Inspector Green's killer latkes

This month's theme on Type M is food recipes as they figure in our books. Thanks, Rick, for this idea! I actually like the idea of having themes which we can follow or not as we wish. If we have something compelling we want to blog about, we can ignore the theme, but if, as often happens after years of writing blogs, we are scratching our heads about what to write this time, a theme offers some readymade inspiration.

Reading through the earlier blogs, I'm intrigued to see how many of our protagonists don't cook much, mostly because they have no time and are focussed on solving the case. Often they are also incompetent, wishing they'd paid more attention to their mothers growing up. Sometimes there is even a mother or the ghost of one nagging in the background.

Recipes and food feature much more prominently in cosy mysteries, where the emphasis is more on community, friendship, and comfort than on nail-biting suspense. Even if the cosy mystery has a reluctant chef, as in Vicki Delany's Sherlock Holmes Bookshop Mysteries, there is a popular tea shop or restaurant where the protagonist and friends hang out.

Comfort and community have less place in grittier, darker mysteries and thrillers, for obvious reasons. We don't want the reader settling in for a comfortable cup of tea unless there's a stalker hiding in the next room; we want them holding their breath in excitement and apprehension. And yet, interludes of relaxation have an important place in any story, to vary the pace and give the reader and the characters a chance to reflect. Not to mention catch their breath. A family dinner promotes conversation or at least inner musings about the case and about the state of their lives, which adds depth and richness to the characters.

This is why I don't like the very lean, mean, edgy thrillers that race forward from cliffhanger to cliffhanger with no time to get to know the characters or learn about their complexities and other dimensions. These characters all seem interchangeable. In grittier stories, however, balance is key, and even the food scenes should add to the atmosphere and the momentum of the plot.

My current series character, Amanda Doucette, has little time for cooking, and besides it's no fun cooking for one, but having worked all over the world, she loves the spicy, imaginative food of Thailand, India, Cambodia, South America, and Africa. So far in the series, I have added food scenes related to the setting of the book. FIRE IN THE STARS is set in Newfoundland, for example, so she eats seafood chowder and shrimp. In THE ANCIENT DEAD, the book I am currently writing, set in the Alberta badlands, they are eating a lot of Angus beef steak.

But because of the festive season about to start, I am reaching all the way back to my Inspector Green series for my recipe of the month. Green comes from a rich Eastern European Jewish tradition, so I do mention Shabbat roast chicken dinner, honey cake, and other holiday fare in the books sparingly. This week marks the beginning of Hanukkah, when foods fried in oil are served to commemorate the miracle of the lights. For my own contribution to Type M's recipe collection, here is my father-in-law's recipe for potato latkes:


Inspector Green's Killer Latkes

5-6 medium potatoes, grated (hand is best but food processor if you wish to preserve your knuckles)
1 medium onion, finely grated or minced
3 eggs
1/4 cup flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. black pepper
enough cooking oil to deep fry (not olive oil)

By hand, mix together the eggs, flour, baking powder, salt and pepper until they are light and frothy. Add the minced onion. Grate the potatoes, squeeze the excess moisture out with your hands, and add to the egg mixture.

Heat about 1/2 inch of oil in a large frying pan and test heat with a small amount of mixture. When it sizzles, add batter in spoonfuls (about 1/3 cup, but they can be bigger or smaller to taste) to fill the pan. Turn when golden and cook the other side. Remove to a platter lined with paper towel and repeat until finished, topping up the oil as needed. Serve piping hot with sour cream or applesauce.

Enjoy, and Happy Hanukah!

For the love of books

Barbara here. Chanukah is over (except for the Fradkins, who operate in our own weird universe and will celebrate it together on December 30) but there are still nine days before Christmas, so it's time to talk about the incredible gift of books.

I grew up surrounded by books. My father was a philosophy professor at McGill and an incurable book addict. Being a philosopher, he was inclined to be oblivious to the exigencies of daily life, and so even when the family budget could barely afford oatmeal, he bought books. Not as articles of decor or status to be displayed by the fireplace, but for the richness they contained. Knowledge about the origins of the universe, tales of adventure and peril, insight into the lives of great historical figures...

He was in love with knowledge, as the word philosophy suggests. Our house had bookcases everywhere, and when he ran out of room, he built another one. Usually somewhat rickety and rustic, because he was less handy with a hammer than he was with a pen. His study was lined on all four walls with books, and there was even a bookcase in his clothes cupboard. The minute you walked in the front door, you ran into a wall of books lining the front hall.

As a child, I loved to peruse these shelves, pulling out books at random and leafing through them to see what captured my interest. The great Russian novelists, Marcel Proulx, Faulkner, Shakespeare, Toynbee, Winston Churchill, Bertrand Russell... I could be thrilled, intrigued, informed, entertained, sometimes bored, but there was always enough discovery at my fingertips to keep me coming back. I'm not sure how much I got out of Solzhenitzyn at the age of ten, but the images of the gulag have stuck with me to this day.

Both my parents were committed to books, to words and storytelling. My father told us bedtime stories about his childhood in Newfoundland, and my mother read my sister and me novels that were above our own reading level. The whole Anne of Green Gables series became an ongoing nightly drama that spanned months. On Sunday evenings, I recall we had a poetry hour in which each of us picked a poem from the poetry collections in the house, recited it, and talked about it. I recall loving the musical sound of the words tumbling through the air, and the laughter at some of the sillier poems.

This love of books has carried into our adult lives. I'm happy that after years of trying to select presents for our extended family get-together, we have settled on a book exchange. Each of us buys a book, wraps it without naming a recipient, and puts it under the tree. When we gather to unwrap the presents, each of us in turn selects a book. Others are free to steal it or trade theirs for it instead of selecting a new one, and in this fashion, everyone gets a book that they find intriguing, even if outside their normal reading habit. It fills the gift opening time with laughter, exclamations, and even groans.

All this for roughly $20 a person.

In this frantic lead-up to Christmas, as each of us struggles to figure out what to buy and how to afford it, think of books! They are so much more than an app on a tablet or a little block of paper. They are an invitation into a new world, of fantasy, mystery, history, or scientific discovery... They provoke thought and discussion, enrich the soul as well as the brain, and stimulate the powers of concentration and imagination far more than TV and video games can never do. And they don't break the budget. They are by far the best educational aide you can provide for your children. A lifelong habit of reading books is a life-long habit in learning. And thinking.

Books don't break, don't grow obsolete, don't invoke envy in the schoolyard, and don't clutter up the landfills. If you have too many books (how can you have too many books!), donate them to the local library, thrift store, women's shelter, or fundraising book exchange. It's a gift that punches well above its weight. And cost.

You gotta love it.