If you love to cook and entertain, you've probably had lots of requests to divulge your signature recipes. Why not share them with a wider audience and write your own cookbook? Here's assemble your ideas and make a mouth-watering pitch to publishing houses that are hungry for new material.
Instructions
1. Determine a solid theme for your cookbook (i.e., ethnic, regional fare, cooking on a budget or one-dish meals). The more unique your concept, the more likely it will catch a publisher's attention.
2. Browse your home cookbook library as well as your neighborhood bookstore to see what your predecessors have already written. Jot down notes on the page and section lengths of these books as well as whether they are strictly recipes or incorporate photographs and historic/cultural/anecdotal material related to the dishes being described.
3. Jot down the names of specific publishing houses that have produced books similar to your own vision. Look up their submission guidelines on the Internet or in writers' annual resource guides such as "Writer's Market" (Writer's Digest Books).
4. Identify your target market for this cookbook. In the cover letter you are going to write to prospective publishers, they will want to know whether your material is geared to beginners, seasoned chefs, harried parents or individuals who have the leisure of shopping all day for exotic ingredients.
5. Prepare a working outline in which you determine how many sections the book will be and approximately how many recipes will be included in each one. Again, the review of existing cookbooks will give you ideas regarding the progression of recipes and their division by region and complexity.
6. Write down your best recipe, making sure that you have listed all of the necessary cooking utensils, exact measurements of every ingredient, cooking times, and serving suggestions. Test the recipe by giving it to someone who has never prepared this dish; if you have written it accurately, they should be able to produce the same results as when you cook it yourself.
7. Address your proposal letter to the correct person at each publishing house. Although the contact information will be listed in the submission guidelines, keep in mind that it's always best to double-check with a phone call or email. The salutation should be to "Dear Mr. or Ms.", not "Hi, Bob." Even if you are submitting your proposal via email, always observe the formalities of a professional inquiry.
8. Provide a brief overview of your cookbook proposal in the first paragraph of your letter. This paragraph will explain why the book is unique, why you are uniquely qualified to write it, and who this title will especially appeal to. Reference should also be made here to the approximate length of the book and whether it includes photographs, other artwork, or tables/graphs.
9. Provide a brief sampling of the book's contents in your second paragraph. This paragraph can include a short bullet-point list of section titles and/or tantalizing teaser recipe names for dishes that prospective readers will learn master.
10. Explain briefly in the third paragraph how you plan to help market this title. Examples would include demonstrations at local cooking schools, radio and TV interviews, networking through culinary academies, and fund-raising events for charity organizations. This demonstrates that you intend to take a pro-active approach in helping sell the book yourself.
11. Conclude your letter (which should not exceed one typed page) with an offer to send a sample chapter or the full manuscript upon request. Include your complete contact information: address, phone number, email, and webpage.
12. Staple a copy of that best recipe you typed out earlier as a single attachment. A variation on this is to type the recipe on a 3 x 5 recipe card and staple it to the front of the letter. If you are emailing your inquiry, include the sample recipe in a P.S. at the bottom of your correspondence. Publishers are as wary as everyone else of opening attachments from individuals they don't know.
