COOKING WITH CLORIS--AUTHOR BARBARA PRONIN'S NEW WWII HISTORICAL NOVEL AND A RECIPE FOR CHALLAH

Brooklyn born Barbara Pronin is the author of nine novels acclaimed by such notables as Mary Higgins Clark, Tony Hillerman, and Faye Kellerman. Learn about this SoCal transplant and her books on her website.

Full disclosure: my newest novel, a WW II historical called Winter’s End, is not about a crafty killer. It is about three crafty killers, three amazing young women of the Dutch Resistance who learn to blow up trains and take out Nazi tyrants in their mission to help Jewish escapees and save their homeland from starvation in Nazi-occupied Amsterdam. 

 

Led by young Evi Strobel, who, I swear, walked into my head one night and would not leave until I told her story, the three are as different as night and day, yet they work together like the tiles in a Rubik’s cube to outfox their Nazi enemies. 

 

Here is 16-yearold Evi, enticing Nazi officers from smoky taverns to their deaths until the fateful night when she is saved from rape by a downed American airman.

 

There is Dr. Zoe Visser, a veterinarian by trade, picking pockets for Dutch ID cards for use by escaping Jews, and leading frightened escapees to their border destinations in the dead of night. 

 

And here is Mila Brouwer, the beautiful daughter of a wealthy collaborator, passing secrets she learns at her father’s dinner table to waiting Resistance leaders.

 

Their stories evolve on several levels – as an unexpected love story, as a coming-of-age story, and as a tale of incredible bravery – a remarkable journey I fell in love with, from its beginnings in the cobblestoned streets of Amsterdam to its ending more than seventy years later and a world away, where one of these women learns to bake a delectable Sabbath challah from her Jewish-American mother-in-law.

 

Winter’s End will be published on May 15, but it is on pre-sale now at Amazon and Barnes and Noble.com. While you wait for it, you may want to try your hand at making a golden loaf of homemade challah bread. (It takes a bit of work, but trust me, it’s worth it!)

 

Golden Challah

(makes one loaf)

 

Ingredients:

1 packet dry yeast

1 tsp. sugar

1 cup warm water

1 egg

1/4-cup honey

3 tbs canola oil

1 tsp salt

4 ½ cl. Flour, approximately

 

For the egg wash:

1 egg

2 tbsp. honey

1 tbsp. vanilla

 

Directions:

Dissolve yeast and sugar in 1/4-cup warm water in a medium-sized bowl. Let sit about 15 minutes until thick and frothy.

 

Add the egg, honey, oil, salt, remaining 3/4-cup of water, and 3 cups of the flour. Mix until a loose batter forms. Add the remainder of flour slowly. You may need all, less, or more flour, so use your hands to add it in slowly. The dough should be soft but not sticky. Once the dough has enough flour, knead it for a couple of minutes right in the bowl.

 

Cover the dough with a wet towel and put it in a warm place to rise for about 1—1-1/2 hours. Dough should double in size.

 

Punch the dough down and let it rest for 10 minutes.

 

Divide the dough into thirds and with your hands, roll each piece into a long (13-14 inch) piece. Attach the three pieces at one end, tuck the end under, and braid the dough as you would if it were Evi‘s hair. Tuck the second end under, place the braided loaf on a lightly greased cookie sheet, and let it rise for another 30-40 minutes.

 

Beat the egg with the honey and vanilla and gently brush over the loaf. Bake at 375° F for approximately 35-45 minutes. Loaf should be golden on top, and firm on the bottom.

 

Winter’s End

Luring Nazi officers from smoky taverns to their deaths was not what Evi Strobel bargained for when she agreed to join the Dutch Resistance. But that is what she did until that fateful night she was saved from rape by a downed American Airman.

 

Nor did Zoe Visser expect to be picking pockets for Dutch ID cards for use by escaping Jews, much less leading frightened enemies of the Reich toward uncertain treks to the Belgian border - nor did Mila Brouwer, the beautiful daughter of a wealthy German collaborator, expect to be passing secrets learned at her father's dinner table to help Resistance stalwarts blow up Nazi trains and meeting halls.

 

But four years into German occupation, with the Dutch surviving on boiled tulip bulbs, and Hitler tightening control ahead of advancing Allies, that is what they did. Follow them as Winter's End traces a harrowing journey from the cobblestoned streets of Nazi-occupied Holland to an astonishing finale seventy years later and a world away.

 

Preorder (available 5/15/25)

#COOKING WITH CLORIS--ALMOND FLOUR BREAD #RECIPE WITH GUEST AUTHOR RED L. JAMESON

Almond Flour Bread

A military historian by day, sometimes Red L. Jameson feels a bit clandestine when she writes romance at night. No one knows that while she researches heroes of the past and present, she uses everything for her characters in her books. Her secret's been safe . . . until now. Learn more about Red and her books at her website and blog.

I love researching everything about my books. In my latest release, Cowboy of Mine, my heroine, Meredith Peabody, has been dumped from modern times into the Montana Territory of 1887. There, after a few months, she begins to have a blast baking bread.

Challah

I already liked baking bread, since I have a bread machine. So I went nuts baking various breads while writing Cowboy of Mine. My absolute favorite was making challah, which I would let my bread machine turn into batter, then make the pretty braid and bake it. Yum! And so lovely, too.

However, as the months passed while writing Cowboy of Mine, and as my family and I kept eating bread after bread, I worried we’d carb overload. So the recipe I’m sharing today is my go-to bread when I’m craving all the challah in the world, but I’m worrying my jeans are a little more snug than usual. This is a paleo recipe, so it’s grain-free, low carb, and full of protein.

Almond Flour Bread

2-1/2 cups almond flour

1/2 teaspoon salt (preferably sea salt or perhaps Himalayan pink salt)

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

3 eggs

1 tablespoon agave nectar or honey

1/2 teaspoon apple cider vinegar

Place wet ingredients together in food processor. Pulse until well mixed. Add dry ingredients until well mixed. The batter is very thick. Spoon into a well-greased small bread pan. Bake at 300° F for 45 – 55 minutes.

(Warning: Although I do like this bread, it is not exactly bread. More bread-like than anything else. However, it is good!)

Cowboy of Mine

Book Three of the Glimpse Time Travel Series

The matchmaking, time-traveling muses have a huge problem. An angry Norse god has just captured one of their mortals, refusing to tell them where he took Jacob Cameron, let alone when.

As a seventeenth-century Highlander, being shuttled through time by a man calling himself Odin, might have been enough to crack Jake Cameron’s sanity. He’s kept his mind only through grit, gumption, and the single goal to somehow return to 1653 and his brothers. Landing in the freezing wilds of Montana in 1887, becoming the sheriff for a small mining community, Jake now needs to make a plan to travel back in time. However, when a wee fae-like woman walks into his life all his best-laid intentions becomes hazy.

As a thief and liar, Meredith Peabody knows she has no chance with the new sheriff in town. Although, he melts her frozen heart with his protection and smoldering looks. Even if she did have a chance with him, how could she ever relate she’s not from this time? She might never get the chance because as soon as she realizes her winter’s wish—for Jake to stay close—the criminal he’s hunting turns the tables on him. But there’s no way in h-e-double hockey sticks Meredith will let that happen.

The muses have their work cut out for this glimpse—chasing after a god, trying to find clues where and when their humans could be, and fitting in time for dress shopping has been murder. Gods, hopefully not literally!

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