(the day after) Pancake Day

I couldn't get online yesterday, so this post is a belated.

Recipe for Spiced Pancake avec Bean (Mr Kite's invention)

For the pancake:

110g plain flour

pinch salt

2 eggs

200ml milk mixed with 75ml water

2tspn garam masala

2tspn tumeric

1 tspn ground coriander

sieve flour and salt into a mixing bowl. Break the eggs into the mix, or blend. Add milk and water gradually. When all the milk and water is added, slide a spatula around the edge of the bowl to incorporate any stray flour. Add the spices and whisk until smooth.

(Note: These pancakes seem to take slightly longer to cook than conventional pancakes. The spices seem to slow the cooking down. Allow about 5 mins per pancake, but ultimately you decide when they're done.)

for the Avec Bean:

(pancakes to be cooked during the Avec Bean cooking time, or if multi-tasking is impossible for you, after. Ensure the bean mix is kept warm while the pancakes cook.)

1 red onion- chopped

2 cloves garlic- chopped

1 red pepper- chopped

2 courgettes- chopped

mushrooms- chopped

ginger- sliced. Smallish quantity.

chilli powder- 1tspn or less

tinned tomatoes

tinned mix beans

150g mozzarella

coriander leaf

basil

Fry onions for 5mins

add pepper and garlic and fry for further 5mins

add courgettes and ginger. Fry for 5mins

add mushrooms. Fry 3mins

add the herbs and spices and tomatoes and fry for 5mins

add beans and fry for a further 5mins.

Add the mozzarella 30 seconds before serving.

This recipe can be adapted and changed for variety.

Serve with spicy pancakes.

Maid Marian and a Song for Nero

I just finished reading Thomas Holt’s A Song for Nero. I picked it up because it’s a historical fiction told in a modern style with a few deliberate anachronisms and a contemporary flavour. My own novel I’m working on is a light-hearted anachronistic historical fiction. I’m trying hard to find published novels following that sort of principle.

Song for Nero was easy to read with a good concept. The light-hearted style made it a much more enjoyable read from other historical fiction. The characters were strong and well described. The whole ambience of the story put me into that time in history without alienating me.

The book was excessively long considering nothing much actually happens. It was over the top to the extent that though I guess a lot of stuff did happen, it seemed to be negated by the OTT barrage of stuff that I couldn’t relate to. All the mishaps that occur bled into one another creating a spiral of repetition. Despite such a formulaic repetition, the characters never learn from their previous experiences. Though Galen does seem to develop towards the end, I felt character development was thin on the ground. I had no reason to root for the characters because it was never made clear what the characters actually wanted, other than to be in a different situation.

Having said all that, I did enjoy reading it. I just felt it came so close to being an amazing perfect book, but it never quite connected, never quite filled its potential.

Has anyone out there read a good historical fiction in a similar vein to A Song for Nero? I’m talking modern language, no excessive description into intricate historical fact, a lot of deliberate anachronism, tongue in cheek and chilled out? I’m talking Maid Marian and Her Merry Men but in adult novel form. If anyone can suggest something similar (that isn’t the book I am writing) then point me that way.