Authors' Row at the Jones Creek Regional Branch Library

 

My very first public appearance as a writer of fiction! Saturday, April 23 the East Baton Rouge Parish hosted an "Authors' Row" for all of us indie authors at the Jones Creek Regional Branch Library. They even gave us a tote bag with swag! 

So, here's my display. Maybe a little busy but people did stop and ask about the postcards. Mike lent me his serape; wasn't it perfect? Very pleased with the bookmarks -- Vista Print if anyone wants to know -- and the print books. I wonder if I should have had copies of the recipe (Fried Chicken Castañeda, what else?) to hand out? 

 The event went for 3 hours. Most of those in attendance were other authors (LOL!) and friends and family of authors, but still, I sold TWO books (thank you!)! And handed out about a dozen bookmarks. 

Harvey Girl Special Little Thin Orange Pancakes

Here's an additional recipe for foods that appeared in Fried Chicken Castañeda. I'll be publishing others after I test them. 

I have made these and the flavor of the oranges really comes through. You could use tangerines or mandarins or any other sweet citrus fruit. Ruby red grapefruit also might work. I'm not so sure about lemon, although with additional sugar -- and some poppy seeds ... 

Original recipe : 

Combine one-quarter cup diced orange sections and juice (half an orange), one teaspoon grated orange peel (also from half an orange), one cup pancake mix, and about one cup orange juice. Bake small pancakes on hot griddle, using one tablespoon butter for each pancake. Serve with maple syrup, honey or jelly. (https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/56650/appetite-for-america-by-stephen-fried/?fbclid=IwAR1QKi0poC7QYWnNM2o9nOoiBtl8R_j_jgu503qsWs9WSI84KdMrxf8xUhk)

Updated recipe (You can use Krusteaz or Bisquick or your favorite pancake mix for the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt)

Serves 2 

1/4 cup diced orange sections with their juice (1/2 an orange) (add juice as necessary to make 1/4 cup)

1 tsp orange zest (optional or to taste)

1 cup orange juice

1 cup all-purpose flour

2 TBS sugar (more or less depending on sweetness of fruit)

2 tsps baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

Combine orange sections, zest, and juice in a medium mixing bowl. Stir together flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in a small bowl, then add all at once to orange sections. Mix just until combined (do not over mix -- batter will be slightly lumpy). 

Drop tablespoons of batter onto a hot griddle (greased/oiled if necessary) and cook until golden on both sides, turning once. Serve with maple syrup, honey, jelly, or powdered sugar. 

 I've begun the second book in the series and am really excited to see where Prudence takes us! And learn more about her fellow Detourists ... yes, it's quite true what they say. The author is at the mercy of the characters. 

While doing research online (never-ending and always interesting), I ran across a scan of a 1927 Southwest Indian Detours brochure! 

https://fredharveyjewelry.com/1927-fred-harvey-indian-detour-harveycars-brochure/

It's chock-full of photographs of Harveycars, Couriers, drivers, Detourists, Harvey House hotels, and various sites, as well as a complete itinerary with notes and descriptions. There are many photos of Pueblo people, as well. 

To learn more about the Ilfeld family of Las Vegas, https://swja.library.arizona.edu/content/ilfelds-family-story

Fred Harvey Recipes

 Just a short post listing the various sources of original Fred Harvey recipes on the web. There are more FredHeads out there than you might think (certainly more than I expected!). 

Stephen Fried's blog https://www.stephenfried.com/blog/) is

 the go-to source for recipes online, although he hasn't updated it in quite a while.

He also maintains the Harvey Girls Cookbook  Facebook page at  https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100063519038954 Some recipes. Mainly announcements about Fred Harvey-related events, including the Annual Fred Harvey Foodie Dinner at La Fonda in Santa Fe. 

The related Harvey Girls Cookbook Project Tumbler is https://fredharveycookbook.tumblr.com/?fbclid=IwAR0hIot_mLtgLSefU7GS-_4wXl7JNPwxbMma2eOXY3YVJ1oLKPIDGRDv-5E Quite a few recipes, but nothing recent. 

Fred Harvey Cooks Blog http://fredharveycooks.blogspot.com/ Doesn't look as if anything has been added since 2011. 

PDF of the Super Chief Cook Book undated, but clearly mid-20th century.  http://streamlinermemories.info/SF/SFCookBook.pdf

Fried Chicken Castañeda -- the book

"Fried Chicken Castañeda," the first in the series "Couriers" is now available at Barnes & Noble as an e-book and also in print, and as an ebook on Amazon. Print version coming on Amazon as soon as they finish their interminable review of the updates. Despite promising a 72-hour review, it's been a week, or something like 168 hours. 

This historical mystery begins in January, 1929, when Prudence Bates, a librarian at the Cleveland Public Library, attends a public meeting promoting the Fred Harvey Southwestern Indian Detours. She is utterly entranced with the romance of the West. She determines to join the next training course for Couriers, or guides, at the La Fonda in Santa Fe in June. Six months later, she leaves for Santa Fe aboard the California Limited from Chicago, stopping in Las Vegas, New Mexico for a week to soak up local culture. On the train, she meets  a charming Navajo school teacher, Jerry Begay, a product of the Indian Boarding school system. They feel an instant rapport, but he’s going on to Gallup, so it’s a brief encounter between two strangers on a train. In Las Vegas, she is befriended by Martha, a Harvey Girl at the Hotel Castañeda, her brother Tom, a local bootlegger,  Clara, the desk clerk at the hotel and  her boyfriend John, Anne, another Harvey Girl, and her boyfriend, Mike, Gene, and Liz, the daughter of the richest man in the area. Shortly afterward, Tom is found murdered. Is it because of his bootlegging activities?  And was that really Jerry Begay whom Prudence saw meeting with Tom in secret the day before he was murdered?

The volume ends with an authentic Fred Harvey Company recipe for Fried Chicken Castañeda, updated for modern cooks. 

The Fred Harvey Company really did offer Southwestern Indian Detours from 1926-1941, when World War II put an end to them. There was a brief revival from 1947 to around 1968, when Grey Lines bought the rights to the name and the routes, but the heyday had ended. While there is plenty of information to be found online about the Detours, the definitive work is D. H. Thomas' Southwestern Indian Detours : The Story of the Fred Harvey/Santa Fe Railway Experiment in "Detourism" (Hunter Publishing, 1978). Additional information about the Fred Harvey Company and the Harvey Houses can also be found online (in particular https://fredharvey.info/ and their Fred Harvey History Weekend)  and in Stephen Fried, Appetite for America: Fred Harvey and the Business of Civilizing the Wild West--One Meal at a Time (Bantam, 2011) (see also his blog at https://www.stephenfried.com/blog/), Lesley Poling-Kempes The Harvey Girls : Women Who Opened the West (Da Capo Press, 1994), and George H. Foster & Peter C. Weiglin, The Harvey House Cookbook: Memories of Dining Along the Santa Fe Railroad (Taylor Trade Pub., 2006).

The Castañeda Hotel (https://castanedahotel.org/) was restored and reopened to guests in April 2019. There is an Amtrak station just south of the Hotel where the Southwest Chief stops twice a day, once eastbound from Los Angeles and once westbound from Chicago.

The Meadows Hotel now operates as the Historic El Fidel Hotel https://www.facebook.com/elfidelhotel/

The Montezuma Hotel aka Montezuma Castle is still in existence but is the home of the Armand Hammer United World College and open for tours only on specific dates. https://www.uwc-usa.org/

The Montezuma Hot Spring are open to the public https://www.visitlasvegasnm.com/montezuma-hot-springs