Belated Top Ten and Tomatoes

Yes, this is just how I see myself!

I enjoyed reading everyone's Top Ten Tuesday posts last week so much that I decided to do my own...a week and two days late. But it was a fun exercise to not only see what I was reading but also picking which book I wanted to feature from the books finished in the month of August over the past ten years.

2025 - Heartwood, by Amity Gaige - absolutely loved everything about this "lost in the woods" book.

2024 - Table for Two, by Amor Towles - a set of short stories, linked by location, by one of the greatest living writers. I love everything Towles writes.

2023 - True Grit, by Charles Portis - a five-star classic western; I said I was going to read other books by Portis, but of course, haven't...yet! 

2022 - The Diamond Eye, by Kate Quinn - another five-star novel by Quinn, having a Soviet sharpshooter as the protagonist takes a lot of skill, but she pulled it off. A terrific WWII novel from a non-traditional (for me) perspective.

2021 - A Woman of No Importance, by Sonia Purnell - here's what I wrote back in 2021: "...this is one of the best books of 2021. Could not put it down. Virginia Hall was incredible--brave, passionate, capable. She persisted. Despite a prosthetic leg. Despite the old boys' network. Despite the Gestapo, betrayals, and red tape, she really, truly helped liberate France and end WWII. This is non-fiction at its finest."

2020 - Devil's Brood, by Sharon Kay Penman - an absolutely wonderful historical novel by one of my favorite historical novelists--this one is about Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine and their three sons. If there ever was a prototypical dysfunctional family, this is it. So good!

2019 - Spying on the South: An Odyssey Across the American Divide, by Tony Horwitz - Tony's last book--he died while on book tour for it--I didn't do a post on it, not sure why. I learned so much about Frerick Law Olmsted, whose journey Horwitz traced. As a student of the Civil War (that sounds pretentious, but not sure how else to say it), I loved the premise of the book, and Horwitz didn't disappoint.

2018 - The Essex Serpent, by Sarah Perry - I gave this four stars on GoodReads, but I had to read my post to remember what it was about. I chose it because it was actually the only book I finished in this month--we were traveling in France in August 2018, so I probably read this book on the flights to/from.

2017 - The Women in the Castle, by Jessica Shattuck - another WWII novel, but this time the main characters are women in Germany. I think this is due for a reread. I liked it, but the details are fuzzy.

2016 - Eventide, by Kent Haruf - by one of Colorado's native sons, this is a beautiful book about small-town life on the prairie. To quote myself, "I loved the experience of reading Eventide--I loved the language, the stories, the tenor, the mood. Haruf was a master of his craft--his sparse prose creates a depth of understanding and compassion that is a joy to experience."

Garden Notes

It's August and so you cannot escape some garden notes. I have been harvesting tomatoes, and I made my favorite roasted tomato soup yesterday for dinner, with homemade croutons.

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I used 2.5 pounds of roma tomatoes, washed, sliced, and deseeded with two onions (also from the garden), quartered, and six cloves of garlic. I drizzled with olive oil and seasoned with salt and pepper and roasted at 375 degrees for 40 minutes. A great variation is to add sliced bell peppers to the medley.

I then transferred the lot to a stock pan, added a quart of chicken stock and two bay leaves, brought to a boil and simmered for 20 minutes.

I then removed the bay leaves and pureed the soup. I added 3/4 cup of milk (or cream if you want it richer and don't mind the calories), reheated, added a few dashes of Chihuly hot sauce for fun, and topped each serving with freshly julienned basil (from the herb garden).

The croutons are painfully easy as well. Just cube some bread (I usually have some heels of rustic loaves on hand), toss with olive oil and season with S&P, garlic powder, and Italian seasonings, and roast in 400-degree oven for 10 minutes or until crispy.

Tonight we are harvesting our first ears of corn!!!