Happy Pi Day 2014

Happy Pi Day 2014!  

I will make a pie later today, a Beef and Stout Pie* to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day/Weekend. Will you bake a pie? How about eat a slice?

Here’s the photo story of the Grape and Peanut Butter Pie which I dedicate to Rhapsody Jill since she is the ultimate inspiration. She is always sending me pie recipes and I had told her months ago that I wanted to try an idea I had about creating my own Peanut Butter & Jelly concoction in pie form.

My idea was to bake the bottom layer as a traditional double-crust grape pie. I halved the amounts so that I would have room  to add more layers. I have made and loved this Grape Pie many times (click on the photo below of the sliced-in-half grapes in the crust and it will take you to the recipe), though for some reason, this time the red grapes didn’t turn as purple as they did the last time I made this recipe. Maybe a different variety…

Then I borrowed the peanut butter layer from another recipe, mixing PB with cream cheese and a few other things (milk, more sugar) and spreading it as you see here:  and then topping all this with a real whipped cream. Adding some delicately sliced grapes for garnish.

But the best news yet is this!  Beth Howard’s soon-to-be available book of pie HOW-TOs and recipes and good no-fuss advice arrived on my doorstep last night. I can’t wait to dig in and try her crust technique and abide by her “there-are-no-rules!”** tips and tricks. I loved her memoir, Making Piece, which you can read about by clicking this sentence. Clicking on this photo of her new book will take you to goodreads.com where you can access options for getting your own copy.

Celebrate Pi Day with PIE!  and tell me all about it. I hope it is pie-riffic.

Oh, I just started reading Labor Day because I know about the pie scene…

H

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* Beef and Stout Pie from Never Enough Thyme when Lana’s Cooking blog.

** The only real rule is to try not over work the dough.

*HIdeinWhitetoSkipLine

Copyright © 2007-2014. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Slaughterhouse-Five

Thoughts  Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, RosettaBooks 2010 (orig 1969), 285 pages

For the What’s in a Name 7 Challenge.
Number in Letters category
First book of six.

A reread. First experienced in the early 80s.

FIRST Sentence:  “This all happened, more or less.”

What’s it ABOUT: This is a book about one guy’s experience in World War II, specifically about being an American POW, witnessing the bombing of Dresden, living a normal life after the war and time travel. Tell me again, what is a normal life?

“And so it goes.”

What’s GOOD: Vonnegut’s “la di da” tone of ambivalence towards everything, tragic and not, and yet still being able to call attention to the true horrors of war. He states things that happen with little added emotional emphasis. He is sympathetic but not sentimental.

It is comic in many many places. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this non-linear, meta-fictional, historically educational (accuracy is debatable), crazy story full of fascinating characters. This book is listed 18th on the 100 best English-language books of the 20th century (Modern Library, 1998).  It has been often criticized and banned from schools and people have gone so far as to claim the time-travel elements ‘don’t work’. (See the Wikipedia page, Criticism section.) Whatever – how do they know if time travel works?! I enjoyed it very much. I love time travel books.

RATING:  Five slices of pie. Grape and Peanut Butter Pie. 

I adored and devoured all of Vonnegut’s book when in High School. I don’t remember why so I wanted to revisit a few. I *think*, maybe?, that Cat’s Cradle was my favorite. I wish I had kept a book blog then. I can’t even find much mention of the books I read in any of my journals.

Are you a Vonnegut fan? Have you seen the movie of this book?

Copyright © 2007-2014. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club. It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

What’s In a Name Challenge UPDATE

Hello! I just found out that my favorite challenge has added an additional category!

The What’s In a Name Challenge for 2014 now has a BONUS category of reading a book with a title that has something to do with SCHOOL.

I have quite a few nonfiction choices in my tbr. The one fiction I have wanted to read is The School of Essential Ingredients by Erica Bauermeister. Have you read this? I also have a book poetry, God Went to Beauty School by Cynthia Rylant. How about this one?

I found out this news when I was double-checking on the number category. Sure enough, I can count Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five for this challenge. The number is spelled out in letters and not as ’5′, so it works. Expect my thoughts on this reread soon.
Have you read this one?

Copyright © 2007-2014. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club. It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

The Garden Party and Other Stories

Thoughts  The Garden Party and Other Stories by Katherine Mansfield, Kindle Edition 2012 (Orig 1922), 192 pages

A lovely LOVELY collection! Though it has been well over a month since I read this, I can still recall the wit and deep meaning wrapped up into interesting little stories. I can see why Virginia Woolf would admire her writing; they were in the same ‘set’ of modernist writers so says Wikipedia. I must finally get to my bio of Woolf so I can find out more. I really didn’t know anything about Katherine Mansfield before researching books for the Classics Challenge and seeing this on the list of Books To Read Before I Die.

 She died young; age 34 in 1923.

The Garden Party was my favorite of the stories – masterful! A wealthy family plans a picnic when a poor neighbor suffers a tragedy. The debate begins of whether or not it is proper to continue with the party. Well, of course it is. Right? No answers, just interesting thoughts and contrasts on sensitivity of youth and propriety. Complex and insightful; very easy to read.

Recommended.  FREE eBooks available.

Read for the Classics Challenge – Woman Author Category.

“Laurie put his arm round her shoulder. “Don’t cry,” he said in his warm, loving voice. “Was it awful?”

“No,” sobbed Laura. “It was simply marvellous. But Laurie—” She stopped, she looked at her brother. “Isn’t life,” she stammered, “isn’t life— ” But what life was she couldn’t explain. No matter. He quite understood.

“Isn’t it, darling?” said Laurie.

HIdeinWhitetoSkipLine

Copyright © 2007-2014. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

They Called Her Styrene

Thoughts by Ed Ruscha, Phaidon Press 2000, 608 pages

This book was in our suite at the Cosmopolitan Hotel Las Vegas. The place had another coffee table book called 30,000 Years of Art. I wish I could have had more time there to read that one, too. Nice place; I recommend it.

So, what Mr. Ruscha does and is known for, is taking a word or phrase and making it art. I photo’d a few that caught my eye.

I don’t think I realized it, but I seem to have chosen words with a science-y theme.

IDLE  and THE QUESTION – not sure why this amused me. Maybe because I was on vacation.

I was really hoping to run into a page that said PIE. Had to settle for this:

You can imagine this didn’t take me long to read. AND since it was Vegas, I had an incredible view of the Bellagio fountains and the Eiffel Tower, and the book was ART – thus, how cultured am I? — had to give this the coveted FIVE SLICER. Five beautiful slices of Banana Cream Pie. Because… well, because pudding.

The view: (ignore the rooftops and parking lots! I never seemed to have my camera when the fountains were playing.)

“Sometimes found words are the most pure because they have nothing to do with you. I take things as I find them.  A lot of these things come from the noise of everyday life.”   – Ed Ruscha

MORE INFORMATION ABOUT ED RUSCHA provided by this link to Wikipedia.

HIdeinWhitetoSkipLine

Copyright © 2007-2014. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Green Grass of March

I’m back. I’m suffering from a wee spot of jet lag. I didn’t think I would succumb to its insidiousness but I feel so vaguely distractedly slow. Like I’m tired or something. So weird.

Green grass wins. This is actually a shot from the marshlands of Race Point near Provincetown, Cape Cod, Massachusetts. I think it was in July. My brother and his wife were visiting and I was not getting along with my brother. At all. That is what I was thinking and what this photo reminds me of. He was so dang annoying, as brothers can be. We usually get along.

Thanks everyone for voting! Will be back to post a book review eventually, I hope. I also want to share all the connections I’ve encountered in my reading. Like (TEASER?!) the area of England that Georgette Heyer has set Venetia is near York and Thirsk. This is similar to the setting of The Radleys by Matt Haig.

Happy March! Pi Day is the 14th…

Unplugged Notice

This blog has been temporarily suspended. Normal activity will resume at a later currently undecided time. While waiting for the following reviews to be written-posted, please vote for which header photo you might like to see for March. Assuming, of course, said blogger emerges from vacation/school/other categories of time-sucks that take her away from all of you lovelies…

Note: LetterMO still underway and in process every day mail posts in February.

Reviews requiring posting in that uncertain future:

The Garden Party by Katherine Mansfield – Classics Challenge

Movie(s) Reviews of Brideshead Revisited - Classics Challenge

Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut (reread)

Kate Winslet narrated audiobook: Therese Raquin by Emile Zola  - Classics Challenge

 

(It is highly likely that other books will be read before Care comes back to here. Possibly The Radleys, a Sherlock Holmes, Venetia (a Georgette Heyer!), Three Men in a Boat – all eBooks. Print books in contention: My Antonia and Sister Carrie, smallish paperbacks (with extremely tiny print!)

OK, now for the photos:

 Esther & Oscar

 Boat Art…

 Tulips – Get ready for Spring!

 Windy Green Grasses

Just leave a comment; not really motivated to create a poll… You may also ask my any questions about my reading, or say whatever. It’s a free for all. I’m leaning towards this last photo. I always think of March as GREEN, don’t you?  February is pink, April is white or candy striped with pastels. May is royal blue; June is orange, a bright shiny cheery happy orange.

Bye! Later!!

HIdeinWhitetoSkipLine

Copyright © 2007-2014. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Brain

Thoughts  Brain: The Man Who Wrote the Book That Changed the World by Dermot Davis, Expression Unleashed Publishing 2013, 217 pages

Winner of the USA Best Book Award 2013 for Humor.

Recommended by the wonderful blogger at BookFoolery.  Thanks Nancy!

“A delightful, humorous satire that pokes fun at the world of publishing via a flawed character who, in becoming a success for all the wrong reasons, emerges a better person. “

Did this book have any reference to pie?  No, sadly, I do not recall any mention of pie.

Did this book have adventure? Oh yes, or no. Certainly some mind-altering experiences (and I don’t mean drugs.)

Did this book feature books?  and libraries? YES. Who doesn’t love a book about books?

Would this book be about literary ambition? Madcap hilarities?  Satire upon satire?  Yes, yes, yes.

Do you want me to tell you what it’s about or are you comfortable with my vague ramblings?  How about a quick and dirty plot-scape?

Daniel desires to be an author. Of course, he wants to be an adored writer who writes great works and is adored for such. Unfortunately, his plan to be an adored author didn’t work out like he had hoped but starvation and desparation spurs on some motivation. He somehow writes a best-selling self-help book (not his intent) but WHO CARES! It’s selling like hotcakes! Who cares if the adoring fans are a little looney-tunes. Not his problem, right?

Let me tell you this:  The guilt that Daniel suffers is absolutely NOTHING compared to the guilt experienced by our lovers in Zola’s Therese Raquin  Just sayin’. That book is cray-cray in an entirely different way. Actually, opposite in many ways.

Read Nancy’s thoughts on Brain (link above, purple font.) And if you like fun books and feel-good story-telling and insights into the industry of publishing for fickle masses, this book is for you.

Rounding up to four slices of pie! 

HIdeinWhitetoSkipLine

Copyright © 2007-2014. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Me Before You

Thoughts  Me Before You by JoJo Moyes, 2012, 369 pages

File this one under Books that Made Me Cry.

For my book club, The BOOKIES.

Oh, just go read Jill’s review because I just read it and have been sitting here for too many minutes now and still can’t think of anything to say.

Four and half slices of pie.

Anybody want to plan a book blogger retreat here?

 

Trou d’Eau Douce Bay Mauritius

Trou d’Eau Douce Bay MauritiusWHIWheinWhitetoSkipLine

Copyright © 2007-2014. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club.  It should not be reproduced without express written permission.

Like Water for Chocolate

Thoughts  Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel, Anchor Books 1995 (orig 1989), 246 pages.

FIRST sentence: “Take care to chop the onion fine.”

THREE words:  Passionate, fierce, independent.

What’s it ABOUT: A young girl grows up in a kitchen, falls in love, fights her fate, and cooks up magical treats.

I have two reasons for wanting to read this book:  it has recipes and I wanted to know what the title meant.

OK, I do seem to enjoy the foodie books even though I don’t seek them out. I should. I see a pattern. Give in to it already. I love that each chapter of this story revolved or involved a recipe of some sort. I may  not actually try cooking any but I did enjoy reading through the ingredients and the process.

What was most enjoyable was the results described when eating Tita’s concoctions!  I did mention magic, did I not? Wonderful magic, unquestioned, just accepted, not fancy but so revealing. This was such a fun little book!

The book cover calls it a romance but do not let that throw you off. Tita is very much a strong girl who accepts hardwork but fights for what she believes it. When circumstances and family decide things that are not to her liking, she accepts but never ever bends. Yes, there is love and passion and passionate reactions. Love of all forms is explored.

Tita’s sister is also a delight. Well, ONE of her sisters, anyway.

I think this an excellent choice for a book club.

I am also very glad that I can show off that I have read another book off my physical book hoarding shelf. CHECK. It’s a book that is on the 1001+ Books to Read Before I Die. YAY! It’s a book that was translated – from Spanish. I’m doing good for exploring more of my planet. It’s a book that has been made into a movie! I can’t wait to see how it translates to film.

Have you read this? Have you seen the movie? Do you have any other FOODie books to recommend?

RATING:   FOUR slices of chocolate cream pie with loads of whipped cream and a few strawberries and maybe rose petals.
HIdeinWhitetoSkipLine

Copyright © 2007-2014. Care’s Online Book Club. All rights reserved. This post was originally posted by Care from Care’s Online Book Club. It should not be reproduced without express written permission.