Recipe by CarrieCourse: dinnerCuisine: AmericanDifficulty: easy
Servings
2
servings
Prep time
5
minutes
Cooking time
10
minutes
Calories
181
kcal
Stuff That Goes In It
1 tbsp oil
1 medium onion, diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
500 g (~ 17 1/2 oz) mushrooms, sliced or diced
1 tsp smoked paprika
70 ml (~ 1/4 cup) vegetable stock
2 tbsp sour cream
Salt and black pepper to taste
4 tbsp fresh parsley, chopped
How to Make It
Be excited that YOU are eating vegetarian. Meat costs so much, amirite? But also, nothing with lungs have died to make this meal. That we know of at least.
Find a big frying or saute pan and put the oil in it. Heat it on medium.
Find an onion. As you put that onion in the oil (still on medium heat) and cook it for about three minutes, wonder why vampires are anti-garlic and pro-onion . I mean, onion makes you cry. Garlic just makes you have funky breath.
Make sure the onion is a bit soft and then plop in that garlic and your happy little mushrooms. Feel badly for the garlic. It gets such a bad rap and mushrooms? People go into the woods looking for them and make entire Facebook groups about them–with pictures. Celebrating their existence.
Cook all that for five minutes and decide you need a garlic support group. It’s just so unfair.
Okay. Vow to start the Facebook group but in the meantime coat all that stuff in the pan with the paprika. It does look a bit vampy now, doesn’t it?
Pour in the stock. Plop in the sour cream. Mix it.
Make it simmer in a happy, gentle way. Cook until it’s as silky as Dracula’s bedsheets.
Wonder what’s wrong with you that you even thought that.
Put in all that salt, pepper, and parsley and give yourself some grace. We all have weird minds, right?
Notes
You can serve this on top of pasta or rice.
This recipe is adapted from Easy Cheesy Vegetarian, a lovely site with lovely recipes. They do not discriminate against our poor friend, Garlic.
Share this if you want and also because it would be super nice of you!
Recipe by CarrieCourse: AppetizersCuisine: AmericanDifficulty: Easy
Servings
8
servings
Prep time
15
minutes
Cooking time
20
minutes
Calories, but who is counting, really?
113
kcal
Total time
35
minutes
Stuff That Goes In It
THE OLIVES OF AWESOME ROASTED HAPPINESS
2 cups of different kinds of olives, pit those bad boys
⅓ cup of the olive oil that not just a virgin, but an extra virgin, wonder what the hell that means.
6 cloves garlic, smashed up (not on booze, this isn’t drunk garlic; it’s smooshed)
1 shallot, quartered
1 lemon, quartered
2 sprigs fresh thyme and 2 sprigs fresh oregano, hanging out together the way thyme and oregano do
Chili flakes to make it spicy
Feta that is all Honey Whipped
8 ounces of feta cheese
3 ounces of room-temperature cream cheese
3 tablespoons of honey
black pepper
How to Make It
This is the sexy part. Find your oven. Turn it on. Do whatever it takes to heat that baby up to 450° F. I
Feel accomplished. Now search through the tupperware for an OVEN SAFE baking dish.
Put your all those olive ingredients (including the olives and chili flakes to taste) together so they can party like it’s 1999 and Prince is coming over.
Bake for somewhere between 20 and 20 minutes in the oven. Do not use cannabis! YOU are not getting baked. The OLIVES are getting baked.
But on your best BDSM gear and whip the feta. How do you do this? Not with whips, actually! I know! I know! Bummer. Just put all the whipped feta ingredients into a food processor . Pretend you’re at a nightclub and pulse it. Pulse it again and again and again. Throw your hands in the air. And do it until that mix is all smooth and creamy.
Find a spoon. Use it to put the feta in a bowl. Now top it with the baked olive mixture. Feel sexy while you eat it because you are, damn it. No matter what that boy said at your sixth-grade dance at the Catholic Church in Bedford, New Hampshire, you are.
Notes
This amazingly sexy recipe is adapted (and made goofy) from the WONDERFUL recipe site that I adore with all my heart, Half Baked Harvest. You can see the real recipe there, but I mean, you can still cook with this one. But you should go give them some love. You won’t regret it.
Recipe by CarrieCourse: FruitCuisine: AmericanDifficulty: easy
Servings
4
servings
Prep time
20
minutes
Chilling time
1
hour
The fruit salad that might inspire you to finally write an erotic scene in your novel. But also somehow reminds you of your grandparents. Shudder. It’s good though!
Stuff That Goes In It
21 oz can peach pie filling
20 oz can pineapple chunks drained
15 oz can mandarin oranges drained
16 oz frozen or fresh strawberries halved or quartered
3 kiwi sliced
2 bananas sliced
Tiny bit of vanilla
Maybe an apple
Seedless grapes if you’re into it
Maybe ⅛ teaspoon of lemon juice if you’re using apples and not eating it right away (it helps keep the apples from oxidizing).
How to Make It
Realize that if you want to make any money in writing, you’re probably going to have to learn to write sexy scenes.
Realize that you’re pretty bad at writing sexy scenes.
The only way to deal with this is to make a naughty fruit salad.
Gather up the ingredients! Let’s go.
Chop the fruit up until it’s bitable pieces. People bite and nibble and stuff in sex scenes, don’t they?
Mix up all the fruit and vanilla and peach pie filling and lemon juice. If the peaches look too chonky, cut them up so they are easy to nibble on. Try to wield the knife seductively. Realize the only thing you can wield seductively is . . . is . . . is . . . insert your own favorite swear word here . . . nothing
Chill it like a cold shower for at least an hour. You can write the cold shower scene! That’s not naughty — or is it?
Think about your bank account. Realize you need a side hustle. Get depressed. Decide only food will help. Realize this is an unhealthy behavior pattern. Decide not to care.
Find a big bowl and put the sauerkraut and cheese in it. Stir it together and wonder if you can somehow make sauerkraut a side hustle.
Put dressing in there — just enough to coat stuff. You aren’t made of money. Thus, the need for a side hustle. Mix it up.
Wonder if other authors have side hustles.
Go get the bread and butter. Think about the phrase ‘earning your bread and butter.’ Decide it’s a stupid phrase as you butter the bread on ONLY ONE SIDE!
Maybe your side hustle could involve stupid phrases?
Go get the cheese/sauerkraut mix in the bowl and put it on the unbuttered side. Do it for only HALF the bread. Put a tomato on it (sliced). Put another piece of bread on top. IT IS A SANDWICH!
Maybe your side hustle could just be helping people spell sauerkraut. It’s not an easy word.
Find the oven. Find a skillet. Make it a large skillet. Find the thing on the oven that turns the temperature on the burner. Put it on medium high. Maybe you could help people find things? That seems like a possible option. People are always losing things–dogs, cats, phones, glasses, minds.
Cook/fry the sandwich on both sides so that it is happily toasted and the cheese is gooey/melted. Go start a website promoting your side hustle or something. You’ve got this!
Why oh why, did you have to read that blog by Mr. Mansplain I’m The Best Writer in the Universe guy? Did you want to ruin a perfectly good day? Yes. Yes, apparently you did.
Now turn the oven on 450-Fahrenheit.
Why did he think “kill your darlings” originated with him? Or “butt in chair?”
Seriously? The ego.
Spray the cooking sheet with cooking spray.
Take a deep, calming breath.
Do not go back to the website to see his smug face or read that just the term “mansplaining” mean we’re infantilizing women.
Instead, melt butter in a big ole skillet over medium-high.
Add garlic and onion.
Sauté for 4 minutes.
Add stock and broccoli. Bring to a boil; cook 3 minutes.
Do not think about the author who name drops other authors’ names every two minutes. Don’t tell them that you know all the authors they are talking about. Swoon about the workshop she took with Rita Williams Garcia. Nod nicely when she talks about her tweet volley with Salman Rushdie.
Find rice.
Heat rice following the directions on the packages.
Don’t think about the author in your workshop who won’t stop complaining about how harrowing writing is. “It’s ripping open a vein and bleeding on the page.”
Don’t think about all her sob-story tweets and how many fans she gets by complaining.
Don’t think about how she makes writing into a ‘mystical, mystical gift that drives me to penultamate heights and miserable lows, but I am compelled to fight through it and share my genius gift to the world.”
Do not give her the finger via a gif.
Instead . . .
Put the broccoli mix, panko, mustard, rice, pepper, salt, and 1/2 cup of the cheese into a big ole bowl.
Find the eggs. Put them in too and stir.
Make eight different (2 1/2-inch) patties.
Put the patties on the pan and spray them with cooking spray.
Bake at 450°F for 15 minutes.
Add the cheese on top.
Bake for 4 more minutes or stop when the cheese gets all melty.
Put green onions on it if you want.
Eat and worry that you’re a mansplaining, harrowing (woe is me) or name dropping author. Decide you aren’t and call it good. Refrain from going on the internet and looking at those authors’ accounts and getting annoyed.
Recipe by CarrieCourse: DinnerCuisine: vegetarianDifficulty: Medium
Servings
4
servings
Prep time
5
minutes
Cooking time
25
minutes
Total time
30
minutes
Stuff That Goes In It
2 cups finely chopped fresh mushrooms
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 cup dry bread crumbs
1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1/2 cup finely chopped onion
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 tablespoon canola oil
4 hamburger buns, split
Optional: Sliced tomatoes and mayonnaise and lettuce and raw onion and cool condiments like crispy chili
How to Make It
Stand up. Shake your fist at all those writing mentors who say, “To write you have to put your butt in the chair.”
Ha! Like it’s that easy?
Writing isn’t just about sitting!
It’s also about nourishment, nourishing the muse, and also your stomach, damn it.
Let’s make burgers! Where we don’t kill any animals.
Find a really large bowl. You can’t do that in front of your computer, can you? Well, you can, but you can’t put the first 9 ingredients into that bowl.
Combine all those ingredients. Think about how nice it is to be out of a chair.
The whole “butt in chair” thing comes from Mary Heaton Vorse who told author Sinclair Lewis, “The art of writing is the art of applying the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair.”
Feel a little angry at her even though she is dead and was probably cool and stuff. But you can stand and write, too. Or flop down. It isn’t all about the chair, Mary!
Take some calming breaths and shape the stuff in the bowl into four 3/4-in.-thick patties.
Google Mary. Realize she was a novelist and social activist. Feel guilty about thinking ill of her.
She also wrote creepy things.
Find a big and heavy skillet.
Use those writer wrist muscles to lift the skillet onto the burner.
Put oil in.
Turn the burner onto medium.
Wonder if you can earn money blogging on Medium.
Decide no.
Bet Mary made a lot of money.
Add burgers; cook about 3-4 minutes on each side; they should be a nice light brown color.
Put the burgers on buns and add the stuff you want to add.
Find Mary’s “Sinister Romance” story online. Read it.
Eat standing up and toast Mary. 🙂
Notes
This recipe is adapted from Taste of Home
Share this if you want and also because it would be super nice of you!
1. Here’s a hint: They are called devilled eggs for a reason. 2. And, no, it is not because of the little hint of jalepeno that gives them a kick. 3. It’s because you have to HARD BOIL the little suckers first, and there are all these rules about boiling them. Yes, rules about boiling an egg! WHY MUST THERE BE RULES ABOUT EVERYTHING!?!?! 4. Boiling an egg should be simple. 5. It isn’t. 6. It really isn’t simple if you get distracted by the fact that the 90-second rice pouch you put in the microwave just exploded. 7. But this is about eggs, not exploding rice pouches. 8. So, if you manage to boil the egg, you should then plunge the poor thing in cold, cold water.
And you must then PEEL THE EGG! 9. Eggs are not meant to be peeled. This is why they are eggs. Not bananas.
10. If you have happy, young fresh eggs they are harder to peel. The old buggers are better. 11. Be prepared to sacrifice many, many eggs in your egg-peeling quest for the perfect egg to devil. 11. Once, eggs are peeled, halved, and stuffed, do not be offended when people in house say, “Holy crud. It’s like the egg has acne pits or something.” 12. Do not be offended when people in the house say, “Um? Are you sure this is a devilled egg? Should it be all wobbly like this? And gooey? It’s kind of gooey.” 13. Do not be offended when people in the house say, “Next time, can we just buy the premade kind in the grocery store? You know, the kind that is full of chemicals?” 14. And do not have hurt feelings when they do not celebrate with you because you keep saying, “But look at the yolk. It isn’t green. That’s a big achievement, not to have green yolks.” 15. Do not throw eggs at them. 16. Breathe deeply and try to be one of those yoga-calm people who smell like lavender and sage incense and just say “Namaste” whenever they are pissed off. 17. Honestly, just accept that you are not a gifted deviled egg maker. We can not all be gifted in all things eggy. You are a good scrambler. Be happy with this.
WHERE TO FIND OUR PODCAST, DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE
Basically, it’s set up a bit like a distance MFA program, only it costs a lot less and also has a big element of writer support built in and personalized feedback from me! This program costs $125 a month and runs for four-month sessions!
So, sometimes you might have a new book coming out and you might freak out that nobody will read it and that is when you make this soup and try to breathe through your nose and cry. Not like I know this personally or anything. Not like I’ve been doing it all week.
[ultimate-recipe id=”4531″ template=”default”]
Man Verdict: This tastes like hope.
Carrie Verdict: Exactly
Dogs’ Verdict: Please spill some on the floor.
Big News!
I’m about to publish a super cool adult novel. Gasp! I know! Adult! That’s so …. grown-up?
Rosie Jones, small town reporter and single mom, is looking forward to her first quiet Maine winter with her young daughter, Lily. After a disastrous first marriage, she’s made a whole new life and new identities for her and her little girl. Rosie is more than ready for a winter of cookies, sledding, stories about planning board meetings, and trying not to fall in like with the local police sergeant, Seamus Kelley.
But after her car is tampered with and crashes into Sgt. Kelley’s cruiser during a blizzard, her quiet new world spirals out of control and back into the danger she thought she’d left behind. One of her new friends is murdered. She herself has been poisoned and she finds a list of anagrams on her dead friend’s floor.
As the killer strikes again, it’s obvious that the women of Bar Harbor aren’t safe. Despite the blizzard and her struggle to keep her new identity a secret, Rosie sets out to make sure no more women die. With the help of the handsome but injured Sgt. Kelley and the town’s firefighters, it’s up to Rosie to stop the murderer before he strikes again.
So, um, please go buy it. I am being brave, but that means that despite all my reasons for doing this, I’m still terrified that nobody will buy it and I really, really love this book. A lot.
DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE
This week’s podcast is up and excited to be there! Join 154,000 downloads and see how weird yet helpful we are.
Share this if you want and also because it would be super nice of you!
Dogs Verdict: People can also marry their dogs, you know.
My Verdict: I love all things. I love all things brownie. I will marry you all.
Gabby’s Thought for the Day
Humans,
You were given your dreams.
Make them true. You can do this.
Also, totally feel free to squint at your Thursdays. Thursdays can be like that. But don’t let Thursday stomp down you or your dream.
Gabby Dog
Big News!
I’m about to publish a super cool adult novel. Gasp! I know! Adult! That’s so …. grown-up?
Rosie Jones, small town reporter and single mom, is looking forward to her first quiet Maine winter with her young daughter, Lily. After a disastrous first marriage, she’s made a whole new life and new identities for her and her little girl. Rosie is more than ready for a winter of cookies, sledding, stories about planning board meetings, and trying not to fall in like with the local police sergeant, Seamus Kelley.
But after her car is tampered with and crashes into Sgt. Kelley’s cruiser during a blizzard, her quiet new world spirals out of control and back into the danger she thought she’d left behind. One of her new friends is murdered. She herself has been poisoned and she finds a list of anagrams on her dead friend’s floor.
As the killer strikes again, it’s obvious that the women of Bar Harbor aren’t safe. Despite the blizzard and her struggle to keep her new identity a secret, Rosie sets out to make sure no more women die. With the help of the handsome but injured Sgt. Kelley and the town’s firefighters, it’s up to Rosie to stop the murderer before he strikes again.
The Write. Submit. Support. format is designed to embrace all aspects of the literary life. This six-month course will offer structure and support not only to our writing lives but also to the roller coaster ride of submissions: whether that be submitting to agents or, if agented, weathering the submissions to editors. We will discuss passes that come in, submissions requests, feedback we aren’t sure about, where we are feeling directed to go in our writing lives, and more. Learn more here!
“Carrie’s feedback is specific, insightful and extremely helpful. She is truly invested in helping each of us move forward to make our manuscripts the best they can be.”
“Carrie just happens to be one of those rare cases of extreme talent and excellent coaching.”
It’s with Steve Wedel. It’s scary and one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019. There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed!
Order this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?
As you know, I’m trying desperately to make the family vegetarian and I am TOTALLY failing.
But here is my recipe for Halloween pizza. Halloween is a frantic night for us because we get about 800 – 1,000 trick-or-treaters. So, I tend to make things that are fast and easy like calzone snakes or mummy Stromboli, but this… this, my friends, is the ultimate in easy. It’s sort of embarrassingly easy. Stay tuned below for the story of my first-ever ghost sighting.
Ghostly Pizza
So, sometimes I cheat because on Halloween things get hectic here.
1 lb Frozen Pizza Doug (do not judge)
1 tbsp olive oil
.75 cup pizza sauce
.5 lb mozarella slices
some little capers (for the eyes)
Realize that you have no time to make food that isn’t candy.
Preheat oven to 475ºF.
Spray bottom of a 16-by-11-inch rimmed baking sheet with the stuff that makes things not stick. Or use olive oil, but olive oil is expensive, so maybe don’t. I mean olive oil is awesome, but we’re already using pre-made pizza dough here so pretension is gone, right?
Spray the darn sheet.
Celebrate by eating candy.
Stretch that dough evenly to cover bottom of sheet.
This is a lot like stretching your 20,000-word story into a 50,000-word novel. You might have to take a couple of rounds, and rest in between to get this stretched.
Do not give up.
Celebrate by eating candy.
Open the jar of sauce.
Cry because you have no wrist strength.
Celebrate when you finally open the jar. Celebrate by eating candy.
Spread that sauce over the dough. Try to make it even. Leave a border on all sides of the rectangle. Try to make that border a 1-inch border.
Celebrate with candy.
Set a timer. Put it in the oven.
Bake about 15 minutes.
Celebrate that. Celebrate that with candy.
Now, you get to have fun! Yay, fun! Remember fun?
Scrounge up a ghost-shaped cookie cutter and cut ghosts out of cheese.
That is so cool.
Put the ghosts on the pizza. It is hot. Be careful. Obviously these ghosts have been hanging out in hell. The sauce is like red flames. And the whole scene is hot.
Celebrate liberating the ghosts from hell with candy.
Hide the candy wrappers in the garbage during the final five minutes of baking.
Take the pizza out. Look how cool that is!
Put caper eyes on each ghost.
Let is stand for five minutes. Eat it. Eat it with a celebratory side dish of candy.
Man Verdict: It needs meat and more cheese.
My Verdict: Seriously? I’m so full from the candy.
Dogs’ Verdict: We agree with the man. If you’re going to dress us up, the least you can do is add more meat.
Writing News
Last Time Stoppers Book
I love this book baby and you can order my middle grade fantasy novel Time Stoppers Escape From the Badlands here or anywhere.
People call it a cross between Harry Potter and Percy Jackson but it’s set in Maine. It’s full of adventure, quirkiness and heart.
OUR PODCAST – DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE.
Thanks to all of you who keep listening to our weirdness as we talk about random thoughts, writing advice and life tips. We’re sorry we laugh so much… sort of. Please share it and subscribe if you can. Please rate and like us if you are feeling kind, because it matters somehow. There’s a new episode every Tuesday!
Writing Coach
I offer solo writing coach services. For more about my individual coaching, click here.
COOL CONTEST OF SPOOKY AWESOMENESS!
Um. MacMillan is having a super cool sweepstakes where you can win the book I wrote with Steve (IN THE WOODS) and four other scary books. Go enter! Go win! I’m rooting for you!
IN THE PAPER, BABY
I was just in the newspaper and I think the photo of my head is actually larger than my real-life head. Go figure. It was super kind of them to notice me and to write about me. Here is the link.
LEARN WITH ME AT THE WRITING BARN!
The Write. Submit. Support. format is designed to embrace all aspects of the literary life. This six-month course will offer structure and support not only to our writing lives but also to the roller coaster ride of submissions: whether that be submitting to agents or, if agented, weathering the submissions to editors. We will discuss passes that come in, submissions requests, feedback we aren’t sure about, where we are feeling directed to go in our writing lives, and more. Learn more here!
“Carrie’s feedback is specific, insightful and extremely helpful. She is truly invested in helping each of us move forward to make our manuscripts the best they can be.”
“Carrie just happens to be one of those rare cases of extreme talent and excellent coaching.”
It’s with Steve Wedel. It’s scary and one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019. There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed!
Order this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?
In the Woods
Share this if you want and also because it would be super nice of you!