Ms. Goldsmith goes to New York.

2012 is turning out to be a good year, indeed, for Michael's Genuine Food & Drink pastry chef Hedy Goldsmith.

The modest and talented chef is on her way this weekend to New York City for the annual James Beard Foundation Awards ceremony at Lincoln Center's Avery Fisher Hall on Monday, May 7, where she is a nominee in the Outstanding Pastry Chef category, alongside notable peers Joanne Chang (Flour Bakery + Café in Cambridge, Massachusetts), Melissa Chou (Aziza in San Francisco), Dahlia Narvaez (Osteria Mozza in Los Angeles), Ghaya Oliveira (Boulud Sud in New York), and Mindy Segal (Mindy's Hot Chocolate in Chicago).

If that's not all, her first book, Baking Out Loud: Fun Desserts with Big Flavors, which has an October 2 release date, is available for pre-sale on Amazon.com for $14.74 (which is a big savings over the $27.50 list price).

Chef Goldsmith has shared a sneak preview of her book with Short Order readers, with a recipe for her easy-to-make and delicious popcorn & peanut bark. Give 'em hell in New York Hedy!
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​Some women at a Texas prison have compiled their culinary wisdom into a cookbook for those on the outside. The volume, titled From the Big House to Your House, is a collection of 200 recipes written by six women of the Mountain View Unit of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice in Gatesville, Texas. All except one of the authors -- Celeste Johnson, Ceyma Bina, Barbara Holder, Tina Cornelius, Trenda Kemmerer and Louanne Larson -- are serving prison sentences of at least 50 years for murder convictions.

The women pooled their resources to seek alternatives to prison chow, which eventually led to the cookbook. The recipes are easy-to-prepare meals, snacks, and desserts. They have to be easy because in prison there are no toaster ovens or microwaves; all they had to cook with was a hot pot and an empty potato chip bag -- which works well for trapping heat.
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Bea Arthur: Thank you for being a veg.

​If you always wanted to cook like a (dead) rock star, then The Dead Celebrity Cookbook is for you.

This little tome of awesomeness is the brainchild of Frank DeCaro, who started collecting the recipes of stars gone "bye" after attending a "dead celebrity party." DeCaro, who was a movie critic on The Jon Stewart Show, has broken up the recipes into some freaking funny chapters, like:

I Lunch Lucy, featuring Lucille Balls' Chopped Chicken Livers, Sunday Night Goulash, and Tropical Treat (a possible homage to ex-husband and fellow dead celebrity, Desi Arnaz).

Thank You For Feeding a Friend is all about the Golden Girls being healthy (before taking dirt naps).  PETA supporter Bea Arthur's Vegetarian Breakfast, Rue McClanahan's Non-Dairy Cheesecake, and Estelle Getty's Baked Chicken Fingers recipes are included. So far, Betty White, who just turned 90, isn't included since she's still above ground.
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I have come to praise Miami Book Fair International, not to bury it. I mean seriously: Is there any other event of this size that runs so seamlessly and trouble-free year after year? Plus, if not for Mitchell Kaplan, a lot of people in Miami might still not know what a book is.

All I'm saying is that the cookbook authors secured for this year's event are not necessarily the cream of the crop. And there are some legitimate reasons. Many of the top-selling cookbooks of 2011, for instance, were penned by chefs who have restaurants to run and can't be flying off to do every book fair (Heston Blumenthal, Daniel Humm, and so forth). Other authors were simply unavailable due to their own meager personal reasons.

The book fair did manage to get Calvin Trillin, whose The Tummy Trilogy remains one of the best collections of stories about eating ever written (although he is known for far more than food writing).

Other food events include:

This coming Saturday at 11 a.m., Andrew Carmellini (American Flavor), Gabrielle Hamilton (Blood, Bones & Butter), and Jessica B. Harris (High on the Hog) will take part in a reading.

Later on Saturday, at 4 p.m., there will be a See, Learn, Eat! cooking demo with Daniel Orr.

Michael Schwartz (Michael's Genuine Food) will be joined Sunday at 3 p.m. by Cheryl Tan (A Tiger in the Kitchen) and Mary L. Zamore (The Sacred Table).

BUT, here are five authors who have not only written great cookbooks but also could have taught us all a whole lot about food and cooking.
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Miami Book Fair

The Miami Book Fair: eat and read at the same time.

​The Miami Book Fair International is once again taking over the streets of downtown Miami. Every fall, voracious readers look forward to perusing both new and antique books in the hope of finding a treasure or a bargain at the street fair, or listening to a book reading by a celebrity author.

The fair also hosts some great cocktail parties, book signing events, and an international village (this year's featured country is China). We've put together a list of the food-related events at the Book Fair, by date, so you can have a handy, dandy guide.

Events start Sunday, November 13th and the street fair runs November 18-20. Admission to the fair is free, Friday, November 18th. Saturday and Sunday, November 19th and 20th, admission is $8 for adults. Admission for teens 13 to 18 and seniors over 62 is $5. Children 12 and under are free.

Admission to the Twilight Tastings are free. Most events are included with event admission, but some events (as noted), require additional tickets. See miamibookfair.com for details and to purchase advance tickets.
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The White House

Michelle Obama and Bo in the White House garden.

​The first lady has written a cookbook with gardening tips. The 256-page book, American Grown: How the White House Kitchen Garden Inspires Families, Schools, and Communities, is scheduled to be released April 10 in both print and e-book editions. (Pre-order it at randomhouse.com.)

The book is Mrs. Obama's first. (Her husband, the president, has written several best sellers, including a children's book.) She has taken no advance and is donating all "net or after-tax author proceeds to a charity or charities to be named after."

American Grown tells how her daughters -- Sasha and Malia -- helped the family change its eating ways. The girls, in fact, were the reason behind the edible garden on the South Lawn. The last first lady to plant a vegetable garden, by the way, was Eleanor Roosevelt during World War II.
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Noah Fecks

Andrew Carmellini is one busy man.

​Andrew Carmellini has a lot on his plate, so to speak.  In between trips to Miami to oversee the build-out of his SoBe outpost of The Dutch and visit local farms like Teena's Pride and Paradise Farms, Carmellini is going on Today to plug his cookbook, American Flavor.

The 336-page book, which comes out today, features a diverse mixture of "roots-inspired" cuisine. Carmellini shares recipes from many of America's ethnic sources, from Polish to Irish to Thai and back to Carmellini's Italian heritage.

Carmellini will appear on The Today Show Wednesday, October 19, at 9:45 a.m. to discuss American Flavor and his plans for The Dutch in Miami Beach, which is set to open at The W South Beach Hotel and Residences in time for Art Basel.

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​"This is what the food movement used to be all about -- honesty and integrity -- not hype." That's Alice Waters talking about Edward Behr's The Art of Eating, a quarterly food publication since 1986 and now a new cookbook subtitled "Essential Recipes From The First 25 Years."

Authenticity and simplicity inform the writing and recipes in this 279-pager. Behr shares knowledge gleaned from research and travels, each recipe prefaced with information about relevant history, origins, or perhaps a certain technique required for the preparation. There is no advertising in the magazine, and no silly filler in the cookbook. The author's standards are uncompromising, his attention to details meticulous, his attitude iconoclastic. He has been called "possibly the most food-obsessed individual in America and certainly one of the world's most knowledgeable and talented food writers."

This is, in fact, a damn good cookbook.
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​Are you chronically dehydrated? I just learned I am and, according to many websites, about 75 percent of our population is in the same boat. There's a simple explanation: water is boring. So when my chiropractor said I needed to divide my body weight in half and drink that many ounces of plain water each day, I felt dejected. Seriously? How was I going to chug 64 ounces of water a day? Then a few days later my dermatologist, Dr. Marcy Alvarez at Lincoln Road Dermatology came down on me, too. "You should be drinking about two liters a day," she said. "We're 60 percent water and all our organs need it."

Desperate to cure my hydration phobia, I went home and Googled "water recipes." Not surprisingly, there wasn't much info to be had. But one particular website caught my eye so I clicked. Turns out the blogger, Pam Wenzel, a 45-year-old Texan, mother of two, and 18-year breast cancer survivor, is also the author of a new "cookbook," Spa Water. It's an oversized hardcover with pictures that literally make you thirst for a sip of the 22 recipes inside.
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Cuban food lovers, put down your forks and stop in at Books & Books in Coral Gables tonight at 8 p.m. to talk rice and black beans and more with Raquel Rabade Roque, author of The Cuban Kitchen, owner of Downtown Book Center in Miami, and co-founder of the Miami Book Fair.

Her new paperback is loaded with 500 recipes ranging from classic, home-style plates like ropa vieja and pescado asado a la cubana to authentic, but uncommon, items such as Farmer-style Rabbit, made with aguardiente. Many of the recipes come from her family's collection, but others are attributed to famous writers, local chefs, and patriots.

Available for $20 and published by Alfred A. Knopf, the cookbook also features fun photos of Cuban icons, brief anecdotes about the featured dishes and their origins, and a smattering of "secrets" scattered throughout the book. (For example, "How to rinse rice," "How to store a pig overnight," and "Tips for the crispiest frituras.")

Roque set a few minutes aside to share her story with Short Order:
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