For my lasagna night, I made two versions.  The first was a vegan roasted vegetable lasagna using a recipe from The Candle Cafe Cookbook.  Candle Cafe is one of the leading vegan restaurants in NYC, and one of my favorite places to dine. For the second, I used a recipe from Lidia’s Family Table for lasagna with homemade spinach noodles and layers of béchamel and Bolognese sauce.  Lidia Matticchio Bastianich’s recipes are often labor intensive, but my meat-eating guests loved the final product. 

I also experimented with my father’s chocolate soufflé recipe, using notes I scrawled while watching him prepare this treat in the past. I’ve learned a number of recipes by watching my father cook over the years. However, my notes are usually challenging to follow after the fact seeing as my dad rarely measures anything.  He simply knows just by looking at the empty pot how much butter or milk to add.  Thus, my careful notes often list a dash of this, or a pinch of that.  And I must admit that I often call him for help when preparing his recipes, as does the rest of my family.  During the Christmas holiday this year, we joked that my father was running a 1-800-clam sauce phone line.  My cousin decided to prepare my dad’s traditional linguine con vongole, and he called a number of times to ask questions.  

With my father’s help, my soufflé came out of the oven looking great (see picture!), and my dinner guests claimed that it tasted great too. Of course, I did not taste the soufflé as it featured eggs and butter. I am still searching for a great vegan soufflé recipe, keeping careful watch on my favorite cooking blogs, Fat Free Vegan and Vegan Yum Yum.

This week, I am back at my computer. However, my husband is on vacation next week, so I’m also actively looking for new recipes in my spare time. Do you have a favorite cookbook?  A favorite recipe?  How about a favorite food blog?

©2010 Sarah Tormey Blog. All Rights Reserved.

Somewhere amid the elaborate gowns and Hugh Jackman’s utterly entertaining musical numbers, I was thrilled to see a tribute to romance at the 81st Academy Awards ceremony.  At the heart of nearly every one of this year’s nominations lay a love story.  From Slumdog Millionaire to the animated film Wall-E, in 2008 movies told an age old story in a new way, taking a fresh look at what draws two people (or in some cases two robots) together despite conflict and complications.  For fans of the romance novel genre (both readers and writers), this is nothing new, it is what we hope to achieve in every page we write and what we look for in every romance novel we read.  

This montage was by far my favorite part of the 81st Academy Awards.  What was yours?

©2010 Sarah Tormey Blog. All Rights Reserved.

At this juncture, I feel I should mention that I follow a strict vegan diet and have for about twelve years.  My husband on the other hand eats just about anything.  Dinner preparation in our home can be very interesting. 

Seeing as I came straight home fully intending to write, I had not stopped by the grocery store and thus was left to cook my heart out with whatever we had on hand.  Thanks to Costco and the weekly farmer’s market in our neighborhood, I could allow my creativity to run wild.  For my husband’s dinner I turned to one of my favorite non-vegan cookbooks, Everyday Food: Great Food Fast, and selected a Pan Fried Shrimp with Green Curry Cashew Sauce.  From The Veganomicon, one of the best vegan cookbooks ever written in my humble opinion, I made a Chickpea-Quinoa Pilaf (if you’ve never cooked with quinoa, I highly recommend it!).  

After a few hours of inspired cooking, my kitchen was filled with enticing smells and tastes.  I thought my main course creations were delicious (admittedly I did not try the shrimp, but my husband seemed quite pleased.)  Dessert however was another matter.  

I decided to make a low-fat vegan apple pie, this time without a recipe.  The result, while tasty, hardly resembled a pie apart from the fact that I’d baked it in a pie dish.  Apparently there is a limit to the amount of fat one can remove from apple pie and still have something more than a few baked apples dusted with cinnamon, who popped out of the oven begging for a sugary crumb topping.  I believe even the pre-made graham cracker crust was offended.  In the end it tasted great (after I added a bit of vegan ‘buttery’ spread and sugar), although it still looked like an example from Martha Stewart’s guide on how not to make dessert.  

Today I’m back at my computer ready to write, write, write with only brief breaks for leftover apple disaster!

©2010 Sarah Tormey Blog. All Rights Reserved.

This past Saturday, at the RWA NYC chapter meeting, the very talented Hope Tarr spoke to the group about her writing process. Seeing as Hope’s latest novel Every Breath You Take is currently in stores (the best purchase I’ve made in a grocery store recently!), one would assume Hope has established a successful process. Personally, I was relieved to hear her daily regimen often includes running while brainstorming about her work in progress or plot lines for future novels. The treadmill and more importantly, the music on my iPod, have become key elements in my own writing adventures.

I discovered this essential part of the process while on the treadmill one dreary winter day, listening to a playlist of classic songs. After I set my pace to Simon & Garfunkel, I allowed my mind to wander, trying to focus on anything other than how far I’d run and how much longer I should stay on the silly machine. Then, the song I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles) by The Proclaimers began, and suddenly a scene unfolded in my mind. For some reason this song transported me to a London ballroom filled with the characters from my current work in progress. The dialogue flowed and the prose fell into place. And that’s when I realized—much to my horror—I did not have a pen and paper.  

Mumbling to myself, I jumped off the treadmill and ran for the locker room (and yes, a number of my fellow gym members threw questioning looks in my direction.) By the time I reached my locker, the song had ended. Terrified the inspiration would end with the music, I quickly started the song from the beginning, opened my locker and found my notebook. Sitting on a bench in the locker room with music blaring from my iPod, I furiously transcribed the scene unfolding in my imagination onto paper, all the while praying I would be able to read my handwriting when I got back to my computer.  

Is music a key component of your process? Has a particular song ever inspired your writing? Do you sometimes find yourself without a pen and paper when inspiration strikes?  

©2010 Sarah Tormey Blog. All Rights Reserved.