by Debby Dyess

Created on: August 06, 2008

The Cooking Club of America is obviously such a cool idea. Like so many online offers, it sounds like a big bang for a little buck, offering members an amazing number of benefits. The organization promises you an opportunity to test and keep new kitchen gadgets simply for filling out a survey at the end of a usage period. In addition, members receive a magazine, Cooking Pleasure, full of recipes, advice and tips. Publication of a recipe, tip or question in the magazine will, they claim, give you another opportunity to win free stuff. You may also, as a member, enter online or via snail mail in the Cooks Giveaway. For $12 per year (at the time of this article) or a life-time membership of $330, it sounds like an awesome club, one that any cooking enthusiast would enjoy.

A quick look at what one would think is the CCoA website (cookingclubofamerica.com) reveals an attractive, well laid-out site, with options including a variety of recipe websites, cooking magazines, and sites on which to purchase cookware, supplies and even cooking schools. One website listed, cookingclub.com, takes you to the real CCoA site. Here you'll find several contest entry opportunities for members only, and several recipes available to visitors (check out the dynamite recipe for watermelon soda! It's incredible). A search bar is provided for quick and accurate recipe retrieval. There is also a question/answer section on the page; the day I visited it concerned storage of olive oil. A member spotlight section gives a brief bio of satisfied Club members, encouraging readers to join, also. I enjoyed taking a look at the site and at this point would have considered joining. Although I'm not a great cook (just ask my poor family), the opportunity to improve seemed to be right in front of me for only a measly $1 per month.

Intrigued, I decided to check for complaints about the company good thing, too. It seems the Club doesn't live up to the hype. If you Google the words "Cooking Club of America scam" or "Cooking Club of America reviews", you'll get over 140,000 and 290,000 responses, respectively. Complaints range from fraudulent advertising in the magazine ads and charges for returned material to a failure on the part of CCoA to follow through with marketing promises. I found nothing positive about CCoA. As one complainant put it, "take your $330 membership fee and go buy yourself something you'll actually use."

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