Dining With The World-renowned Desert Museum

A Feast of Treats Await Those Who
Try "Dining with the Desert Museum"

TUCSON - Where else could you find fine dining recipes and small talk tidbits all tastefully illustrated by local and nationally known artists? A new collection of recipes called "Dining with the Desert Museum" answers all this and more.

With content gathered by Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum staff, docents, volunteers and board members and enhanced with a full party menu prepared by local chef Patrick Fahey, the cookbook is a gift from the docents to the Museum's capital campaign. "Many of the more than 300 recipes include regional ingredients, including Nopalitos Colorados, Mexican Spoon Bread and Oven-roasted Mojito Chicken", said Amy Hartmann, Community Development Officer for the Desert Museum.

"This project was conceived and produced entirely by the Museum's docent volunteers including the testing of every single recipe.' Hartmann said. "Tasting the recipes, especially the Zuppa Inglese (aka Death by Chocolate), was a labor of love by everyone involved."

To make this publication distinctive and fun, the cookbook includes fun facts about the Museum. From the best hummingbird food, to the favorite meals of javelina, lizards and big horned sheep, these highlights give you a sense of what makes the Desert Museum experience unique, as well as giving you great dining conversation topics.

A beautiful array of artwork illustrates the cookbook and features the talents of Museum staffers Kim Duffek, Ken Stockton and Susan T. Fisher, who is also president of the American Society of Botanical Artists and former staffer Nick Wilson. Other original work contributed to the book came from the Museum Art Institute instructors Rachel Ivanyi, who is an award-winning illustrator and Margaret Pope, who also serves as a docent.
Proceeds from the cookbook, retailing at $24.95, will support the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum's "Treasure the Desert - The Campaign for Our Future." Capital building projects at the Museum include large-animal exhibits, a much-needed education center with classrooms, offices, and an animal retirement center. Included in the Education complex will be studios to accommodate the Museum's Art Institute.

The cookbook has lay-flat binding to make it easy to follow the recipes when cooking and the pages hold up well to spills. In addition to the Desert Museum gift shop, "Dining with the Desert Museum" is sold at many local shops, including the Arizona Inn, Culinary Concepts, Ventana, El Conquistador and La Paloma resorts, Native Seed Search, Old Tucson, Tohono Chul Park, Borders bookstores and The West.
The Desert Museum is the nation's leading outdoor living museum, featuring more than 300 species of native wildlife and 1,300 varieties of desert plants. The museum, located at 2021 N. Kinney Rd., is open every day of the year from 7:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. March through September and from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. October through February. Admission is free for members and children under six, $9 for non-member adults and $2 for children age six through 12 (May through October). On Saturdays after 5 p.m., admission for non-member adults is $5 and for children six through 12, $2. Call (520) 883-2702 or visit www.desertmuseum.org for more information. Call (520) 883-2702 or visit www.desertmuseum.org for more information.

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