The Rent Before Buying Cookbook Pledge

I have to admit it. I have a problem. A cookbook problem, that is. I look at a cookbook, especially one with the delightful pictures and chatty backstories about the recipes, and all I see are endless possibilities. The problem comes in when I actually get the book home, and realize that I’m changing all the recipes anyway, or that it take hours to prepare each one so the book is relegated to weekend cooking or that I just don’t share the taste of the author. And the cookbook, rather than become a source of entertainment and inspiration, becomes a dust collector. Or a paper weight. Or a coaster.

I have found this to be a particular problem with “celebrity chef” cookbooks. I like their shows, and even try some of the recipes. But when I have received their cookbooks, I don’t find I use them very often. Giada’s Family Dinners never excited my family (if you have an herb garden, great. But 3 or four different fresh herbs for every meal really ads up in winter in PA). Mario Batali’s Simple Italian Food was anything but simple, at least in the ingredient department (guanciale is just not as common as you might think outside of Manhattan as Mario thinks). Still, despite the fact that I get three cooking magazines monthly, I love nothing better than to cuddle up with a good cookbook.

What’s a voracious reader to do? Rent!

That’s right. Instead of sneaking a peak at a few of Amazon’s “Look Inside” pages, I am trying a new tactic. Here’s my pledge: I’m not buying a cookbook until I’ve cooked at least three recipes out of it, liked them all without infinite tweaking, and found the types of ingredients used fit my budget, my aesthetics, my area of the country and my time constraints.

Admittedly, I am aided in this challenge by having one of the most amazing library systems in the country at my beck and call. Turns out there is virtually no book I have thought of that at least one university in the increasingly poorly named Big 10 has not purchased already. Nigella Lawson? No problem. Jacques Pepin? Got it. James Beard? Everyone. And it’s not just classics and best sellers. The Hospitality Management (a.k.a. Hotel and Restaurant) programs at the various universities require students to research all kinds of cooking trends. So browsing the catalog I’ve come across The Sriracha Cookbook, The Africa Cookbook: Tastes of a Continent, and The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook.

This week I’m trying out Nigella Express. And I’m waiting to hear about an interlibrary loan for Chocolate & Zucchini.

The question for Weekend Cooking readers is this: What cookbooks should I rent next? Thanks for any suggestions you can offer!

Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page. Thanks to Beth Fish Reads for hosting!

THE CROWN and THE CHALICE by Nancy Bilyeau

Careful folks, I’m about to gush! I enjoyed Nancy Bilyeau’s The Crown and its sequel, The Chalice, that much!

I think the best thing a historical novel can do is take a historical situation we’re all familiar with in some broad sense – say, the Great Depression or the Fall of the Roman Empire – and give the reader an idea of what it would actually be like to be one of the myriad people caught up in the historical circumstance. Not necessarily the people making the policy or winning the wars – there’s plenty of great academic history written about the kings, queens, presidents and popes that set the world spinning in one direction or another. Rather, I generally prefer historical novels in which those characters are secondary to “real people” who are dealing with the circumstances that they have purposefully or accidentally created. That is what Nancy Bilyeau has done with Sister Joanna – given us a window into what it would be like to live through Henry VIII’s brutal suppression of the Catholic Church.

By the way of backstory, one of the best seminars I ever took as an undergraduate was called “Tudor-Stewart Britain,” taught by a professor who was taken from the world far too early, Michael Foley. Needless to say, the

Dissolution of the Monasteries was a topic we discussed A LOT in that class. But I don’t think I ever really thought about what that would mean for the nuns, priests and brothers forced from their convents and abbeys until I read Bilyeau’s fantastic books. Through Sister Joanna, a young and brilliant Domincan novice from an old and landed family that had run afoul of the grasping Tudors, we get a real sense of what Henry’s policies, designed for the preservation of the tenuous Tudor dynasty, actually did to the people impacted by them.

In The Crown, Joanna goes through the first stage of mourning for her lost world: disbelief. She believes that events will somehow be turned around. And as it turns out, oily Bishop Gardiner of Winchester thinks he can use her relationship to Dartford Abbey to find the legendary Athelstan Crown, which has the magical power to bring Henry VIII – and his reforms – down. The book reads like a historical mystery, as we watch Sister Joanna try to figure out the mystery of where the crown may be kept. But there are other mysteries going on in the abbey as well, including the strange behavior of some of Joanna’s fellow novices. Oh, and there’s also a handsome, mysterious stranger who seems to have a knack for saving Joanna’s life. And a couple of displaced monks who help provide her with clues. I found it a total page-turner, even though I know how the history turns out, obviously, so we know going in that Sister Joanna can’t possibly succeed in ending the reforms she opposes so deeply.

By The Chalice, Joanna has moved onto the next phase of mourning: anger. Evicted from her abbey, and unwilling to live with her Stafford cousins, she is forced to try and make her way in the world – not a simple thing for an unmarried woman in Tudor England. She is not without means, being a distant relative of the king, and is able to come up with the money to buy a loom and begin a tapestry business. But the magical arc of the story continues, with a prophesy that indicates that she is the one who is meant to change the course of history. The only thing is, she has to willingly hear the second two parts of the prophesy, and she is not willing to be drawn into the fray again. But, of course, history intervenes, and her fury eventually leads her back into the Tudor Court – and eventually into the path of the famous mystic, Nostradamus.

I liked The Chalice even better than The Crown, because all the layers of intrigue helped illustrate how the English Reformation was viewed not only within England, but in other countries. Bilyeau also expanded the cast of characters, giving us insight into how dangerous the world of even the Tudor’s closest confidants could be if they appeared to be at all disloyal. The action never stopped – in fact, I read it cover to cover on a plane ride back from London. Having just seen Salisbury Cathedral, which was partially destroyed during the dissolution, I had an easy time imagining exactly what Sister Joanna had lost, and why she would be so frustrated by its loss.

The characters are beautifully drawn, but not at all black and white. Everyone’s motives are suspect – even Joanna’s at some points. Obviously, having left the abbey, there is more room for romance in the second novel, and constable Geoffrey Scoville seems like a likely candidate. But former friar Edmund Sommerville is also clearly smitten with Joanna. And when the romantic plot gets twisted up with the mystical prophesy plot and the historical facts, Bilyeau manages to weave it all together like a beautiful tapestry. It was the kind of book that I was sad to finish, because I knew if it was on a book tour, the next book in the series probably wasn’t out yet! It kept me that interested.

I definitely have to thank Audra at Unabridged Chick, one of the book blogger world’s go-to people for historical fiction. Her earlier review of The Chalice really piqued my interest, and when she mentioned it was the second book in a series, I mentally put them on both on my TBR. About a week later I found out they were on a TLC book tour and jumped on the proverbial bandwagon. I received a complimentary copy of both books – and only the books – in return for my honest opinion. Thanks, as always, to Lisa for including Col Reads on the tour. For other opinions on this fantastic title, please look here.

Godiva by Nicole Galland

Maybe because I studied medieval history as an undergraduate, historical novels set in that era have a particular fascination for me. I love trying to imagine characters that I know from chronicles and legends take on personal details and emotional lives that their original biographers wouldn’t have been interested in – and even if they were, they might not have recorded for political reasons. This is particularly salient when it comes to medieval women. With some notable exceptions – mostly saints and queens – women operated below the level of interest for those recording histories during the medieval period. This is hardly surprising, since many of those writers were clergy, and had very little interaction with women at all. Which is a long explanation for why I was really looking forward to reading Nicole Galland’s Godiva -- and why I truly enjoyed it too, even though it takes more a feminist turn than I think would be historically accurate.

First, the fabulous. Galland does a really fantastic job of writing about an actual friendship between historical women. Godiva, Countess of Mercia, is a long-time friend of Edgiva, the Abbess of Leominster and also a member of the tenuous royal family. This book actually passes the famous Bechdel* test: the book has two female characters; they talk to each other; and they don’t always discuss a man. It’s surprising how many historical fiction novels centered on women don’t pass that test. In this case, Godiva and Edgiva are united in their opposition to an unfair tax, the heregold, which ultimately results in the great Lady’s infamous ride. This is actually a twist on the original story, in which Godiva defies her husband with her ride, but I liked the arc of the story better with Godiva opposing the king, rather than her husband.

Next, the quibbles. The novel takes place at the end of the Anglo-Saxon era in England, when England was culturally more a Scandinavian country than a Continental one, with powerful earls like Leofric of Mercia, Godiva’s husband, loosely held together by an essentially foreign king, Edward the Confessor. Galland uses this fact to justify Godiva’s seemingly modern attitudes and behavior. (Less than 20 years after the events detailed in this book, William the Conqueror and the Normans overran the island and brought closer ties to the Catholic Church.) But while I’ll certainly concede women had more property rights in the Anglo-Saxon era, nothing I’ve ever read, including Sigred Undset’s painstakingly researched Kristenlavransdatter trilogy, indicates that women had the kind of autonomy – economic and sexual – that Godiva wields at any time in Europe until at least the 1970s. For me, that gave the book an anachronistic feel – or maybe it would be better to call it a “New Age” feel, kind of like Zimmer Bradley’s Mists of Avalon or Tobin’s Ice Land, rather than a traditional historical novel.

For example, at one point, Godiva tries to convince one of her husband’s rivals of her availability:

“I am barren,” she whispered. “Not that I was desperate for motherhood anyhow, in this world where someone else nurses the babe and someone else yet raises it. Where is the motherhood in that? No wonder the likes of Queen Emma became such a heartless and conniving monster. My very womb rebelled against it early. So you see, there is not the slightest danger of embarrassment to Leofric, and he knows I would never make a fool of myself.” (p. 58)

The problem is, that was motherhood back then. The current conception of motherhood as nurturing and child-focused is just that – modern. What would have been Godiva’s basis for comparison? It seems too progressive a statement for a time when even wealthy women had trouble living through childbirth and children’s life expectancies were brutally short. Nursing and fostering were thought to benefit the children and the family. From what does the childless Godiva construct her alternative motherhood? As Ralph Linton said, “The last thing a fish would ever notice would be water.”

That said, I enjoyed the novel, and I think it was mostly successful. Galland certainly managed to pull the action away from romantic entanglements and on to issues of social importance. I was surprised by the ending, mostly because the focus shifted from Godiva to Edgiva, and considering the title and the legendary events portrayed, I hadn’t expected it. But I actually liked it. This novel is a great choice for historical fictionistas, but I’d also see it as a choice for those who enjoy New Age fantasy, and are looking to stretch a little beyond the genre.

I read this book as part of a TLC Book Tour, and received a free copy of the book in return for my honest opinion. For other takes on Nicole Galland's Godiva, please follow the links here. Thanks, as always, to Trish for including me on the tour!

*Bechdel, A. (n.d.). The Rule. Retrieved July 11, 2013 from http://www.flickr.com/photos/zizyphus/34585797/. Go ahead, try to find a blockbuster movie that passes the test this summer. It ain’t easy!

Book Review: Doctor Who 50th Anniversary Editions' Ten Little Aliens

Of all the things you might want to do in the Universe, apparently bumping into the Schirr is NOT one of them. After all, Schirr are nasty, body-snatching creatures hell bent on the destruction of the human race, permanently at war with Earth’s far-flung outposts. At least that’s what the human’s elite Anti-Terrorists forces believe. But the First Doctor – Dr. Who, that is --- and his companions Ben and Polly are not completely convinced. That’s the confusing landscape into which the reader is dropped in the first of the Dr. Who 50th Anniversary Edition novels, Ten Little Aliens by Stephen Cole.

The TARDIS lands First Doctor, Polly and Ben in the 30th Century, on an asteroid that appears to be the final resting place of 10 alien corpses, who just happen to be the most wanted criminals in the known universe – a Schirr terrorist known as DeCaster and some of his followers. The TARDIS crew is surprised by a group of cadets from an elite anti-terrorist military academy who have arrived at the planetoid for military exercises, along with their training instructors, Haunt (a female veteran of the Schirr wars) and her assistant, Shel. First Doctor begins to suspect a trap when half the asteroid splits off, taking the cadets’ ship with it. With the TARDIS mysteriously locked, the group is cut off from the Universe.

And then cadets and corpses begin to go missing in pairs. And did I mention the creepy little cherub statues scattered about the asteroid? One of the party must be responsible for the disappearances – which turn out to be murders. Is this beginning to sound a bit familiar?

I love classic mysteries. And I love Dr. Who. So the idea of reviewing a Dr. Who homage novel based on Agatha Christie’s classic Ten Little Indians (perhaps better known in the US as And Then There Were None) was pretty irresistible. And I wasn’t disappointed.

But I will admit that I was confused at times. The sci-fi gadgets and pyrotechnics muddied the narrative waters for me. I felt like I had to spend a lot of time figuring out what was actually going on in the futuristic physical world. Maybe this was meant to put me in the place of Ben and Polly? I did admire the author’s attempt to provide multiple viewpoints for the same events, without giving the reader an idea of which of the narrators was reliable. But the narrator transitions were accompanied by all kinds of directions that were distracting, and interfered with the flow of the book for me.

Cole’s novel definitely reflects its early 20th century British origins, which means there’s a good bit of post-colonial angst. Shade, one of the cadets, is notable for his Earth-born origins – he’s in turns respected and reviled for his unique position. There’s also a politically correct spin on the old “terrorists vs. freedom fighters” question that is pretty interesting. But the subtexts were only revealed in bits and pieces, and some of them were never fully explained, so at some points I thought the backstory actually detracted from what was in fact a really interesting Who adventure.

Still, for all its “fan-fiction” flaws – and all my fan quibbling – this was a fun book. Like the television series, it required attention to detail. Adding First Doctor and companions to the Christie set-up was a neat creative twist, despite the unevenness in the narration that the addition entailed. Who fans will definitely love this book. I can’t say the same natural affinity exists for Christie fans, because the mystery element really takes a back seat to the sci-fi. But the combination was really fun for me!

I read this book as part of a TLC book tour, and received a free copy of the book – and a companion volume, Whoology -- in return for my honest opinion. Thanks, Lisa, for including me on the tour. For other opinions on this book – and all the books in the anniversary series – follow the links here.

Greek Chicken and Grain Burgers: Col’s VB6 Recipe of the Week

I'm a huge Mark Bittman fan, and my plan for getting back to Weekend Cooking was actually a review of his new book, VB6, which outlines the eating plan he described in his previous book, Food Matters. But then I read the reviews of the book, and many noted there wasn't much in there except a more persuasive case for his vegan-during-the-day-omnivore-at-night concept, and some very easy recipes based on it. And since I've been making an attempt -- sometimes successfully, sometimes not so much -- to incorporate VB6 into our lives since I read the previous book, I didn't think I could justify the cost of (yet another) book. So instead, I thought I'd share where I took one of his ultra-flexible Meat and Grain Burger recipe from Food Matters. Both my carnivorous husband and omnivorous daughter LOVED these, and they'll definitely be finding their way to the grill throughout the summer!

Greek Chicken and Grain Burgers 
1 6 oz. bag baby spinach
2 tbsp. olive oil
12 oz ground chicken thighs
1 cup rolled oats
2 ounce block feta, diced finely
¼ cup minced red onion
1 clove garlic, minced
1 egg
2 tbsp. ketchup
1 tbsp. Greek seasoning
Salt and pepper, to taste
8 small whole wheat rolls
Tzatziki for serving

Heat the oil in a large pan over medium heat. Don't dry spinach -- just toss in hot pan, and cook until the spinach is wilted. Set aside to cool, then wrap in a clean kitchen cloth and twist to release as much water as possible. Chop the little spinach block that remains finely, and toss with all ingredients through salt and pepper. Refrigerate for an hour, then form eight small patties. Grill until cooked through (165 degrees), and serve on whole wheat buns with tzatziki sauce -- or ketchup, if you're my daughter!

These make small burgers, so they don't dry out during cooking -- kids will likely eat one, but my husband eats 2.

Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page. Thanks to Beth Fish Reads for hosting!

Book Review: FLAUBERT'S PARROT by Julian Barnes

Julian Barnes’ Flaubert’s Parrot is a strange book, indeed. I spent the first half thinking I was reading a book about a literary obsession when I suddenly realized I was reading a book about a widower trying to understand his relationship with his late wife. Talk about confused! Several months have gone by since I read it, and in retrospect I believe one story was actually told through the other. But somehow I can’t quite decide whether or not I think Barnes pulled it off.

Let’s start with the fact that although I have read Gustave Flaubert’s Madame Bovary, it was a long time ago. And that is the only Flaubert novel I have read. I have not read, most importantly, A Simple Heart, also known as The Parrot which winds up being central to the plot – or at least what there is of a plot. I had no idea about Flaubert’s family life, his philosophy, or his, shall we say, eccentricities. That didn’t actually detract from my enjoyment of the novel, because I found reading the biographical bits on Flaubert really fascinating. But it certainly may have impacted my ability to decipher the story.

The ostensible plot involves a retired British doctor and Flaubert aficionado, Geoffrey Braithwaite, touring through France in search of the answer to a mystery: which of two ancient stuffed parrots claiming to be so is actually the one that stood on Flaubert’s desk while he wrote A Simple Heart? What, in a nutshell, is the inspiration for genius, appeared to be the question to which Braithwaite was seeking an answer. But what the asynchronous narrative slowly reveals is that Braithwaite believes understanding Flaubert’s life and inspirations will help him understand his own domestic story – one that has the small, sad dimensions of a Flaubertian tragedy.

The book was slow-going, but it wasn’t as heavy as it sounds. In fact, there are quite a few very funny bits. One of the most interesting chapters in the book is entitled “Braithwaite’s Dictionary of Accepted Ideas,” which encapsulates the conventional wisdom about Flaubert and his work with tongue-in-cheek encyclopedia entries:

WHORES: Necessary in the nineteenth century for the contraction of syphilis, without which no one could claim genius. Wearers of the red badge of courage include Flaubert, Daudet, Maupassant, Jules de Goncourt, Baudelaire, etc. Were there any writers unafflicted by it? If so, they were probably homosexual. (Kindle location 2525)

The book is beautifully written, I’ll say that. But there was something of Joyce’s Ulysses in this to me, so think with literary illusions that I couldn’t get a fix on the book I was actually supposed to be reading. The book ought to come with The Parrot as a pre-req – maybe I would have understood it that way!

Back from hiatus with THE LOVE SHACK -- and not a Chrysler or a B-52 in sight

As anyone familiar with this blog knows, I’ve been on hiatus for some time. I didn’t actually mean to go on hiatus – it just happened. We went to Shanghai, my daughter went to college, I went on sabbatical, my mom got sick. I’ve certainly been reading – as always, it’s been a huge comfort. But I just couldn’t find the time and energy to share my thoughts. It became stress, and not fun, and that’s exactly what I didn’t want when I started this blog. So I stepped back – and vegged.

Around January, I realized I was getting antsy, and had some things to share. But I held back from jumping back in to the book blogging world – I felt detached from a community I had been part of, and I didn’t know how to jump back in. So I waffled, which is like vegging, but with the addition of conflicted thought.

But then I got an email about a TLC tour that was way off my normal reading radar – a beach romance, for goodness sake. And I thought to myself, “Maybe that’s just the thing. Read something you haven’t read since you were a teenager, and see if it gives you something new to say.”

Which is the long way round to explaining why my usually lit/fic, historical novel and mystery blog is featuring a romance for my return to blogdom. A romance called, The Love Shack, no less. (Cue  the B-52s, my favorite 80s band).                                                                                                                                                            

All I can say was, it was a reading vacation. It was fun, decadent, and not terribly demanding.

Christie Ridgway gives the reader a story more Georgette Heyer than Nora Roberts. There’s lots of back story, lots of emotion, lots of complications and even a rumored necklace with lots of jewels. Oh, and there’s romance too. But it’s way more cerebral than I thought it would be. Seriously.    

The story is as simple at its heart as you might expect. Gage is a photojournalist who books some downtime in the place he happily vacationed as a child – Beach House No. 9. The owner’s little brat of a daughter, Skye, is now the owner of the place – and predictably gorgeous. He’s been working behind enemy lines in the war on terror. She’s been dealing with her own war on peace at home. Both Gage and Skye have incidents in their past that tend to keep them isolated – but they are also absolutely drawn to each other. You know they belong together from the first chapter – it’s a romance, for goodness sake – but Ridgway keeps you wondering if they’re going to figure it out before calamity strikes.

The Love Shack is a good beach book: comfortable and escapist, but just a little unexpected. Ridgway definitely channeled the Regency Romance aesthetic in a contemporary setting. The book was honestly far more restrained than I had expected. If you are looking for a fun, contemporary romance with an interesting set of supporting characters, consider putting The Love Shack in your beach bag this summer. No one is going to confuse it with Anna Karenina -- or The Gulag Archipelago for that matter* – but it’s good, reasonably clean fun.

I was supposed to receive a copy of this book in return for my honest opinion, but had so much trouble with NetGalley that I bought the book myself. Still, many thanks, as always, to Lisa at TLC for including me on this tour.  For other opinions about this title, follow this link.

*Deperado Penguin knows this to be true!