We are overjoyed to be featuring Gooseberry Patch this week. These women are truly an inspiration and we love partnering with them. Read on and you will see why!
When friends combine their dreams, a business comes about that has heart. That’s just what we hoped for when we founded Gooseberry Patch back in the early 80s. We were new neighbors living next door to each other in the small town of Delaware, Ohio with our young families. We connected first as moms, but it wasn’t long before we discovered we had more than soccer games in common…we both adored strolling through flea markets, crafting, decorating, cooking and baking.
Searching for a way to feed these passions that would still allow us to stay home with the kids, we came up with the idea to start a mail-order catalog. Featuring all of our favorite things, Gooseberry Patch’s “A Country Store in Your Mailbox” was born. Right from the start, we sprinkled in recipes amongst items for the home. Since the catalog was only mailed twice a year, we hoped that the recipes would encourage folks to hold onto their issues a little longer. It worked, and along with the orders that started arriving, we also received recipes and the memories that went along with them from these new friends.
With so many of these heartfelt letters and family-favorite recipes piling up, compiling a cookbook seemed like the next logical step. Our customers started asking for us to publish one and that was all the encouragement we needed. We gathered all of the goodies they’d shared, included a few recipes of our own and our first Gooseberry Patch cookbook was on its way.
Since Christmas has always held a special place in our hearts, our first cookbook was centered on celebrating the season with family & friends. Old-Fashioned Country Christmas debuted in 1992 and we filled it with customers’ recipes, memories, traditions and lots of homemade gift, decorating and craft ideas. We sprinkled in dozens of charming hand-drawn illustrations created by some of our favorite artists…some with whom we still work today! These, along with the homestyle recipes, memories and crafts, defined the soon-to-be Gooseberry Patch signature style. It was a winning combination, and was so well-received that we’ve based all of our subsequent books on this original concept.
Fast-forward nearly two decades and Gooseberry Patch is still best-known for these homestyle cookbooks, now recognized as national bestsellers! They’ve recently started turning them into eBooks and have been creating a new series of cooking videos featuring some of their own and the very best from their cookbooks. (Look for some of these to be shared right here every Saturday on Amuse-Bouche!)
They’ve jumped into the world of social media with both feet, creating vibrant communities of over 95,000 fans on Facebook and over 8,000 followers on Twitter. Their blog has a readership of thousands every day but what’s more important than these numbers? “The immediate connection with our Gooseberry Patch family,” says Vickie Hutchins. “There’s just nothing like being able to have conversations about recipes, celebrations or just about anything with these folks who’ve been enjoying our books all these years.”
While lots of things have changed since Gooseberry Patch started – the catalog was discontinued in late 2009 and the cookbooks are now our primary focus – the most important things have remained the same. We try to stay rooted in how people really live and cook. We take care to feature recipes that just about anyone can make from what’s already in their pantry. It’s one of the reasons we think our cookbooks are so collectible and well-loved and we hope to keep providing them for many years to come.
So, who would’ve expected two moms at a kitchen table to have come so far? We have been blessed…and we couldn’t have done it without our customers’ help!
Do you have a much-loved recipe, family tradition or a special holiday memory? Readers of Amuse Bouche and Where Women Cook are invited to share them with Gooseberry Patch…you might just find yourself featured in one of our upcoming cookbooks! Visit Gooseberry Patch and click on “Share A Recipe.” Join us on Facebook too and keep up with all the Gooseberry Patch goodies.
Be sure to check out Gooseberry Patch today to see how you can get a free copy of their Christmas Cookbook Ebook!
P.S. Remember to enter your pie for a chance at $1000 and a spot on our new Pieography Cookbook!
A friend told me about your books, i just love all that you have,,,so down to earth, my kind of cookingg again thanks i enjoy very much… sandy
Gooseberry Patch is a lot like having your Grandmother or Mom with you as you prepare great food in the kitchen. You know the ad about “betcha can’t eat just one potato chip”, well you can’t have just one Gooseberry patch cookbook.
How true it is, you just can’t have enough Goose Berry Patch cookbooks. There wonderful.
I am crazy about your cookbooks and I am honored to have had some recipes chosen to be included in four of them!