Really Random Tuesday #78: Homemade Sun-dried Tomatoes, a Spring Surprise, and a Book Winner

Several months ago, I was intrigued when I found a recipe within a recipe for making your own sun-dried tomatoes on a vegetarian blog that my daughter loves.  The recipe is super easy, and I've made sun-dried tomatoes many times since then.  Unfortunately, I can't find the original recipe that sparked my interest, so I can't give credit and thanks where it's due.

Homemade Sun-dried Tomatoes

  
To make your own sun-dried tomatoes, coat a small pan (such as a toaster oven pan) with cooking spray or oil.  Slice desired quantity of cherry tomatoes in half and place upright on pan.  I usually get sugar plum cherry tomatoes from Trader Joe's; they are the best--sweet, tasty, and inexpensive--and they're organic!  (This year, I'm also trying to grow some of my own cherry tomatoes, from a Home Depot plant, as well as from seeds I've recently planted.)  Sprinkle sliced tomatoes with salt, spices, and herbs.  I like to use pink Himalayan or Hawaiian salt, and organic oregano, basil, and rosemary from my garden, or from Trader Joe's, and black pepper.  Then mist everything with some organic olive oil.  I use a Misto which is a nice way of controlling the amount of oil.

Cook tomatoes in a 200° or 225° oven for about 2 to 3 hours, until the tomatoes look like "real" sun-dried tomatoes.  This recipe is foolproof as long as you check on the tomatoes every so often and don't forget about them altogether.  Setting the oven timer helps me, especially when I'm multi-tasking.   :)
 

Before cooking

After cooking

Once they're made, it's hard to resist popping them into your mouth.  The flavor becomes so concentrated and delicious.  I like to add sun-dried tomatoes to pasta dishes.  I'm not sure how else to use them.  What are some more creative ways to use sun-dried tomatoes?

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I wasn't expecting to see this "amarylllis" in the garden this spring, popping out above the geraniums and sea lavender.  I planted the bulb outside about a year ago, and basically forgot all about it.  And now it has bloomed!  I think it's grown because this area (the side of the garage) gets watered automatically and regularly. 

April 2014

February 2013

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Please help me to congratulate Julianne from Outlandish Lit.  She's won a copy of  The Frangipani Hotel: Stories by Violet Kupersmith.

Congratulations, Julianne!  I think you'll enjoy this collection of short fiction. Your blog is new to me and it looks quite inviting.  I'll visit it again as soon as I have a few minutes to spare.

Afternoon update:  I just found out that Julianne has won a copy of this book elsewhere, so I drew a new winner, Rebecca Orr.   Congratulations, Rebecca!

If you didn't win this time, don't be dismayed!  Please take a look at the other book giveaways listed the right side of my blog, and click on the book covers that interest you.

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Appearing on random Tuesdays, Really Random Tuesday is a way to post odds and ends--announcements, musings, quotes, photos--any blogging and book-related things you can think of.  I often announce my book giveaway winners in these posts.  If you have miscellaneous book news to gather up and are inspired by this idea, "grab" the button for use on your own blog, and add your link to the "master" Mister Linky on the Really Random Tuesday page. 

As always, your comments are welcomed!

The Frangipani Hotel: Review and Giveaway

Ghosts!  The Frangipani Hotel: Stories by Violet Kupersmith is a collection of short fiction based on traditional Vietnamese tales, which features the presence of the supernatural in the form of ghosts.  I'm not terribly familiar with ghost stories as a genre, so I consulted Wikipedia, as usual, for more insight.

"A ghost story may be any piece of fiction, or drama, that includes a ghost, or simply takes as a premise the possibility of ghosts or characters' belief in them."

Simple enough to understand, this is an appropriate description for the short stories in the book The Frangipani Hotel, which will be available to the public on April 1, 2014.  The nine short stories in this collection take place in the United States as well as Vietnam, and deftly envelop subjects and themes which bring Vietnamese culture to life vividly, including family relationships, story-telling (within the stories), the post-Vietnam War experience, food, and also, as mentioned before, ghosts.

You may or may not believe in ghosts, but I imagine you do want to learn more about the ghosts in The Fragipani Hotel.  Most notably, these are not your average, garden-variety ghosts, who make a career of haunting and scaring people.  The  ghosts in these stories are beguiling, and appear to be regular folks--at least initially.  Somewhat unexpectedly, I loved to read about these ghosts.  Slowly and skillfully, the author makes them appear more strange, until you realize you're dealing with supernatural beings.  In the second story, Reception, which takes place in the Old Quarter of Hanoi at the dilapidated Frangipani Hotel ("the Frangi"), the main character, Phi, meets an attractive, extremely thirsty girl in room 205 with "dark, dark", "liquid eyes", who's been taking a very long bath.  He senses that the girl and the situation are rather odd, although he does not understand what's going on.  In the third story, Skin and Bones, Mrs. Tran sends her teenage daughters, Thuy and Kieu, from their home in Houston, TX, to Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam to visit Grandma Tran, because Mrs. Tran wants Thuy to lose some weight.  Instead, Thuy meets a vendor there, who wears a straw hat and a kerchief that covers her face, who makes her delicious Vietnamese sandwiches, bánh mì, which cause Thuy's stomach to "gurgle in anticipation".  (Usually I order my beloved phở at Vietnamese restaurants, but next time I may order bánh mì.)  In the seventh story, Turning Back (which is probably my favorite story in this collection), the main character, Phuong Nguyen, meets a naked septuagenarian outside in the early morning while at her job at Kwon's World Grocery in Houston, Vo Van Hiep, who explains his nakedness with a very unusual secret.

Violet Kupersmith

This entire collection of short fiction is bewitching and well written.  The first story, Boat Story, and the last story, Descending Dragon, are connected, and all of the stories are imaginative.  It was hard to stop reading The Frangipani Hotel once I settled down with the book, and it kept me up later than I'd planned on a few nights.  I enjoyed the way that the ghosts are introduced in the stories, and how it gradually becomes clear that they are otherworldly beings. The Frangipani Hotel is an exceptional and exquisite debut by Violet Kupersmith, and I look forward to reading future work by this author. 



Win a copy of this captivating book and be among the first to read it!  The publisher, Spiegel & Grau, is generously offering a giveaway for a copy of The Frangipani Hotel (U.S. only).

• To enter this giveaway, simply leave a comment. 
• For another chance at winning, become a follower of this blog, or let me know that you're already a follower.
• For an additional chance, post about this contest on your blog, Facebook, Pinterest, or Twitter. 
• For one extra chance, mention ghost stories you've enjoyed reading. 

Enter by 5 PM PDT on Monday, April 7. One winner will be selected randomly and announced on Tuesday, April 8.

Special thanks to Lisa from TLC for sending me an advance reader's edition of this book.  For more reviews and features, please visit the other stops on TLC's book tour for The Frangipani Hotel.