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The Hungry Bookworm

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lunch

Anxious People + Pizza Capricciosa

December 1, 2020 by Megan 4 Comments

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As I have said time and time again, I really love Fredrik Backman’s storytelling. In the case of Anxious People, his latest novel, not that much happens but you get so caught up in the story that you fall in love with it anyway. Anxious People takes place during a hostage situation in Sweden, and though we have a few flashbacks and several interrogation scenes at the police station afterward, the majority of it takes place in a single apartment. 

Anxious People by Fredrik Backman

It is not dissimilar to Bel Canto, which also takes place during a hostage situation (this one in a large mansion in South America) and which I also loved. The key here is that Backman really builds the characters — and they’re mesmerizing. With some, you meet them thinking one thing and leave them realizing you were completely wrong; with others, your initial judgements were apt from the start.

[Read more...] about Anxious People + Pizza Capricciosa

Filed Under: book review, recipe Tagged With: baking, contemporary, dinner, favorites, fiction, lunch

Mexican Gothic + Asada Mushroom Tacos

October 27, 2020 by Megan 1 Comment

I don’t like scary movies, but somehow, I still get a thrill out of watching them… sometimes, usually with a viewing partner and often in the daylight. I need the boundaries of someone else’s imagination to keep mine in check. So, it may go without saying that I don’t typically like scary books. My mind runs wild! But, it is spooky season, and if you’re going to give a creepy book a try, why not now? 

Mexican Gothic is a hot novel right now. Not just because it’s October, but that certainly doesn’t hurt. I’ve heard about it everywhere lately. One of my friends picked it as our current book club read, so I had no choice but to see what the fuss was all about. (Side note: we meet on Thursday and I can’t wait to see what they all thought!)

Mexican Gothic by Sylvia Moreno-Garcia

Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s novel begins slowly, in classic gothic fashion. In 1950s Mexico, Noemí receives a frantic letter from her cousin, who recently married a man who lives in a mysterious house in the countryside. Noemí has no choice but to head to High Place to see her cousin. High Place is isolated and full of secrets and odd family members, which is really the perfect setting for a book I shouldn’t have been reading just before bed.

Noemí does have some hope in the youngest brother, who she comes across picking mushrooms which leads to a sort of bond. He proves himself to be willing to help her help her cousin, at least some of the time. I don’t want to give too much away so I’ll end here, but if you’re looking for something eerie and old-fashioned, this would be a great pick. This book is such a mood. Sort of Jane Eyre-esque in its setting. 

Since I don’t read really these types of books I’m not exactly sure how to rate it as I have very little to compare it to, and honestly I was so creeped out most of the time, I’m not even sure if I was seeing clearly, so to speak.     

The mushrooms I mentioned earlier actually pop up constantly in the novel because they grow on the High Place's property. Mushroom tacos seemed like a great pairing. In looking for a recipe, I learned from Epicurious that the earliest Mexican cuisine was, in fact, vegetable-based. I didn’t ultimately choose their recipe, but it sounds delicious and seems like it would definitely be worth a taste! I found a recipe from Half-Baked Harvest that looked amazing for Asada Mushroom Tacos and made those.

Unfortunately, my grocery store was all out of portobello mushrooms the day I was cooking, so I subbed in baby bellas instead. This totally worked fine, and if you can’t find mushroom caps and really want these, by all means, swap them in. But I really like think, if you have the larger portobello mushrooms available to you, that’s the way to go — primarily for texture, but also ease of cooking (especially if you’re wanting to grill them). 

Anyway, they’re super easy to make. First I made the marinade and got the mushrooms in there so they could soak up that flavor for at least an hour. 

Marinated Mushrooms

While those marinated, I made the pineapple salsa. (Not quite the same make-up but reminded me of my first post!) I used guacamole we already had on-hand, so I didn’t make that from scratch this time. 

Making Salsa

It was also colder the day I decided to cook these than I had anticipated, so I instead cooked the mushrooms on the stovetop. If you opt for this method, make sure to drain the pan a few times as you cook it so the mushrooms have a chance to develop some color. 

Sauteed Mushrooms for Tacos

I served these on corn tortillas that I warmed in a pan. 

Mushroom Tacos

We really enjoyed them, but like I said, I think the large portobello mushroom caps would’ve been even better. They were the perfect accompaniment to the novel for sure.

Mexican Gothic Book Club Tacos
Mushroom Tacos
Print Recipe

Asada Mushroom Tacos

Prep Time20 mins
Cook Time10 mins
Total Time30 mins
Course: Main Course
Cuisine: Mexican, Vegetarian
Keyword: vegetarian
Servings: 6 tacos

Ingredients

  • 6 portobello mushroom caps halved
  • 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
  • 1/3 cup orange juice
  • 4 cloves garlic minced or grated
  • 1 chipotle pepper in adobo chopped (or 2 teaspoons chili powder)
  • 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
  • juice of 2 limes
  • 1/2 cup fresh cilantro roughly chopped
  • corn or flour tortillas warmed
  • crumbled feta or cotija cheese for serving (optional)

SALTED LIME AVOCADO

  • 2 avocados mashed
  • juice and zest of 1 lime
  • Maldon sea salt

PINEAPPLE SALSA

  • 1/2 of a small pineapple cubed
  • 1 jalapeño seeded and chopped
  • juice of 1 lime
  • 1/4 cup fresh cilantro chopped

Instructions

  • Add the mushrooms to a ziplock bag. Next add the olive oil, orange juice, garlic, chipotle peppers, paprika, lime juice, cilantro, and a large pinch of salt. Seal the bag and marinate 10 minutes or in the fridge up to overnight.
  • Meanwhile, stir together the avocado, lime juice and zest, and a pinch of salt.
  • To make the salsa. In a bowl, combine the pineapple, jalapeño, lime juice, cilantro, and a pinch of salt.
  • Preheat your grill or grill pan to high. Remove the mushrooms from the marinade and sear for 5 minutes, flip and sear another 5 minutes or until lightly charred on both sides. Slice into strips.
  • Spread the avocado onto the warmed taco shells, and top with the mushrooms, salsa, and cheese. Enjoy!

Notes

From: Half-Baked Harvest

This post contains affiliate links. This does not increase the price you pay, but I may receive a small commission for any products you choose to buy. Purchases made through affiliate links help to cover my blogging costs. Thank you for helping to support The Hungry Bookworm! Full disclosure here.

Filed Under: book review, recipe Tagged With: book club, dinner, easy prep, lunch, suspense

Good Morning, Midnight + Kale Sausage Soup with Tomatoes and Chickpeas

October 20, 2018 by Megan Leave a Comment

Good Morning, Midnight is a low-key post-apocalyptic novel. Augie is an aging but brilliant astronomer who ends up stranded in the Arctic, choosing to stay when everyone else flees because of “war rumors.” He never hears from them again. In space, Sully is the communications specialist aboard the Aether, which is heading back from a mission to Jupiter. As they get closer to home, it becomes worrisome that they’re unable to re-establish communication with Earth.

Good Morning, Midnight by Lily Brooks-Dalton

I didn’t love this book as much as I expected to, but it certainly had gorgeous elements. Lily Brooks-Dalton’s writing was vivid and imaginative. I could picture Sully’s living quarters and appreciated the description of life in space. I could feel the cold as Augie explored the frozen world around him.

[Read more...] about Good Morning, Midnight + Kale Sausage Soup with Tomatoes and Chickpeas

Filed Under: book review, recipe Tagged With: dinner, easy prep, fiction, lunch, post-apocalyptic, soup

The Clockmaker's Daughter + Fish and Chips

September 30, 2018 by Megan 3 Comments

I have never read a Kate Morton novel, but I have heard amazing things -- and a lot of buzz about her latest novel, The Clockmaker’s Daughter. So, I was naturally quite excited when I was granted my NetGalley request to read it early. It’s the story of an English love affair and a mysterious murder that begins in the 1860s and ripples into the present.

The Clockmaker's Daughter by Kate Morton

It all starts when Elodie, a modern archivist, stumbles upon a satchel with a notebook and old photograph inside. Elodie diligently researches their past, whisking us across time as the story develops. Chapters are told from multiple points-of-view, and it’s not always immediately clear at the outset whose we’re seeing or where we are in time and place. It’s a method that works well, getting us to the end without giving all the twists and turns away beforehand.

[Read more...] about The Clockmaker's Daughter + Fish and Chips

Filed Under: book review, recipe Tagged With: deep fried, dinner, fiction, historical fiction, lunch

The Dream Daughter + Copycat Mexican Pizza

September 22, 2018 by Megan 1 Comment

The description for Diane Chamberlain’s “genre-spanning” novel The Dream Daughter promises it will be “irresistible.” In that, it was 100% correct.

The Dream Daughter by Diane Chamberlain

Twenty-six-year-old Caroline Sears is pregnant when she finds out her baby has a fatal heart defect. In 1970, there’s nothing that can be done, and the news is devastating. Carly’s brother-in-law Hunter is a physicist, who came into their lives quite mysteriously a few years before. When he tells her he has a way to help her baby, she’s skeptical.

The book description doesn’t give too much away, beyond the fact that, what Hunter is proposing is inconceivable. To save her baby, Carly needs to be courageous in the face of the unknown. I’ll expand just a little bit more to say that how Hunter saves Carly is by helping her time travel into the future, a time when medicine has caught up to her baby’s needs.

I won’t give anything else away, but if I had known this was book involved “realistic time travel” -- one of my absolute favorite sub-genres (think The Time Traveler’s Wife and the movie About Time) -- I would have rushed to pick it up even sooner. After a few chapters in, when I figured out what was going on, I was hooked. I couldn’t put it down, and I stayed up until 1am one night to finish it (if you know me, that’s a huge deal; I typically go to bed around 10).

Oh my gosh, I can’t say enough good things about this novel. It was unexpected and clever. It definitely played with my emotions a little bit, but I didn’t even care. I was all in, and I loved every minute of it!

When Carly goes forward from 1970, a lot of things are unfamiliar. The technology, yes, but also the food. In one of the most amusing scenes, Carly’s host brings home some Taco Bell for dinner. Not only has Carly never heard of Taco Bell, she doesn’t even know what Mexican food is. She specifically calls out the taco, burrito and enchirito, but also mentions that there were a few other items on the table that were “alien” to her.

I like to think one of those was the Mexican Pizza, my absolute favorite thing at Taco Bell. I’ve been eating them since I was a young kid, and I like to think of myself as a Mexican Pizza aficionado. Regardless of what they ate for dinner they night, they ate Taco Bell, and this is my excuse to make a copycat version of the best food on their menu.    

For those of you who don’t know, a Mexican Pizza is definitely a loose interpretation of the word pizza, but it’s delicious, and that’s what matters. It has meat and beans sandwiched between two crispy tortillas; the top tortilla is covered in red sauce, cheese and tomatoes. (There also used to be green onions, back when I was little, so I brought those back into this homemade version.)

I found a recipe from Genius Kitchen to use as a guide, though having eaten an embarrassing number of these throughout my life, I probably could’ve figured it out myself. I did tweak it a bit to be closer to the Taco Bell version. Good news: Like the book, it turned out even better than I imagined!

To start, I prepared my taco meat (ground beef with taco seasoning) and warmed my canned refried beans. I also combined a can of red enchilada sauce (I used medium, you can use whichever spice-level you like best) with a can of diced tomatoes with green chiles (drained) to make the pizza’s sauce.

Then, I prepared the tortillas. If you can find flat, roughly 8” corn tortillas, that would definitely make this experiences easier and quicker, but I couldn’t. I used the flour tortillas from the recipe. To get them crispy enough, you need to fry them in oil on the stove top -- just until they’re golden brown and stiff.

They don’t need much time, about a minute or so will do it. You might need to flip and repeat on the other side (I did). Once all of your tortillas are ready to go, it’s time to assemble the pizzas.

Fried Tortilla

First, I spread a thin layer of the refried beans onto a tortilla and covered them with some of the ground meat.

Bottom Layer of Mexican Pizza

Then, I added another tortilla on top of that and carefully spread on some of the sauce and covered it with cheese.

Mexican Pizza

Then, I added my toppings -- in this case, diced tomatoes and chopped green onions, but you could also add black olives (or anything else taco-y, I suppose). I wanted to keep it as close to what I’ve come to know-and-love at Taco Bell; plus, Scott doesn’t like olives.

Mexican Pizza with Toppings

Finally, I put the prepared pizzas under the broiler in the oven just to melt the cheese.

Mexican Pizza Taco Bell Copycat

They came out perfectly! If I’m being honest, even better than half the time I get them at Taco Bell (where the employees clearly don’t care if it looks as perfect as I’d like). It looked like something right off the menu.

I cut them in fours and served them up.

Mexican Pizza Cut

The best part? They tasted DELICIOUS. (And maybe even better than the Taco Bell version…)

Piece of Mexican Pizza

Mexican Pizza Taco Bell Copycat
Print Recipe

Taco Bell Copycat Mexican Pizzas

Prep Time15 mins
Cook Time15 mins
Total Time30 mins
Course: Main Course
Cuisine: Mexican
Servings: 4

Ingredients

  • 1 8 1/2 ounce package 8-inch flour tortillas
  • 1 10 ounce can enchilada sauce
  • 1 10 ounce can diced tomatoes with mild green chilies drained
  • 1 lb ground beef
  • 1 package taco seasoning
  • 1 15 ounce can refried beans
  • 1 8 ounce bag Mexican blend cheese
  • 2 stalks green onions chopped

Instructions

  • Prepare taco meat per package directions.
  • Warm refried beans.
  • In a small bowl, combine enchilada sauce with diced tomatoes and green chiles.
  • Prepare a small amount of oil in pan to 375°F (do not put so much that it will cover the flour tortillas). Cook flour tortillas in oil for 30-45 seconds or until just golden brown, flipping once. Drain on paper towels.
  • To assemble: top 4 tortillas with a thin layer of refried beans, followed by a layer of taco meat. Put another tortilla on top of the taco meat. Add red sauce on top of the tortilla, followed by the Mexican cheese blend and then top with diced tomatoes and green onions if desired.
  • Put finished Mexican pizzas on cookie sheet and broil in oven until cheese is melted.
  • Cut into fourths and serve.

Notes

Slightly adapted from: Genius Kitchen

I received a free digital copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This post contains affiliate links. This does not increase the price you pay, but I may receive a small commission for any products you choose to buy. Purchases made through affiliate links help to cover my blogging costs. Full disclosure here.

Filed Under: book review, of interest Tagged With: dinner, favorites, fiction, lunch, science fiction

The Book of Essie + Cuban Sandwiches

August 16, 2018 by Megan Leave a Comment

Meghan MacLean Weir’s debut novel The Book of Essie is about seventeen-year-old Esther Hicks, also known as Essie. Her father is an evangelical preacher and she grew up on a hit reality show, Six for Hicks. Not only do her parents have strict expectations for her, but her entire life is often under public scrutiny. When her mother finds out Essie is pregnant, an emergency meeting with the producers determines the best way to salvage the situation. 

The Book of Essie

While the producers and her mother plan out Essie’s life without her input, she is arranging a different future. She attaches herself to fellow student Roarke, and their to-good-to-be-true love story is sold to the media. Will Essie get the happy ending she desires, or will her parents and producers get their way?  

[Read more...] about The Book of Essie + Cuban Sandwiches

Filed Under: book review, recipe Tagged With: contemporary, dinner, fiction, lunch, meat, sandwich, slow cooker

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The Hungry Bookworm brings together literature and food. Megan has an insatiable appetite for both.

As C.S. Lewis said, “Eating and reading are two pleasures that combine admirably.” Enjoy!

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