Dinner and a Book: Standing In The Rainbow

Dinner and a Book: Standing In The Rainbow


Meatloaf

The Christmas Train

In December, 2002, the Dinner and a Book Club took a ride on The Christmas Train by David Baldacci. Vicki sent us all train tickets that entitled us to a fine dining experience while enjoying the company of good friends, stimulating conversation, and holiday cheer… she also let us know, in keeping with our Christmas tradition, we would be exchanging Christmas trees (in the form of ornaments, jewelry, stationery, decorations, whatever we chose). A Christmas tree was part of a significant and poignant point for the main character of our book.

Vicki and her cohostess Jeanne dressed as conductors for our train trip- cute matching white shirts, black pants, and red bow ties and cummerbunds!!

Synopsis

In the tradition of John Grisham's Skipping Christmas, this holiday tale offers humor, romance, mystery, and a reminder of what Christmas is all about-by seven-time New York Times, bestselling author David Baldacci.

Vicki and Jeanne served up a delicious Christmas spread of roast turkey with gravy, cornbread pudding, cranberry Jello salad, candied yams and green bean casserole. For dessert we had pistachio cake.
Vicki says:

(This is my mother’s (Kay) recipe, and we have had it at our Thanksgiving meal since I was a little girl.  It was a substitute for the plain cranberry sauce the five of us kids didn’t care much for…so mom found something we liked!)

Kay’s Cranberry Jello Salad    (Always great to make the night before)

1 pkg. of black cherry jello
1 large can of crushed pineapple, in juice (drained – keep the juice for the jello!)
1 can of mandarin oranges
1 can of cranberry sauce
½ to ¾ cup chopped walnuts (optional)
(I always make this without the walnuts now because my kids don’t like them)
It is great with the walnuts in it too!

Make the jello according to the package directions.  You can follow the regular method or the quick-set method, depending on the time you have.  Use the juice drained from the pineapple as the water for the jello – it tastes even better!

Put the jello in a pretty glass bowl or casserole, chill to set – but not all the way – about 30 minutes to an hour.  Once it’s semi-set, fold in the other ingredients, cover and chill to completely set (overnight is easiest!).  Enjoy.  This is a pretty, colorful salad for your table as well!

We did a Christmas tree exchange in keeping with our annual gift exchange based on the book.

                                                               Jeanne and Debbie

Merry Christmas (belated!) from our book club to you all!!

Standing In The Rainbow

April 2003 brought rainbows to our book club- from Fannie Flagg...

Book Magazine says:

In small-town Elmwood Springs, Missouri, on the heels of World War II, life holds promise for little boys like Bobby Smith. America is a nation of "Coca-Cola, chocolate- covered peanuts, jukeboxes, Oxydol, Ivory Snow, oleomargarine, and the Atomic Bomb" and is "bigger, better, richer, and stronger" than anyplace else. Bobby's dad is the town's pharmacist, and his mom hosts the state's most popular morning radio program from the family's living room. This ambitious effort from the author of Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe spans fifty years fraught with scandal and romance. The Smiths and their friends and neighbors display a kind of big-hearted optimism that has the potential to reduce their story to sentimental mush. Flagg's knack for humor and observation lend the characters a depth that rescues what might otherwise have been a typical, dramatic saga. For all its myriad twists and turns, this tale never takes an easy way out.

We enjoyed the book as well as Lois and Lisa's menu of meat loaf, mashed potatoes, biscuits, fried okra, and green beans- a true 1940's American meal.

All American Meat Loaf

1 1/2 pounds ground beef
1 cup crushed saltine crumbs
2 eggs, beaten
1 (8 oz) can tomato sauce
1/2 cup finely chopped onion
2 Tbsp chopped green pepper
1 1/2 tsp salt
Dash of thyme and marjoram

Mix together all ingredients but beef. Then mix in beef with a spoon or your hands. (Must be combined very well). Shape into a loaf and cook in a shallow dish or loaf pan at 350 degrees for about 50 minutes to 1 hour.
The best way to eat this is the next day, cold, sliced, on white bread with ketchup and mayonnaise!!!

Southern Fried Okra

Mix together equal parts flour and cornmeal. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Slice fresh okra into rounds, throw into flour mixture to coat, and fry in hot vegetable oil until browned and tender. Mmm, Mmm, Good!

The door prize was a cookbook, bag of flour, and kitchen stuff...

Lindsay's Zeta Sisters/Samford University

(They look like they are standing in a rainbow, don't they??)

Come with us next time on a new adventure- Bryson City Tales...and another of our trips...to the Smoky Mountains...

Caramelo

March 2003 brought us Caramelo by Sandra Cisneros.

Synopsis

Lala Reyes' grandmother is descended from a family of renowned rebozo —, or shawl-makers. The striped (caramelo) is the most beautiful of all, and the one that makes its way, like the family history it has come to represent, into Lala's possession. The novel opens with the Reyes' annual car trip — a caravan overflowing with children, laughter, and quarrels — from Chicago to "the other side": Mexico City. It is there, each year, that Lala hears her family's stories, separating the truth from the "healthy lies" that have ricocheted from one generation to the next. We travel from the Mexico City that was the "Paris of the New World" to the music-filled streets of Chicago at the dawn of the Roaring Twenties — and finally, to Lala's own difficult adolescence in the not-quite-promised land of San Antonio, Texas.
Caramelo is a vital, wise, romantic tale of homelands, sometimes real, sometimes imagined. Vivid, funny, intimate, historical, it is a brilliant work destined to become a classic: a major new novel from one of our country's most beloved storytellers.

Susan and Debbie H took us to a world of tissue paper fiesta flowers and pinatas...as I said in the last blog, we had a group of crazy-blindfolded-big stick wielding-women trying to break open a pinata after consuming a couple of glasses of vino! I think we hit each other more than we hit the pinata, but we finally had success and scrambled all over the floor, fighting each other for the penny candy!!

The menu was authentic Mexican cuisine- guacamole and chips, brie and walnut quesadillas, red snapper Veracruz, green bean/spinach and beet salad, arroz roja (classic red rice), and coconut flan for dessert. (Debbie H burned herself while making this and said "never again" so that recipe is not included...)

Susan's Red Snapper Veracruz

1( 3.3 pound) whole red snapper, cleaned and scaled

Marinade:
3 cloves garlic, chopped
2 limes, juiced
2 Tbsp water
pinch of ground cloves and black pepper

Vegetable oil- for sauteing
1/2 cup chicken stock or broth
1 onion, sliced
2 bay leaves
2 pinches dried oregano
1/2 cup tomato puree
4 plum tomatoes, chopped
6 pickled chiles (optional)
8 green olives, pitted and crushed, plus 12 green olives, whole
1 Tbsp capers
salt
3 Tbsp chopped fresh parsley

Clean fish without cutting off head or tail. (You want him to look at you as you eat him...) With a sharp knife, score fleshy part of snapper. Combine marinade ingredients- pour over fish and marinate 30 minutes. Pour 1 Tbsp oil in hot pan- sear fish a few minutes on both sides. Add chicken broth and rest of ingredients except whole olives and parsley, and salt to taste. Simmer 15 minutes Sprinkle whole olives and parsley over when serving.

Door prize was a shawl, margarita glasses, and a candle.
How can we eat something this
                                                                                                                              cute??
I will leave you with this picture in your head.
Next blog is about Standing in the Rainbow...Fannie Flagg...

One Thousand White Women

You know, this book is soooo politically incorrect. My apologies to all that we even picked a book about only white women...but it was history...

Our book for February, 2003, was One Thousand White Women by Jim Fergus.

We invited 989 other white women, but none of them showed- it was only the 11 of us. (Just kidding>>>)

However, the book was a great read- and Roxanne and Jaye made the meeting fun by building a tepee (yes, I did say a tepee) in the family room and dressing as Indians (American Indians). My stepdaughter and her family LIVED in a tepee for a while, but that is another story.

We were all given Indian necklaces with our new Indian names- mine was “Music Maker Woman”. Roxanne and Jaye wore Indian headdresses. The meal was delicious as usual-  Cornish game hens, rice and corn.

Roxanne’s Cornish Hens

(adapted from a recipe by Emeril Lagasse)

Ingredients

• 4 Cornish game hens (1 1/4 to 1 1/2 pounds each)
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/4 pound Italian sausage, casings removed (Roxanne has to include something Italian)
• 1/2 cup diced onion
• 1/4 cup diced carrot
• 1/4 cup diced celery
• 2 teaspoons chopped garlic
• 2 teaspoons minced orange zest
• 1 cup long-grain white rice
• 1/3 cup golden raisins
• 2 tablespoons toasted almond slivers
• 1 tablespoon chopped parsley leaves
• 1 1/2 teaspoon chopped thyme leaves
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 5 teaspoons salt
• 3 1/2 teaspoons freshly cracked black pepper
• 2 cups chicken stock
• 2 cups apricot jam
• 1 cup fresh orange juice

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
Heat the oil in a 2-quart saucepan over medium heat and add the sausage. Cook until the fat is rendered, about 4 to 5 minutes. Add the onions, carrots and celery and cook until the onions are translucent, about 3 minutes. Add the garlic and 1 teaspoon of the orange zest and sweat for about 30 seconds. Add the rice and cook stirring continuously for 3 minutes. Add the raisins, almonds, parsley, thyme, cinnamon, 1 teaspoon of salt, 1/2 teaspoon black pepper, the chicken broth and bring to a boil. Cover the pot and place it in the oven and cook for 30 minutes.
Remove the rice from the oven and increase the oven temperature to 375 degrees F. Place the rice on a sheet pan or a platter to cool.
Combine the apricot jam, orange juice and remaining zest in a small mixing bowl and whisk to blend. Place the glaze in a saucepan over high heat and bring to a boil. Allow glaze to cook until reduced by half. This will take about 8 to 10 minutes.
Season the hens with the remaining salt and pepper on the insides and out. Stuff each hen cavity with about 3/4 cup of the cooled rice and place in a roasting pan. Use a pastry brush to spread the glaze on the hens and place them in the oven.
Roast the game hens for 15 minutes, remove from the oven, and spread another layer of glaze over the hens. Return the hens to the oven and roast for an additional 15 minutes. Remove the hens from the oven, spread the glaze over the hens, and return to the oven.
Continue to cook for 30 more minutes, or until an instant read-thermometer inserted in the thigh registers 160 degrees F, and inserted into the rice registers 140 degrees F.
Serve the hens with any extra rice pilaf.

The door prize was an Indian purse, jewelry and belt
This last picture kind of reminds me of how Roxanne was dressed that night, so I included it...

Check back soon, because I am going to tell you about our book Caramello and the crazy-blindfolded-big stick wielding- women who tried to break open the pinata...

Synopsis

One Thousand White Women is the story of May Dodd and a colorful assembly of pioneer women who, under the auspices of the U.S. government, travel to the western prairies in 1875 to intermarry among the Cheyenne Indians. The covert and controversial "Brides for Indians" program, launched by the administration of Ulysses S. Grant, is intended to help assimilate the Indians into the white man's world. Toward that end May and her friends embark upon the adventure of their lifetime. Jim Fergus has so vividly depicted the American West that it is as if these diaries are a capsule in time.

Dead Sleep

Okay- I am going to break one of my rules, I am skipping the blog for Christmas, 2002 (waiting on some recipes from fellow booksters) and I am moving on to January 2003.

Attention: the book club meeting for January 2003 will never be topped!!! We read Dead Sleep by Greg Iles…

Barnes and Noble reports:
Jordan Glass, a photojournalist on a well-earned vacation, wanders into a Hong Kong art museum and is puzzled to find fellow patrons eying her with curiosity. Minutes later, she stumbles upon a gallery containing a one-artist exhibition called "The Sleeping Women," a mysterious series of paintings that has caused a sensation in the world of modern art. Collectors have come to believe that the canvases depict female nudes not in sleep but in death, and they command millions at auction. When Jordan approaches the last work in the series, she freezes. The face in the painting seems to be her own.
This unsettling event hurls her back into a nightmare she has fought desperately to put behind her - for, in fact, the face in the painting belongs not to Jordan but to her twin sister, murdered one year ago. At the urging of the FBI, Jordan becomes both hunter and hunted in a duel with the anonymous artist, a gifted murderer who knows the secret history of Jordan's family, and truths that even she has never had the courage to face.

Now, as I have told you before, our book club goes all out to make our meeting an experience to remember. But this one ...we all came to Debbie's home, started enjoying appetizers and chit-chat. Suddenly someone noticed Debbie's hall was filled with, not pictures of smiling family, but pictures of us as nudes, posing in her hall gallery!!! Someone very accomplished with printshop had transferred our faces to copies of various famous nude paintings!! (If they weren't x-rated, I would put some pictures here). It was so hilarious and unexpected, even for Debbie and Joanne. ( I think Alisa was the additional culprit if I remember correctly.)

Needless to say, after laughing for hours, we were ready to eat the delicious reprise of Debbie H's shrimp and bowtie pasta (recipe in an earlier blog, you can use my search on this page) and wonderful Cat Head biscuits (the story behind the name- the biscuits are supposed to be as big as a cat's head, but Debbie made mini ones)

Debbie H's Cat Head Biscuits

1 (8 oz.) package cream cheese softened
1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened
1 cup self rising flour

Beat cream cheese and butter at medium speed of an electric mixer 2 minutes or until creamy. Gradually add flour, beating at low speed just until blended.

Spoon dough into ungreased miniature (1 3/4- in.) muffin pans, filling full. Do not grease pans. Bake at 400  for 15 to 17 minutes or until golden. Serve hot. Yield's 1 1/2 doz.
Delicious and so easy!


The door prize was an IV bag (have to read the book to understand)

Next month's selection was One Thousand White Women by Jim Fergus- but we only had 11 in attendance...ha ha....

Blessings

Jaye picked a great book in November of 2002- Blessings by Anna Quindlen. Perfect choice since getting to know Jaye has been a blessing to everyone in our book club...One of my favorite sayings is "Of all the blessings that time and earth bestow, there is none so precious as one true friend". Reading books and sharing meals together has brought our group so much closer over the years.
Barnes and Noble says:
Blessings, the bestselling novel by the author of Black and Blue, One True Thing, Object Lessons, and A Short Guide to a Happy Life, begins when, late at night, a teenage couple drives up to the estate owned by Lydia Blessing and leaves a box.
In this instant, the world of the estate called Blessings is changed forever. The story of Skip Cuddy, the Blessings caretaker, who finds a baby asleep in that box and decides he wants to keep her, and of matriarch Lydia Blessing, who, for her own reasons, decides to help him, Blessings explores how the secrets of the past affect decisions and lives in the present; what makes a person, a life, legitimate or illegitimate, and who decides; the unique resources people find in themselves and in a community. This is a powerful novel of love, redemption, and personal change by the Pulitzer Prize–winning writer about whom The Washington Post Book World said, “Quindlen knows that all the things we ever will be can be found in some forgotten fragment of family.”

Jaye and Roxanne prepared a true Southern feast with hot chicken salad, frozen fruit salad, asparagus, and pound cake with strawberries and whipped cream.
Jaye had baby decorations and a Thanksgiving theme- read the book and you will know why!
The door prize was a box filled with a Walmart gift card, Quik Trip gift card, gardening tools and gloves, etc.

Jaye's Hot Chicken Salad
6 split chicken breasts, baked and cooled, cut into chunks
6 hard boiled eggs, chopped
1 lg. pkg slivered almonds
2 tsp minced onions
1 can cr. of chicken soup
2 T lemon juice
4 cups chopped celery
1 cup mayonnaise
1 tsp. accent
1 tsp salt
2 cups grated cheddar cheese

Combine all ingreds in a large bowl and refrigerate over night. Pour mixture into casserole dish and top with cheese. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes. Serve in lettuce cup.

Jaye's Frozen Fruit Salad

2 cups dairy sour cream
2 tablespoons lemon juice
3/4 cup sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt
8 1/2 ounces can crushed pineapple, drained
1/4 cup sliced maraschino cherries
1/4 cup chopped pecans
1 medium banana, sliced

Directions:

Blend together sour cream, lemon juice, sugar and salt in bowl. Stir in pineapple, cherries, pecans and banana. Pour into 1 quart mold or paper-lined muffin-pan cups. Cover and freeze. Let thaw at room temperature 15 minutes before serving.

(The picture is of Jaye and her special blessing- her son, Mitch!)

So until next time, read those books, make those recipes, and be excited for my next blog- we are taking a trip on The Christmas Train...