Step into the world of plain cooking and simple living with Amish Wisdom, and your Host Sherry Gore. It's doesn't take an airplane ticket--or even a buggy ride--to experience the hometown taste, smells, and sounds of a traditional Amish meal; to meet the colorful people living with Sherry in the Pinecraft, Florida PLAIN community; or to understand the joys of simple living from the Authors, educators, and media personalities making Amish culture more accessible than ever before:  just close out the modern world and take a step into a different life, a Plain and joyful life, with Sherry as your guide.  

Sherry Gore was not born Amish; she committed to an Amish way of living after finding a true Christian faith.  And as she once learned the secret of Plain living from her community, you will learn those secrets from her.  Also an accomplished cook and card-carrying foodie, Sherry takes Amish Wisdom into kitchens throughout the United States in order to deepen her personal relationship with food (and hopefully provide a few pointers along the way).

A fun and thought-provoking quest into the lives of good people, the mysteries of good food, and, of course, pie:  it's Amish Wisdom.  You've earned a little vacation, so why not visit Florida in your mind, right now, with your Host Sherry Gore.  

Tune into "Amish Wisdom." Thursdays, 5-6pm Eastern.   

About the host:

Sherry Gore is editor-in-chief of Cooking & Such magazine, a weekly scribe for the national edition of the 120-year-old Amish newspaper The Budget, and the author of Simply Delicious Amish Cooking. Sherry is a year-round resident of Sarasota, Florida, the vacation paradise of the Plain People. Sherry’s culinary adventures have been featured on the Today Show, NBC Daytime, and National Geographic Channel’s documentary Amish: Out of Order. She has three children and is a member of a Beachy Amish Mennonite church. She’s a caregiver to her twenty-three-year-old daughter, a Sunday school teacher, a cooking show host, and an official pie contest judge.

Have a question for Sherry or one of her guests? Call the show at 1-877-864-4869.

To learn more please visit Sherry's web site and for the latest news, her blog!

Missed a show? Listen here or on iTunes here!

Don't miss this week's show with Sherry Gore. Sherry and her three guests, Rhonda Schrock (Mennonite background), Sharon Lavy (Old Order German Brethren) and Mary Ann Kinsinger (Amish background), will be discussing the traditions and customs of Plain weddings. What are the differences and similarities? What are meanings behind the different customs? And what's with all that celery? Tune in on Thursday at 5pm Eastern.

Leave a comment for a chance to win a copy of Sherry's Simply Delicious Amish Cooking or Mary Ann Kinsinger's Amish NEW children's book, A Big Year for Lily (co-written with Suzanne Woods Fisher).

More about Rhonda: Rhonda Schrock is the mother of 4 sons, ages 6 to 22. She and her family live in Northern Indiana. She is a telecommuting medical transcriptionist and the writer of the weekly column, “Grounds for Insanity,” which appears in The Goshen News.  A prolific blogger, she appears twice monthly on Suzanne Woods Fisher’s website and writes once monthly for Sherry Gore, author and founder of “Cooking & Such” magazine. Rhonda is also the editor of “Cooking & Such,” and her column is featured there regularly.  

You can find her at www.RhondaSchrock.com.

More about Sharon: Sharon writes inspirational women's fiction with suspense. She hopes her stories will encourage hurting women who have had problems with a troubling family relationships.She is a member of several Christian writing groups including ACFW.  Sharon and her family live on a farm in Ohio and  enjoy the farming life style.

Connect with Sharon on Facebook, Twitter, and her website.

More about Mary Ann: Mary Ann Kinsinger was raised Old Order Amish in Somerset County, Pennsylvania. She met and married her husband, whom she knew from school days and started a family. After they chose to leave the Amish church, Mary Ann began a blog, A Joyful Chaos, as a way to capture her warm memories of her childhood for her own children. From the start, this blog found a ready audience and even captured the attention of key media players, such as the influential blog Amish America and the New York Times. Mary Ann co-writes a series of children's books, Adventures of Lily Lapp, with author Suzanne Woods Fisher. She lives in Pennsylvania with her family.

Learn more at Mary Ann's blog, A Joyful Chaos.

This week on Amish Wisdom we'll be catching up with ever-exciting Sherry Gore. Her new cookbook is out and she's got some BIG news of her own! Don't miss this week's show. 

Want a copy of Sherry's Simply Delicious Amish Cooking? I've got three copies to giveaway! Just leave a comment below (or email ckrumm@litfusegroup.com if you are having a problem with the comment box). Winners will be notified next week via email.

More about Sherry: Sherry Gore is a scribe for the national edition of The Budget newspaper, a cookbook author and editor in-chief of Cooking & Such magazine.

Learn more at Sherry's website, www.sherrygore.com.

More about Sherry's new cookbook, Simply Delicious Amish Cooking (Zondervan): Unbeknownst to many folks outside the Amish Mennonite population in America, Pinecraft, Florida---a village tucked away in the heart of Sarasota---is the vacation paradise of the Plain People. Unlike any other Plain community in the world, this village is a virtual melting pot of Amish and Mennonites from around the world, intermingled with people, like author Sherry Gore's family, who live there year-round. Gore has put together a cookbook that represents the people who make Pinecraft unique.

With hundreds of easy-to-prepare recipes, 16 full-color photographs and black-and-white photographs throughout, this cookbook includes traditional favorites such as Sweet Potato Sweet Mash and Mrs. Byler's Glazed Donuts, as well as Florida favorites including Fried Alligator Nuggets, Grilled Lime Fish Fillets, and Strawberry Mango Smoothies. Interspersed with the recipes are true-life stories about births, engagements, weddings, deaths, funerals, celebrations, wildlife encounters, and accidents told through years of Sherry's Letters from Home column published in The Budget, the Amish newspaper. This delightful cookbook offers readers a faith-based, family-focused perspective of the simple way of life of the Plain People. It is truly a breath of fresh air from Sarasota, Florida!

Order a copy of Simply Delicious Amish Cooking today!

Don't miss Amish Wisdom this week. My friend, blogger and columnist Rhonda Schrock, will be filling in as host. The topic this week? New Amish fiction! Authors Kate Lloyd and Shelley Shepard Gray will be joining Rhonda to share their new books. Sounds like a delightful show.

Kate and Shelley are both giving away a copy of their books (Pennsylvania Patchwork and Ray of Light). To enter, just leave a comment here (or email ckrumm@litfusegroup.com if you experience a problem with the comment box). Winner will be notified next week via email.

More about Kate: Author Kate Lloyd is a passionate observer of human relationships. A native of Baltimore, Kate spends time with family and friends in Lancaster County, PA, the inspiration for her novels. She is a member of the Lancaster County Mennonite Historical Society. Kate and her husband live in the Pacific Northwest. Kate studied painting and sculpture in college. She's worked a variety of jobs, including car salesman and restaurateur.

Be sure to visit Kate's blog, www.katelloyd.net.

More about Pennsylvania Patchwork:

Seattle native Holly Fisher is smitten by Lancaster County, its simplicity and her long lost relatives. In the sequel to bestselling Leaving Lancaster, Holly embraces the Amish culture, learning to slow down to see what – and who – really matters.

Meeting the family that her mother had kept hidden from her, Holly comes face to face with her real life and blood legacy. She also falls for the charming Zach, a handsome Mennonite veterinarian who is everything she’s ever wanted in a husband: confident, kind, successful, and authentic. And Zach proposes marriage. Is this too soon? Is this the right choice? Mother and Amish grandmother think she’s rushing into too much of a lifestyle change. Holly is in love with Zach and that precludes everything. Until she meets an attractive Amish man. And an old suitor shows up.

Pennyslvania Patchwork is the moving, richly told story of one woman’s heart, her faith and trust, and the choices she makes. Never easy, but one choice can change your destiny.

More about Shelley: Shelley Shepard Gray is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of the "Sisters of the Heart", "Seasons of Sugarcreek", "Secrets of Crittenden County", and Families of Honor series. She lives in southern Ohio, where she writes full-time, bakes too much, and can often be found walking her dachshunds on her town's bike trail.

Visit Shelley's website for more, www.shelleyshepardgray.com.

More about Ray of Light:

Bestselling author Shelley Shepard Gray brings inspirational romance to life in this sweet tale of love in the Amish community, Ray of Light, the second installment of her Days of Redemption series.

Roman Keim just wants a break from the family drama at his snowy Ohio home when he heads to an Amish snowbird community in Florida. There he meets Amanda Yoder and her daughter Regina who soon are warming his heart. But will Roman return to Ohio or will he stay and help the young widow embrace a second chance at love?

The author of the series Sisters of the Heart and Seasons of Sugarcreek, Shelley Shepard Gray delivers an honest, tender love story in Ray of Light, featuring the challenges of faith, family, and romance.

More about Rhonda: Rhonda Schrock is the mother of 4 sons, ages 6 to 22. She and her family live in Northern Indiana. She is a telecommuting medical transcriptionist and the writer of the weekly column, “Grounds for Insanity,” which appears in The Goshen News.  A prolific blogger, she appears twice monthly on Suzanne Woods Fisher’s website and writes once monthly for Sherry Gore, author and founder of “Cooking & Such” magazine. Rhonda is also the editor of “Cooking & Such,” and her column is featured there regularly.  

You can find her at www.RhondaSchrock.com.

This week on Amish Wisdom we'll be talking about two very different topics! The first half hour we'll be checking in with Dan Walsh about the new series he's co-writing with Gary Smalley. We'll discuss how marriage is portrayed in fiction and how story can help encourage and edify a readers' marriage. Then during the second half hour, Melissa K. Norris will be talking about homesteading. What is homesteading? What does it look like to homestead today? We'll also look at the reasons behind this trend's popularity. Should be an interesting show.

Both Dan and Melissa are giving away a copy of their books. Leave a comment here (or email ckrumm@litfusegroup.com if you are having a problem with the comment box). Winner will be notified next week via email.

More about Dan: Dan Walsh is the bestselling author of several books, including The Discovery and The Reunion. He has won three Carol Awards, and two of his novels were finalists for RT Reviews Inspirational Book of the Year for 2011 and 2012. A member of American Christian Fiction Writers, Dan served as a pastor for 25 years. He lives with his wife in the Daytona Beach area, where he's busy researching and writing his next novel. Visit Dan's website to learn more about him and his other books. www.danwalshbooks.com. 

More about The Dance: Jim Anderson is a successful businessman, and his wife, Marilyn, is the perfect wife. And why wouldn't she be? He gives her everything she needs. That's why Jim never expected to come home one day and find Marilyn gone.

After 27 years of marriage, Marilyn has had enough of feeling unloved and neglected. She wants to experience some measure of happiness before she's too old to enjoy it, even signing up for dance lessons, something Jim would never do. What will it take for Jim to finally become the man Marilyn needs him to be?

Combining the literary talents of bestselling author Dan Walsh and the relationship expertise of bestselling author Gary Smalley, The Dance is the first novel in The Restoration Series. Readers will get caught up in these flawed but sincere members of the Anderson family as they rediscover genuine love and start a transformation that ultimately affects all of them.

More about Melissa: Melissa K. Norris is a Christian fiction author, newspaper columnist, and author of her award winning blog at www.melissaknorris.com. 

She found her own little house in the big woods, where she lives with her husband and two children in the Cascade Mountains of Washington State. 

Her books and articles are inspired by her family's small herd of beef cattle, her amateur barrel racing days, and her forays into quilting and canning--without always reading the directions first.

More about Homesteading Today: Do you long for the simpler times of yesteryear?

Do you wish you had the time to offer your family home grown meals?

Does your heart silently cry for a quiet place in this fast paced life?

In Pioneering Today-Faith and Home the Old Fashioned Way, author Melissa K. Norris explains practical and easy methods to cook from scratch, garden, preserve your own food, and see God’s fingerprint in your everyday busy life. You’ll learn how to:

Decrease your grocery and energy bill

Improve your family’s health by cooking from scratch and over 40 delicious recipes

Grow and preserve your own food

Reduce your time in the kitchen without sacrificing taste and nutrition

Expand your view of God in your daily activities

Whether you live in the middle of the asphalt jungle or on the side of a mountain, you can experience the pioneer lifestyle and start your own homesteading journey. When you surround yourself with things made from the hand of God, you can’t help but see Him.

Don't miss this week's edition of Amish Wisdom. Judy Christie is filling in as guest host extraordinaire and welcoming Amish fiction authors Vannetta Chapman and Kathleen Fuller to the show. Vannetta will be talking about the new book in her Pebble Creek Amish series, A Home for Lydia. Then novelist, Kathleen Fuller will join the show during the second half hour to talk her novel, Letters to Katie.

Both authors are giving away a copy of their books. Leave a comment here for a chance to win (or email ckrumm@litfusegroup.com if you're having a problem with the comment box). Winners will be notified next week via email.

More about Judy Christie: Judy Christie committed to write her first novel when she turned fifty – and her seventh novel, “Sweet Olive,” will be published this year. Like many writers, she started keeping a diary when she was nine – and still has all of them.  She loves to talk about reading and writing and how to slow down and enjoy each day more.

Judy is the author of the Green series of novels set in the fictional North Louisiana town of Green.  “Downtown Green,” the most recent, is No. 5 in the series.  Publishers Weekly has given Judy’s work a starred review, and Library Journal has compared the Green series to Jan Karon’s Mitford series and Philip Gulley’s Harmony series.

She also wrote the award-winning “Wreath,” a novel about a 16-year-old girl who is determined to finish high school after her mother dies – and lives in a Central Louisiana junkyard to do so.

Judy loves to help busy people slow down and enjoy life more and has written the popular Hurry Less Worry Less nonfiction books, including “Hurry Less Worry Less for Moms.” 

She loves to visit with readers from her green couch and blogs at www.judychristie.com. Follow her on Twitter @judypchristie.

More about A Home for Lydia: A Home for Lydia, the second book in a new romantic series from popular author Vannetta Chapman, centers again on the Plain community of Pebble Creek and the kind, caring people there. As they face challenges to their community from the English world, they come together to reach out to their non-Amish neighbors while still preserving their cherished Plain ways.

Aaron Troyer simply wants to farm like his father and grandfather before him. But instead he finds himself overseeing the family's small group of guest cabins nestled along the banks of Pebble Creek. That also means he must work with the cabins' housekeeper, Lydia Fisher.

Lydia is the most outspoken Amish woman Aaron has ever met, and she has strong opinions about how the guest cabins are to be run. She also desperately needs this job. Though sparks fly between boss and employee at first, when the cabins are robbed, nothing is more important to Aaron than making sure Lydia is safe.

Together they work to make the vacation property profitable, but can they find out the identity of the culprit before more damage is done? And is Lydia's dream of a home of her own more than just a wish and a prayer?

More about Kathleen: I was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, grew up in Little Rock, Arkansas, and now make my home in beautiful Geneva, Ohio. I’ve been married to James for 19 wonderful years (really, they have been wonderful!) We have three terrific children, three dogs, and an overwhelmed cat. We have also raised cattle, pigs, and chickens at various times over the years. We would have gone into the goat business, but I had to draw the line somewhere. I started writing in 2000, and published my first short story a year later. Since then I have authored several short stories, novellas, novels, and have done a lot of freelance non-fiction work. I have also worked as an editor. I have a Masters degree in Special Education, emphasis on teaching the blind and visually impaired, and a Bachelors in Early Childhood/Elementary Education. I have taught all age groups ranging from age 4 to age 21. A few of my favorite things: my relationship with Christ, chocolate (of course!), autumn, a satisfying book, good friends, a sense of humor, people who don’t take themselves seriously, haunting melodies, NFL football, and did I mention chocolate? Learn more about Kathleen at her website, http://kathleenfuller.com

More about Letters to Katie: Everything changed between them the first time he called her Katie.

Katherine Yoder has loved Johnny Mullet since the two were children, but he’s never returned her affections.

Now Johnny is trying to forge a new life for himself by purchasing a farm and building a business of his own. But times are tough, and he soon learns that he can’t take anything for granted—especially Katherine.

Before Johnny has the opportunity to tell Katherine his true feelings, she’s struck by a serious illness. While Katherine struggles to recall recent memories of Johnny, a surprise visitor comes back into her life, claiming that his letters speak of a history and a future for the two of them.

With the two men vying for her attention and her memory still elusive, Katherine has never felt so torn. But will the solutions to both Johnny’s and Katherine’s problems lie in places neither one has ever considered?