Oodles of Noodles

Every family has its own special "must-have" dishes to make the Christmas dinner just right. At our house, you can keep the dressing and pumpkin pie. It's all about the noodles.

When I was first learning to cook, I was so frustrated by the good cooks in my family who didn't have exact measurements for their recipes. My mother-in-law always said she'd just start at one end of the kitchen and keep going till she reached the other, dirtying up every pot and pan in the place. My mother claims she adds ingredients "until it feels right."

Grrr! How could I ever fix anything with advice like that?

So let me apologize in advance if my noodle recipe seems a bit loosey-goosey. Mom was right. Sometime, you do have to rely on feelings. And my M-I-L would be happy to know making my noodles spreads flour in all directions. But my family loves them, so here's what I do:

Ingredients:
All purpose flour (2-4 cups, depending on how many noodles you want)
salt 1/2 teaspoon
eggs 2-4 depending on how many noodles you want
milk 1/3 cup (add more if you want more noodles)
cream of tartar 1/4 teaspoon
baking powder 1/4 teaspoon

Directions:

1. Start the night before you mean to serve the noodles!
2. Whip the eggs and milk together in a large bowl.
3. Add the cream of tartar and salt, stirring vigorously (Get some kids involved at this point!)
4. Begin adding flour one cup at a time and mix it thoroughly with the wet ingredients. Eventually, you'll need to use your hands to work the flour in. But don't knead it too much or the noodles will be tough.
5. Spread some of the left over flour onto a pastry cloth, putting a pile of flour in the center. 
6. Form your noodle dough into a ball and place on the center of your cloth. Pour the last of the flour on top before you begin rolling the dough out with a rolling pin. 
7. Cover with a cloth and let dry overnight.
8. The next morning, cut the dough into noodles.
9. Heat a stock pot of broth to a rolling bowl and then add noodles a few at a time. Once they've boiled for 5 minutes under your watchful eye and stirring spoon, turn the heat down until the noodles are barely bubbling. Set a timer and stir every 5 minutes so nothing sticks to the bottom of the pot. 
10. Do not stir in a circle or you'll end up with the world's largest dumpling! 
11. After the noodles have cooked for an hour, serve to your grateful family. They'll love them!

You can make them well in advance and freeze them. Once cooked, they are great left over and can be worked into casseroles and soups.

Here's wishing you and your family the merriest of Christmases! Enjoy!

And speaking of enjoying, be sure you check out the recipes from the Green Apple Grill, home to my hunky hero in The Coldwater Warm Hearts Club. 

Little Drummer Boy Redux

Talk about an update! This version of The Little Drummer Boy is a brilliant re-imaging of an old standard. Love it! Hope you did too!

Jingle Bells Bluegrass

If I had one word to describe this bluegrass version of Jingle Bells featuring a 9 year old banjo prodigy, that word would be "Joyful!" I love this and I don't even like bluegrass!

Ethel's Icebox Rolls

I promised to let my characters from The Coldwater Warm Hearts Club take over the blog from time to time. Up next is Ethel, the geriatric waitress at the Green Apple Grill. Jake, the owner of the restaurant, suspects she calls everyone "honey," "sugar", or "darlin'" because she can't remember their names. When she's not fussing at people for failing to clean their plates, she's sharing some of her favorite recipes with Jake. Here's the recipe for her delicious... 

Icebox Dinner Rolls

Ingredients:

1 cup shortening
1 cup sugar
1 tbsp salt
2 pkgs (1/4 oz) of Fleishmans dry active yeast dissolved in 1/2 cup of water with a tbsp of sugar on top
6 cups of flour (more or less, depends on how it feels)
1 cup boiling water
1 cup cold water
2 eggs

Directions:

Cream the shortening, sugar & salt. Add the hot water, then the cold. Beat the eggs in a separate bowl and then add to the mix. Add the dissolved yeast, then the flour. 

Ethel says once it's all together the dough is so thick she can't hardly beat it with a large spoon. That's the only reason she shared this recipe with Jake. She needs him to do that final stirring. Let the dough rise for an hour or so. Cover and refrigerate and you can use this to make dinner rolls or cinnamon rolls when ever you want.  

Roll out the batter on a pastry cloth and use a glass to cut it into circles. Put the circles in a non-stick baking pan and bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes. 

For a change, you can use the dough to make cinnamon rolls. Just dip the circles of dough into melted butter, stretch it into  long oval and roll it in a cinnamon and sugar mixture. Tie it in a knot and bake as directed above! 

Ethel says to serve them with love, honey! 

Valor Knows No Age

A couple years ago, Mr. Eddings and I took a cruise around the British Isles with stops in Ireland, Orkney, Scotland and France. When we travel, part of the fun is meeting new people, so we always opt to be seated with others instead of having a private table. We are usually seated with folks who are close to our age, and arguably would have similar interests.

This time we were seated with two nonegenarians. At first, we were disappointed. What common ground would we find with these men in their 90's?

Then we got to know them and discovered that they were both WWII veterans.

George and Joe had been friends since high school. After Pearl Harbor, they volunteered when the country went to war. George was a soldier in the European theater, was captured by the Nazis and spent time in a POW camp. Joe was an airman, flying bombers out of Burma. They both survived the war, came home, married, had families and meaningful careers. In an ironic twist, George married a German girl who came to the States for college,

Both men were with their wives for more than 50 years, so they know a thing or two about faithfulness and making a love last. When we met them, they'd both become widowers, but their friendship was as strong as ever. Each year, they take a trip together and this particular year, they hoped to visit the beaches of Normandy when we stopped in France.

We are losing our WWII vets at a rate of 550 a day. My hubby and I count ourselves blessed to have been able to spend 12 days getting to know these two.

To all our vets, to our current airmen, sailors, marines, soldiers, coasties and their families, please accept my heartfelt thanks for your service to our country. You are my heroes!

Jake's Lazy Man Chili

This week the weather is brisk in Coldwater, Oklahoma, the fictional setting for my Coldwater Cove series. Folks are turning up their collars against the wind that whistles down from the tired peaks of the Winding Stair Range and off the choppy surface of Lake Jewel. Jake Tyler, an ex-marine who's also the chief cook and bottle washer of the Green Apple Grill, has put his Lazy Man's Chili back on the menu. 

When he has time, Jake likes to cook from scratch, but sometimes he takes a few shortcuts. The results are still fantastic. Here's his easy recipe for chili soup guaranteed to warm up your insides:

Ingredients:

Spicy V8 juice (48 oz.)

Chili Beans (2 cans)

Pinto Beans (2 cans)

Kidney Beans (2 cans)

Rotel Diced Tomatoes & Green Chilies (10 oz. can)

Bell peppers (1 red, 1 yellow, 1 green)

Onion diced

Mushrooms (1 cup sliced)

Ground Beef (2 pounds)

Minced Garlic (1 Tablespoon)

Sea Salt

Freshly Ground Pepper

Chili Powder (1 Tablespoon)

Directions:

Combine first 5 ingredients in a stock pot. Be sure to drain the pinto and kidney beans before adding. Cook on medium heat. Chop up the peppers, onion and mushrooms and add to the mix. You can also add half a package of frozen corn if you wish. It adds another pop of color to the bowl.

Jake likes to use a steamer/strainer to cook his ground beef. It drains the excess fat without sacrificing flavor. Or you can brown it in a skillet. If you prefer to use ground turkey or venison, either works well. Season the meat with sea salt, fresh ground pepper, minced garlic and chili powder. Add to the stock pot. 

Bring it to a boil, then lower the heat till it's bubbling gently. Let it cook for about an hour, stirring occasionally. 

Jake's Green Apple Grill customers garnish their chili with chopped jalapenos if they're feeling adventurous and shredded cheddar if they're not. Serve in a deep bowl. You'll want a Methodist's portion. (That means a lot!) 

All Done But The Shoutin'

The ink hasn't hit the contract yet, but I'm thrilled to share that Kensington Publishing has offered a sweet two book deal for my Coldwater Cove series! I've instructed my agent to accept so we can proceed with the formalities.

Excuse me while I do a little happy dance.

It's pure joy to conceive of a whole town full of characters whose lives intersect in funny, poignant and unexpected ways. It's even better to know I'll have a chance to share that little town with the reading world.

I don't know when The Coldwater Warm Hearts Club will come out. Or when the second book will follow, but I can share that they will be offered in beautiful trade paperback. This is the perfect format for this type of story. Hopefully, the adventures of the residents of Coldwater will attract book clubs and libraries. Since my hero is a wounded warrior, I'd love to see the book in PX's. And with the Methodist Prayer Chain figuring prominently in several plot points, there may be potential for a little CBA cross over. (If you wonder why I pick on Methodists, the answer is simple. I are one!)

Anyway, I couldn't keep the news any longer. Over the next few months, I'll be sharing more about the special world of Coldwater Cove, including some of Jake's favorite recipes from the Green Apple Grill. My dear husband has pointed out to me that Green Apple Grill's initials spell "gag" but I assured him the fare offered there is Ozark cooking at its finest! And no, there is no section in the menu for road kill!

If you haven't done so already, I invite you to sign up to receive my posts by email. It's easy. Just type your address into the little box in the right hand column. Next post: Jake Tyler's Lazy Man's Chili!

See you then!

Anticipation...all it's cracked down to be

I hate to wait.

I'm sure I'm not alone in this. We are a culture of right now--instant coffee, fast food, friendships with one click via social networks, Whatever it is we want, we want it NOW!

But sometimes I wonder if slower isn't better.

In the case of coffee, food and friendships, I'm certain it is. We moved recently from a city of about a million souls to a small town of about 11,000. Things are definitely slower. There are times when we feel like the only hares in a tortoise race.

I'm starting to like it. If the grocery store clerk wants to visit while she checks out my purchases, who does it hurt? The person behind me in line is likely to join in on the conversation and we all pass a pleasant time.

Measuring the passage of time is a pretty artificial construct, after all. I haven't worn a wristwatch since I started carrying a cellphone years ago. (Of course, that may be because something in my body chemistry drains the batteries of a watch in about a month unless I put a moleskin patch between me and the metal, but that oddity is another blog post entirely!) Even though the town around me is on a different schedule, I still have issues with punctuality. Not mine, you understand. Being a railroader's daughter, I'm rather OCD about being where I'm supposed to be when I'm supposed to be there. But having to wait for others who are not so inclined is a trial to my hyper-punctual soul.

However, into each life some waiting must fall. I'm in that situation now. My proposal for The Coldwater Warm Hearts Club is under consideration by a NY publisher and, while the editor is very excited about the project, the acquisition board still has the final say.

So, I'm drumming my fingers on my laptop wondering what will come...If it's something wonderful, trust me, you'll be the first to know.

The Pleasures of Backstory

It's done. I've finished the first three chapters of The Coldwater Warm Hearts Club. I've introduced my characters, set up the conflicts, and generally given my readers the nickle tour of Coldwater, Oklahoma. The town has a personality all its own.

Wanna know how I know so much about this fictitious place?

My friend and I took an afternoon and drew the whole thing out on my dining room table. (Yes, I have a real life friend who doesn't mind playing with imaginary people and places. And yes, I guess you could say we're both a little weird that way.)

But now I know that Lake Jewel forms the eastern boundary of the town. Tiny, well-endowed Bates College, where students graduate in disciplines about as useful as Underwater Basket Weaving, graces its southwestern shore. The Marina is on the north end of the lake and a public park with a gazebo where the town band plays on sultry summer nights occupies the rest of the western lakefront. The other side of the water is home to summer cabin in the hills of the Winding Stair range.

A gem of a Victorian courthouse occupies the center of the town square. It's ringed with thriving businesses, including Gewgaws & Gizzwickies (my heroine's mother's favorite junk shop!) and the Green Apple Grill, Jake Tyler's place. There's an old Opera House circa 1890. The town fathers like to claim that Jenny Lind, the Swedish nightingale, sang there when she was traveling with PT Barnum.

Since that tour took place in 1850-1852, I have my doubts. Guess some folks think there's still one born every minute.

The well-heeled part of town is on the northwest side. Lacy's parents live there in their elegant colonial that's jammed to the rafters with her mom's collectibles and enough furniture to fill two houses of similar size. Lacy's dad is a retired lawyer. He made his career doing taxes for the local businesses and civil litigation over water rights and land contracts. But he secretly wanted to be a trial lawyer and is fascinated with organized crime in the same way some men obsess over football.

Jake's family arrived in Coldwater by accident. His grandparents thought they were retiring to the little town they had honeymooned in some fifty years previously. His grandmother had been big on architecture and fell in love with the ultra modern (at the time!) art deco court house. After they bought their new home, she wanted to take a stroll to the square and bask in the clean lines and geometric embellishments of the government building. Instead she was met by a frilly Victorian in gray limestone.

"Where the h*** are we?" she demanded.

It was the only time she ever swore in her whole life. Turns out, they had honeymooned in Colson, a little town about 80 miles closer to the Texas border, but since the art deco courthouse there had been destroyed in a tornado that very year, Jake's grandmother decided it was fate that had lead them to Coldwater instead.

All these little tidbits are what's known as backstory. Will they all make it into the final book? Probably not. But I need to know them because these details make the town of Coldwater and people in it breathe for me.

Have you ever read about a fictional place that seems so real you almost want to book a trip there? That's what I'm trying to do with Coldwater. If you have a minute, check out the first chapter and let me know if you think I'm succeeding. Thanks!