I don’t excel at much in the kitchen sphere but if there is one thing I like to make for myself it’s a delicious entrée. Over the years I’ve collected a handful of nice things that aren’t good for the waistline but offer a series of simply prepared recipes that look hella fancy and taste divine.
Asparagus Roll
Ingredients; Asparagus, crumbly/good quality feta, thinly sliced prosciutto, a touch of butter.
Lay out a piece of prosciutto, put a dollop (heaped teaspoon) of feta on one end, place two or three asparagus stalks on the feta, and warp up. Place on a non-stick pan, and I like to dab a bit of butter on either end of the asparagus. Cook for 20mins between 160-180 degrees (Celsius). Serve immediately.
Salmon Cream
Ingredients; Cream cheese, sour cream, dill, capers, lemon juice, salmon, water biscuits.
Mix according to the quantity needed one part sour cream, three parts cream cheese. I don’t have a set guide,but mix smaller portions until I have enough for how many water biscuits I’m serving. Crush the capers, add to mix, and then add a dab of dill and lemon juice. Mix thorough and adjust level of capers, dill, and lemon based on taste. Once done lay out water biscuits, and place a square of salmon on each water biscuit. Then using two teaspoons, place a small ball of the cream sauce (which should hold its form if you use cream cheese) on the salmon, and on top of that a single caper. I like to use baby capers to soften the flavour and stop the capers overpowering the other flavours. This one can wait to be served but don’t leave it out for long, especially in hot weather. Don’t refrigerate either, it makes the water crackers soggy.
Cheeky Potato, Chorizo, and Cheddar
Ingredients; chorizo, whole potatoes, a hard (smoked)cheddar
Peel potatoes and cut so they are more than paper thin but not much more, a few millimeters at most. Any thicker and they wont bake in time. Lay these on a nonstick, olive oil sprayed pan. Then a slice of the same thinness of chorizo and then one of the cheddar. You can place another smaller piece of potato on top of th cheese. Bake for roughly 20mins/until the potato is crisp/cooked, at 160-180 degrees (Celsius). Service straight away.
Panfried Prawns
Ingredients; lime, chilli, garlic, olive oil, and prawns.
This one is very simple; top and tail your prawns (cut off the head and tail, and remove the shell), and add the marinade to the prawns. I don’t like leaving them too long, about 30mins, and then simply pan fry them in a bit of butter, not longer than ten minutes. Serve immediately.
The advantage of all these recipes is a very simple one; I like fancy food and hate cooking. I’m not lazy, (I totally am), I just like my kitchen very tidy and get annoyed at recipes that call for you to dig into every corner of your cupboard to extract the strangest of devices that create an abundance of mess for very little savory results. These recipes aren’t just about how to create something delicious in minutes, there is also minimal time spent in the actual creation of a fancy entrée, and you can make it quickly for a bit of fancy TLC as needed.
E. J. Dawson
Genre: Gothic Suspense
Publisher: Literary Wanderlust
Date of Publication: 1st October 2021
ISBN: 9781942856931
ASIN: B0981C89JL
Number of pages: 252
Word Count: 86k
Cover Artist: Violeta Nedkova
Tagline: To catch a killer or save her sanity
Book Description:
Can she keep the secrets of her past to rescue a girl tormented by a ghost?
In 1920s Los Angeles, Letitia Hawking reads the veil between life and death. A scrying bowl allows her to experience the final moments of the deceased. She brings closure to grief-stricken war widows and mourning families.
For Letitia, it is a penance. She knows no such peace.
For Alasdair Driscoll, it may be the only way to save his niece, Finola, from her growing night terrors. But when Letitia sees a shadowy figure attached to the household, it rouses old fears of her unspeakable past in England.
When a man comes to her about his missing daughter, the third girl to go missing in as many months, Letitia can’t help him when she can’t see who’s taken them.
As a darkness haunts Letitia’s vision, she may not be given a choice in helping the determined Mr Driscoll, or stop herself falling in love with him. But to do so risks a part of herself she locked away, and to release it may cost Letitia her sanity and her heart.
Excerpt One:
“My apologies,” Letitia said, hopeful she could put him off with an
excuse, “I’ll need a preliminary appointment and then a secondary one for the
actual session, and I’m unavailable for another three weeks―”
“I can’t wait that long,” he said, reaching into his suit pocket to
pluck out a brown envelope. “If you require a provisional report to better assess
the situation, you can come by my office in the morning, where I will have
legal paperwork for matters of confidentiality. I believe most of your
consultations are in the afternoon, so it should not interfere with your
appointment book.”
Letitia snapped the ledger shut. “I have other errands I must attend to
tomorrow.”
“I wasn’t asking you, Ms. Hawking.”
She had guessed he’d spoken to one of her patrons, which would explain
his presence on her doorstep, but now she was certain. Only during private
consultations did she give her name, and only to those who treated what she
gave them with due dignity. Each client had to meet her conditions, and each
made a substantial payment for her service. It varied on the time passed and
the trauma of death, but each one carried a price—for them and for her. Letitia
always finished her sessions by asking patrons for their discretion and giving
out a card with a telephone number and times to call. She was happy for a
client to refer her to others, but rather than call he was here in person,
making demands. He was not the kind of clientele she sought, especially one
connected to a patron who had broken her request for privacy.
“I don’t appreciate your tone of voice,” she retorted, “or opening my
door without invitation like a common thief, never mind you haven’t even
bothered to introduce yourself.”
“I believe I’ve already apologized for my error,” he said, and Letitia
would have responded in kind, but he was instructing her again. “And under the
circumstances of your profession, I’m being more than reasonable in my request
as well as reimbursement for your time.”
He attempted to hand her the envelope, and when she didn’t accept, he
dropped it where she still held the ledger. It brushed her bare fingers, and a
shadow grew behind the stranger.
The captivating dark absorbing her being, Letitia fumbled for the
mental defenses against a true apparition, stunned as she was by its vivid
form.
A cloud of darkness without face or features hovered over the man’s
shoulder, but deep inside it she sensed it staring at her. Broad arms that
could have grasped her in its embrace lay still by its side. Letitia couldn’t
draw breath to scream at the darkness within the figure, the soul-sucking
despair rendering her voiceless at the shadow’s presence.
About the Author:
Beginning a writing journey with an epic 21 book series, Ejay started her
author career in 2014 and has taken on the ups and downs of self-publishing
with her fantasy series The Last Prophecy since 2016. At the start of 2019, she
put the series on the backburner to write Behind the Veil in 25 days, and
signed a publishing contract for the gothic noir novel to independent publisher
Literary Wanderlust. Behind the Veil is set for release on the October 1st
2021. She resumed self-publishing a scifi series, Queen of Spades released
across 2020 and 2021, as well as signing another contract with Literary
Wanderlust for NA fantasy, Echo of the Evercry. Believing in more than one path
to a career in publishing, Ejay pursues self-publishing alongside querying
traditional publishers with multiple manuscripts.
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