Piccata Archives - Tena Stetler

Aug 3rd Peggy Jaeger Talks Food & Passion’s Pallette

Give a warm welcome to Peggy Jaeger, author of Passion’s Palette, fifth book in the MacQuire Women series released today August 4th 2017! Happy release day Peggy!

Pull up a chair, grab a drink of your choice from the cooler, a homemade Chocolate Chip or Peanut Butter cookie from the plate and let’s find out a little about Peggy Jaeger and Passion’s Pallett.

Peggy, I’ve read a few of your books. I love the large noisy families and cooking that seem to be a common theme in most the books I’ve read. Do you like to cook?

Food and family play such major roles in my writing. It doesn’t take endless hours on an analyst’s couch to figure out where those two themes hail from. I am the only child of divorced parents and as a child I was a latchkey kid, a term I don’t think is used any more. It meant I was all alone, on my own, every day after school. My parents worked and my mom couldn’t afford a babysitter after I turned 8. My mother and stepfather didn’t usually arrive home until after 7 each night, so I had to fend for myself if I got hungry. Back then, putting together a seven course meal wasn’t going to happen, so I learned how to open a box of macaroni and cheese and not burn the pot when I made it! A few years down the road I’d elevated to making spaghetti and hand rolled meatballs. In my teens, I started experimenting with sauces. So, you can see this was procession of learning skills. My love of cooking developed and grew as I did.

I hated being an only child (still do!). I always wanted brothers and sisters, people my age living in the same house with me. Siblings I could learn from, maybe even teach something to – like cooking – who’d be there to support and love me. People I had a connection – a DNA connection – to.

Didn’t happen.

Oh, I know exactly how you feel! I’m an only child too, raised by a single parent. Wasn’t much fun. Sorry for the interruption, go on.

So, I married a man with a big family and started writing my own romance stories centering around families, their relationships, and their lives. I have to admit, it’s been fun.

I also learned to cook really well. I would never flatter myself and say I’m a “chef” but if I ever find the time, I think I’d like to go to cooking school to better my skill set. Most of what I learned about cooking I learned, first from cookbooks, and recently from cooking shows. God bless the food and cooking channels! And You-Tube! This is just one bookcase in my home that houses some of my 120+ cookbooks. You’ll even see on the very top a cookbook by my favorite author, Nora Roberts.

Luckily, I have a husband who can eat anything and is always up for trying a new dish.

In PASSION’S PALETTE, the 5^th book in my MacQuire Women series, I tell the story of artist Serena MacQuire and veterinarian Seamus Cleary. This is the second prequel in the series and it goes back a little in time to the beginning of their lifelong love affair. In the book, Serena has come back to her childhood home for a much-needed rest and to start planning a mural she has been commissioned for. Her old nursemaid and housekeeper, Addie O’Malley is worried about Serena. The girl looks so exhausted and she’s way too thin, so Addie makes Serena’s favorite dish, veal piccata. It’s a relatively easy dish to make and it just screams comfort food. Served with mashed sweet potatoes or rice, it’s a delicious meal that feeds the soul. Just the thought of it warms Serena’s heart and gets her taste buds watering. The thought of Seamus Cleary does that, too!

Food plays such a big role in my stories because I believe there’s nothing stronger that holds a family together as sitting around a dining room table, sharing a meal…or two…or ten. We all have such busy lives that sometimes we lose touch with those who mean the most to us. Sitting at the table, discussing your day, sharing a meal that’s been made with love and care, is a gift we should give ourselves every day. Every single day.

And here’s my gift to you: Serena’s favorite recipe, Addie O’Malley’s Veal Piccata.

Ingredients:

8 small veal culets, pounded flat

2 eggs, beaten slightly

2 Tablespoons vegetable oil

½ cup all purpose flour

2 Tablespoons REAL butter ( never margarine!)

½ cup dry Sherry

1 Teaspoon lemon juice – or the juice of one lemon that you squeeze yourself!

2 Tablespoons capers ( you can eliminate these if you don’t like their pungent taste)

1 cup chicken stock

2 Tablespoons chopped parsley

Salt, to your taste

Ground white pepper, to your taste

Method:

Combine the flour, salt and pepper in a shallow baking dish.
In another baking dish, add the beaten eggs.
Dredged the cutlets one at a time first thru the egg mixture, then the flour mixture, coating both sides with flour. The egg makes it stick to the cutlet
Add the oil to a big sauté pan and heat until hot
Cook the cutlets one or two at a time, 2-3 minutes per side until both sides are golden brown. Remove them from the pan and set them aside on an plate. Cover with aluminum foil to heel hot.
For the SAUCE: add the chicken stock, Sherry, lemon juice and capers to the sauté pan and scrape off all the left over cutlet bits from the bottom of the pan into the mix.
Bring to a boil, then lower the heat and simmer for 3-5 minutes or until the sauce has reduced by about a third. Add the butter and mix it into the sauce, then swirl the parsley through out right at the end. Add some salt and white pepper to you taste
Place the cutlets on a large serving dish and pour the sauce over each piece, coating it.
Serve and enjoy!

Tell us a about PASSION’S PALETTE

Talented and witty portrait artist Serena MacQuire is successful in everything but love. Her gift for capturing people on canvas is rivaled only by her fiery and legendary temper. A tragedy from the past keeps her heart securely locked away, preventing any man from getting close enough to claim it.

But Seamus Cleary isn’t just any man. After he left his professional football career to become a veterinarian, his bitter wife ended their marriage. Now, as he starts his life over in a new town, love is the last thing he’s looking for. The more he tends to Serena’s horses, though, the more he realizes her own heart needs tender care and healing as well.

Will he be the man who finally unlocks and claims her heart?

How about a sneak peek between the pages of Passion’s Palette?

With a hip resting against the tabletop, he browsed through her paints and brushes, lifting one color pot, then another. “So. You’re an artist.”

She nodded.

“What do you paint?”

As he opened and closed the pots, Serena observed his hands, silently assessing the length and width of his fingers. Her mind registered the dexterous movements of each action, the deliberate, studied way his hands performed each task.

“Portraits, mostly.”

His eyebrows rose. “This is pretty big equipment for a portrait. Where do your pictures hang? In castles?”

“Three do,” she told him, charmed when his neck reddened. “But this stuff is for a mural I’ve been commissioned to do for a hospital.”

His eyebrows lifted. “Impressive. You must be good.”

Allowing a smidgeon of playfulness to creep into her voice, Serena gave him a shrug that rivaled his own and repeated his words back to him. “Better than some. Not as good as others.”

He returned her smile with one of his own.

Serena’s heart giddyapped.

Buy Links

More about the Author:

Peggy Jaeger is a contemporary romance writer who writes about strong women, the families who support them, and the men who can’t live without them.

Family and food play huge roles in Peggy’s stories because she believes there is nothing that holds a family structure together like sharing a meal…or two…or ten. Dotted with humor and characters that are as real as they are loving, Peggy brings all topics of daily life into her stories: life, death, sibling rivalry, illness and the desire for everyone to find their own happily ever after. Growing up the only child of divorced parents she longed for sisters, brothers and a family that vowed to stick together no matter what came their way. Through her books, she has created the families she wanted as that lonely child.

Tying into her love of families, her children’s book, THE KINDNESS TALES, was illustrated by her artist mother-in-law.

Peggy holds a master’s degree in Nursing Administration and first found publication with several articles she authored on Alzheimer’s Disease during her time running an Alzheimer’s in-patient care unit during the 1990s.

In 2013, she placed first in two categories in the Dixie Kane Memorial Contest: Single Title Contemporary Romance and Short/Long Contemporary Romance.

In 2017 she came in 3rd in the New England Reader’s Choice contest for A KISS UNDER THE CHRISTMAS LIGHTS and is a finalist in the 2017 STILETTO contest for the same title.

A lifelong and avid romance reader and writer, she is a member of RWA and her local New Hampshire RWA Chapter.

Website/Blog: http://peggyjaeger.com/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/peggy_jaeger

Amazon Author page: http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B00T8E5LN0

Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/pages/Peggy-Jaeger-Author/825914814095072?ref=bookmarks

Pinterest: https://www.pinterest.com/peggyjaeger/

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/13478796.Peggy_Jaeger

Instagram: https://instagram.com/mmj122687/

I can’t tell you how many times I wondered while reading your books, if you were really from a big family. You answered so many of my questions, so glad you stopped in. Please feel free to stop by anytime. Good Luck with Passion’s Palette.