Reader comments needed for 25th anniversary More-with-Less cookbook

Mennonite Central Committee
Friday, 3 March 2000

AKRON, Pa. -- Almost 25 years ago, the More-with-Less Cookbook struck a nerve with its call for every household to help solve the world food crisis.

Editor Doris Janzen Longacre called on readers to consider eating and spending 10 percent less. We are looking for ways to live more simply and joyfully, ways that grow out of our tradition but take their shape from living faith and the demands of our hungry world, she wrote.

Herald Press, publisher of the More-with-Less Cookbook, plans to issue a 25th anniversary edition. Comments from readers and cooks who have used the book over the years will be included.

Do you have special memories, occasions, or anecdotes connected with the cookbook or with particular recipes in it? Have you made microwave or other adaptations to recipes? Has the cookbook's "more-with-less" philosophy affected your family's approach to food and living simply over the years?

Send responses to: More-with-Less Project Editor, 924 Chestnut St., Akron, PA 17501; by e-mail to abstau@desupernet.net; or visit www.mph.org/mwl and fill out a form.

How did Herald Press find out in 1975 that the cookbook's "more-with-less" theme was timely? "We hoped we would be able to sell the first printing of 10,000 within a year," says Paul Schrock of Herald Press. But within the year 45,000 more copies had to be printed to meet demand; the following year 75,000 were printed. British, German, and mass-market editions sold more than 195,000 copies. Forty-seven printings and more than 800,000 copies sold have generated about $872,700 Cdn./$600,000 U.S. in royalties for the work of Mennonite Central Committee over the years.

For more information, or to contact Mennonite Central Committee, see their website at: www.mcc.org