In Which Monday Menu Mayhem Bounces Back

YOU GUYS.

There are explanations to be made involving travelling for work, moving (Hello, Scout Camp!) having one day out of fourteen to get settled after moving, and then an epic hurricane that knocked out power to everyone I know for at least 3 days.

But explanations are boring, and I have a feeling you didn't notice one way or another that this blog has been shockingly void of new material since July (!!).

So let's just get right back in to it, shall we?

And, starting back on the right foot, I of course have no photo to offer of the Ten-Hour Chicken I made for  Ma, Pa, and Baby Bro Jones on this glorious Labor Day.

I do, however, have an explanation.

It's a Gwyneth concoction, and it's actually the second time I've made it: you squeeze a half a lemon over each end (front/back, top/bottom, whatever you want to call it) of the chicken, then thoroughly salt-and-pepper the whole thing.  Stuff the lemon halves and 3-4 cloves of garlic into the chicken, put it in the pan, and put another 3-4-5 cloves of garlic in the pan, seal tightly with foil, then cook at 200 for nine and a half hours.  At the nine and a half hour mark, you pump the oven up to 400, remove the foil, re-salt-and-pepper, and chuck back in the oven for 15-20 minutes, or until the skin reaches desired brownth.

This is some of the best chicken I've ever eaten.  The foil seal and slow cook keeps all of the moisture in, and all of that lemon and garlic infuses in to every square inch of the chicken.  Additionally, the juice that ends up at the bottom of the pan makes for (literally) effortlessly delicious gravy.

The original recipe calls for the chicken to be cooked breast-side down for the nine and a half hours, and then flipped when the browning needs to occur.  We tried this the first time, and the problem becomes that after nine and a half hours, the chicken falls the frak apart.  In a great way.  In a glorious way.  In a way that makes it impossible to be flipped intact.

Make this chicken, friends.  Make it right side up, and enjoy every bite.

In Which I Review To Taste Temptation by Elizabeth Hoyt.

So this seems to be the latest pattern of my life: I give a paperback to Wendy Pan, she reads it (maybe), and then goes and buys the rest of the series on Kindle without telling me.

And then she tells me how awesome it all is.  Because the Kindle is such a secretive device (Sorry Dad! You brought it on yourself...), I can never tell what she's reading, and as a result I can never say "ohmygodisthatbookreallyexcellentortheworstthingever??"

Until it all comes out over dinner (or something), at which point I order the paperbacks from Amazon (Thank you, Amazon App), and then I get accused of being in possession of too many books.

Ha.

Devotees will remember that I recently read Elizabeth Hoyt's To Seduce a Sinner, which turned out to be the second book in the Legend of the Four Soldiers Series.  It's that second book that Wendy Pan read in paperback, and the first, third, and fourth that now live in the Amazon cloud.

So obviously I had to buy them, because I remain unconvinced of the Kindle (or any digital reading device) as a full-time reading option.  Personal opinion.  Haters to the left.  There's librarian in my DNA, dammit.  I have to collect the books.

ANY. WAY.

To Taste Temptation is officially Book One in The Legend of the Four Soldiers Series.  I know because it says so on the cover.  It's the story of Samuel Hartley, former military, recently civilized American colonist, PTSD sufferer.  Samuel and his regiment were viciously and brutally attacked and tortured on the frontier during the French and Indian War, and he has come to England on the pretext of expanding his Colonial import business, but with the grander idea of investigating the attack.

Part of his plan involves contacting the widowed sister of his murdered commanding officer, Lady Emmeline Gordon.  Emmeline supplements her income by steering young women through society and helping them "come out" as it were, and Hartley just happens to have a rambunctious baby sister whose Colonial upbringing, combined with his insane wealth, is a dangerous (and new!) combination in the ton.  And thusly Hartley and Emmeline are thrown together all the time.

Man oh man, do they have the hots for each other.

Let me start off by saying that this book flows so seamlessly into book two, that I'm very curious to find out what more can be said about our remaining two soldiers in books three and four.  The mystery of the attack that is set up in this book is not solved until book two, but it is solved in book two.  We also meet our book two hero and heroine, Emmeline's fiancé Lord Vale, and her best friend Melisande.  What's very, very interesting to me is that there is no setup for the couple in this book.  In fact, Melisande outright says in Temptation that Vale doesn't even know her name.  I think I like this.  If I had read To Taste Temptation first, it would have been surprising and intriguing to find these two paired in the sequel.

Emmeline and Hartley have a number of problems, both emotional and logistical, to overcome.  She has a huge abandonment complex because of all of the people around her who died and left her to pick up the pieces.  As a result she can be rather cold, and on more than one occasion is described as "prickly."  Hartley has his PTSD to contend with, in addition to his general incomprehension of the world in which Emmeline lives.

Class is a huge part of this book, but what I like about Emmeline is that she never considers Samuel to be beneath her, which in London society in that time was a very real consideration.  Her only concern is that they are different.  So different, that it would be impossible for them to meld their lives.  Samuel, on the other hand, acknowledges the differences, but like any true American, knows that they can be overcome.

I really like this book, and I really recommend it, preferably before you read To Seduce a Sinner.  The characters were vivid (especially Emmeline and Samuel), the suspense... fine (way predictable, but I didn't care), and the romance top-notch.  So go buy it.  Or ask Wendy Pan and myself about any number of our lending options.

Let the magic begin!

So, one day, Kate Jones gives me this Zoe Archer book and says, "Momma, you HAVE to read this!" I put the book on my bedside table and promised to get to it as soon as I finished whatever I happened to be reading at that moment. The problem was that I was reading something on my beloved Kindle. When you read from a Kindle, you are never really ever finished! It's the book that just keeps on writing! Then Lady Liberty comes to visit. She sees the book on my bedside table and asks me how far I have gotten because she's slated to read it next. Um, I am on page 14! I distract with a discussion on the awesomeness of the Kindle and I whet Lady Liberty's suppressed appetite for e-books! Within hours - I am the grateful recipient of the whole Zoe Archer Blades of the Roses bundle... on Kindle! My 50th birthday gift from Lady Liberty.(She really wants to read the books and is tired of waiting for me to put the Kindle down.)So now I have been asked to write a skeptic's review of the Blade of the Roses series. Kate wanted me to review the first book - but Kate knows I am hopeless at remembering one book once I have started another - so I offer a compendium of the four.

I have to say, if the books were not on my Kindle, I would still be on page 14 and still putting off the reading of them. Kate warned me (and she knew I needed warning) that the books were historical romances - I'm in so far - and involved some, "magic." This is me back-peddling. Um - yeah, NO! "Just read the first one, Momma, I promise you will love it." SIGH (of major magnitude!)Okay, and now they are on the Kindle - so no more excuses!

The characters in these books are fantastic. I cannot emphasize, enough, how much I enjoyed meeting them, getting to know them and caring about them. Their relationships with their romantic partners are so well developed and their relationships with each other are strong and believable. The historical aspects are well plotted and fascinating. I was in Mongolia, Greece, Canada, and England, learning things I didn't know and remembering things I did. I cheered the heroes, cursed the villains, and held my breath as battles of enormous magnitude threatened my main characters!

So, you ask, what's with the skepticism? It was the whole "magic" thing. I am not a fantasy reader and I am not in the least bit interested in Vampire stories. My reluctance in getting past page 14 was the magical appearance of some metal beetles attacking someone and drilling holes in a concrete wall. In the end, Zoe Archer had me completely committing myself to faeries, pixies, the Colossus of Rhodes, people who can change into wolves, bears and hawks, transporting ones self through fire, King Arthur (and Merlin.) There were the magic fish which enabled some of our heroes to breath under water, there were ancient compasses with the technology of modern day GPS systems, and there were spells and potions. The author had so perfectly developed the characters and the conflicts that the hows and the whos didn't matter to me at all. The only thing I cared about was how it was all going to resolve itself. The magical individuals who came out of the woods (and there were a lot of woods) became as believable and important as the "real people." Nothing was off the table. Inventions and science played their parts, but it was the magic that saved the day. And love. Let's not forget that! Because everyone gets a happy ever after to make the deepest cynic sigh. And you believe!

So, thanks Kate - for helping me to expand my horizons into a comfortable realm of fantasy. Thank you Lady Liberty - for feeding my Kindle hunger and for taking away the last hurdle of my excuses. Go out and buy, beg for or borrow Zoe Archer's Blades of the Roses quartet and prepare to sit back, be mystified, horrified, mesmerized and taken up in the magic that she has created for you! I know I was!

In Which Monday Menu Mayhem Cheats! CHEATS, I Tell You!

First of all, I write this post to the most epic Buffy ep "Once More, With Feeling," possibly one of the best episodes of television ever.  It's at least in the top 20.  "Every single day/ The same arrangement/ I go out and fight the fight..."

Second of all, I have to confess that I was not at Scout Camp this weekend, and therefore was nowhere near the Nigella cookbook that is requisite for this column.

HOWEVER.  Due to the birthday of one Wendy Pan (Happy Birthday, Momma!), I did some serious cooking tonight, but from a different cookbook.  So I'm cheating, but not really.

Ladies and gentleman, I give you Coq au Vin via the Barefoot Contessa:

(insert your own coq joke here... don't be afraid, we've all been doing it for about two weeks now...)

I'm supposed to offer the following analogy at this point in time: Nigella : Kate Jones :: Barefoot Contessa : Boy Scout.  I'm really sorry if that's wrong.  I was a French major, and I haven't thought about math on purpose in at least seven years.  The point is that Boy Scout seems to be working through the Contessa tome (Back to Basics) the way I'm working through Nigella, and boy does he rock my world.

But let's not get in to that now.  I just ate, after all.

However, this is the one recipe that I have made from the book, and I'm a fan in a qualified sense.  There's absolutely nothing wrong with starting with bacon (my favorite starter ingredient!) and then adding a bottle of wine to braise a whole chicken you've carved up yourself (Aside from being in constant danger of dismembering myself, I am a hugely huge fan of this step.  Sorry vegetarian readers) (Oh!  And have I mentioned you get to try and light the kitchen on fire as a step in the recipe?  Awesomesauce, crispy-fried on a stick).

It doesn't look like it, but this is a labor intensive recipe, and I don't necessarily recommend it for formal dinners.  However for my two purposes (casual friend dinner and casual family celebration), it worked like a charm.  And both times the chicken came out fork-tender and full of flavor.

As time goes on, I would love to play with this recipe and make it more "mine."  It's delicious, but I do feel that it could use some "making it my own."

Here's a vid to finish off the mayhem... For the record, I did cook barefoot this evening.  (That noise?  My esthetician weeping...)

Kindle: To excite (interest, feelings etc), Ignite

Okay, so, I had my doubts. Well, not really. But for the sake of argument - let's pretend I did. I had read about them and I had a narrow vision of what they might have been like. But never in my wildest imaginings did I expect to fall in rapture! I am speaking, of course, of my Kindle!

Dan Darling gave me one for Christmas after I expressed an interest in stealing Sam-I-Am's from him. Maybe Dan Darling had ulterior motives. The Amazon boxes were piling up on the front porch... daily! Maybe he thought this would curtail my reading (ha!) maybe he just plain old accepts that I am a reading machine and loves me anyway! For whatever reason, I am the proud owner of a Kindle (with a lighted brown leather cover, no less!)

Did it take a while to get used to? Nope! I downloaded my first book the day after Christmas. A Nora Roberts. And I like to think I helped to push her over the top as the all time best selling author on Kindle (to date.) I read with the usual distraction of a Beagle on my lap. I held my Kindle with one hand and became adept at turning the page without even moving my arm! I downloaded my next book later that day and was reading as if I had a lot of time to make up for. Dan Darling asks, "Are you still reading the same book?" Um, not quite! 15 books later (this is just since Christmas mind you) he caught me reading a paperback book. "What's that?" It was my Book Club book. The one I had ordered from Amazon before I knew I was getting a Kindle. I started/finished that on a snowy/icy Wednesday with the same Beagle on my lap. I had to turn pages. I had to read both sides of the book (not just a single screen.) It was awkward. I survived. Hereafter, I will make sure I can download my Book Club books.

Will I ever prefer a book to my Kindle again? Absolutely! I must have my J.D. Robb books in bound, covered editions. I own them all so far. And downloading them all to my Kindle would be really silly! And since I am notorious for rereading things over and over, it makes sense for me to have the whole series... in print.

That being said, I am a huge Kindle fan! I have no intention of using it just when I travel! I will use it any and every opportunity I am given! UPS doesn't visit so much anymore, but the satisfaction of going online and ordering a book and having it loaded in my Kindle immediately is beyond description!

I did have one minor issue with my brand new Kindle! And it was not pretty. I had finished the last of my downloaded books and was ready to find another - when our internet went down. I drove around town (at 9:00 at night) looking for WiFi. Even the town library was inaccessible from the parking lot! I was like an addict! It was a long night! I will have to make sure I always have a few books on my queue! Lesson learned!

Dear Kate:

You are an inspiration!I am humbled. While you manage to get your WriMo ass moving, I am stuck in readers paradise. I got the latest JD Robb book in the mail yesterday. As if WriMo wasn't difficult enough, now I have to share my writing time with my reading time (and I even started knitting again!)! Yowza!

Okay, so I read those Tessa Dare books that you made me read - and then I mailed the latest one to you. Thanks for the push. I did enjoy them and they were very easy and comfortable reads. Like wearing old slippers with new soles. The characters were fresh, the heroes believable (if a bit dominating) and the heroines were not too prissy!

Now I have to get into my Eve Dallas mindset. Ready to absorb the intricacies of being a famous NYC cop of the future, married to the richest man in the known universe. Your grandfather is already asking me if I have finished it... we soak them up! Will get back to you, when I have finished, to let you know what I thought!

Hugs and kisses, Wendy Pan

Characters welcome?

Well - I have to concur that the characters compel me to finish a story far more than any plot ever will. Don't get me wrong, I really appreciate a well told story, and will enjoy the clever twists an author can infuse: Sandra Brown's "Envy" anyone? But the characters keep me until the end - whatever it may be. I am gloriously involved with the "...In Death" series that J.D. Robb so brilliantly pens. Some of the plots are less intense than others, but I have come to look at the characters as old and comfortable friends. I genuinely care for Eve and Roarke and have come to care equally for the series regulars. Even the coroner, Morris, got his own story and, heartbreaking though it was, we were given a here-to-fore- unseen glimpse into the person behind the spiffy clothes and the great hair. While the plot lasts only as long as the book, the characters live on. (Dare I bring up Gone With The Wind, Kate? We all want to know what happened to Rhett and Scarlett. Do we really care about the restoration post Civil War? nah!)

... discussing

Kate will say that every book I read is like the first time. I am constantly purchasing books I already own because I don't remember the plot or the main characters names. So my choice may be rather skewed.

I have to say, that I agree with Kate in that many of my current "favorite" authors have developed writing styles that improve with time (exception: Jude Deveraux - what's up with her lately? And have I already asked that?)

So, for the book I would like to experience "a-new" all over again, I have to harken back a long time to a favorite read, re-read, re-re-read. M.M. Kaye's Shadow of The Moon. The intensity of the history detailed in the Indian uprising and the intelligence of the hero (whose name, I DO remember, is Alex) make it more than just a romance novel. And the end of the book still clutches my heart.

The book is no longer in print and the copy I own was borrowed from my local amazing library and subsequently lost, so I paid for my negligence. I have since found it and it assumes a place of honor on the bookshelf in my living room.

I'd lend you my copy to read, but it's kind of a treasure!

Gently finding my way back

Okay, so there appears to be some time in my days that wasn't available to me as recently as a week ago. I will take advantage of it. I'm in "Comfort Food" mode and reading Jude Deveraux's Sweet Liar. I need to remark on the fact that in the past few years I have given up on her books. I just can't seem to understand what or why she's writing. But I digress. Sweet Liar takes us back to her wonderful Taggerts and Montgomerys. As I have not finished the book (this time around) yet, I can only remark on my observations so far. It still holds up! Sam and Michael still appeal, and the story has meat. The heroine, Samantha, starts off wishy washy enough, but soon Michael (did I mention he's a Taggert?) brings out some very charming qualities and I am delighted by her spree in the bookstore - because who wouldn't like to be told that whatever books they could pick out in x number of minutes would be theirs to keep? The whole concept of the reenactment of a massacre is a bit overdone, but it gets us more familiar with other characters (who will eventually get their own books) and sets up the end of the story nicely. I'll let you know when I finish, and maybe I'll have time to read something a little meatier next time.

Discussion Continued-- The Kinks are worked out! (No, the band didn't go to the gym... nevermind)

WENDY PAN:
Okay - so why is it that when the heroine loses her virginity it's always a glamourous and wonderful adventure? Where is the fear, the pain, the mess?


Oh - maybe I'm talking about my first blog publication. I am being hounded by Kate Jones to contribute to this space and I make the effort with the humble knowledge that while I taught her all I know, she far surpasses me in talent. I think when I was her age I had the wit and wisdom to be creative, but I seriously doubt my ability to hold my own in this, our joint post.

So, I'm supposed to make witty reparté about lame heroines? The pressure is on. There was a time when I was enthralled with anything Jude Deveraux wrote and equally Joanna Lindsey. Not so much now. The heroines kind of remind me of the uncomfortable feeling I would get when I watched "I Love Lucy." You just KNEW Lucy was going to screw up and get in trouble and it was going to take the rest of the show for Ricky to figure it out and for them to get kissy face and get over it. I understand the concept of conflict - God knows it exists every day in real life - but do these women seriously have to create ways to be idiots?

Part of my thrall may have been based on a lack, in my own life, of the kind of "romance" that I read about in my favorite books. I have since learned that the fantastical romance I sought escape to, in the pages of comfortable trash, is so far from real life that it actually feels uncomfortable.

So, lame heroines are the ones that have to resort to any kind of subterfuge to attract the man of their dreams, or even the villain who later becomes the hero (Whitney My Love?) And those who think that when the initial bloom of romance is gone they have lost their man to a rival (The Black Lion).

A real heroine - whose character is to be applauded - is the one who is who she is and never needs to make things up to get her guy. But - if she does have to make things up, it's only to protect her man (Lyon's Lady, Guardian Angel). The one with enough guts to enjoy the battle and the struggle - for the reward of endless devotion from the man who sees beyond the tough exterior to the puddle of mush inside (J.D. Robb's Eve Dallas).

KATE:

Well Wendy Pan, thank you so much for joining us! No more putting down your own ability to repart-- any blog where we make up words like "repart" obviously has no standards of any kind.

I was waiting for you to bring up Eve Dallas, a difficult female character who finds a dude who, as you say, finds the puddle of mush inside. It makes the heroes better (sexier, more likeable, etc.) when they can see past the heroine's serious flaws (difficult, standoffish, badass warmonger, etc.) and like her anyway. This is the evolution of the "new" heroine, who the man adjusts to. Unlike in the earlier books you mentioned (everything, ever by Jude Deveraux), where it is up to the heroine to adjust and forgive and negotiate parts of her own personality.

Wendy Pan:

Okay, so what happened in society that made the weeping wimpy heroine so unacceptable now? And can any of us go back and be satisfied with Kathleen Woodiwiss again? I mean, Shanna... really? I think K.W.'s Ashes In the Wind gave us a better heroine - one more vibrant and less weepy, but the doctor actually fell for the sneaky cousin instead. Look how that ended!

I began reading trashy romance at the ripe old age of 17 (my grandmother's influence, if you can imagine) and Shanna was as hot as they got. (I won't say, "back in the day" but it's implied.) I worked my way over to Jude Deveraux and was truly, madly, deeply in lust with anyone whose last name was Montgomery. The women I could take or leave. They weren't why I was reading. I think Linda Howard changed my perception of the heroine. She made her women witty and bold. Jaine Bright - I mean, how great is she? And that Sam actually "gets" her at the same time he is perplexed by her? And that she drives a really cool car and that she's so not a wimp! Heroine evolution? God did not just create her, she has evolved. Her genetic roots can be tracked back to Lucy the fossilized hominid. And baby, look at her now!

KATE:

Funny, I'm a Taggert girl, myself...