Cookin It With Kix

The country music icon and radio/TV host shows how we all can celebrate cooking outdoors, bringing people together, and the joy of good food. We’re talking tailgating, barbecues, and parties on the patio for two or twenty. Country music icon and radio/TV host Kix Brooks showcases the All-American pastime of celebration and cooking outdoors for family and friends. With his Southern sense of humor and good-natured personality, Kix breaks down the art of a perfect steak or chop, the proper Southern side dishes, and amazing desserts and drinks that will make your mouth water and your stomach smile. With easy-to-understand recipes, Kix Tips, and tons of ideas, his Louisiana heritage shines through as he shares some of his treasured family recipes and the stories behind them. In Cookin’ It with Kix, Kix highlights some of his favorite delicacies such as: D-Daddy’s Fried Fish, Big Ol’ Mess Jambalaya, Grilled and Smothered Strip Steak, Revved-Up Brussels Sprouts Slaw and more Cookin’ It with Kix will give you what you need so you can throw down a delicious meal off the grill for you and your family or be the king at your next party.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER | WALL STREET JOURNAL BESTSELLER | USA TODAY BESTSELLER The best things in life are really not that fancy. This photo-driven book featuring all-things-Reba invites you to get back to the basics of life: fun, food, friends, and family. In her first book in over two decades, actress and country music legend Reba McEntire takes you behind the scenes and shares the stories, recipes, and Oklahoma-style truths that guide her life. FROM REBA: "To me, there's nothing better than sitting on the back porch looking out at the land that goes on for miles. A beautiful sunset and then me, just sipping on a glass of iced tea (or whiskey and Sprite) with my friends and family. I don't know what heaven's going to look like, but I hope it feels like Oklahoma. Throw in some beans and cornbread, and I'm all set. "Okies know that the secret to a good life is to keep things simple and be thankful for what the good Lord's given you. That's what I want to get back to. Simple fun, hard work, good food, and laughing with those you love. Everything I'm doing in my life from here on out—personal or professional, doesn't matter—I'm going to have fun. "That’s what I'm sharing in this book—some simple, not-that-fancy truths I live by and a bunch of good stories, photos, and recipes that go along with them. So if you're looking to slow down, get back to basics, and have a heckuva lot of fun, I think we're going to have a good time together in these pages. Come on in, kick off your boots (or leave them on, I don’t care), and learn how to bring a little bit of my downhome-inspired life into your own." FROM THE PUBLISHER: Not That Fancy includes: Nearly 200 photographs from Reba's childhood, career, and personal life—many of which are straight from Reba's phone Never-before-told stories from rodeoing with her family to pranks with Brooks & Dunn to falling in love over a plate of tater tots Behind-the-scenes anecdotes from her music and acting career, with inspiration on how to follow your passion, trust your gut, and take a chance on yourself More than 60 recipes of appetizers, mains, sides, desserts, and cocktails from Reba's personal kitchen, from friends and family, and from her restaurant, Reba's Place Lighthearted lifestyle tips on how to achieve Reba's signature hairstyle, plan a down-to-earth date night, throw an effortless dinner party, and more Not That Fancy is the perfect deluxe gift for Christmas, birthdays, Mother's Day, Father's Day, and special occasions. This keepsake book is ideal for Reba fans, country music lovers, or anyone who enjoys an easygoing Western lifestyle.

This volume offers new critical insights into the increasingly mythological figure of the American cowboy and “The West” in the 21st century while seeking to explain how these components of American identity continue to fit into our shared culture narrative.

Star Wars Mania shows fans of all ages how to turn ordinary objects into incredible intergalactic creations. This amazing book is filled with craft projects, trivia, experiments, party ideas and more. Packed with fascinating fun, Star Wars Mania is sure to make a Star Wars maniac out of you! Hours and hours of fun guaranteed!

Quincy Troupe's candid account of his friendship with Miles Davis is a revealing portrait of a great musician and an intimate study of a unique relationship. It is also an engrossing chronicle of the author's own development, both artistic and personal. As Davis's collaborator on Miles: The Autobiography,Troupe--one of the major poets to emerge from the 1960s--had exceptional access to the musician. This memoir goes beyond the life portrayed in the autobiography to describe in detail the processes of Davis's spectacular creativity and the joys and difficulties his passionate, contradictory temperament posed to the men's friendship. It shows how Miles Davis, both as a black man and an artist, influenced not only Quincy Troupe but whole generations. Troupe has written that Miles Davis was "irascible, contemptuous, brutally honest, ill-tempered when things didn't go his way, complex, fair-minded, humble, kind and a son-of-a-bitch." The author's love and appreciation for Davis make him a keen, though not uncritical, observer. He captures and conveys the power of the musician's presence, the mesmerizing force of his personality, and the restless energy that lay at the root of his creativity. He also shows Davis's lighter side: cooking, prowling the streets of Manhattan, painting, riding his horse at his Malibu home. Troupe discusses Davis's musical output, situating his albums in the context of the times--both political and musical--out of which they emerged. Miles and Me is an unparalleled look at the act of creation and the forces behind it, at how the innovations of one person can inspire both those he knows and loves and the world at large.

The ultimate New England store, whose catalog reaches millions of people, presents the store's first cookbook bringing us back to simpler days. The Vermont Country Store Cookbook captures both the essence of the iconic store and the soul of the Vermont way of life: a self-reliant, rich life in the slow lane. Through recipes, yarns, archival photos, and sumptuous visuals, it tells the story of five generations of Orton storekeepers, while featuring fresh-from-the-farm cooking that imbues the cuisine of the present with the best of the past. Approximately 120 updated and original family recipes evoke memories, conveying all the hominess of the catalogue, but also appeal to the modern tastes of contemporary cooks. The book also features sidebars of Vermont history and more than 200 photographs, both black-and-white archival and four-color photographs, the latter taken especially for the book.

This book is about cooking real food. Country music star Tracy Byrd grew up in Texas in a family that took cooking seriously... both for the food itself and for the community that food brings together in towns all across America like Beaumont, Texas, where Tracy is from. Filled with stories about his life, and life as a recording artist, this book also includes more than recipes for good, home-cooked dishes everyone will love.

"When bebop was new," writes Thomas Owens, "many jazz musicians and most of the jazz audience heard it as radical, chaotic, bewildering music." For a nation swinging to the smoothly orchestrated sounds of the big bands, this revolutionary movement of the 1940s must have seemed destined for a short life on the musical fringe. But today, Owens writes, bebop is nothing less than "the lingua franca of jazz, serving as the principal musical language of thousands of jazz musicians." In Bebop, Owens conducts us on an insightful, loving tour through the music, players, and recordings that changed American culture. Combining vivid portraits of bebop's gigantic personalities with deft musical analysis, he ranges from the early classics of modern jazz (starting with the 1943 Onyx Club performances of Dizzy Gillespie, Max Roach, Oscar Pettiford, Don Byas, and George Wallington) through the central role of Charlie Parker, to an instrument-by-instrument look at the key players and their innovations. Illustrating his discussion with numerous musical excerpts, Owens skillfully demonstrates why bebop was so revolutionary, with fascinating glimpses of the tempestuous jazz world: Thelonious Monk, for example, did "everything 'wrong' in the sense of traditional piano technique....Because his right elbow fanned outward away from his body, he often hit the keys at an angle rather than in parallel. Sometimes he hit a single key with more than one finger, and divided single-line melodies between two hands." In addition to his discussions of individual instruments and players, Owens examines ensembles, with their sometimes volatile collaborations: in the Jazz Messengers, Benny Golson told of how his own mellow saxophone playing would get lost under Art Blakey's furious drumming: "He would do one of those famous four-bar drum rolls going into the next chorus, and I would completely disappear. He would holler over at me, 'Get up out of that hole!'" In this marvelous account, Owens comes right to the present day, with accounts of new musicians ranging from the Marsalis brothers to lesser-known masters like pianist Michel Petrucciani. Bebop is a jazz-lover's dream--a serious yet highly personal look at America's most distinctive music.