Foodies To Become 'Do-Goodies' In Innovative Cookbook Contest For Charity

Online, July 27, 2010 (Newswire.com) - Could you invent a dish containing a triangular rice snack? You could be published in a unique cookbook called riceworks® Recipeworks, with all proceeds going to charity.

Popular snack producer, Shearer's Foods, Inc. has issued a challenge. Use its famous riceworks® Gourmet Brown Rice Crisps in a new recipe that you post at www.riceworksrecipeworks.com for your chance to win, and be published with 49 other food aficionados in this one-of-a-kind cookbook.

How the contest works
Participants are invited to register and submit their recipe anytime before midnight on October 1, 2010. Next, an independent panel of judges will select what they deem the top 50. Then they'll expedite production of riceworks® Recipeworks, an inspired cookbook featuring the winning recipes, in time for the holidays.

Recipes will be judged and scored for: taste, 30%; originality, 30%; difficulty, 20% and presentation, 20%. The judges are Tricia Ryan, Director of Marketing for riceworks®, John Frostad, Executive Vice-President of Shearer's Foods, Inc., and Shelley Case, Registered Dietician and author of the popular book, "Gluten-Free Diet".

It began with a challenge
"It's the next step in an ongoing campaign which riceworks® started just before last year's holidays," reminisces Tricia Ryan. "That contest, 'Show Us Your Goodness', also raised funds for charity. But this year, we're blending riceworks® Recipeworks with our outdoor summer promotion How riceworks® Better."

Reaching out locally this summer, riceworks® is attending community events in parts of Canada and the United States. Brand ambassadors of riceworks® will challenge snack lovers with the declaration, "Your snack works - riceworks® better." While giving away samples of riceworks® crisps, the riceworks® brand ambassadors will inform consumers about riceworksrecipeworks.com and their chance to be published in riceworks® Recipeworks.

Look for riceworks® teams at events as widespread as the Taste of the Danforth Festival in Toronto, Ontario, August 6 - 8, and the Fisherman's Feast in Boston's North End, August 12 - 15.

Why another cookbook in time for the holidays?
"One reason is people living with celiac disease. They often feel left out at the dinner table," sympathizes Ms Ryan, also a dietician though not professionally practicing. "Their condition means they can't enjoy foods with wheat, barley or rye which is an excruciatingly long list. But it doesn't mean they can't - you know - have their cake and eat it too!"

That's where riceworks® Recipeworks cookbook comes in. However, it's also bound to be claimed by those many diet-watchers who've cottoned onto the gluten-free trend in dieting, and people who just love good food.

Indeed, many recipes which riceworks® devotees have already shared are very creative. "Most of us are stumped beyond the idea of riceworks® crisps with dip or salsa," says Ms Ryan. "But you'd be surprised at how innovative these recipes are! For instance, you can grind riceworks® crisps into dust, creating 'flour' and suddenly you can make a tasty cheesecake base."

Making quotation fingers in the air, Ms Ryan sheepishly smiles and says, "The ideas 'mushroom' from there. Sure, that's a terrible joke but it's all for a good cause."

About Shearer's Foods, Inc.
A manufacturer of branded and private label snack foods including potato chips, tortilla chips and extruded snacks, Shearer's Foods, Inc. recently purchased Snack Alliance Inc. The firm's signature product, riceworks® Gourmet Brown Rice Crisps, is a tasty and popular whole grain gluten-free snack that has won kudos from snack lovers in the United States, Canada and Great Britain. For more information about the product visit www.riceworks.com.