Author Archives for Have Fork, Will Travel

About Have Fork, Will Travel

Office by day, home cook/baker by night, maker of many things. Food groupie always. Life is too short for bad food.

TOC All*Star Christmas

Food Network knows a good chef competition will catch people’s attention. Tournament of Champions is no exception. This go-round has the chefs pairing up to battle for money and prizes. One of the newer parameters for this season is since there are two chefs, so they need to make two dishes. As always, the Randomizer has the last laugh with the combinations. The season starts on November 5th on Food Network. Click on the picture below to get a print-friendly bracket to pick your teams.

New episodes every Wednesday. Season runs 11/5/25-12/10/25. Make sure to catch the Instagram live feed with Michele, Allison, and Matt each week as we discuss the show!

It’s time to play the HFWT Home Game!

October means that fall weather is in the air, and also time for the Big Fresno Fair (BFF). For whatever reason this year, I simply ran out of time and energy to get all my entries completed before the turn-in day. I have 18 items between baked goods and crafts, so hopefully most of them won ribbons. I’ll do another post after we go to the fair with the results. In the meantime, here’s the 2025 HFWT Home Game card to print out and take with you to try to find my items. I only ask that you don’t tell me how they did before I get a chance to go.

fresno fair entry card listing items submitted for the 2025 fair

Summer fun 2025

How’s everyone doing so far this summer? In central California, we’ve had a mostly (almost) balmy time of it with only 11-12 days over 100 degrees. This time last year, we were over 30 days. The trick is to stay inside as much as possible, keep hydrated, and do your errands as early as possible. I work on campus as a staff member, so we’re there all year round. The professors are off for the summer, so they travel, research, and spend time with family. The administrative support is taking care of room reservations, schedule planning, ordering books, and anything else you can think of regarding ending one school year and preparing for the next.

My summer has been mostly uneventful, but Allison, Matt, and myself have been reviewing the Season 6 episodes of BBQ Brawl on Food Network. We each chose our top 2-3 pit masters from the three chef mentor teams, and evaluate the cooking challenges, the food cooked, any drama, or whatever else catches our fancy that week. There are only a few weeks left in the season. It will be interesting to see if one of our dream team chefs win it at the end.

The most recent filming of Worst Cooks will air on Monday, July 28th at 9pm. This is Anne Burrell’s final season on the show due to her sudden passing in June. As of this post, the list of new recruits hasn’t been posted yet. We do know that Gabe Bertaccini will be the blue team chef against Anne’s Rockin’ Red Stars. Anne and her red sharpie will be missed severely. Here’s to Anne and the joy she brought to the cooking world.

There are a few new things in the works, so check back to see what adventures I’m able to go on. Allison, Matt, and I are continuing the Worst Cooks Pajama Talk on Instagram before each of the new episodes. You can catch them on my page at @forktravel.

Student Cupboard Milestone – 10-years

One of my passions on the Fresno State campus is the Amendola Student Cupboard. I’m a little partial since I’m both student and staff, however, I can attest that it has made a huge difference towards improving student food security. The coordinator that runs the pantry is Michael Ballin, who was one of the students when I worked with the MSW (Masters of Social Work) program. It has been very rewarding to watch him grow as a person and manager while using the skills learned in the Master’s program.

There was a ceremony on campus today, along with a proclamation from the City of Fresno, about the impact of the pantry for the campus and students. In my estimation, the student cupboard and essential services provided to the Fresno State students are some of the best. It’s a giving time of year and if anyone would like to make a donation to a truly worthy cause, please consider donating to the Student Cupboard. They accept monetary as well as food donations. If you want to check out the food security project to learn more about it, click here.

End of the semester….

Whew! It’s the end of the spring semester, almost the end of the CSU fiscal year, and lots of tidying up to do for the academic year. I have to say that it hasn’t been total zaniness all of the time. Quite a bit, but not all the time. Homework has been turned in. The Wind Symphony of Clovis concerts are done for the semester. The test interviews for the Anthropology department’s podcast project have been completed and uploaded. I’m sure that we’ll be editing them more before they are put on the department’s website, but I did post my homework ones on YouTube.

The folklore project that I had been working on with one of the retired professors from Fresno State was completed enough (from the professor’s point of view, not my secretarial standpoint) to send to the Library of Congress. My Honors undergraduate thesis was revised, revised again, and revised still more. That was submitted over a week ago. I can finally box up my papers for a few months.

The person from the library that booked my cooking videos for the last three years retired in December. Apparently the new person wasn’t interested in programming adult cooking videos, so no go for this summer. That means…….HFWT videos will be in production soon. You can watch the original ones for the library here. With having free time this summer, I can also work on the podcast and Food Groupie Cinema. I’ve been looking forward to this project for awhile.

The icing on the cake is that I was elected to serve on the board of the Southwestern Anthropological Association as one of the two Members-At-Large. I don’t know exactly what that will entail, but it will be interesting and I will learn a lot.

Whew (again)!

If you have a suggestion for a cooking video, food or beverage to try, or even a question about food history, let me know.

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