#COOKING WITH CLORIS--AUTHOR DAVID RYAN'S FBI AGENT COOKS UP A SPAGHETTI DINNER

Author David Ryan’s debut novel, Dead Odds, features an FBI agent who enjoys cooking. Today he shares the recipes for the apology spaghetti dinner his protagonist cooked for an Orlando homicide detective. Learn more about David and his series at his website. 

In my debut novel, Dead Odds, the protagonist is a Tennessee-based FBI agent who takes time off to handle some family business in Florida. The agent has been out of college (and out of law school) for more than a decade and is single, but he is not the law enforcement version of Oscar Madison. (For those of another generation, Conrad Keane, my protagonist, is not a slob.)

Keane finds himself in Orlando investigating the murder of his estranged and much-younger brother, and he discovers his brother did not lead the life everyone believed he did.

One of the revealing scenes in Dead Odds is when Keane, needing to apologize to an Orlando homicide detective because he stuck his nose into her murder investigation. On the spur of the moment he shows up at Det. Tina Rossi’s house and cooks a spaghetti dinner for the two of them. He knows that Rossi’s family owns and runs an Italian restaurant in Leesburg, Florida, a small city near Orlando, which probably gives him a clue to the kind of food she’d be receptive to eating without notice.

Keane doesn’t necessarily fancy himself a gourmet chef, but he takes pride in the fact that he doesn’t rely on fast food or Uber Eats. He cooks, and he’s good at it.

Enjoy. I promise you, this is delicious.

Conrad Keane's Spaghetti Dinner

Red Sauce

Ingredients:
5-6 mild Italian sausages
6 12 oz. cans of tomato sauce
1 6 oz. can of tomato paste
1 medium or large onion, chopped
3 garlic cloves, minced
2 T fennel seeds
2 T garlic powder
2 T dried basil
1/2 cup basil leaves, chiffonade
1 T dried oregano
1 T onion powder
3 T olive oil
Grated, shredded or shaved Parmesan cheese
Salt and pepper to taste

Heat olive oil in a pot and sweat onions for 4 minutes. 

Remove casings from sausages. Pinch off small portions of sausage, drop into onions mixture and brown, breaking up the chunks into smaller bits as you go. 

Remove excess grease with a ladle and add fresh garlic, stirring for 1 minute. Add tomato sauce, fennel, dried basil, garlic powder, oregano and onion powder. Stir, lower heat and let simmer for 15 minutes.

Add most of the basil leaves, reserving some for dressing. Add tomato paste to get desired thickness of the sauce. Salt and pepper to taste.

Simmer 15 minutes uncovered, remove from heat and cover.

Note: You can make this sauce one or two days ahead of time and keep it in the refrigerator. I recommend making it at least one day in advance. That gives the ingredients time to marry and makes for a more developed sauce.

Garlic Bread

Ingredients:
4 cloves finely chopped garlic
4 T melted butter
1 loaf French bread

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

Slice bread into desired thickness. Keeping the bread pieces in order, brush insides of the bread with butter and add garlic pieces.

Place the bread pieces back together into loaf. Wrap in foil. Bake 20 minutes.

Spaghetti

Ingredients:
1 box of your favorite dried spaghetti
1/2 cup kosher salt

Bring large pot of water to a boil. Add the salt, stir, and add the pasta. Turn down the temperature after the water comes back to a boil and cook until the pasta is al dente.

Prepare your dinner in the manner of your choice: Plate the pasta and add sauce, or mix the pasta with the sauce and then plate.

Sprinkle fresh basil and Parmesan cheese on top.

Dead Odds
A Conrad Keane Novel, Book 1

There's nothing FBI Agent Conrad Keane wouldn't do to catch his brother's killer. Will his pursuit of justice lead him beyond the law and ruin his life?

Keane's reunion with his estranged half-brother Sean is cut short by a seemingly random tragedy outside an Orlando bar. Detective Tina Rossi vows to track down the person responsible, but Keane is determined to find his own answers.

An outsider with no jurisdiction, Keane forms a tenuous alliance with Rossi to investigate Sean's life as a star college football player. But the deeper he digs, the more he uncovers that Sean led a secret life - one that got him killed.

The university president, his cadre of well-heeled friends, and a mysterious former donor keep Keane and Rossi guessing about a puzzle they can't piece together. When other men connected to the school turn up dead, Keane races to catch a killer whose sights have turned on him.

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#COOKING WITH CLORIS--AUTHOR JUDY ALTER'S NEW COOKBOOK

Today we welcome back frequent visitor Judy Alter. Judy writes three different mystery series as well as historical fiction based on the lives of women in the nineteenth century American West. She’s recently written a cookbook and is here today to tell us about it. Learn more about Judy and her books at her website. 

A New Cookbook…and an Old Spaghetti Sauce Recipe

A little more than two years ago I moved from a 2,000-square-foot house, where I’d lived for twenty-five years, into a 600-square-foot cottage (a remodeled garage/guest house) on the same property. It meant downsizing big time. My daughter and I were ruthless about clothes, books, even my beloved but appalling recipe collection. And kitchen utensils.

Size dictated that my kitchen be the size of a postage stamp, so it is way short on counter space. A bigger complication: local zoning laws forbid more than one full kitchen on a property. That means I cannot have built-in appliances such as a stove or dishwasher. Anything you plug in is okay, so I have a large refrigerator, toaster oven, magnetic hot plate, and coffee maker. I do not have a microwave, an Instant Pot, an air fryer, or a crock pot.

My cooking changed dramatically. My magnetic hot plate became the center of my cooking. I learned to do all kinds of things on it. I also learned that it cooks hot and fast—and you have to push the start button. That was a biggie. The first time I used it, I set the temperature I wanted and waited for the pan to heat. My daughter was with me. We put a lamb chop in the pan. Nothing. No sizzle. She held her hand out to feel heat, put her ear down, poked the meat. Nothing. Then we saw the start button.

The hot plate requires special pots and pans, which of course you buy from the company that sold you the hot plate. Gone, with regret, are the days of cooking in a cast-iron skillet. These new pots and pans will scorch food if you turn your back, but they are super easy to clean, and I have one large pot in which I can simmer a pot of soup all day.

But with one hot plate, you cannot, for instance, cook pasta and sauce at the same time. If I use the hot plate and the toaster oven, I blow a fuse. So I developed a new technique. If the pasta must sit a bit while I fix the sauce, I stir just a bit of olive oil in to keep it from clumping. Then I give it a quick re-heat before adding the sauce.

Gradually, as I learned new techniques, the idea for a cookbook formed. A friend suggested the title, Gourmet on a Hot Plate, and I began collecting recipes for the things I cooked—some new experiments, many old familiar dishes adapted to my new situation. Believe me, there were some disasters. I regularly burned things, even in the toaster, which set off the smoke alarm more than once. The smoke alarm hurts my dog’s ears, and she associates it with the toaster, so Sophie now begins barking when she sees me with a slice of bread in my hands. But Gourmet on a Hot Plate includes lots of cooking tips along with some tasty recipes.

Gourmet on a Hot Plate will be available as an e-book and in print November 15, perfect for holiday gift giving. It’s currently available for pre-order. Meantime, here’s a spaghetti sauce recipe a good friend contributed. Her mom got it from a woman in Rome in 1950. When I made it, even twelve-year-old Jacob said it was good, really good—and such praise is hard to come by.

Spaghetti Sauce

Ingredients

1 medium onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, pressed

1 lb. lean ground beef

2 Tbsp. olive oil

1 6 oz. can tomato paste

1 14.5 oz. can diced tomatoes

1 14.5 oz. can tomato puree

1/2 tsp. each sage, rosemary, oregano, thyme, savory, marjoram, and basil

Salt and pepper to taste

Cook the onions and garlic in olive oil until onions are slightly softened. Add spices and mix thoroughly.

Add tomato paste, puree and diced tomatoes, and stir well. Simmer on low heat for about three hours or in a slow cooker for six hours.

Serve with your favorite pasta and fresh grated Parmesan.

Gourmet on a Hot Plate

Without formal culinary training, Judy Alter has cooked her way through life, feeding family and friends at everything from casual dinners al fresco to elaborate meals for twenty. An award-winning author and publisher, she jokes she’ll come back in another life as a chef.

Today Alter finds herself cooking in a four-by-six kitchen where zoning laws forbid built-ins but allow anything that plugs in. So she cooks with a hot plate, a toaster oven, and a large refrigerator/freezer. Given these limitations, she has developed a new approach to food, one that she says lets her get in touch with the food itself. By choice, she does not have an Instant Pot, an air-fryer, or a microwave. Her menu choices are dictated by her cooking facilities—and she loves it. She shares her tiny kitchen tips and recipes, developed over the past couple of years, in Gourmet on a Hot Plate.

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#COOKING WITH CLORIS--MEATBALLS & SAUCE WITH GUEST AUTHOR ELIZABETH JOHN

Elizabeth John writes sweet contemporary romances and cozy romantic suspense novels. She loves dogs, the beach, and books, of course! Learn more about her and her books at her website. 

In my book, Judging Joey, Madeline White rarely had a home cooked meal growing up. Her dad had his hands full taking care of her neglectful mother, so Madeline had to fend for herself unless he remembered she was too young to turn on the stove. Macaroni and cheese from a box became the closest thing to real cuisine until she moved in with her elderly aunt and uncle. Her aunt introduced her to a world filled with nutrition, recipes, and family time at the dinner table. Sadly, her aunt passed years later, and Madeline took over the kitchen duties. Uncle Mark could make toast and tea and that was all. His attempts at preparing meals became an inside joke to the two because Madeline had to beg him to let her do all the cooking after one of his ‘Tuna Surprise’ casseroles.

Madeline takes pride in her culinary talents. Just like she prepares her lesson plans for teaching her students, she preps her meals in advance too. Sometimes the meal is elaborate such as her stuffed roasted pork loin. No matter what, each morning she knows what she and her uncle will have for dinner. That is until Laura, her widowed next door neighbor, begins to frequently stop by with her famous hot chili or freshly baked apple pie to whet her uncle’s appetite. Madeline thinks their blossoming relationship is cute and appreciates the diversion from her uncomfortable reunion with Joey O’Neill. When Madeline comes home from a stressful day at work, she is thrilled to find Laura stirring a pot of spaghetti sauce and meatballs.

All the foods cooked in this book are recipes I’ve learned from my mother. My German mother learned how to cook Italian from my father’s sister, who of course, learned from my grandmother. However, my family never said spaghetti sauce. The red paste was called gravy. When the grandchildren were born, calling spaghetti sauce gravy was confusing. The kids insisted gravy was brown. Although, my mother still calls spaghetti sauce gravy, nobody cares since her dish tastes magnifico by any name. Enjoy!

Spaghetti Sauce and Meatballs

Meatballs:

1/2 cup of each: ground beef, veal, pork (All beef or a combination is fine, too.)

1 small onion, minced

1/2 cup plain bread crumbs

1 egg

Salt and pepper to taste

Handful of chopped Italian parsley

1/4 cup parmesan cheese (optional)

olive oil

Mix together by hand. A large melon scooper will help keep the size of the mixture the same. Use hands to roll into golf-sized balls.

Coat frying pan with olive oil and allow to heat up. Brown meatballs lightly on all sides.

Sauce:

2-3 garlic cloves

olive oil

1 can crushed tomatoes

oregano

salt

pepper

fresh basil

Slice garlic. Sauté in olive oil. (Garlic can be removed before serving guests.) Add tomatoes.

Add oregano, salt and pepper to taste, plus several fresh basil leaves.

Let the sauce simmer with the meatballs and continually stir the sauce so it doesn’t stick to the bottom. Be careful not to break up the meatballs. The sauce should simmer at least an hour, but the longer, the better.

Serve with al dente pasta.

Judging Joey

Madeline White must return to her hometown to help her uncle, her only family. She gets a job teaching and sees the man who broke her heart back in high school. Then she discovers he’s the school’s Safety Officer and his nephew is her student! Madeline’s determined to clear the air with him and hopes they can be civil to one another. When she builds up the courage for a painful reunion, she is shocked that he doesn’t remember her.

Officer Joey O’Neill is committed to his job, so after the beautiful redhead accuses him of the contrary, he takes offense. When Madeline informs him they’ve met before, he insists she’s mistaken. Although his family wants him to settle down and judges his carefree bachelorhood lifestyle, it doesn’t mean he forgets the people in his life. Past or present.

Like years before, people begin to whisper about her when things go missing in the school. Joey starts to wonder if what they say is true. As the past comes back to haunt Madeline, she struggles with a secret that jeopardizes her job and hopes she can trust Joey. Has he finally out grown being a wise-cracking jock?

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COOKING WITH CLORIS--GUEST AUTHOR ROSEANN DEFRANCO

Contemporary romantic comedy author RoseAnn DeFranco returns today to share some recipes with us. Learn more about her and her books at her website and blog.

‘Tis the Season in Audubon Springs…The Making of Mama’s Italian Sauce

Thank you for welcoming me back to Killer Crafts & Crafty Killers! 

Previously I introduced you to my Brothers of Audubon Springs series set at the Jersey shore where the men run as hot as the temperatures in late July at the shore. My heroes in the series, Rafe, Tony, and Vince have a dominating Italian Mama. Some people dominate in a boardroom, others captivate from the stage; Marcella Iuliano runs her family with a firm hand from the kitchen.

It should come as no surprise the women strong enough to claim the hearts of these men also need to win the approval of their mother. She is a force of nature, and it is best to have her on your side.  What better test, or initiation, into the family than the making of Mama’s own Italian sauce?  I imagine each of my heroines attempting mama’s recipe, with varying degrees of success, under her watchful eye, over the years to come.  I’m sure it will only take ten to forty years to get the recipe deemed acceptable. Good thing Emma, Annie and Kit are in it for the long haul!

This recipe has been pulled from my own mother’s cookbook…she is my real life version of Mama Iuliano, and I love her dearly.  Once I let go of the pressure of being her equal in the kitchen, my life became much easier.  She is a tough act to follow.  I do however make a MEAN version of her sauce every year for the holidays.  It has become my own personal tradition. While standing in my kitchen, I feel close to my mom, my grandmother, and all the women in our extended families.  As our families have spread out across the years and miles, and our traditions have changed, one thing remains a constant and will always bind us together…we love to EAT! 

Enjoy my Mama’s Sauce recipe – complete with my own notes…that of the novice chef!

Ingredients

4 Lg. Cans Tomato Puree

4 Lg. Cans Crushed Tomatoes

3-18oz. cans Tomato Paste

2 handfuls of fresh basil chopped (I’ve been known to use 6 Tbsps. dried basil without detection)

1 Tbsp. pepper

1 tsp. salt

1/3 C. sugar

½ Tbsp. baking soda

3 medium onions chopped (DO NOT use the food processor as a short cut!)

10 cloves garlic, chopped (food processor approved)

Directions

Sauté onion & garlic in olive oil over medium heat until tender. Add tomato paste with a little water and continue to cook. After a few minutes add puree tomatoes and the rest of the ingredients. I LOVE watching the sauce bubble when adding the baking soda. I think this is the secret ingredient that pulls the acidity out of the recipe. Add a few cans of water to the desired sauce thickness. Simmer on stove while preparing meat. I always love this bit of direction…it is understood that if you are making mom’s sauce, you better add the meat!

Note from Mom: This is a large recipe which I make and freeze. It requires 2 large pots (8 & 16 quarts). Recipe may be cut in half or quartered.  All of her recipes include notes of what may and may not be done regarding cutting and doubling.

Meatballs

4 lbs. ground round

1 lb. ground pork

5 eggs

5 cloves garlic, chopped

2 ½ C. Grated Romano

2 ½ C. Flavored breadcrumbs (Mom likes Progresso)

2 lg. Onions chopped fine

Salt and pepper to taste (This always throws me. I do not taste raw meat, so just add some salt and pepper)

This is where the instructions she provided to me end. The message here is clear…any daughter of hers better know how to make a meatball. I’ll fill in the gaps…

Mix all ingredients. Add a little water.  Shape and fry in olive oil then place in simmering sauce.  That is what mom wants you to do, but I skip the fryer and put the meatballs right into the sauce and let them cook that way. This cuts down on grease in the sauce, again reducing acidity. To this day I’ve never been questioned on my meatballs! They ROCK!

Mom also adds other meats depending on the holiday. Spare ribs are a fan favorite, and of course the Italian Specialty – Brasciole – YUM! That is a recipe for another day. The newly minted Iuliano women are NOT ready for Brasciole. 

Return to Audubon Springs

When Emma Grant returns to her family's Audubon Springs beach house to fulfill the stipulations of her father's will, she has every intention of forcing her former lover out of the house for good. She's never fit into her wealthy family and would prefer avoiding her past, but with her brother threatening to reveal her young daughter, she has no choice.

Rafe Iuliano has other plans. The wealthy Grants tried to bribe him out of Emma's life years ago, but he's determined to prove once and for all that a master carpenter is worthy of Emma and the house.

Their ridiculous and steamy battle for the house reignites the love and passion that bloomed between them years ago. But when Rafe discovers she's kept their daughter a secret for two years, can he overcome anger and pride to claim his family and the love of his life, or will the deception drive a final wedge between them?

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