Gumbo Tales: Finding My Place at the New Orleans Table, by Sara Roahen

Gumbo Tales: Finding My Place at the New Orleans Table, by Sara Roahen.

W.W. Norton & Co. 2008. 293 pages.

 

This is the fifth book I've read for the Foodies Read 2 Reading Challenge this year, and I loved the book.  I bought Gumbo Tales several years ago, and it is another one that sat on my library shelf waiting for the right time for reading. Unfortunately, hurricane season in Louisiana is the apropos time to read this series of essays on the food culture of New Orleans area, because Roahen's book discusses venues destroyed by Katrina and the elderly restaurateurs who didn't survive the evacuation. 

Today, as I write, people in New Orleans are digging out after Hurricane Isaac, while others in South Louisiana are evacuating because of broken or breached levees.  The destruction wrought by hurricanes, even supposedly low level 1 hurricanes, wreak havoc on a state still recovering from Hurricane Katrina, which swamped New Orleans and St. Bernard Parish exactly seven years ago to the week (Katrina was a slow developing catastrophe).

While some stories in Roahen's book are tragic, she uses humor effectively to prevent the essays from being too depressing,  pessimistic or maudlin.  She divides her book into chapters on emotion-laden subjects, at least in my household--topics, such as:  gumbo, po-boys, crawfish, coffee and chicory, and red beans and rice.  Other important subjects she scrutinizes are sno-balls (snow-cones);  red gravy (Italian tomato sauce); turducken (if you watch football, you should know this one); and oysters.  Other chapters include Sazeracs, vegetables, poisson meuniere amandine, pho, coconuts, king cake & y-ka-mein, le boeuf gras, and turkey bone gumbo.

Roahen's descriptions will interest anyone wanting to know more about the melting pot of New Orleans inhabitants as told through their food.  Roahen does explain in her foreword that some of the places mentioned were washed away, and she doesn't know if or when they might return, e.g. the Vietnamese market area outside the city, but they were so much a part of the fabric of the New Orleans she experienced that she couldn't leave them out.  Roahen herself no longer lives in New Orleans, but the reader knows that the city has become part of her so she will return often.

Anyone familiar with the Crescent City will undoubtedly see favorite neighborhood venues mentioned.  I know we rarely visit New Orleans without stopping by Mandina's, an Italian-creole neighborhood restaurant on Canal that has been totally revamped since Katrina.  And drinks on the porch at The Columns on St. Charles will become part of our ritual after our recent visit. 

This book to be one to be read slowly and savored, and I plan to pack it to use as a culinary guidebook for our next visit to NOLA.

Gone Missing, by Linda Castillo

It is a busy time of the year for educators and Early Head Start is no exception.  My consultant friends and I have been busy aligning our Early Head Start School Readiness Goals with our assessment instrument and our curriculum--FOR INFANTS AND TODDLERS NO LESS!!--but it's largely completed and the teachers have received pre-service training according to all the bureaucratic requirements of our funding source and our state government. 

I'm hopeful this may enhance the teachers' understanding of developmental milestones and give them some cultural capital needed to participate in the debates over education during these challenging times.  I still have to develop several implementation plans, educate parents on what we are trying to do and get them engaged in the process and write the continuation federal grant.  BIG SIGH......

I've often commented to friends, facetiously, that murder and blues elevate my mood--by this, I mean reading an engrossing mystery and listening to some down and dirty blues, or R and B, make me feel better.  Go figure.  This may be one reason I so enjoyed forgetting everything this past weekend and reading a hard boiled mystery set incongruously in Amish Country.



Gone Missing, by Linda Castillo.  Minotaur Books. 2011. 277 pages.

 

Police Chief Kate Burkholder knows the Amish culture in Ohio where she presides over a small police department in a generally peaceful, rural region.  Burkholder grew up Amish but rebelled in her teens and left the culture and life style behind.  But, when Amish teenagers begin to disappear, Buckholder is the person called in to consult on the case.  It is lagniappe that this allows her to work again with State Agent John Tomasetti with whom she has a burgeoning romance.  Soon the case takes on alarming and dark overtones, and young women's lives are at stake.  Will Kate find them in time?

 

This is a hard-boiled mystery rather than a feel good cozy.  The setting may be Amish country, but there is evil and insanity lurking among these peaceful, aloof folk.  Sometimes the police deductions seem slow, but the pacing of the plot makes this a page turner.  The book also taught me something about Amish culture, e.g. the existence of "Rumspringa," a time before baptism when Amish teens are allowed to experience the life of the "English" culture without rules. 

 

There are three earlier books in this series, and I read this last book in the sequence before the others because a friend gave me the book.  I think I would now like to read the first book in the series to get additional background and back story on the recurring characters and the setting.  It's certainly not a typical "Amish mystery."

 

Has anyone else read this series?  What did you think? 

Goddesses--Domestic and Otherwise

 

Gully at Wassona Park

I recently spent over a week back "home" in the mountains of Virginia, visiting my mother and my sisters. My old neighborhood consists of a large gully encircled by a street. On the gully side of the street are trees, creating lovely shade for the road.  The resulting environment is the reason that this neighborhood was originally called a "Park.".  




childhood home

Across the road from the trees are the houses.  My family lives at one end of the circle road, and my grandmother and my cousins lived in houses situated farther around the circle.  It was a perfect neighborhood for us growing up in the fifties.  It was and still is a residential area in rural, small town America.

My sister now lives there near my mother, and she and her husband have a large garden.  While we were there, they fed us well--"Slow Food" grown primarily by them, cooked by my sister with occasional help from the rest of us, using tried and true recipes.  My mouth waters just thinking of the bountiful meals we had last week.




Stuffed peppers, cole slaw, green beans, squash casserole, corn on the cob, deviled eggs--
a home grown, home-cooked meal--with blackberry pie for dessert!




Before I went to Virginia, I wanted something really light to read and my sister-in-law had once suggested I try author Sophie Kinsella when I got a chance.  She went on to say that she couldn't read Kinsella's books in public because she laughed too hard.  When I was looking for a "fast read," I looked on my library shelves and noticed an abridged version of Sophie Kinsella's The Undomestic Goddess.  "Okay," I thought,  "I'll give it a try."  I am not a chick lit kind of woman, but I can relate to being an "undomestic" goddess, having suffered culinary disasters in my kitchen unlike my sisters, who both are actually skilled in the domestic arts.


The Undomestic Goddess, by Sophie Kinsella.
New York: Dial Press, 20005
 

In Kinsella's book, a fast track lawyer, Samantha Sweeting, is obsessed with her high stress position in a prestigious British law firm.  She thrives on the pressures of the job and is a total workaholic.  Her family is equally driven and not exactly close-knit, and the book begins with Samantha's less than spectacular birthday celebration.  Nonetheless Samantha's life is roaring along at warp speed until she misses a deadline that causes a client to lose a massive amount of money.

In a daze of disbelief, Samantha ducks out of her office and boards a train to avoid the repercussions of her error until she can think about how to deal with it.  She gets a bit tipsy and has a roaring headache.  When she exits the train several cities later, she knocks on the door of a wealthy couple to request an aspirin and water to clear her head so she can think.  The couple, the Geigers, think Samantha has come to apply for a job as a full-time housekeeper and are impressed with her totally fabricated credentials.  Samantha is hired and the comedy of errors begins, because Samantha knows zero about domestic chores.  Somehow each of Samantha's domestic disasters is salvaged, and she begins to want to learn how to do the tasks expected of her.  Of course there is also a love interest thrown into the mix.

The characters are likable, and Kinsella adds humor to the formulaic story of Samantha's tenure with the Geigers and her ultimate redemption.  I'm somewhat embarrassed to admit that I thoroughly enjoyed the book, found myself laughing out loud at times and might even try another of Kinsella's books in the future.

Cozying Up With a Cozy: Jenn McKinlay Library Lover's series

It's the Dog Days of August in Northwest Louisiana, and what's a girl to to do but curl up in an air-conditioned cottage with a good book or two and some Sangria wine to take her mind off the weather.  At least that's the advice I gave myself this week.  And, best of all, I found the perfect companion with Jenn McKinlay, author of the new Library Lover's mystery series.  When I haven't been glued to the TV watching the Summer Olympics, I've been reading.

Author Jenn McKinlay on her board

Author Jenn McKinlay may be familiar to some of you with her Cupcake Bakery series, but the Library Lover's mysteries are my introduction to her work.  I discovered McKinlay thanks to Cathy's Kittling: Books blog .

First, a word about Jenn McKinlay.  I learned from her website that she is the mother of boys, a skateboard enthusiast, horseback rider, hang glider pilot, wife of a musician, and has written books under her own name, as well as pseudonyms.  She now has five mystery series in the works.  Wow!  She's clearly either crazy, on speed, or just highly energetic and efficient with an enthusiasm for living life to the fullest.

After reading the Kittling Books review and discovering that the books are set in a small town library, I thought I would enjoy this series.  Loving the immediate gratification of my Kindle, I downloaded Books Can Be Deceiving and Due or Die--and began reading.

Books Can Be Deceiving, by Jenn McKinlay

Berkley Prime Crime, 2011.  Kindle download

After being downsized from her university archivist position and discovering her professor fiance was cheating on her with a student, Lindsey Norris is looking for a place to start over and finds it in coastal Connecticut as the Director of the Briar Creek Library where her college friend, Beth Stanley, is the children's librarian. Beth is having man problems of her own.  She is engaged to a selfish, reclusive children's author/illustrator, Rick Eckman, who is as "icky" as his name implies.  When Rick is found murdered, Beth becomes the chief suspect after the police discover that Rick and Beth had a public quarrel and Beth had gone to Rick's house to confront him about his lying and dishonesty.  Lindsey and her friends must discover the real murderer because the police chief has stopped looking--he is convinced the perpetrator is Beth!  Books Can Be Deceiving is a great title for this book, and Lindsey is determined to uncover the layers of deceit and clear Beth in the process.

Sometimes I find McKinlay tries too hard with her metaphors.  It's not that they aren't evocative or descriptive, but for me, they interrupt the flow of her story.  Examples are: "Not surprisingly sleep eluded Lindsey like a cat that did not want to be found." or "The bike ride into work woke her up, as the brisk October air pinched her cheeks like an affectionate auntie."

However, McKinlay creates an interesting group of people who live in Briar Creek: the retired actress, Violet LaRue; Lindsey's landlady, Nancy, a widow; Mary who owns the local diner with her husband, Ian; Mary's brother Michael "Sully" Sullivan who begins to ignite Lindsey's interest in men again; Mrs. Cole, "the lemon" and Lindsey's nemesis at the library; Milton Duffy, the 82 year old yogi and frequent visitor to the library.  These characters all are back for book 2 in the series, Due or Die.

Due or Die, by Jenn McKinlay

Berkley Prime Crime, 2012. Kindle download

Carrie Rushton, a well-respected nurse, is elected President of the Friends of the Library in an acrimonious election.  A couple of the townspeople are upset by the election, and one unhinged library patron makes veiled threats against both Carrie and Lindsey as director of the library.  When Carrie's generally disliked husband is murdered the night of the election, people wonder if Carrie is the intended target or if she could be the murderer.  Carrie is so upset by the murder, she moves in with Nancy and Lindsey in Nancy's home where Lindsey has an apartment. 

Lindsey seems slow to suspect that there is more going on at the Briar Creek library than meets the eye, but after a series of mishaps, the mystery is satisfactorily solved. 

As the Kittling Books blog suggests, one of the most enjoyable parts of Due or Die is experiencing, vicariously, the nor'easter that buffets Briar Creek during the course of the book, while here in my world the outside the temperatures hover around 100 degrees.  Hurricane force winds are not unknown to Louisiana, by any means, but to pair the wind with a blizzard and frigid temperatures, then it begins to sound truly uncomfortable.

This strengths of this series don't lie in the tension of the plot, the keen detective work of Lindsey and her friends, or the thrill of the discovery of the murderer. It's about spending a relaxing evening in the company of people who are becoming folks you care about and want to get to know better.  Add a lovable mutt into the mix and the appeal factor keeps going up.  If you like a cozy mystery series that doesn't take itself too seriously, I recommend this one.  Book 3 in the Library Lover's series, Book, Line and Sinker, is scheduled for release December 2012

In Dallas with Another Man's Moccasins

If anyone is wondering, it's as hot in Dallas as it is in Shreveport at the end of July, with a hot, dry breeze blowing here in Dallas, which is better than no breeze.  Though Shreveport bears many similarities to Texas, once you enter East Texas, there is a different feel to the land.  The trees look "scrubbier" along with the cattle, and there are more fields full of round hay bales wrapped in plastic--looking like giant Texas-sized, vanilla Tootsie Rolls.

I am getting hungry at this point, so everything is beginning to remind me of food.  The Hyatt provides no free room food, unfortunately.  I should have told Maria, my personal greeter, that this might be one way to make my stay more pleasant.  I find it interesting that Maria zeroed right in on me as someone with a Head Start program, as opposed to being part of the other large group meeting here--Mary Kay Cosmetics.

While writing this, I have scrounged through my purse and have eaten the single grape lifesaver and the Sun Burst that I had leftover from some other Head Start workshop. It is now time to call my traveling companions and look for real food.

Later, with a full stomach....


Dallas feels like the beginning of the West, so it's a good place to discuss the latest Walt Longmire mystery I've read--Another Man's Moccasins, by Craig Johnson.  (2008, 304 pages, read in Kindle download)

The setting returns to Wyoming with this book.  Walt's daughter, Cady, is back in Wyoming to continue her recovery from the traumatic brain injury she suffered in Kindness Goes Unpunished, and Walt  must solve the murder of a Vietnamese girl whose body is dumped in a ditch near the culvert where a troubled Indian has been living.  Everyone thinks the massive Indian has to be the murderer, but Walt isn't ready to charge the guy without more concrete evidence.  There are other strangers in town who seem involved in the case and sorting it all out is what Longmire does best.

In this book the action alternates between flashbacks to Walt's time in Vietnam as a young marine when he won't stop until he finds out who murdered a young Vietnamese bar girl , and the similar investigation he's pursuing in the present.  We get to see the young, thoroughly decent, stubborn and brash Walter Longmire and note that little has changed, except Walt is now older, a bit wiser,and certainly more world weary.  Walt and his second in command, Vic, are still tiptoeing around the idea of romance, but Cady and Vic's brother aren't so cautious as they deepen their relationship.

The action in Vietnam is violent and apocalyptic, while the present-day case evolves slower and with a lower body count.  I'm not a big fan of flashbacks, but I am a fan of Craig Johnson, and the author utilizes this technique to propel the plot forward and to shed more light on Walt Longmire's character.  The reader emerges from this book knowing Walt--his weaknesses and strengths--better.

Arm Chair Traveling, or Still Reading

Ricky and I are trying to decide whether our next big trip is to tour around the American West, or set out for an adventure in Scotland.  Ricky has become interested in whiskey-making (and tasting), and Scotland has a large number of distilleries, especially in the Highlands and Central Speyside sections of Scotland.  Of course, our ancestors hail from Scotland and Ireland so it makes a trip to that part of the British Isles doubly interesting.  Since my Scott (my maiden name) grandfather-- many greats added--who settled in Virginia in 1770's came from Northern Ireland, we probably wouldn't go there and would just confine our explorations to his wife's (my many great's-grandmother)
native country of Scotland. 

Actually, we have have no idea where we might end up on our next big adventure, but isn't thinking about traveling half the fun.  In reality, my next trips include several days next week in Dallas for work, then a trip back to Virginia to visit my family the following week.  I'm looking forward to these jaunts, too. 

In my reading, now I'm heading Out West again with two of my favorite mystery authors: J. A. Jance and Craig Johnson.

Damage Control, by J. A. Jance (William Morrow. 2008. 374 pages)

Sheriff Joanna Brady never experiences a dull moment, certainly not in this book as she juggles marriage, a new baby, the demands of her husband's "jobs" as an author and stay-at-home dad, and her teen-age daughter from her first marriage.  Joanna's mother's is acting more strange than usual, and several puzzling deaths are thrown in on top of all this for good measure. 

An elderly couple dies in a suicide pact, but their unfortunate deaths are puzzling as more information becomes available about their family circumstances.   If that isn't enough, body parts are found wrapped in plastic bags in the desert, and Joanna is determined to find out who is responsible for this gruesome crime, especially when she discovers the victim had developmental disabilities.

The action is fast paced and, unfortunately, Joanna loses one of her own before the perpetrator is brought to justice.  Add a couple  personal mysteries in Joanna's family that she seeks to resolve, and the 13th book is this series is another page turner.  With multiple deaths and sub-plots, there are many loose ends to tie up before this mystery ends  The action of the plot and the engaging characters are what make Jance's books satisfying to me, more so than the final resolution. 

This was another of those books that I found on my library shelves.  A friend passed this mystery along to me sometime in the past, and I appreciate her generosity--it provided me with light summer reading, which I find relaxing after a day at work.

Tomorrow I'll continue the blog with a review of Craig Johnson's Another Man's Moccasins, a Kindle download.

Foodies Read 2: Tender at the Bone, by Ruth Reichl

Despite meetings for my historic neighborhood association and the work projects crowding my schedule, I continue to find time for reading :-) .  I was fortunate that the two meetings this week, relating to my volunteer work with the neighborhood, took place at near-by restaurants--doubly gratifying because the Highland neighborhood has some of the best eating establishments in the city!

On Tuesday I was treated to a delicious, spicy but light quiche at TWINE, a new restaurant and bar on Line Avenue, the major street that separates the two historic districts in our neighborhood.  It was a veggie quiche but the vegetables were mere suggestions, spots of color in the quiche, which must have included bits of hot pepper that provided the perfect "punch" of taste to wake up the mild quiche.

Then on Wednesday evening after work, tapas were on the menu at the reopened and re-imagined restaurant, STIR, tucked into the neighborhood a few blocks from my house.  I savored the creamy shrimp remoulade served on fried green tomatoes, while my friend tried the lobster wrap.  The shrimp remoulade is a destination dish, one of those foods you would return to a restaurant just to taste again.


Since food was on my agenda for this week, it should come as no surprise that my reading material echoed this interest and was also part of my Foodies Read 2 Reading Challenge.  I vicariously (and literally, it would seem) ate my way through the week with Ruth Reichl's Tender at the Bone: Growing Up at the Table (Broadway Books. 1998. 282 pages. Memoir).


This is one of the many books that I've picked up on the cheap at the local college's annual Book Bazaar fundraiser.  This book cost $1.00 and is one I've had on my shelves for awhile, apparently waiting for the right moment to read it.  Reichl has been a food writer, restaurant critic and is now producing television food shows.

If you have ever wondered how one lands this kind of job, this memoir shows the circuitous route Reichl took, and it's probably not a path to emulate.  Her career path started in childhood when Reichl's family assignment was to protect the dinner guests from her mother's strange dishes and casual attitude toward food freshness and storage.  Reichl proceeds to take the reader on a wild and funny ride through her childhood and early adulthood in a household with a bipolar mother and a father who escapes through his passion for his job as a book designer. 

Reichl encounters frequent personal challenges--having an unpredictable manic depressive mother, being sent away to Montreal to boarding school against her will and being picked on by the class rich girl.  After three years, Reichl returns to live with her parents as a high school student, only to essentially be left alone during the week to raise herself, but Reichl has the knack for turning disaster into opportunity, with a dose of laughter thrown in to avoid appearing pathetic.  We follow Reichl to college, her first marriage and her first cooking jobs.

This memoir is highly readable, is interspersed with a few recipes, as well as many wonderful descriptions of foods, meals and the people who propelled Reichl ultimately toward a writing career.  Good stories, tight writing and interesting characters elevate this memoir above the norm.  I am late coming to this book and its author.  I'm sure many of you read Tender at the Bone and the sequels years ago, so I'm glad I held onto this book waiting for the right time to "devour" it.

New Orleans Memories Continued

Evening events kept me busy this week so not much time for blogging or, more accurately, not much energy left for blogging.  However, sitting in my library on this scorching Saturday afternoon, my mind has returned to New Orleans.....

There have been many trips to New Orleans since my first memorable college experience--other conferences attended--with graduate school and working in education, academia has been a major part of my life.  One of my favorite conference experiences was when my ex-husband and I lived and taught at Sinte Gleska College, now University, on the Rosebud (Sioux) Reservation in South Dakota. 

Shortly after our arrival, we attended a Native American Education Conference with our friend who was tribal chairman of the Rosebud Sioux. Our friend was open-mouthed during our tour of the French Quarter and looked on in puzzlement as small boys accosted him in the Quarter, yelling, “I bet you a dollar I can tell you where you got dem boots.”  Our friend was dressed in the traditional Indian cowboy attire--jeans, ribbon shirt, silver and turquoise accessories, cowboy hat and boots-- and presented a handsome silhouette on Bourbon Street, so ladies of the evening also called out to him, much to his embarrassment. 

At another academic conference when we were still grad students, my ex and I had to travel on our own meager budget.  I remember this conference because we stayed in some small Canal Street store-front hotel where you had to get buzzed in.  The rooms had high ceilings, ours was spacious and kind of sectioned off, so we shared it with my husband's major professor because we were too poor to get our own room!  We presented academic papers on Social Foundations of Education at the conference, enjoyed the intellectual give-and-take of the discussions, and explored the city with colleagues after the sessions ended each evening.

Dauphine Orleans Hotel, New Orleans

Later, I went to work as a regional preschool coordinator for the Louisiana Department of Education, a project then housed in the School of Allied Health Sciences, LSU Medical Center in Shreveport.  Preschool coordinators were then part of a summer seminar in New Orleans. My colleagues and I stayed in the French Quarter on Dauphine Street, enjoyed late afternoon teas at our hotel and compared seafood dishes at various restaurants around town.   

Courtyard, Dauphine Orleans Hotel

Our week long class was held each summer at the University of New Orleans (UNO) and, as I’ve never been one to pass up a book store of any kind, I browsed through the UNO book store during breaks, purchasing esoteric titles on the history, sociology, anthropology or philosophy of education.

My husband Ricky and I love New Orleans. Before we were married, we attended Mardi Gras where we dived for beads and slept in passion tangled sheets on a pallet on the floor of a friend's small St. Ann Street house. We attended Jazz Fest to hear famous performers, then ended up in a tiny neighborhood club where a sensual man played the saxophone in a smoke-filled room and mesmerized patrons swayed to the music like snake charmers.

Our friends' second story front porch where we sit and people watch

When Hurricane Katrina and the flood hit, Ricky and I took in a family who were evacuated to the V.A. Hospital in Shreveport. They lived in our guest cottage until we could find them a house to rent. Though they were strangers to us when we met, like many relationships forged by the tragedy of Katrina, they have become our friends. This has been great for us because we have close friends to visit when we travel south to New Orleans.


When I first visited New Orleans so long ago, I never imagined this unique and troubled city would become part of who I am.

NOLA, the first time

In the sea of memories, "the first time" often stands out--the first day of school, the first kiss, the first formal evening gown, the first trip to New Orleans.

My first trip to New Orleans was a spur of the moment trip to a history conference while I was in college.  One of my hometown friends stopped by my dorm room to lament the fact that she was due to leave the next day to attend a history conference in New Orleans, but the other girl scheduled to go had cancelled.  The history professor taking the group to the conference wouldn't let just one female go by herself.  The hotel accommodations for the males attending were separate from those of the female students because of room availability. 

"I'll go with you," I quickly volunteered, "if my parents will let me."  I called home and did some fast talking.  The next day I was heading to New Orleans for the first time.  The history professor drove a van with 4 or 5 students, and it seemed like a long trip from the mountains of Virginia.  I don't remember the boys who went with us from our college, but I do remember New Orleans! 


The history conference was lively--there were heated discussions between young black activists and author William Styron because he, a white man, had the audacity to tell the story of Nat Turner in Styron's Confessions of Nat Turner that won the Pulitzer Prize that year (1968).  These angry black men in the audience also disagreed with the literary license Styron took in painting his portrait of Nat Turner. We sat in an aisle of the filled-to-capacity meeting room to listen to the debate. 



 My friend Annie and I continued our historical and cultural studies the next day in a tiny bar as we drank bourbon and Coke, while an older black man played the piano for us and very few other patrons--of course it was before noon!  We took a bus tour of New Orleans and walked through old cemeteries and looked for sites associated with voodoo queen, Marie Laveau.


 
One evening all of us from our college went with others from the history conference on a river boat cruise on the Mississippi.  Half intoxicated history professors danced with coeds, trying to grope them.  After an overly friendly, middle-aged professor danced with me, I pointed out my friend as a slow dance began and told the professor that she liked to dance much more than I did, which was true.  She could also handle herself better in delicate situations. 

A tropical rain storm descended as the cruise ended, and there were no taxis to be found.  All of us from our school ended up in the revolving bar atop the Monteleone Hotel to wait for a taxi.  That in itself was interesting since we attended a Methodist College that frowned on student drinking.  We had one drink and watched the city of New Orleans slowly revolve or so it seemed from our vantage point.  Once we were able to secure a cab, it dropped off the professor and male students at their hotel, with them all claiming extreme fatigue.  We later learned everyone from our college went back out that night, each intent on adventure.

Annie and I were not ready to call it a night, so instead of having the driver take us to our hotel, we had the cabbie take us to a bar we had visited earlier in the week.  It had been full of Tulane students, we had befriended the wait staff, and we felt it was a safe option for two girls alone in the Quarter. 

We didn't stay there long, however. We soon met two young sailors on leave and with them, we proceeded to hit every bar on Bourbon Street.  The shows in the bars were risque and my sailor got a bit frisky, so I made my friend trade with me.  I was happier to be paired with the shyer of the two guys.  The evening ended hours later with a brief kiss, probably to the disappointment of the sailors.  In truth, they  were even younger than we were, and at least they could tell their shipmates they had dates for the evening. 

As soon as our escorts left us, my friend and I were out on the street again, hunting for food this time.  We found an all-night diner close-by and put some food into our stomachs to counteract the bourbon we had consumed. 

As I recall, we headed home the next day.  I've always felt the Crescent City had to live up to high standards if subsequent visits were to be as eventful as my first, but more about that later. . . .

Heading West, at least in my reading....

I've been doing some reading, in addition to all the other "goings-on" at our house since I last checked in.  The film crew from New Orleans has come and gone.  They are competing for the Louisiana Film Prize, and they arrived early last Tuesday morning and filmed for 13 hours straight, mostly in our kitchen.  They staged out of the cottage so it worked out well, but for a day there seemed to be young adults wherever you looked or wanted to sit down! 

I'm working on various projects for work--the federal government never runs out of reports that they want us to turn in.  Luckily I work with some fine staff who help get it all done. 

My latest zucchini adventure was trying my Aunt Jean's recipe for zucchini bread, a healthy variety using whole wheat flour, wheat germ, honey.  I still need to tweak the recipe a bit more.  We spent a quiet Fourth of July (we were quiet but the neighbors weren't).  Ricky installed a new screen door for the back and fixed some of his delicious shrimp pesto pasta, a highly popular yet simple dish.  Firing up the grill struck us as too hot an activity.

I abandoned the Gothic mystery I was reading--it just wasn't doing it for me--and returned to the West in my books. 

I read another Walt Longmire mystery, Kindness Goes Unpunished, the fourth in the Longmire series and originally published in 2005 but I read the book on my Kindle.    Longmire goes to Philadelphia to visit his daughter, Cady, and things go downhill from there.  Cady is attacked and left for dead.  Longmire and his friend Henry must protect Cady and help her recover, while also catching the bad guys.  It was engaging as all of Craig Johnson's books are, but I prefer the Wyoming setting.

Author, Craig Johnson, with his book

I stayed out West by reading next--

Murder on the Red Cliff Rez, by Mardi Oakley Medawar.  New York: St. Martin's Press, 2002.

This is the debut mystery in this series featuring main character, Karen Charbonau, aka Tracker, set on a Wisconsin Ojibwa reservation (which seems like the West if you were born in Virginia as I was).  Tracker is called upon to find, i.e., track down, the man who taught her to track because he's suspected of murder.  In the process, Tracker is thrown together with her former boyfriend, Police Chief David Lameraux.  While reviews of this book were positive at the time of publication, I didn't care for it.  I had downloaded the book to my Kindle since I'm drawn to mysteries set on Indian reservations.  The characterization seemed superficial, the plot uninteresting to me and the writing not up to par, even for a genre novel.  However, I did enjoy the setting and learned more about the life and culture of the Ojibwa.

Outlaw Mountain, by J. A. Jance.  New York: Avon Books, Inc. 1999.

The last of the Western mysteries is an older book that I hadn't gotten around to reading before now, but it has been sitting on my library shelf.  I've read many of the Sheriff Joanna Brady series by J. A. Jance, but I had missed Outlaw Mountain.  Jance's mysteries are always enjoyable reading for me, and Outlaw Mountain is the seventh book in this series of 15 or more books.  I like Jance's characters, the writing is tight and the plots fast moving and multi-layered.  It doesn't matter to me that I often read this series out of order.  I bought this book at a used book sale, knowing it would fit the bill for an engaging fast-moving mystery.  This one didn't disappoint.

I'm leaving the West for now and heading to South Louisiana--this time I'm physically traveling for a mini-adventure of my own.  I'll be sure to tell you all about it when I return.

Lingering at the Beach

Life seems strange to me at times, or at least mildly interesting, in the juxtaposition of realities--there's the world of books that I inhabit intensively when I read and the daily currents of my very ordinary life.  Tonight I resided part of the evening in a mouldy castle with a young heroine and ghosts of memories, a gothic world I don't often seek out.  I'm not totally comfortable there, me with my healthy sense of normalcy. 

I often feel strangely disoriented when I step out of an alternate reality in the cottage where I've been reading into the kitchen of our main house, where tonight I absentmindedly nibble a newly ripe grape tomato from the Early Head Start garden, experiencing the crunch of the outside skin followed by the sweet juiciness of the tomato's pulp.  My mind moves on to thoughts of making okra, tomatoes and corn tomorrow, using the fruits of the garden.  I wonder about what new zucchini dish to try next, then fret momentarily about getting the house clean enough for some young friends from New Orleans to shoot scenes for a Louisiana Film Prize film here over the Fourth of July. 

Last weekend I rarely emerged from my fictional world when I holed up and read four books, one right after the other.  In this alternate Universe, before I arrived at the castle, I was at the beach:

An Appetite for Murder: a Key West Food Critic Mystery, by Lucy Burdette. New York: New American Library (a division of Penguin Group). 2012

Hayley Snow wants to remain in Key West where she currently resides in a small bedroom on the house boat of her former college roommate, but she needs a job.  Hayley moved to Key West to live with a new man in her life, but after a few months, he has dumped her.  Hayley is dismayed to discover the new woman in her ex's life, Kristin Faulkner, is also the person who would be her boss at the Key West style magazine where Hayley has applied to be the food critic.  When Kristin is murdered, Hayley becomes a prime suspect, and she must clear her name if she has a chance of landing her dream job. 

Hayley, as amateur detective, turns out to be a trouble magnet, but her exploits are entertaining for me, the perfect genre mystery--strong setting; interesting, idiosyncratic heroine; and fast moving plot.  I really enjoyed this mystery and look forward to the next book in this new series, Death in Four Courses, coming in September.  This book was a Kindle download for our Florida vacation, but I never got around to reading it at the beach.  It was perhaps even more enjoyable to visit this wet corner of Florida after our return to hot, parched Louisiana.

Author Robert Isleib aka Lucy Burdette

This mystery was doubly fun because it also counts toward the Foodie Reads 2 Reading Challenge.  The book is full of food facts, with a few recipes included at the end of the Kindle version.

Author Lucy Burdette is the pen name for clinical psychologist Roberta Isleib who writes two other mystery series under her own name--the Advice Column Mystery series and Golf Lover's Mystery series.  Isleib has been nominated for various awards for mystery authors and is a past-president of Sisters in Crime.

A Year by the Sea: Thoughts of an Unfinished Woman, by Joan Anderson. New York: Doubleday. 1999.

My next trip to the beach was with author Joan Anderson as I read her non-fiction account of a year spent alone in her family's rustic Cape Cod cottage, where she searches for answers about her life and her marriage. This journey of self-discovery is interesting to me because of the setting, the people she meets and the jobs she holds.  The book, another Kindle download, is adequately written but doesn't contain the beauty of writing and depth of self-reflection of Anne Morrow Lindbergh's Gift from the Sea, for example.

Anderson, according to her blog, began her writing career as a stringer for Gannett newspaper chain, moved on to creating essays for children's photo books, and finally to the genre of memoir writing and a career helping other women "find themselves" through retreats she leads for women at Cape Cod or other locales in across the country.  Anderson apparently gained fame and popularity through appearances on Oprah and other television shows.  Anderson has written five memoirs in all.  While I don't rule out reading another of her books, I wouldn't seek them out.

Author Joan Anderson

After my extended visit to the beach, I head back to Indian territory with Walt Longmire, plus a new mystery series set on Indian reservation.  More about that tomorrow....

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What Next? Zucchini Corn Bread!

This week has flown by and there seemed to be no time or energy for blogging.  One night we attended a going-away party for one of my husband's colleagues, another night I had one of my neighborhood association board meetings, plus the preparations for the meeting. I've worked every day and worked out, too.  Before I knew it, the week was coming to an end and the weekend was beckoning! :-) 

However, you probably won't be surprised to learn that I still managed to try out a new zucchini dish this week--zucchini corn bread.  I'm a country girl, and I do love my corn bread with the Farmer's Market fresh green beans.  I found the recipe in my hometown Big Brothers/Big Sisters cookbook, and several of my sister's friends had submitted it, so that was enough endorsement for me.  Comfort food from home...

So, here's the recipe....

Zucchini Corn Bread

3 eggs, beaten
1/4 cup sugar
1 1/2 cup self-rising corn meal
1/4 cup self-rising flour
1 1/2 sticks of margarine, melted
3/4 cup cottage cheese
2 cups shredded zucchini

Combine all ingredients.  Pour into greased pan.  Bake at 400 degrees for 35 minutes.

Batter looks like this

Baked corn bread detail

The corn bread was moist and delicious.  This would make a good foundation for a hearty Mexican corn bread.

Fortunately, last weekend I had time to read so I have four more "beach" reads to share with you tomorrow. These are all Kindle downloads--two selected because they do have beach settings, and I spent last summer reading about France so this year I guess my focus is the beach. 

Geronimo's Next-to-Last Stand: Fort Pickens

One of our excursions while in Pensacola Beach was to visit Fort Pickens, a harbor fort that for 100 years protected Pensacola Bay and the naval yard there.  The building of the fort was begun in 1829, completed in 1834 and used until 1947 when airplanes, missiles and bombs made the fort obsolete. 



Masonry walls were strong enough to support heavy cannon on top and allow for space for cannons below, too.

According to our self-guided tour, over 21.5 million locally-made bricks were used in the building of Fort Pickens, and skilled slaves from New Orleans were brought to Pensacola Island to construct the fort.  Ironically the only time the fort saw action was during the Civil War when the Union forces held this fort (that the US government built using slave labor) during the entire war as they faced off with Confederate forces on the mainland. 

Three acres of open ground in the center of the fort once provided space to quarter and drill troops. About 850 men from the 3rd Infantry and 1st and 2nd Artillery regiments camped here in September, 1861, according to the literature we received. 

Parts of the old fort appear to be built into bluffs with look-out areas on top of the outside walls.  The other three folks in my group scrambled eagerly to the top of the walls where they took advantage of photo opportunities.


Patty and Dave at Fort Pickens



Me with my feet firmly planted on Mother Earth peering at tunnels through fort.



View of one section of the fort from high vantage point

Ricky climbed a lookout tower manned by a Park Service employee in order to get this great view.

To read more about Fort Pickens, click Here.

Fort Pickens is also famous for being one of the forts where Apache tribal members were held, including the Apache warrior, Geronimo, in 1887. 



Geronimo

Born in 1829, Geronimo lived in western New Mexico when this region was still a part of Mexico. Geronimo was a Bedonkohe Apache that married into the Chiricahuas. The murder of his mother, wife and children by soldiers from Mexico in 1858 forever changed his life and the lives of settlers in the southwest. He vowed at this point to kill as many white men as possible and spent the next thirty years making good on that promise.

Geronimo was a medicine man and not a chief of the Apache. However, his visions made him indispensable to the Apache chiefs and gave him a position of prominence with the tribe.

In the mid 1870's the government moved Native Americans onto reservations, and Geronimo rebelled against this forced removal and fled with a band of followers. He spent the next 10 years on reservations and raiding with his band. They raided across New Mexico, Arizona and northern Mexico. His exploits became highly chronicled by the press and he became the most feared Apache.

Geronimo and his band were eventually captured at Skeleton Canyon in 1886. These Apache were then shipped by rail to Florida.  All of Geronimo's band was to be sent to Fort Marion in St. Augustine. However, a few business leaders in Pensacola, Florida petitioned the government to have Geronimo himself sent to Fort Pickens.

They claimed that Geronimo and his men would be better guarded at Fort Pickens than at the overcrowded Fort Marion. However, an editorial in a local newspaper congratulated a congressman for bringing such a great tourist attraction to the city.

On October 25, 1886, 15 Apache warriors arrived at Fort Pickens. Geronimo and his warriors spent many days working hard labor at the fort in direct violation of the agreements made at Skeleton Canyon. Eventually the families of Geronimo's band were returned to them at Fort Pickens, and then they all moved on to other places of incarceration.

The city of Pensacola was sad to see Geronimo the tourist attraction leave. In one day he had over 459 visitors with an average of 20 a day during the duration of his captivity at Fort Pickens.

Unfortunately, the proud Geronimo was reduced to a sideshow spectacle. He lived the rest of his days as a prisoner. He visited the St. Louis World's Fair in 1904 and made money signing autographs and pictures.  Geronimo eventually died in 1909 at Fort Sill, Oklahoma.

(Source of above information about Geronimo: Geronimo and Fort Pickens: An Unwilling Tourist Attraction, by Martin Kelly, About.com Guide)  Click here for original article.

"I was born on the prairies where the wind blew free and there was nothing to break the light of the sun. I was born where there were no enclosures."

                                                                                     ~ Geronimo

More pics from the beach

Ricky and I missed the 20" rainfall that Pensacola Beach had the day before our arrival, but we did experience this rainbow while we were there.

rainbow at Pensacola Beach

We spend quite a bit of time in vacation mode, vegetating in the living room, or eating our vegetables--artichoke dip munchies on the deck.

 

heron in sea oats

a walk on the beach in stormy seas

Contemplation of a tranquil sea

We took a pontoon boat out one afternoon for a mini-adventure and fishing excursion for our lone fisherman.

Back Seat Driver Dave

Watermelon Break

Caught one!





Sunset at Pensacola Beach









What Else I Did on My Summer Vacation

Our house on the beach with first level and second level decks

Though my last post made it sound like all I did was read books while I was at the beach, that was a bit of hyperbole.  While it was a leisurely week, we had fun and various enjoyable activities were going on all the time.  Ricky and I were listing our favorite things about the week as we drove home, trying to stay awake. 

We agreed that the best part was ten of his family being together for the week.  Because of the number in our party, we ate many meals at the beach house, all seated at the table for ten in front of wall of glass overlooking the Gulf.  Ricky's brother-in-law made gumbo one night, while Ricky contributed his shrimp pasta one night and ham and spinach frittatas for a couple of brunches.  We had homemade zucchini bread  and chocolate chip cookies.  Patty, Ricky's sister, and Monica, the wife of Ricky's nephew, made sure we always had something good to munch on. 

Patty in kitchen at beach house

Patty was also in charge of games.  Four of us laughed and squabbled through a spirited game of Buzzword, while others enjoyed Dominoes and Bananagram.  The teenage girls rarely lifted their heads from their electronic devices when they weren't outside sunbathing, hanging out on the beach or in the hot tub.  I'm not sure we adults were much better as Iphones, lap top computers and DVD players were much in evidence.

Ricky and the girls enjoy the cool waters of the "hot tub"

There are various ways you can categorize those of us on this trip:
Family Units:
Ricky's nephew Neil, wife Monica and their two children plus a friend from Nicaragua.

Neil's family jumping for joy

Ricky's sister Patty, her husband Dave, and their son, Michael, all from Colorado where the most destructive fire in Colorado history rages in their absence, blanketing their town with smoke so bad that people and pets have to stay inside.

Michael, Patty, Dave & kite in background

Ricky and me during the mandatory photo op on boardwalk leading to the beach.

You could also classify us as those who tan and those who don't:

Ricky and Patty ended up with sun poisoning, I ended up as white as the day I was born except for a few more freckles or age spots!  The other guys--Dave, Michael and Neil--had various degrees of tan and pinkness as they exercised some restraint in their hours in the sun.  And then there was the Latino contingent, those with Nicaraguan blood...brown as nuts with tans worthy of old Coppertone ads.

Those with beautiful tans

As usual, Ricky is the photographer documenting another great trip.  More pics from our beach adventure will follow in subsequent posts if anyone is interested.