Martha, Helen and Me

My co-worker Trish was eating something delicious looking at lunch the other day- red lentil cakes. An avid vegetarian, I’m always looking for something to stick in a bun that doesn’t come from a cow or other animal. I’ve made black bean burgers, tofu cutlets, tofu and beet burgers and my personal favourite: chickpea cutlets. Everyone in my house likes chick peas, so even my youngest (and fussiest child) will dig in. So I asked Trish just where she had gotten the recipe and she said Martha Stewart. We then had what I call, The Martha Stewart Conversation. You see, I’m not supposed to like her. She’s too omnipresent, too conventional, too perfect. People like me, we’re supposed to read Vegetarian Times, Bust and Adbusters, which I do. But I also have a soft spot for Martha. Her magazines are decorating-porn for me. When I read the Martha Stewart Living magazine, I too have an upper East-side apartment with a living room the size of the square footage of my entire house. I have a closet just for dinner napkins and a room for gift wrapping and flower arranging. Which I don’t really want, except for sometimes. Don’t tell anyone.

There’s another reason I have a soft spot for Martha. You see, I still have a stash of Martha Stewart Living magazines on my closet shelf at my cottage. I read them in the summer and I think of my mother-in-law, Helen. They were her magazines and it used to be her cottage, which she loved. And so when I sit in my darkened bedroom in the afternoon for a few minutes away from my kids and flip through a spread of vintage tea towels or porcelain milk pitchers shaped like birds, I like to imagine Helen is still out on the front porch. She’s watering her geraniums or digging in her garden, and I imagine any minute she’ll come to me with some vegetarian recipe she found in the magazine and ask me if she should try it out.

Here’s the recipe for Lentil Cakes. I’m not sure Helen would have liked them, but she would have tried them with great open-minded gusto, just like she approached everything else in life. 

Ingredients

• 1 cup red lentils
• 3 scallions, pale-green and white parts chopped; greens thinly sliced on bias
• 1 tablespoon harissa (or chile garlic paste or other spice)
• 1/4 teaspoon turmeric
• 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
• Coarse salt
• 1 large egg plus 1 large egg white
• 2 1/2 ounces goat's-milk or sheep's-milk feta cheese, crumbled (1/2 cup)
• 1/2 cup nonfat plain Greek yogurt
• 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice
• 1/8 teaspoon finely grated garlic (from 1 small clove)
• 1/2 English cucumber, cut into half-moons (1 cup)
• 1/2 ounce upland cress or watercress (1 cup)
• 1/4 ounce fresh mint leaves (1/2 cup)
• 2 teaspoons safflower oil

Directions

1.       Cover lentils with 2 inches cold water. Soak 4 hours at room temperature or up to 1 day in refrigerator. Drain well. Pulse pale-green and white parts of scallions in a food processor until minced. Add harissa, turmeric, baking powder, 1/4 teaspoon salt, and egg and egg white; pulse to combine. Add lentils; puree until almost smooth. Transfer mixture to a bowl, and stir in a little more than half the feta.

2.       Whisk remaining feta, the yogurt, lemon juice, and garlic in a small bowl. Combine cucumber, cress, and mint in another bowl. (I gotta tell you, I never got to the greens part, and it was still delicious.)

3.       Heat 1 teaspoon oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Place a scant tablespoon of scallion greens in pan, and spoon about an eighth of the batter on top, spreading to make a 3-inch cake. Repeat, making 4 cakes at a time. Cook until golden brown, flipping once, about 6 minutes. Add remaining teaspoon oil, and repeat.

4.         Divide sauce among 4 plates; top with salad. Place cakes next to greens,

Last week I was tagged by the talented Sarah Aronson, author of Beyond Lucky, in The Next Big Thing. So now it's my turn to answer some author questions. Here we go!

1) What is the working title of your next book?

Lauren Yanofsky Hates the Holocaust
2) Where did the idea come from for the book?
A couple of years ago a student made a Nazi armband during my French class. It got me thinking about my feelings about the Holocaust.  

3) What genre does your book fall under?

Contemporary YA

4) What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?

Logan Lerman (Perks of Being a Wallflower) would play the hunky basketball player and love interest of Lauren Yanofsky. Lauren would be played by Alexis Bledel, but there’d be a time warp and Alexis would be sixteen again.

5) What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

Lauren is sick of hearing about the Holocaust but must make some tough choices when boys from her school start playing Nazi war games.

6) Who is publishing your book?

Orca Books
7) How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?

A year.
8) What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
There are a lot of books for teens written about the Holocaust, but none that I know of about contemporary teens grappling with the legacy of the Holocaust. I'd love to hear of other books.

9) Who or what inspired you to write this book?

My father’s interest in World War Two has led me to think a lot about the Holocaust and the after effects it has had on the Jewish religion and culture.

10) What else about the book might pique the reader's interest?

Not only does this book address some serious issues, there’s also some basketball and even some kissing.

Dance Class- Cheap Marriage Counselling

I was all set up to take a Contemporary dance class at the Kingston School of Dance as research for a book I'm writing for my publisher Orca Books. They have a new series of performing arts books called Orca Limelights and I'm writing one about a ballet dancer who injures her foot and can't do any pointe work for the summer. Her parents ship her off to a dance camp where she has to learn other dance styles. I have a very awful working title right now, so I just refer to it as the "Dance Camp" book.
So, I was all set up to take Contemporary, but the class was Tuesdays at 6pm, smack-dab in the middle of dinner hour. I envisioned myself rushing home from work to make dinner andt then leaving before I could eat it, anad then arriving home just in time for bedtime. Not fun. Anyway, being the somewhat distracted person that I am, I saw a Thursday night Ballroom class and signed my husband and I up on the spot. Not only do we like to dance, I thought it would be an inexpensive way for us to spend time together without actually having to plan a date. The instructor would tell us what to do, and we'd listen. 
I wasn't sure the first class if were more excited about dancing, or if we were just excited to be out on a Thursday night. A mid-week date-ooh! I was a little worried we'd get kicked out of the first class because while everyone else was stiffly foxtrotting around the room, Rob and I were adding in crazy dips and making silly faces. Also, since we're both teachers we find it hard to quietly take instruction. We both always have questions or comments. We're either your ideal keener students or your worst nightmare.
We made our way through the fox trot and then the meringue with ease and maybe even grace. Then came the salsa. Can I tell you how funny it is to watch a room full of very stiff white people (myself included) try and do salsa hips? I highly reccomend the experience, especially if you're not the stiffest person in the room. 
The class ended faster than we'd imagined and we came home happy and thirsty to find out our youngest son had barfed all over his bed and his doll Fuvie. The babysitter had calmy stripped his bed and changed his pajamas, but needless to say, both kids were still up. And there was a slew of phone messages.
Both Rob and I were tired Friday morning, but not too tired to be excited for a Tango class Saturday night. I'm thinking my publisher is defintely going to need a ballroom book.