Big Girls, Global Kitchen: The Book Tour

Not long after January 2011 reared its cold wintry head, the two of us made a decision: when our book came out on sunny May 24th, we were going on a book tour. Book tours for first-time authors are largely unheard of. But we were determined. We spent long hours catering, saving up money for our trip. We reached out to friends in faraway states. And we bugged our dear PR gal, Megan, who managed to stay in good spirits despite all of that bugging, to keep contacting book stores to host us. In late April, we finally settled on a tour: events in NYC, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Washington, DC. (If you don’t happen to live in any of these areas, fear not! We’re hoping to do a bit more touring in the late summer, early fall; leave a comment with where you’d love to have us go!).

Here are the pictures from our trip so you can pretend you were there, right along with us. In addition to the events we organized, we left some time to see the cities: to drive through fierce traffic in LA, to eat fried fish by the Bay in Sausalito, to brunch in DC and go to the market with some of our blogger friends.

You can link to all the fantastic press we’ve received on this page. Now: scroll down to see the slideshow of our trip! (Book Party photos are by Sunny Norton through Guest of a Guest. The rest are by us and friends.)

From our kitchen, back home in NY, to yours,

Cara and Phoebe, THE QUARTER-LIFE COOKS

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On book pub night, we taught a brunch class at the beautiful Brooklyn Kitchen, featuring Baked French Toast and Creamy Mushroom Tartines with Chive Scrambled Eggs.

What a great group!

We dorkily obsessed over seeing our book on shelves and tables at local bookstores.

On May 26th, we threw a fabulous party at The Wooly (organized by the Small Girls PR team who did our blog relaunch party). There were sprinkle-covered BGSK cookies, Onion Dip with Chips in Brown Paper Bags, Mini PB&J Cakewiches, and Rice Krispie Balls!

We had a photobooth for guests to post with kitchen props. That’s us with Katie and Megan of Harper Collins/William Morrow-our publishers.

We partied, danced, and signed books. See the full party album here!

After Memorial Day weekend, we flew to LA. We fell immediately in love with the West Coast food scene. Here, Phoebe snacking on Vietnamese tacos from the Nom Nom Truck outside of Vromans in Pasadena.

Cara really loves Nom Nom!

Our very first book reading! Though we’d been up for nearly 24 hours, the audience said we sounded like pros. At Vromans in Pasadena.

In our host Sam’s kitchen, we baked dozens of gingersnaps for Thursday evening’s book party.

In LA, we hosted a book party at the Thompson Hotel in Beverly Hills filled with new friends and old. Here, we pose with fellow Morrow author, Lulu Powers and lifestyle expert Sally Horchow.

In San Francisco, we headed straight for the Mission. Cara’s burrito at Papalote, loaded to the brim with Cali-Mex goodness.

Cookies and books at our reading, San Francisco’s Books, Inc in the Marina.

On our last day in San Fran, we cooked brunch for a group of 30 women entrepreneurs, organized by the supper club start-up, Grubly.

Our Grubly menu was our favorite brunch from the book: Assorted Quickbreads…

…Creamy Mushroom Tartines with Chive Scrambled Eggs…

…and Baked French Toast with Berry Compote. The compote was made from cherries fresh from the Ferry Building farmers’ market.

Question of the day: should we use a Barbie platter?

With our Grubly hosts, Desiree and Cameron.

Even in the rain, California farmers’ markets are killer.

We met up with our friend Casey to eat our last meal at Fish., in Sausalito. It consisted of barbecue oysters…

…and amazing fish & chips, to sustain us on the red eye back home.

Back in New York, we were guests on Michael Harlan-Turkell’s radio show, The Food Seen (Listen to us here).

Cara’s mom threw us a party too! Besides the food (meatball sliders & onion dip), and the signed poster board, the best part was these Baking For Good BGSK Book Cover Cookies!