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I'm going to the beach for a long weekend soon and can hardly wait to see the ocean. I know it probably won't be warm yet, but summer is close enough to put on jeans and a t-shirt and make the most of some time away.

This particular group of friends is a special one. We try to meet up annually on the shores of North Carolina, and my husband always makes his specialty, filet oscar. Howard is just about the finest griller of steaks I've ever known. On top of the filet, he piles lump crab meat, freshly steamed asparagus and hollandaise sauce.

I've made dessert in the past, but usually the gut just can't take anymore.

Filet oscar season is almost upon us. I must give away a cookbook honoring the beauty of a rich chunk of meat on the grate of a roaring grill. How about "Grill It! Recipes. Techniques. Tools" by Chris Schlesinger and John Willoughby?

If you're interested in winning this cookbook, send in a comment describing your favorite meal off the grill. Deadline is Tuesday at 9 a.m. The winner will be randomly drawn.

Have a VERY LUCKY St. Patrick's Day weekend!

Photo from Amazon.com

Congratulations to Jennifer Nichols, who just won my random drawing for "Entertaining Simple" by Matthew Mead. Jennifer won by submitting an inexpensive appetizer for chili dip, which calls for just a block of cream cheese, a can of chili and hot sauce to your taste. As a nice twist, the dip can be served in a bread bowl.

Thanks to everybody who submitted recipes for the contest. Even if you didn't win, we all won a little bit by collecting a few new ideas for the next time we're headed out to a gathering and looking for a quick, easy, inexpensive hors d'oevres to take along. My Super Bowl column next week will feature two of the recipes that were submitted: Jennifer's chili dip and Amy's cheesy olive bread (which came from the Pioneer Woman Web site).

As long as I'm talking about great Web sites, I've got one you should all check out. Reader Win Hunt alerted me to this site, which is called TasteSpotting. When you go to the site, you will first be greeted by a screenful of beautiful photos of food. If you see something that looks good to you (um, everything) all you do is click on the photo to get recipes. If you need to work up an appetite or find a great recipe, TasteSpotting should be another stop on your tour around the Web. But don't forget to come back to the Fridge Magnet!

Don't forget that if you'd like to win a copy of Matthew Mead's "Entertaining Simple," you can enter by sending me a recipe for a cheap, easy appetizer! Just leave the recipe as a comment on this blog by 5 p.m. today. I will announce the winner tomorrow!

Also, get this craziness: One of the two finalists in the Duke's Mayonnaise jingle contest is originally from Bedford, Va.! I do not want to influence your voting, so I'm not telling which one it is until after the contest is up. But y'all are smart. You can probably figure it out for yourselves.

Nah, I'm not talking about giblets or charcuterie. Although this blog entry does include both chicken and pig!

A few food-related odds and ends have passed my desk or drifted across my mind in the past few days, so I'll take this opportunity to round them up for you.

1. Chick-fil-A has announced that their menu is entirely trans fat free. Also, on a barely related note, they have teamed up with the Kennedy Space Center complex to offer kids a four-part toy Kennedy Space Center that will come in pieces with kids' meals. Kids have to collect all four parts to build their own space station.
2. Wildflour Cafe on 4th Street in Old Southwest Roanoke is in gumbo mode. Apparently, their gumbo is so popular that they felt the need to put out a flyer saying it will be available on the first Thursday of every month between October 2008 and May 2009.

If there's any left over on Thursdays, they'll carry it on Friday, too, until it runs out. It's described as "Mike's Famous Louisiana Gumbo," brimming with chicken, sausage, shrimp, peppers and vegetables and served with authentic dirty rice and bread. Check it out. If you have, let us know if it's really that good.

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It was a big pile of names that went into the hat this time around, thanks to everyone who contributed a money-saving grocery tip within the last few days.

Not only will I have a great number of ideas to share with readers in this Sunday's newspaper (don't worry, no names will be used), but we have TWO cookbook winners.

Blog readers Angela and Seth have been chosen to pick a cookbook out of a list of titles I will provide them with. Seth, Angela, please send me an e-mail at lindsey.nair@roanoke.com to acknowledge your win and get the list of books.

Congrats!

We didn't plan for this past weekend to be a full-on autumnal extravaganza, but it was.

It started Saturday night, not long after the rain cleared out and the crisp fall temperatures set in. My friend, Beth, who just moved here with her family from Detroit, threw a housewarming party that she called a "Soup-a-palooza."

We had white chicken chili, red beef chili, chicken tortilla soup and a heavenly, rich butternut squash soup. Some folks brought beer bread or crusty bread, others brought desserts. We washed it all down with ice cold Yuengling before heading out to the fire pit to roast marshmallows.

On Sunday, the hubby and I drove up to mom's house in Clifton Forge to drop off my useless old desktop computer (she plans to rebuild it). On our way down U.S. 220 through Botetourt County, we realized it was probably peak leaf-looking weekend. The humidity was nonexistent and the colors of the sky and the trees were as vibrant as if a child had colored them.

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I'm so thrilled with the array of great ideas that came pouring in after yesterday's blog post that I'm going to shamelessly entice you guys to keep those tips coming.

I've got a teetering stack of brand new cookbooks beside my desk right now. Some of them have GOT to go. So at the end of the day on Monday, I'm going to put the name of everyone who contributed a tip or a recipe on yesterday's blog in a hat and draw two names.

If you write more than one comment, your name will go in once. After I pick out the two winners, I will email them a list of the books I've got for giveaway and let them pick which one they like best. The first name out of the hat gets first dibs.

Nobody is disqualified, even if they've won a book before. So keep up that brainstorming!

I know I say this every single time I do a Cookbook Giveaway, but this time I mean it more than ever: It was so hard to pick a winner this time.

I had entries from folks who had just quit smoking, were on fixed incomes and could not afford the book, wanted to lose weight for retirement, wanted to help their loved ones cook healthier meals for themselves and hoped the book would help them teach their children about a healthier lifestyle. I wanted to give the book to every single person who entered.

Fortunately, I was assisted just a little bit by a surprise phone call that I received this week. The public relations person for the Podleski sisters are sending me.... drum roll, please... an autographed copy of the book! So now I have TWO copies and I will give them out to my top TWO winners.

The winner of the autographed copy is Amanda, who said: I just started graduate school and am currently living at home with my 2 dogs while my husband is away doing military training. It's so hard to eat healthy when it's just myself! I've been married a little over 2 years and my husband is in the Army. He's been gone for a little over 3 months. Right now he is doing training for his position. He will be be home in October and deployed next year. This will be a great way to get myself in shape -not only for him but for myself. I've started going to the gym, but need help with the nutritional aspect. I have around 40 pounds to go!

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It's here! It's here!

After lunch at Wasabi today (more on that later), we wandered down the street to see if Chocolatepaper's second location had indeed opened today, and lo and behold, it had! Now those of us who live across town from Southwest County or work downtown have easy access to one of the coolest shops in Roanoke.

As I have mentioned before, Chocolatepaper is owned by some of the same folks who own Mongrel, a fun, kitschy gift and card shop in Careytown in Richmond. The downtown Roanoke version features a wide range of cards and three display cases filled with beautiful chocolates, which range from 33 cents up to about $3 apiece.

They also have a lot of Roanoke and Virginia-centric gifts, like solid chocolate Mill Mountain stars and Virginia state-shaped cookie cutters. It would be a great place to make a basket for someone who is new to the 'noke.

Image source: Chocolatepaperroanoke.com

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It's been a long time since I've seen such compelling and convincing entries in the Cookbook Giveaway contest.

Apparently, "Eat, Shrink and be Merry" by Janet & Greta Podleski has struck a chord with everyone from nursing mothers wanting to lose weight and stay healthy to military wives who are trying to stay in shape and maybe slim down for when hubby returns.

I'm guessing the big attraction is probably that the Podleski sisters manage to pass along healthful cooking practices with a big sense of humor. Who needs another dry, discouraging diet book?

Let's keep the entries coming until Wednesday. Since the book sounds so popular, I'm going to share another recipe, this time for a chicken salad with pecans and cranberries in a creamy orange dressing.

Keep those entries coming!!

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