Table of Contents: From Breakfast With Anita Diamant to Dessert With James Patterson - a Generous Helping of Recipes, Writings and Insights From Today's Bestselling Authors (10 page)

Hence, hot mulled cider. I imagine it simmering in a pot on the stove in the kitchen at the end of the book. The smell fills the room. The Snow family has come a long way by now and is actually seeing the cloud's silver lining, but this ultimate comfort food will ensure an ongoing sense of hope. Enjoy!

1 To make the spice bag:
Place cinnamon sticks, allspice, and cloves in a piece of cheesecloth and tie tightly. Set aside.

2 To make the cider:
In a large saucepan combine apple cider, brown sugar, and nutmeg. Add spice bag. Bring to boil over medium-high heat. Reduce heat, cover, and simmer for 10 minutes. Remove spice bag and discard.

3
Serve cider in large mugs with a clove-studded orange slice in each.

Makes 20 sticky buns; 2 pull-apart loaves

I'm a lousy cook. Well, maybe lousy is too strong a word. I am a competent cook who can perform in the kitchen when necessary. But I have no history of cooking. There have been no recipes passed down through the generations, not even a favorite recipe from my childhood. There is definitely a void in my personal history when it comes to food. That's probably why my books so often include kitchen goodies. It's compensation, sweet and simple, for what I don't have in real life.

In the case of
The Secret Between Us
, the kitchen goodies are produced in a bakery. Here's another thing about my books: they often include little pockets of sanity to which my characters and I go when we need grounding. In
The Secret Between Us
, that little pocket of sanity is Sugar-On-Main, the bakery owned by the sister of the main character.

The parking outside is easy, the tables inside perfect for reading the paper or talking with a friend. And the smells? Warm, buttery, and sweet. To die for.

How to write about a bakery when I don't bake myself? Easy. All I had to do was to create a place that serves my favorite goodies. SoMa Stickies are definitely that.

SoMa stands for Sugar-On-Main, and Stickies are pecan rolls, a.k.a. sticky buns with pecans on top. I have always loved pecan rolls. Yeah, some are dry and not very sticky. But when I find a good one, I indulge. This is precisely what I do each time my husband and I vacation at the Ventana Inn in Big Sur, California. Breakfast there is strictly Continental style, but absolutely wonderful. At one end of a long table are fresh berries, hard boiled eggs, and yogurt. At the other end, along with juices, coffees, and teas, are breads, English muffins, and … sticky buns.

We regularly return to Ventana for the hiking, the fresh air and incredible flower smells, and, yes, the sticky buns. I have one for breakfast each morning I'm there. They aren't huge, but they're worth the trip!

1 To make the dough:
In a large bowl or the bowl of an electric stand mixer, combine 1½ cups of flour, the granulated sugar, salt, and yeast.

2
In a medium saucepan over low heat, combine the milk, water, and butter and heat to lukewarm (110°F.) Gradually beat the milk mixture into the flour mixture. Beat in the eggs, and then gradually stir in remaining 2½ cups of flour to make a soft dough that holds its shape.

3
Knead dough by hand or with a dough hook, adding additional flour as necessary. If using your hands, knead until dough is smooth and elastic, about 10 minutes. If using a dough hook, knead until dough is not sticky and pulls cleanly from the bowl sides, or 6–7 minutes.

4
Grease a large bowl with butter. Form the dough into a ball. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm place until doubled in size, 1½–1¾ hours.

5
Turn out the dough onto a lightly floured work surface. Cut dough in half. Using a rolling 51 pin roll out each half into an 8″ × 15″ rectangle.

6 To make the filling:
Spread the rectangles with the butter, dividing it equally. In a bowl, mix brown sugar, cinnamon, and raisins, and sprinkle mixture over the dough. Starting with the long side facing you, roll each dough rectangle tightly. Pinch the seams to seal. Cut each roll crosswise into 10 equal slices.

7 To make the topping:
Grease one 9-inch round and one 8-inch square cake pan. Stir butter and brown sugar together. Add the pecans and sprinkle mixture over pan bottoms. Place 9 dough slices, cut-side down and almost touching, in the square pan. Place 11 dough slices in the round pan. Cover with a kitchen towel and let rise until doubled in size, 60–75 minutes.

8
Preheat oven to 350°F. Uncover the loaves, place in oven and bake until golden brown, about 30–35 minutes. Invert the pans onto wire racks set over aluminum foil. Remove the pans and serve.

Mark Ostow

SELECTED WOEKS

Day After Night
(2009)

The Last Days of Dogtown
(2005)

Pitching My Tent: On Marriage, Motherhood, Friendship and Other Leaps of Faith
(2003)

Good Harbor
(2001)

The Red Tent
(1997)

Dancing to Write
One of the things that moves me to sit down at my computer and create is modern dance, which inspires me in powerful and joyful ways. I love being introduced to the insights of movement, rhythm, music, and sound as the imagination becomes physical. I treasure the adrenaline rush and the challenge to think anew. It reminds me of the honor it is to be a member of the species that dances.

Readers Should Know
I depend upon my writing group a lot. I cofounded a group when I started writing fiction in the mid 1990s. I had not felt the need to be a part of a group as a journalist and nonfiction writer, but the isolation of working without colleagues or a waiting editor made me long for feedback and support. The group has changed over the years and now numbers three dear friends who are trusted editors and necessary cheerleaders.

Readers Frequently Ask
“Where do you get your ideas for novels?”
I can't give a generic answer because it's different every time.
The Red Tent
grew out of many sources, including
midrash
, an ancient and imaginative form of Jewish biblical interpretation, and Virginia Woolf's
A Room of One's Own. Good Harbor
was a response to the fact that so many friends were undergoing breast cancer treatment, and my love for Cape Ann (Gloucester and Rockport, Massachusetts). That was also the setting for
The Last Days of Dogtown
, which was inspired by a local pamphlet about the history of the place. The seed for
Day After Night
was planted in 2001 while visiting Atlit, the “living history” museum where Holocaust survivors were interned by the British in Palestine.

Influences on My Writing
A Room of One's Own
by Virginia Woolf. I first read it as an undergraduate and I am still inspired by Woolf's clear-eyed message that women's stories need to be told, and also by her style, conviction, and wit. M.F.K. Fisher, author of many books about food and travel, is a master of clear, clean writing and I am always refreshed by her prose. And speaking of refreshment, I find it in poetry (i.e., Mary Oliver, Yehuda Amichai, Billy Collins, Pablo Neruda) that invites me to slow down and savor the weight and texture of words.

Make 8 generous servings

There is nothing like a dessert to call up a baker, a kitchen table, and the sweetness of childhood. (Proust knew what he was doing with that madeleine.) For the young Holocaust survivors in
Day After Night
, memories of food are a visceral connection to everything they lost. And yet, biting into a delicious piece of cake among friends is also an affirmation of the senses, of community, of life.

Kuchen, or coffee cake, was popular among German bakers, Jews and Gentiles alike, from the nineteenth century on. There are dozens of varieties, from yeast-based doughs topped with fruit or cheese to quick breads and cakes. Although this version employs yeast, no rising time is required, and the result is a sweet, sticky cake full of the apples and almonds that delight Shayndel at the Rosh Hashanah feast described in
Day After Night
.

Note:
This is equally good with peaches, pears, blueberries, or a combination of fruits. If you use apples or pears, they should be peeled, quartered, cored, and cut into wedges about ½-inch thick at the curved edge. If you use peaches, they should be peeled and halved, with the pits removed, and then sliced into wedges about ½-inch thick at the curved edge.

1
Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter a 9″ × 13″ × 2″ cake pan and place it in the freezer (it is easier to press out a thin layer of dough if the pan is frozen.)

2
To make the topping: Place the almonds in a shallow pan in the oven and bake for about 5 minutes, until hot but not colored. Set aside to cool.

3
In an electric mixer's small bowl, beat the butter until soft. Add the brown sugar and cinnamon and combine, then add the flour and beat only until the mixture is crumbly. Stir in the cooled almonds. Set topping aside.

4
To make the cake: Place the warm water in a small bowl, and add 1 teaspoon of sugar (set aside the remaining ½ cup sugar) and the yeast. Stir briefly with a knife just to mix. Set aside.

5
Sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt and set aside.

6
In an electric mixer's large bowl, beat the butter until soft. Add the remaining ½ cup of sugar and combine. Add the yeast mixture, eggs, the vanilla and almond extracts, and the lemon peel, and combine. (It is fine if the mixture looks curdled now.) On low speed, mix in half of the sifted dry ingredients, then the milk, and finally the remaining dry ingredients. Beat until well mixed.

7
Spread half of the mixture (about 1¼ cups) into a very thin layer over the bottom of the buttered, frozen pan (a frosting spreader works well.)

8
Place the prepared apples in rows, each slice just barely touching the one before it. Or, if you wish, the amount of fruit can be increased slightly and the slices can just barely overlap. Sprinkle raisins over the fruit, if desired.

9
Using two teaspoons — one for picking up with and one for pushing off with — place small spoonfuls of the remaining cake mixture over the fruit and the bottom layer. Try to cover as much surface as possible, although it's okay if some fruit shows through. Then, with your fingers, carefully sprinkle the prepared topping to cover as much of the cake as possible.

10
Bake for 35–40 minutes until the top is nicely browned.

11
Prepare icing just a few minutes before cake comes out of oven to prevent icing from stiffening. To make the icing, combine the confectioners' sugar, lemon juice, and water in a small bowl. Use a rubber spatula to mix until icing is smooth and thick.

12
As soon as the cake is removed from the oven, use the spatula to drizzle thin lines of the icing every which way over the cake.

13
Serve warm. Cut into large squares and use a wide metal spatula to transfer the portions.

Makes 3–4 servings

Chopped vegetables for breakfast? This takes the European characters in Day After Night by surprise. A staple on breakfast buffet tables in modern Israel, these vegetables offer a bright wake-up call to the palate — though the dish remains a bit of a culinary shock for many tourists to this day.