Frosty's Chocolate Orange Martini at the Washington Duke Inn

For the month of December, you can order a cocktail of my very own creation at the Washington Duke Inn’s Fairview Dining Room and Bull Durham Bar. I won first place in their Blog Nog cocktail competition for my riff on a Terry’s chocolate orange. It’s that magical stocking stuffer we’ve all had on many Christmas mornings. Give it a whack, and the ball breaks into a million perfect slices of orange-flavored chocolate. My trivia team, Wrong Answers are Sexy, gets the credit for coming up with the theme of chocolate orange, and Tara Skelly in particular gets honors for being my taster.

The night of the winner unveiling, Durham Magazine posted a brief piece on my victory, from which I’m stealing this picture.

You can also watch the following video of bar manager Chris Thomas mixing up the concoction.

http://youtu.be/bWOLe_jdvEw

But if that’s too much work for you, then here’s my recipe with the tweaks the bartending team came up with to make it better—mainly, they perfected the rimming steps. The drink naming was a team effort led by Don Ball, the director of food and beverage at Washington Duke Inn, from among the fellow competitors and food bloggers who came by for the unveiling.

Frosty’s Chocolate Orange Martini

2 shots orange juice 1 shot Stoli Vanil 2/3 shot white crème de cacao 1/3 shot Grand Marnier 1 shot cardamom-infused simple syrup Finely grated Terry’s White Chocolate Orange Granulated sugar Slices of Terry’s Milk Chocolate Orange

Directions: Chill a martini glass. Rim the glass with extra cardamom syrup, then duck it in a mixture of the ground chocolate orange and sugar. Shake up the first 5 ingredients. Pour into the martini glass. Garnish with a slice of chocolate orange on the side.

Better yet, give the drink a try straight from the expert hands of Washington Duke’s bartenders! It’s $10, and you’ll find these cute little table toppers there.

Enjoy! And tell me what you think.

Winter Tales Reading: Come listen to me read!

This coming Thursday, I will be one of five speculative fiction writers participating in a reading on the topic of winter tales at the Orange County Public Library in Hillsborough (137 W. Margaret Lane) at 6 pm.

Personally, I’m most intrigued to see what a pack of sci-fi writers comes up with for holiday-themed readings! I am opting for a personal essay, and I know at least one of the other authors is writing a song or three. I’m honestly expecting this to be a lot of fun. Here are brief bios of the other participants. By brief, I mean this is how I am most familiar with them:

• James Maxey-Author of the Dragon Age fantasy saga and his current Dragon Apocalypse series. He’s also a great conversationalist at dinner parties full of people you’ve never met before. Or at least that’s my experience.
• Gray Rinehart-Author of several short stories, slushmaster general at Baen Books, and singer of songs.
• Mur Lafferty-2012 Campbell Award nominee, author of Playing for Keeps and the Afterlife series, expert podcaster, and composer of snarky social media statuses.
• Alex Granados-Author of Cemetery Plot, producer of the State of Things, and that guy that was supposed to edit a short story for me once.
• and me, Rebecca Gomez Farrell-Author of Maya’s Vacation and several short stories, food blogger extraordinaire, and the person who wrote this post.

Please come on out on Thursday at 6 pm and join us for the merriment! It will continue all evening for me, because I have a date with the Hobbit at midnight that night!

Official invitation is here.

It's been a while since I posted a bragging entry--I still have much to share! I haven't even gotten to my Bull Spec story, Bother. But life gets busy, and when it does, the bragging falls off my list of to-dos. Today, though, I have a new WRAL review to share with you! Published on Monday, here is my take on the newest food incarnation in that catchy little orange building by the 147 and Fayetteville overpass. Here's your teaser:

Munchëz is located in a little stand that switches owners and cuisines faster than new signs can be produced. I’m still in mourning for the charbroiled chicken tacos from its last incarnation called Pollos La Carbonera. But now, it has been reborn as a sandwich, burger, salad, wings and hot dog joint. Thus, a new visit was in order.

The Location: Munchëz is in an orange and yellow hut that looms up right before the I-147 on-ramp driving up Fayetteville Road into downtown Durham. You can walk up and order at the front window or drive through, but it does take longer than fast food. My meal took about 15 minutes, which they apologized for as lengthy.

And you can read the rest at WRAL Out and About here. Want a photo to further entice you to click their way? Sure thing.

After the publication of Maya's Vacation, I took part in the first Feature Friday story for Astraea Press. Feature Friday is a collaboration among a bunch of Astraea Press authors to write an ongoing story with three words as a starting point. Each Friday, a different author tackled the next leg of the story, taking it in whatever direction they wanted to. As you might imagine, my contribution managed to veer the story into the paranormal, just a little bit. The words that prompted us were llama, dating, and waterfall.

Our story mascot.

You can start the story from the beginning here, or you can just jump in for my contribution. Here's your teaser of the story's beginning, written by Cheryl Grey:

The house looked like half of a bleached orange, placed juicy side down in the shadow of a long, sloping hill. Detective Elleanor Sharpe slammed the door of her rental car, leaned against its hot metal, and kept staring. A geodesic dome, the guy at the gas station had called it as he’d given her directions, his chest thrust out as if proud he’d mastered the term. She’d caught him reading a Scooby Doo comic book, so he hadn’t mastered much else.

Grasslands and cacti faded into the distance in all directions, sliced through by the state road and caliche driveway, punctuated by lazy pump jacks, and weathered, leaning shacks. To the west, looming mesas shimmered in the heat haze. Behind the dome, a flock of sheep hid in the fold of a ravine, the hillside shading them from the afternoon sun. The sky was too dry and washed-out for even the wispiest of clouds.

Here is a snippet from my contribution, the fourth part in a five-part story:

Ellea felt like a vise had cinched her throat. The Natural Assembly was here . . . in Pecos?

Back in Dallas, she’d worked a case on the secretive church and its leader, Reverend Peter Staff. He—it was always a man who led these cults—was in his midfifties with brown hair so gelled a tornado couldn’t move a strand of it. She’d taken an instant disliking to him from the moment she offered her hand in greeting and he held it like a dead fish. The station had called her in to question him after an embezzling charge was leveled against the Natural Assembly by a disgruntled former parishioner. There were also complaints about beheaded chickens, but sacrificing animals was not against the law. Apparently, the church had moved to a smaller pond, perhaps to draw less attention, but they’d also moved on to bigger animals.

You can read the rest of mine here. And because convenience is important to us Americans, here is the entire story together in one post.

It's that time of the week again! This time, I have two food blogging items to brag about, both recent developments. First, Carpe Durham, one of the blogs I contribute to, was a finalist for the third year in a row in the Best Blog category in the Independent Weekly's Best of the Triangle awards.

I cannot tell you how wonderful it is to be part of a website with passionate readers who vote for us year after year. Thank you so much!

Second, I have another review up at WRAL's Out and About. This one is of the newly added brunch menu at the Durham and Hillsborough Bandidos locations. Here's your teaser:

Bandidos is located a hop, skip and jump from my house, so you can bet my husband and I are regular customers. They serve Mexican food in the American style: rice, beans and whatever combination of meat, cheese, sour cream, lettuce and tortilla you want. It’s not street tacos, but it’s comfort food to me. Their salsa is my favorite in the area, and their house margaritas are impressively tasty and strong for the price. Don’t miss Margarita Mondays when they are $1.99 per mug!

You can read the rest of that post here. See you next week for more of my food-blogging bragging. We'll get back to fiction eventually. ,)

After spending a month in Maya's Vacation promotions, I'm switching gears to highlight some of my mentions and interviews for this very blog, the Gourmez, and the connections I've made with the wealth of amazing people in our food and drink industry in the Triangle. Today's brag comes by way of my Carpe Durham connection, which is a food blog that has twice been a finalist for Independent Weekly's annual Best Blog award. In addition to my posts here, I also cross-post to Carpe Durham any Durham reviews that haven't already been posted by one of the other fabulous CD bloggers.

Back in 2010, Matt Dees, the hardworking and food-appreciating editor of Durham Magazine, contacted me and the other Carpe Durham bloggers about doing a piece in their first annual Foodie issue. Of course I said yes, and along with Carpe Durham's amazing primary blogger, DID, we did a little photoshoot for the piece. We were interviewed, too, and the piece primarily discusses the origins of the website with its creators, RPP and YAR.

Now, it's been two years since the articles, so I think I can post the scans without fear of dipping into Durham Magazine's profits for the issue (What can I say? I support writers getting income for their work!). Matt, you let me know if you want it removed, mmkay? Here is the PDF of the article.

Download here.

I hope you enjoy learning about the history of Carpe Durham!

It has come. This is the last week I'm spending on bragging about Maya's Vacation, my romance novella about a woman who has to decide if she wants to chance her heart on an old flame all while painting and eating her vacation away. This week, I'm sharing a few snippets of interviews I've done to promote Maya's Vacation. I was interviewed at a couple of romance book and author sites. If you've ever wanted to learn a bit more about me or my romance novella, you should swing by them!

First up is I Am A Reader, Not A Writer from last June. Here is your teaser:

What is one book everyone should read?

The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell. It is a beautiful book that blends religious striving, human suffering, cultural understanding, and language into a narrative about learning to live with aliens on another planet and learning to live with ourselves.

What is your favorite flavor of ice cream?

Viennese Cafe Waltz—it was a specialty flavor done by Safeway Groceries’ store brand for a few years: chocolate covered hazelnuts in a cinnamon, vanilla, and mocha ice cream.

What is your favorite thing to eat for breakfast?

Eggs Goldenrod—cheese sauce over toast with sliced and grated hard-boiled eggs. Calories for the win!

Night owl or early bird?

Very much a night owl. I get a lot of eye rolls when I say I wake up around 10 am...until I remind them that means I’m in bed around 3 am.

Skittles or M&Ms?

M&Ms, especially those new coconut ones. If they made those in dark chocolate, I’d be in heaven.

Next on the agenda is Astraea Press's blog, where I did an interview the day of Maya's Vacation's release.

A random fact about your story.

Scrabble is not a recommended matchmaking method.A random fact about you as an author.

I’ve been writing stories since I mastered handwriting—though whether I’ve ever actually mastered cursive is up for debate. My first stories involved the La Brea Tar Pit and taking a ride on a unicorn with She-Ra. It was horror and fantasy from an early age.

Favorite line in the story (can be funny, romantic, etc).

My favorite line in the story is actually the very last one, which I dreamed—or rather, I dreamed a version of it that needed some editing. But I can’t share that one! Instead, I’ll pick this: Maya thought that interesting, but Dean’s soothing voice, like jazz spilling out of a sidewalk café, distracted her from giving it any further consideration.

Since three is such a beautiful number in writing, I'll end the interview bragging post with this snippet from Fridays Off the Wall at Joselyn Vaughn's blog last year.

Joselyn: Who would you cast as the main characters in a movie of your latest book?

Rebecca: In Maya’s Vacation, the main character, Maya, is a woman in her early 50s. She has a salt-and-pepper bob and an intuition that guides her strongly. I could see Kathy Najimy playing her. Dean, the main romantic interest, is an artist of the same age, lanky, and has a mop of curly blonde hair. Richard Gere with long hair would be a fun choice and would get that emotional angst just right, but I’d love Viggo Mortenson also. Danny Devito would be a perfect actor for Maya’s bustling friend, John. Naomi and Wynona Judd would have great fun playing Opal and Esther Donnelly, a pair of randy widows, as long as they don’t mind dying their hair pink.

Joselyn: I love the idea of a not 20-something heroine.  We can find love at any age. What is your favorite line for your most recent book?

This is not from a book but from my short story, Apocalypse, published recently at Yesteryear Fiction. It is about a woman—a diviner, actually—who is noticed by someone else for the first time in her life, which makes her realize that she’s worth noticing: His face is alight with the reflection of something dazzling, something she has never seen but always been. From the novel, I can only give my second favorite line—my first is the last line of the book, and I don’t want to give that away! My second favorite is Maya thought that interesting, but Dean’s soothing voice, like jazz spilling out of a sidewalk café, distracted her from giving it any further consideration.

Joselyn:  That is really nice imagery. Do you have any characters who keep bugging you for their own book? Will you give them one?

Rebecca: I assure you, both John and Opal from Maya’s Vacation are quite confident they are worthy of their own books, largely because they find themselves infinitely entertaining and think they are great catches to anyone of the opposite sex. The fact that I have no plans to do so simply mystifies them. Obviously, I’m not paying due attention to their charms, and they may be forced to try harder.

I hope you enjoyed those little tidbits on why I wrote Maya's Vacation and just plain learning more about me. I can't leave you without showing off that cover one more time and giving you links to where you can buy Maya's Vacation for $1.99, now can I? Here's where: Astraea Press, Amazon, or Barnes and Nobles.

And here's that pretty little cover:

We are still on my first published book, Maya's Vacation, in this week's fiction bragging post, and we will be for a few more weeks -- I did a number of interviews promoting it when it came out last March, so I plan to point you toward one each week. But this first one is not an interview with me. Instead, it's an interview I did with the main character in Maya's Vacation, Maya Holden. Perhaps she can interest you in her story.

Me: Maya, you seem like such a down-to-Earth woman, but tell me, how did you end up with a litter of ferrets?

Maya: Oh, that. [She waves it away with a giggle]. My husband — ex-husband, now, of course, but he was my husband  then — he never let me live that one down. What happened was that Meredith Viera one day on the Today Show had these long, furry animals I’d never seen before. They were so cute, I just had to get one. So I headed to the pet store that very afternoon, and what did I find but a mother ferret with a new litter of four babies! They were all so cute, no longer than my index finger, and I just couldn’t separate them. It felt like the right thing to do, taking them all home! Chuck turned bright red when he saw them, but he never did complain, not really. He’d been married to me too long! You might say I’m a creature of instinct.

Me: That’s hilarious, and don’t tell my husband, but I wouldn’t be surprised if I did something like that one day! Animals are hard to resist. Speaking of things that are hard to resist, what did you say about your first boyfriend recently? Something about how kissing him was like a great glass of tempranillo?

Maya: Honey, if I were kissing Dean again, I’d drain the bottle. He was — he was something else. It was so long ago when we were together, and I was probably just giddy with first love, you know how that goes, but I can still remember how he made me feel every time we — well, you know. [She blushes]. But you can’t keep that sort of relationship forever.  We’ve all got to grow up sometime.

Me: Do you really think so? Don’t some people manage to capture the magic forever?

Maya: I suppose I believe that. But don’t you think that sort of connection is scary? I mean, I loved Dean, I loved him so much that I moved from home at 18 to live with him in a rundown flat by the beach that I thought was heaven. We were going to be painters together, but he left and then . . . I couldn’t wait forever, could I? [She wipes a tear from her eye and breathes deeply, straightening up]. But how did we get to this topic? Let’s talk about something more fun.

Me: I can certainly do that! What’s your favorite dish, Maya? What food would you want on a deserted island?

Maya: I’ll take that bottle of tempranillo, for starters! But to help wash it down, I’d go for comfort food like chicken and dumplings—it might get a little lonely out on that island. I can’t help but dress up a recipe, though, so I’d stir some gruyere into the dumpling batter and probably roast the chicken first with tarragon and oregano.

Me: That sounds delightful! Thank you for your time, Maya.

Maya: A pleasure!

If that little peak into Maya's life makes you want to learn what the future may hold for her, then pick up Maya's Vacation today_!_ It's available in all e-book formats, including PDF, at Astraea Press, Amazon, or Barnes and Nobles.

Hello everyone! For my bragging series this week, I am going to share a couple of the nicest reviews I've received so far for Maya's Vacation. But most importantly, I am revealing the winners of the free copies of Maya's Vacation! There were six entrants and I had five free copies, but I couldn't bring myself to leave only one person a loser, so I scrounged up another one. Thus, everyone's a winner! That's right, free books for Rachel, Angie, Heidi, Angel, Lu Ann, and Lisa! Thank you so much for signing up, ladies, and I hope you enjoy Maya's Vacation. I'll send you instructions on how to get your free book.

Doesn't winning feel great?

Now for those reviews. Here are just a few of my favorites, though there are plenty more out there with nice things to say about Maya's Vacation. The most recent one comes first, from just this February. Emma Rae from Romancing the Book had this to say:

Definitely worth the buck or so for this little novella. Go ahead and judge the book by the cover. The two characters are both painters, and so is Rebecca Farrell. I’m not putting a “favorite quote” because I want you to discover the beautiful imagery in this book for yourself. I’m not usually big on descriptions or scenery, and this story doesn’t overdo it, but what is there is superbly written. Calibre tagged this novella as “Christian” when I added it. It’s not, but it’s perfectly clean with just the right amount of chemistry.

The story is mostly from Maya’s point of view, and has an excellent supporting cast. You just know Chuck is a slimy user trying to wiggle his way back into Maya’s life, and he wouldn’t be good for her at all. Dean hasn’t been pining for thirty years, and brings his own hurts to the woods. I wish we’d had some more from Dean’s point of view. I like that nothing is perfect and smooth and clear-cut. There’s regret and sadness, but it’s not the focus of the story and that’s fresh. It’s nice to know romance is still alive at fifty, and there’s always room for second chances.

At Amazon, fellow Astraea Press author, J. Gunnar Gray has the following review:

This is a remarkably fun story of a woman caught between two love interests, and I honestly didn't know how she's choose until the very last pages. Becca Farrell writes with subtlety and imagination, building Maya's character with artistic brushstrokes and showing how she's tugged between doing what's smart and comfortable, and doing what she really wants. This little novella isn't getting nearly the attention it deserves.

And an anonymous review over at Barnes and Nobles:

If you like food, art, romance or any combination of the three than you will thoroughly enjoy Maya's Vacation! The characters are likable and the plot moves at the perfect pace. There are cute analogies and moments the author describes that are laugh out loud funny. The story starts out with Maya taking a brief escape from her current day to day life -- and that is exactly what this story offers the reader: A sweet escape from the everyday. If you'd like a short read that will give you a break from your own reality, then look no further than Maya's Vacation.

Hooray! And looking for these reviews reminded me that I really need to keep a list of all the reviews the book has received, because I've forgotten already! If only I were a better organized writer...someday!

For this installment of my Thursday bragging series, I'm giving away 5 copies of my e-book, Maya's Vacation! What's that? You like to win things? Well, entering to win is easy. Just leave a comment on this post by next Wednesday, 5/9, and I'll reveal the winners on Thursday.  Not familiar with Maya's Vacation? We can fix that easily!

Twenty-year-old Maya knew, as she watched Dean walk away from her front door, distraught at her silence and her father’s threats, that she would never love anyone with the intensity that she loved him. He was her painter, her artist, her soul mate and being apart from him hurt too much. She tucked those feelings away, determined to enjoy the safe and secure life her parents approved of: business school and a marriage to Chuck, a successful real estate agent.

Thirty years later, Chuck has cheated on and divorced her. But when he comes back, begging for reconciliation, Maya follows her intuition and takes a vacation to think it over. Her love of art, food, and wine combine at this retreat in the woods, and she prepares for a week of making new friends, tasting exquisite wines, and learning to paint again. What she hasn’t prepared for is the familiar voice she hears the first morning at camp . . . a voice that makes her skin tingle and brings back memories of who she used to be before Chuck. Has Maya buried her passion too deep to find love with Dean again.

You can also listen to me read from Maya's Vacation, so if you're interested in an excerpt, what better way to get one than by listening to the author speak for her characters? Each clip is about 3 and 1/2 minutes long, and you do need javascript enabled for the clips to work.

[audio:/audio/mvexcerpt1.mp3]

[audio:/audio/mvexcerpt2.mp3]

Don't want to wait to see if you won the contest? You can purchase Maya's Vacation now in any e-book form direct from Astraea Press (direct from the publisher is where I get the biggest cut, hint hint), Amazon, and Barnes and Nobles.

Next week, along with the contest winners, I'll share some of my favorite reviews of Maya's Vacation. There are some great ones out there!