A Smorgasbord, A Potpourri

Posted by Jenny

I could pretend that there is some theme connecting these books, but the truth is, I’ve just been reading around a lot lately. Here are some highlights from my recent perusals.

Out of the Easy by Ruta Sepetys

Josie Moraine is a girl living in the seedy side of New Orleans, pulled between her prostitute mom and her own seemingly impossible college dreams. A brilliant girl, I should say. A bright and salty smart girl, she has spirit and endurance and a very smart mouth in a time and a place where those are not necessarily the thing. Well-written, constantly moving story with great characters inhabiting 1950’s New Orleans, with its small town gossip and big town crime.

Caffeine: The World’s Favorite Drug

Posted by Selby
Whether you slam an energy drink in the afternoon or start your day with a cup of joe, most Americans consume some amount of caffeine during the day, and we love it. Recently, author Murray Carpenter took a good long look at a drug many of us use daily without thinking about it. In his book Caffeinated: How Our Daily Habit Helps, Hurts, and Hooks Us, Carpenter travels the world to see where and how we get our caffeine fix, as well as how it affects our bodies and minds.

Interested in healing foods? Try our Ways to Wellness Program…

Food can be your best medicine! This Sunday the Beacon Hill branch will host the talk Anti-Inflammatory Food for Health and Wellness, by family nutritionist Michelle Babb. She’ll discuss how chronic inflammation can be the root cause of many diseases, including cancer, Alzheimer’s, heart disease and diabetes. She’ll also teach you how to prepare low budget, healthy and tasty meals, and you can walk away with sample recipes and a resource list.

Happy (vegan) Holidays!

                                 

Happy (vegan) Holidays!

Are you a vegan living in self-imposed food exile, avoiding holiday parties? Are you afraid to bring dessert to a potluck, lest it taste like dense cardboard? Are you tired of answering the question, “but what do you eat”? Perhaps you’re just an adventurous cook who wants to experiment with some new recipes. Either way, these vegan cookbooks offer foolproof, palate-pleasing, holiday appropriate recipes. When I first became vegan, I was terrified of “losing” my taste buds, but these cookbooks are truly for those who love good food, not just vegan food.

1)      Vegan Pie in the Sky: 75 Out-of-this-world Recipes for Pies, Tarts, Cobblers & more, by Isa Chandra Moskowitz & Terry Hope Romero. It’s impossible to

Savory goodness in a dish

Comforting. Yummy. Satisfying. Those words are from the back cover of Potpies: Yumminess in a Dish and they perfectly describe this type of savory mini-pie. After trying several commercial varieties, I thought to myself, wouldn’t a salmon potpie be delicious—and oh-so-Northwest? I wasn’t able to find one (either store-bought or from the many excellent pie shops in Seattle) so I decided to make some myself, with help from the library’s cookbooks.