mix well until any chunks are gone and it’s smooth. Finally, add milk until you get to the “Fill LINE” in your ice cream maker. Mix one more time, and add blade and lid.

Fill sides of ice cream maker with salt and ice layering add you go. Adding a little water to it helps to freeze too. Mix until your ice cream maker stops. Add ice as it turns if needed. I typically add more ice at least once. Should only take about 30 minutes. Freeze any leftovers. It keeps for a long time.