Crashing Casseroles Batman! It's Almost Thanksgiving! By Gail Roughton

It won't surprise anyone who knows me to see a cornucopia centered here rather than an image of a turkey. See, I hate turkey. Oh, I've nothing against the birds themselves per se, I just don't like the taste of turkey. And the smell of turkey as it bakes--oh, dear Lord forgive me, I know it's un-American bordering on treason to say this, but the smell of roasting turkey makes me ill. So does this mean Thanksgiving at my house is a meal most fowl? (Sorry, I couldn't resist, it just happened.) 


No, actually, it doesn't. We have ham. Spiral-sliced and honey glazed. That is, we almost always have ham. There are those years when my hubby's memory taste buds get the best of him and he begs and pleads with me, going so far as to buy a turkey and just present it to me with the litany  "Please, please, please--can we have turkey this year? " Please note that he attempted this same tactic for years with liver, buying it and bringing it home, only to watch me deposit it firmly at the back of the freezer to freezer burn into an unrecognizable lump before tossing it into the trash. It never did work with liver--to this day, I've never cooked a piece of liver and I assure you I'll go to my grave with that record intact-- but occasionally  it works as to turkey. Mostly because deep down I feel guilty at depriving the other members of my family of such a deep-rooted and dearly loved American tradition. There's only one problem with that. Turkey hates me as much as I hate it, and no matter how hard I try (and believe me, I've really tried), pretty much every turkey I've ever tried to cook has been a total disaster. It's either too dry, too greasy, too over-done, or--horror of horrors--not cooked completely all the way through and any cook will tell you that's the absolute worst criminal offense you can commit with any type of poultry. Yes, yes, I'm well aware there's nothing to it and 99.9 percent of all Thanksgiving Day turkeys turn out just beautifully.  So go ahead, tell me again how easy it is to cook turkey, I can take it. We've all got our little sack of bird feed to tote around with us.

NOT Gail!

The fortunate thing about this is that after forty-one years of marriage my long-suffering husband's finally come to the realization that turkey, like liver, will never grace our table. Certainly not a turkey I've cooked, 'cause most every turkey I've ever tried to cook is inedible. He's resigned himself to feasting on honey-glazed ham this year and every coming Thanksgiving thereafter. 


Thanksgiving's not just about the turkey or the ham, though. It's not really about food at all, when you get right down to it, it's about being thankful for who we are and what we have, especially our families. But somewhere in the human experience, deep down, food's become symbolic for us, tangible evidence of how much we love and are loved. Getting together for the special holiday meals is one of the greatest joys in life. And the food that graces the table, well, it's not just food for the body, it's food for the spirit. It triggers treasured memories for adults and creates treasured memories for our children and grandchildren to take into adulthood.


And that's where the side dishes come in. Everybody's got their favorite and if a cook's not careful, they could easily talk themselves into a dozen sides, because of course everybody's got to have their own personal favorites. Otherwise, the cook has failed! That's another thing my husband's realized. If nobody helps me reign myself in, the casseroles just keep on coming. It's a given everybody--most everybody--wants dressing/stuffing on Thanksgiving so that's never even up for discussion. But other than the dressing, he tries every year to curtail us down to just one additional casserole, mostly so I won't fall down in the kitchen floor in an exhausted stupor before we even sit down to eat.  But one? Just one?!  I ask you, is that even realistic? No, of course it's not, nor is such going to transpire at my house, either. But how to choose between broccoli casserole and green bean casserole? Noooooo, don't make me choose... And then there's squash casserole and sweet potato souffle and corn pudding and--and--that doesn't even take into account the lighter dishes, like pistachio fluff and ambrosia. Wait! What about dessert?!?  What about the pumpkin pie?! The pecan pie? The peach cobbler?

Well, you get the idea. It's a good thing Thanksgiving isn't every Thursday, or we'd all weigh so much we couldn't walk. Not to mention, we'd be broke, 'cause that type of cooking ain't cheap, folks. Still, I know a place where every Thursday's Thanksgiving. Oh, yes. See, over at the Scales of Justice Cafe in Turkey Creek, Rockland County, Georgia, you always know what's on the menu each and every day. The town folk like it that way. If it's Monday, lunch is goin' to be roast beef. And if it's Thursday--well, if it's Thursday, most folks in Turkey Creek are having turkey and dressing for lunch, right along with broccoli casserole and sweet potato souffle. Come on over, why don't you, and check out the menu? Drop in anytime!

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A New Release from Kat Attalla

How To Marry A Prince (The Desert Prince Series Book 2) Kindle Edition

by Kat Attalla

 

Angie Toricelli has a problem. What do you do when your two best friends are married to royalty? Well, you accept their offer to travel to the Middle East country of Touzar and add some impressive credentials to your resume.

Mandy and Mona made it sound so enticing Angie couldn't turn the opportunity down. The six month job posting would delay her plan to marry a rich husband, the plan she'd carefully constructed following the directions in "The Book", as she thought of it. How to Marry a Rich Man was her ticket to a great life. Playboy prince Tarik Khalid, younger brother of her two friends' husbands, was just a reckless ladies man and no threat to Angie's well laid plans, At least that's what she told herself. Then he started calling her Angel and circumstances threw them together. Soon Angie wasn't sure her 'great plan' was so great after all.

 

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01MDNPTGG

New Releases from Books We Love

Check out these latest releases, and stay tuned for more great reads in November!

 

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Visit the Books We Love Insider Blog and comment on any November post. Be sure to leave your email address in the comment. Then go to the sidebar and follow the blog either with Google follow or Networked Blogs. One random commenter who meets these requirements will be chosen to win a gift basket plus the Books We Love title of their choice at the end of November. Winner will be announced in the December newsletter. http://bwlauthors.blogspot.com/  

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Hallowe'en Greetings from a non-starter

I’ve read with interest the several posts on Hallowe’en, and Happy Hallowe’en to everyone who is participating in any way. Here in Australia, Hallowe’en is not big. In my regional New South Wales town, one supermarket chain offers huge Jack o’Lantern pumpkins with instructions how to carve. A few other retailers display costumes and assorted Hallowe’en bits and pieces; however, early on the morning of Saturday 29^th, the newsagent/gift shop in the main shopping centre reduced its dozen or so Hallowee’en items by 40%.

Several years ago, I was lucky enough to experience an American Hallowe’en while staying with friends in Pensacola. Pride of place in their house front window was a carved pumpkin; rooms were festooned with assorted orange and black decorations, and we ate, among other appropriate foodstuffs, home-made orange cupcakes with black icing. In the evening, we joined a Haunted House walking tour of the historic district, where we heard tales of the houses’ pasts and the ghosts who were (are?) supposed to revisit these, their homes, on Hallowe’en. Such a fascinating and spooky brief encounter with some of the heritage of the area.

* * *

Just the other day, I was asked where I got the idea from for my recent release Where the Heart Is, especially since the setting for most of this contemporary romance is in the Eastern Caribbean, geographically distant and not easy to reach from Australia. A newspaper ad caught my writer’s attention, not because I was interested in the product (which was not for a drink or for travel), but because it featured two tall glasses of an amber liquid garnished with slices of lime and paper umbrellas on swizzle sticks. The background showed a wooden jetty extending into a turquoise sea. Cutting the ad out, I saved it. Some time later, browsing through my ideas folder, the ad “told” me this was the location for a story set in the Caribbean. I have no idea why, as it could easily have been in Australia. The amber liquid became a mango daiquiri, while the jetty was needed for the fictitious amphibian plane that serviced a fictitious island. So much research to do!

I had a fabulous holiday. I visited Barbados, scribbling bits of the story while waiting for a flight to St Vincent, from where I took the ferry through the Grenadine islands. Champagne island in the story is a composite of what I experienced; the characters and plot are entirely imagination.

* * *

Back to Hallowe’en—over to you in the northern hemisphere. Have fun! Love, Priscilla.

Hellhounds: Black Dogs Get a Bad Rap by Kathy Fischer-Brown

We all know about black cats and their associations with “witches” and bad luck if one happens to cross your path. But what about black dogs? As a dog person who’s shared my life with a number of black dogs, I was interested to discover their otherworldly history. And as it’s nearly Halloween, what’s more appropriate than a short history of scary things. After all, I write historical fiction and research is probably the most fun part of the process, and this was no exception.

Since ancient Greek mythology’s Cerberus and especially in old Celtic and Germanic legends, in the British Isles and Western Europe, the black dog has been associated with demons or hellhounds. They’re generally large nocturnal animals with huge claws; black, mangy fur; “nasty, big pointy teeth” (to quote Monty Python…OK that was a rabbit); and red or green glowing eyes. Sometimes he will appear from the shadows of night and at other times a bolt of lightning presages his appearance. He is often associated with crossroads and places of execution. His presence almost always portends death for whomever is unfortunate enough to see him. He’s been known by various names, such as Barghest of Yorkshire and Black Shuck of East Anglia, and Moddey Dhoo from the Isle of Man. In Spain, Dip is an evil, black, hairy vampire dog. Cadejo from Central America and Southern Mexico can be white (benevolent) or black (malevolent), and appears at night either to aid or to kill travelers. In the U.S. we have our own black dog legends, one right here in Connecticut close to where I live, is called the Black Dog of Hanging Hills.

 

In literature, perhaps the most famous devil dog (not to be confused with the yummy Drake's confection) is Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Hound of the Baskervilles. J.K. Rowling’s young sorcerer crosses paths with a black dog in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Even Bram Stoker’s Dracula transforms into a black dog at one point.

Although I haven’t included many dogs in my books, a couple of street curs (one of which is black) makes a cameo appearance in my fantasy, The Return of Tachlanad. And for a fun exercise while in rewrites for book 3 of “The Serpent’s Tooth” trilogy, I made a point to include a few Wizard Oz references in The Partisan’s Wife. One such was naming an inn where Anne and Peter spend a night en route from Albany to New York. I called it The Little Black Dog (homage to Toto). Had I known then what I know now about the nature of black dogs in history, I might thought twice.

Shadow, my first black dog was a young stray mutt who hung out at the Amoco gas station my father frequented. I met him in 1956 on Christmas Eve (not Halloween) when I accompanied my dad to have my mother’s tires changed over in preparation for winter driving. I went up in the car on the lift with the little dog while the work was being done, and we instantly became best buds. To my great joy, Frank, the gas station owner allowed us to take him home. Knowing my mom would disapprove of such a smelly, greasy animal, we had to sneak Shadow into the house. But after a bath, during which I was nearly certain he’d turn white, he became a part of the family for the next 15 years. There was nothing evil or malevolent about my childhood companion, although I did go through a time when I swore he was actually a prince under a witch's spell…and all I had to do was kiss him.

~*~

Kathy Fischer Brown is a BWL author of historical novels, Winter Fire, Lord Esterleigh's Daughter, Courting the Devil, The Partisan's Wife. The Return of Tachlanad, an epic fantasy adventure for young adult and adult readers is her latest release. Check out her The Books We Love Author page or visit her website. All of Kathy’s books are available in e-book and in paperback from Amazon.