White Christmas Recipe Challenge

Welcome to the first recipe challenge organized on Very Good Recipes!

The theme for this first challenge has been selected by 10 food bloggers who have kindly accepted to be the judges for the challenge. Each judge is also presenting his or her own recipe of the theme they selected. The judges will select the winners at the end of the challenge (and of course they cannot win).

The Judges

The judges for this month are:

Thanks a lot to the food bloggers who volunteered to become judges! The judges change every month, so there will be an opportunity to be a judge for all the bloggers who want it. Please e-mail me if you would like to become a judge for an upcoming challenge.

• Alex from Food 4 Thought
• Anne from Les Recettes du Panier
• Han Ker from Hankerie
• Kristina from Knuckle Salad
• Quay Po from Quay Po Cooks
• Rachel from Blissfully Scrumptious
• Russell from London Eats
• Suzy from Suzy Eats
• Vanessa from Vane Valentine

Theme

This month theme is: White Christmas.

There is always a magic feel in the air when snow is falling on Chritmas Eve. Not eveyone lives in a region where snow is usual during winter, but everyone can try to recreate this magic in the kitchen!

What dish do you think of when you hear "White Christmas"? You can of course cook with white ingredients such as white fish, white chocolate, white asparagus, white truffles, white vegetables, chicken, cream, coconut milk etc. But your recipe does not have to be all white! It needs to be festive and have a "snowy" feel. You can be creative and imagine a snowy presentation, for instance sprinkling snow crystals (drops of cream, petals of white edible flowers, and a lot of other ingredients) or trying to create a snow-covered landscape one can eat!

Participating

The challenge is open to everyone, whether you have a food blog or not.

In order to participate, you need to enter a recipe on the theme of "White Christmas".

• If you have a food blog registered on Very Good Recipes, you just need to publish your recipe on your blog with a link to the challenge page http://verygoodrecipes.com/white-christmas-challenge in the text of your recipe. It will then be automatically listed on this page. (if you don't see it after 30 minutes, please e-mail me)
• If you have a food blog (or a blog with a recipe category or label) but are not yet registered on Very Good Recipes, you can register in 30 seconds.
• If you do not have a blog, you can participate by sending me your recipe with one or more pictures. I will publish your recipe on Very Good Recipe's blog so that it can be displayed on the challenge page.

Rules:

• There must be at least one picture in your recipe, and both the recipe and picture need to be your own. If your recipe is inspired by another, please mention it in your recipe.
• You cannot use an already published recipe to participate in the challenge, you need to publish a new recipe (otherwise there's no challenge!)
• We would love to have participations from all around the world, including from blogs in languages other than English. Please do include an English translation of your recipe in your post though. :-) If you need help with the translation (proofreading etc.), we will be glad to help if we can.

You can participate from Monday December 5th 2011 until Monday December 26th included.

Prizes

The judges will select the winning recipes.

Savory Spice Shop will offer prizes for the winners. The shop was set up by Mike and Janet Johnston in Denver, Colorado in 2004 and they are adding more and more locations (a sign that they are doing things right!). They sell spices (there is a very wide selection of spices that are freshly grounded every week, I had no trouble to find lots of white spices and salts for the challenge image above!) and they also offer more than 140 blends to bring new flavors to your dishes.

1st place

The winner will receive a $75 online gift voucher. The voucher can be used to buy fresh spices, some of the 140 unique blends, sauces and extracts, spiceware or anything offered in the shop. There are also many different gift sets that you can give or keep to yourself!

2nd place

$50 online gift voucher.

3rd, 4th and 5th place

$30 online gift voucher.

The vouchers can be used for only one purchase, the amount cannot be divided on multiple purchases.

Savory Spice Shop can ship anywhere in the world, but if you live far from the US and the shipping costs are too high, Savory Spice Shop can replace the voucher by a 4-jar gift set ($25 value or less) that they will send you for free.

All participants will also get free shipping (US only) for any order of $40 or more during the month of December. If you want to take advantage of this offer, please e-mail me so that I can send you the code.

Laurels and badge

All the participants will receive a badge with laurels that will be displayed on Very Good Recipes (on their page and in the huge list of food blogs). You can also display it on your blog or your challenge recipe if you want to.

Feel free to add the badge to your recipe (HTML code below):

<div style="text-align:center;">
<img src="http://verygoodrecipes.com/images/badges/white-christmas-challenge/1.90x120.png" width="90" height="120" />
<a href="http://verygoodrecipes.com/white-christmas-challenge">White Christmas Challenge</a><br />
on <a href="http://verygoodrecipes.com/">Very Good Recipes</a>
</div>

Winners will get gold, silver and bronze laurels.

You can also earn the Christmas crown: all you need is at least two recipes with a link to http://verygoodrecipes.com/christmas.

Have fun!

Thanks a lot to the judges and our generous sponsor to make this challenge possible!

I hope you will enjoy the challenge and that many of you will participate! Have fun!

Results

1st place

My Magical Gingerbread Boxes By Jessie-CookingMoments

2nd place

White Chocolate and Gingerbread Cheesecake – White Christmas Theme By Naked Plate

3rd place

White Chocolate Truffles By The Hedonista - Recipes

4th place

Casetta di pan di zenzero...(gingerbread house) By Bubbule in cucina

5th place

Croccanti By briciole

Congratulations to the winners, and thanks a lot to all the participants, the judges and our sponsor Savory Spice Shop!