This Week's Foodie Freebie: Presto FryDaddy

Welcome back from the weekend readers! Hope you had a good weekend and are ready for the new week ahead. My weekend was food filled and I've got so many things to share in the coming week. Here's a summary of what my weekend entailed...

Tattle Tasters: Cupcakes! - On Saturday, I provided members of What's Cookin, Chicago with half a dozen cupcakes to enjoy. Check back all this week to see what they thought on the cupcakes I made and you'll be able to get the recipes too.

Neighborhood Tour: Ravenswood Corridor - Saturday afternoon, I spent the day with members of What's Cookin, Chicago and we explored the Ravenswood Corridor on the north side of the city. Click on the link to find out where we went... and I'll be sharing the VIP tour details of Urban Accents in a few days. You definitely don't want to miss it!

Eli's Cheesecake Festival - Sunday afternoon, I attended the Eli's Cheesecake Festival on the west side of the city. It was a beautiful fall day and I had the pleasure of doing a culinary demo at their cooking pavillion. Soon here on the blog, I'll be sharing my experience at the festival and recipes for the dishes I created for the audience too.

Autumn Harvest Dinner - Our foodie friends in crime joined us for dinner Sunday night where I highlighted some fall flavors. I'll be sharing the recipes for the dishes I prepared this week so stay tuned!

Now that the food filled weekend is over, you can expect quite a few posts this week with more details including recipes, pictures and details of my recent culinary adventures. Also, with the pumpkin shortage slowly fading away, more folks are able to get their hands on pumpkin. Check out all the pumpkin recipes in my right sidebar for some inspiration on using pumpkin!

So let's get into the nitty gritty. This time of year, Football season is in full swing and everyone's looking for snacks, appetizers and recipe ideas to serve and enjoy during game day... like fried food. Jalapeno poppers, onion rings, buffalo wings, etc - all these football season faves involve some frying. Let's be honest, fried food may not be the best for your health but it's pretty dang good. That crispy crunch, hot out of the fryer taste is hard to duplicate in the oven. Sometimes certain foods are just better fried. Of course, everything in moderation and besides, cleaning up after frying food isn't exactly a fun nor easy task.

I'm not big on frying myself at home because of the mess, but one way around it is to have a deep fat fryer. Achieving perfectly golden fried food is easy with a deep fat fryer and you don't have to use a lot of oil either. In fact, the Presto company (based just north of Chicago in Eau Claire, WI) makes a decent sized deep fat fryer that only uses 4 cups of oil, allow you to save money from buying more oil than you need. This week, one lucky reader will be receiving a Presto FryDaddy (model 05420) to use in time for those upcoming football games, holidays and all throughout the year!

• Makes four servings with just four cups of oil.
• Maintains perfect frying temperature automatically.
• Snap-on lid allows oil to be stored for use again and again.
• Handy lift-and-drain scoop is better than messy baskets.
• Easy to clean! Nonstick surface inside and out.
• Easy to store! Snap-on lid lets you store oil right in the fryer to use again and again.

Some guidelines:
- Giveaway is only for those who live in the United States - my apologies to my international readers!
- You must check back on my blog on Friday to see if you've won so you can claim your prize!

To enter the giveaway, leave a comment answering:

- What is your favorite fried food?


Deadline: Thursday, October 8, 2009 at 12 midnight CST.

ONE WINNER will be randomly chosen by Random. Org's Interger Generator based on the number of your comment and will be announced on Friday, October 9, 2009. Good luck!