Finding Perfect-Available Today!

I'm not cooking today! Today is the release day of my latest book, FINDING PERFECT, and release day means I get to celebrate by letting someone else cook for me! A nice dinner, a glass of wine...

I have been looking forward to this day for a long time. Pia and Raoul are two of my favorite characters. Pia was a mean girl when she was growing up, one of those girls who was too pretty and too rich for her own good. And she knew it. But everything was ripped away from her when her father was arrested for embezzling. She not only lost her status at school, but her family lost their status in the community. They weren't envied anymore, they were scorned. Pia had something inside herself, though, that turned that negative into a positive. She learned humility and kindness and generosity ... but the girl still enjoyed a good party!

Raoul had it tough in childhood, too. And he, too, rose above his circumstances with a good sense of humor and a strong view of right and wrong.

These two are perfect for each other! I hope you'll agree. You can read chapters 1 and 2 for free on the Fool's Gold website. Or just head to your favorite bookstore and pick up a copy of FINDING PERFECT today!

Corn and Blueberry Pasta Salad

I’m a brave person. I wouldn’t say I’m fearless, but I don’t let fear prevent me from taking crazy leaps of faith. Like the time I turned down a well paying job with a solid future in accounting in order to try my hand at writing romance novels.

My latest act of daring could be considered even more foolhardy: I modified a recipe from Better Homes and Gardens.

Gasp!

Let me preface this by saying that I love BHG. The magazine always has great decorating ideas, inspiring garden features, and recipes I love. The recipes are sophisticated but simple.

The other day, I was flipping through the June issue and spotted a recipe for Corn and Blueberry Salad and I stopped in my tracks. Corn and blueberries? Together? It was so pretty, I had to try it.

I followed the recipe exactly, and it was delightful. This salad is gorgeous and would be a wonderful addition to any potluck. But I live in a house with two people, and this was a lot of salad for just two people.

So after we had eaten about half of it, I took a leap of faith and modified the recipe to come up with Corn and Blueberry Pasta Salad. No recipe is sacred. And with apologies to the editors and writers at BHG, I have to tell you, this is even more delicious than the original. It was a great grab-and-go lunch meal for me for a couple of days, which was timely since I was deep into writing one of next year’s Fool’s Gold romances at the time. (I’m working on Montana’s story.)

Note: This recipe is from scratch. Alternatively, you could start out with Corn and Blueberry Salad from BHG and then add the remaining ingredients after you eat about half.

Corn and Blueberry Pasta Salad

3 ears sweet corn
½ C fresh blueberries
½ C cucumber, sliced
½ C carrots, diced
½ C sugar snap peas, chopped
¼ C red onion, diced
¼ C red bell pepper, diced
½ C cheddar cheese, in ¼-inch chunks
2 T chopped fresh cilantro
½ jalapeño pepper, seeded and finely chopped
4 C cooked whole wheat pasta

Dressing:
1 C mayonnaise
1 T lime juice
1 T olive oil
2 t honey
¼ t ground cumin

Boil the corn for 5-7 minutes, then drain and rinse with cool water. Wait until the corn is cool enough that it won’t melt the cheese when you mix the ingredients. Cut the kernels from the cobs and place in a large bowl with the next 9 ingredients.

Whisk together the dressing ingredients and add to the pasta mixture. Fold in the dressing gently so you don’t pop the blueberries. Refrigerate overnight if you can resist it that long. Try to give it at least a couple of hours for the flavors to meld.

Gnocchi with Shrimp and Homemade Pesto

Notice the title of this recipe is not “Homemade Gnocchi with Shrimp and Pesto.” Maybe someday I’ll be willing to attempt gnocchi, but not today. I’m deep into plotting the next Fool’s Gold books, so I needed something I could make while I was distracted by story ideas.

By the way, FINDING PERFECT will be in stores on August 31. I have received a lot of reader mail about Raoul since he appeared in SWEET SPOT in 2008, and about Pia since CHASING PERFECT came out earlier this year, so I’m really eager for readers to see these two strong personalities find each other. You can read a free excerpt of FINDING PERFECT at FoolsGoldCA.com.

So… back to the gnocchi. If you want to make homemade gnocchi, I suggest you try this recipe from A Tasteful Garden: Homemade Gnocchi

My inspiration for Gnocchi with Shrimp and Homemade Pesto was this Cooking Light recipe on AllRecipes.com: Gnocchi with Shrimp, Asparagus, and Pesto It looks delicious, but there were two reasons I didn’t follow it exactly. First, I made asparagus last week, and I want to have variety in this blog and on our dinner table. And second, their pesto didn’t use olive oil.

I’m sorry, but that’s morally wrong.

I started out by making the pesto. I made a lot of it because I remember reading once that you could freeze leftover pesto in ice cube trays and then grab a cube whenever the mood struck.

Homemade Pesto Sauce

2 C Fresh basil, tightly packed
2 cloves garlic
½ C Parmesan cheese, grated
¼ C Pine nuts
½ C Extra virgin olive oil

Put the first four ingredients in a food processor and pulse six times. Add the olive oil and process until it looks well chopped and well mixed. (How’s that for technical recipe jargon?)

Use immediately. Freeze the leftovers in ice cube trays. Once they’re frozen, you can pop them out of the tray and store them in a Ziploc bag. These are very handy.

Gnocchi with Shrimp and Pesto

Note: I took out the word “homemade” here because you can substitute jarred pesto sauce for the homemade pesto sauce.

1 16-oz package of vacuum-packed gnocchi
1 lb. shrimp, peeled and deveined
1 C prepared pesto sauce
Parmesan cheese, shredded (optional)

Heat a pot of water to boiling. Dump all the gnocchi into the water. As the gnocchi floats to the top (after a couple of minutes), remove it from the water with a slotted spoon. Add the shrimp to the water and boil for about five minutes, until the shrimp is opaque. Put all ingredients in a bowl and toss to coat. If desired, top with additional Parmesan cheese. And why wouldn’t you want to do that? Cheese is almost always desirable!

Crispy Baked Parmesan Ranch Chicken with Parmesan Roasted Asparagus

Is there a limit to the number of words that are allowed in a recipe title? At first, I was going to call this new recipe Ranch Chicken. Simple, right? But then I decided to add Parmesan – both to the recipe and to the title. Parmesan Ranch Chicken.

Then when the chicken was done, and it came out so delicate and crispy, I thought, “Well, I have to add ‘Crispy’ to the title. They need to know that right up front!”

Parmesan Ranch Chicken sounds good, but Crispy Parmesan Ranch Chicken sounds delicious! Then I realized that you might wonder what made the chicken so crispy. Did I deep fry it? No! I baked it. And it still turned out delicate and crispy. It’s much healthier than deep fried chicken, and it tastes incredible.

But I thought that Incredibly Delicious Crispy Baked Parmesan Ranch Chicken was going a little too far.

Crispy Baked Parmesan Ranch Chicken

Serious bottle of ranch mix from Sam's Club

2 lbs Chicken breasts with bones (skin optional)
1 C Ranch dressing
1 C Flour
1 t Dry ranch mix
1 t Black pepper
2 T plus 1 t Parmesan cheese, shredded, divided
1 T Olive oil for drizzling

Place the chicken in a Ziploc bag and add ranch dressing. Allow to marinate for at least 2 hours. (8 hours or overnight would be even better.) Drain.

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. In a clean, dry Ziploc bag, add the flour, ranch mix, pepper, and 2 T of Parmesan cheese. Mix well. Add the chicken pieces one at a time, close the bag, and shake to coat. Place the chicken pieces on a cookie sheet with raised edges. Sprinkle with remaining teaspoon of Parmesan cheese, then drizzle with oil. Bake until the pieces are golden brown and reach the desired temperature, about 40-50 minutes.

The chicken recipe used only a small portion of the Parmesan cheese. Plus, in my refrigerator, I had a bunch of asparagus. So I Googled asparagus+parmesan and found this recipe for Parmesan Roasted Asparagus from PickyCook.com.
It was so easy, and it cooked at the same temperature as the chicken. While the chicken started cooking, I prepped the asparagus and then put it in about 20 minutes before the chicken was done. My house smelled amazing.

I love it when a plate comes together! This is seriously some of the best chicken I’ve ever had, and I made up the recipe. I’m so proud of myself. Or should I say full of myself?

Thai-ish Cashew Beef with Garlic Brown Rice

One of the fun things about cooking is that there are many ways to cook just about everything. So if you see a recipe that looks good but you don’t have all the ingredients on hand, you can come up with creative alternatives.

That’s just what I did when I got this month’s Taste of Home magazine in the mail. They had a feature on Thai food, but I couldn’t find one of the ingredients for Cashew Curried Beef at the store. (You can see their recipe by clicking the link. You have to join their website, but it’s free!)

I couldn’t find red curry paste. Now, if I had a better work ethic when it came to cooking, I probably could’ve tracked it down. I could’ve asked someone who worked there, or I could’ve tried another store. I’m a hard-working writer, but I’m a lazy cook.

So I modified the recipe and came up with Thai-ish Cashew Beef with Garlic Brown Rice. I used stewing beef, which was too gristly, but other than that, this was delicious.

Thai-ish Cashew Beef

Marinade:
2 T Thai sweet red chili sauce

2 T Creamy peanut butter
2 T Soy sauce
1 can Coconut milk
¼ t Cayenne pepper

1 lb. Beef, sliced in ¼-inch strips
2-3 t Peanut oil, divided
2 Carrots, sliced into matchsticks
½ Red bell pepper, sliced
½ Green bell pepper, sliced
1 Small onion, sliced
½ C Salted cashews

Mix the marinade ingredients, adding more cayenne if you like spicy food. Pour half the marinade over the beef in a non-reactive bowl. (I feel so smart for saying “non-reactive” like I know what I’m talking about!) Allow to marinate for at least a couple of hours. Reserve the other half of the marinade.

Drain the beef.

Heat 1 teaspoon of peanut oil over medium-high heat in a wok or a deep skillet. Brown the beef, trying not to stir too often. It’s difficult to resist the temptation to stir, but the beef will brown better if you let it be. Remove the beef to a large bowl. Add a little more oil to the pan and cook the vegetables until the carrots are crisp-tender, just a couple minutes. Put them in the bowl with the beef. Then pan-roast the cashews for about 30 seconds in a little more oil, just until they become fragrant. Put them in the bowl with the beef mixture. Toss and serve over Garlic Brown Rice.

Garlic Brown Rice

1 T Vegetable oil
2-3 Garlic cloves, sliced thin
1 C Brown rice
2 ½ C Water

Heat the vegetable in a heavy-bottomed pan over medium heat. Sauté the garlic slices for about 30 seconds, then add the rice and water. Raise to a boil. Once boiling, lower the heat and cover the pan. Simmer until all the water is gone, about 50 minutes.

Voilá! Doesn’t it look pretty?