How to Bake a Chocolate Soufflé by Carly Ellen Kramer is a food fiction novel. And  I thought it would be a perfect fit having Carly as a guest author since I am a foodie. Also, because I love all recipes especially old heirloom recipes. And for all of you who don’t already know,  I am in the process of building the recipe section of my blog The Recipe Weekly.  

Thank you, Carly, for stopping by and sharing information about your book. Also for giving away a signed copy of  your book to one of our commenters.

Good Luck!  A winner will be chosen from all those who comment,  the week of March 18th.                                                                       

Hugs, -Virginia 

About the book

Forget what your English professor told you – life stories are not written in college.

Madeleine LaBlange, Annie Anderson, and Audrey Navarro shared formative years as roommates at Chicago’s Catholic haven for women, the historic Abbott College. If only they could have predicted the collisions between their carefully crafted life plans and the realities they discover beyond campus…

Madeleine harbors dreams of becoming a concert pianist while Dr. Reynold Fenwick, her mercurial graduate school mentor, harbors fantasies of Madeleine. Will pursuing her dreams be worth the cost? Will an evening in Budapest change her life forever?

Annie plans to build a perfect family with her perfect husband in the cutthroat news media industry, until an abrupt tragedy shakes the foundations of her marriage. What happens when she feels pulled between the two men she loves most, her husband and her father?

Audrey leaves her religious, restrictive parents behind and aims for Chicago’s downtown skyline, dating recklessly and staring down each grueling workday one Chicago Dog at a time. Will an island respite lure her away from her corporate future? When she finds herself in the arms of an unexpected lover, will she have the courage to stand up for her own evolving sense of self?

Follow the journeys of these remarkable women, and cheer them on as they navigate life, love, and chocolate soufflé.

Includes over a dozen decadent new recipes from Crowded Earth Kitchen!

Recipe 

Mrs. Baptiste’s Chocolate Soufflé

Grease four single-serving ramekins with real butter and dust with sugar. Set aside.

Set a metal mixing bowl over the top of a pot containing one inch of softly boiling water. The bottom of the mixing bowl should not touch the water in the pot. In the mixing bowl, melt ½ cup of dark chocolate chips. Stir well. Add three room temperature egg yolks and ½ teaspoon of pure vanilla extract to the bowl and mix well. The mixture will harden a bit – don’t worry, this is normal.

 In a separate mixing bowl, exorcise six egg whites – beat the Devil out of them! As you beat the egg whites, add ¼ teaspoon cream of tartar and 1/3 cup of white sugar, a little at a time. When the egg white mixture forms stiff peaks, fold into chocolate mixture. Be careful not to mix the air right out of the egg whites!

 Pour soufflé mixture into prepared ramekins and bake in a preheated, 375 degree oven for 20 minutes. Serve immediately.

Excerpt 

 “After a bit of English – to – French improvisation, I realized that Mrs. Baptiste

didn’t tell me to ‘exercise’ the egg whites. She told me to ‘exorcise’ the egg

whites, or ‘beat the Devil’ out of them!” Laughter ensued. “On my second attempt,

that is exactly what I did. I beat those egg whites until I thought my arm was going

to disconnect at the shoulder. If anyone would have seen me toiling away in my tiny,

ill equipped kitchen, I’m sure they would have laughed out loud. I worked up a

sweat. I honestly thought I pulled a bicep. But do you know what? That soufflé was

fantastic!” Several women in the audience began to laugh. 

“The reason I’m sharing this story is because dreams are like that.”  

“You can hold onto a dream, go after it with a halfway decent effort, and end up

with a fairly respectable result. Heck, that’s what most people do – ‘exercise.’ But

what if your dream is so big you can barely hold it in your arms? What if your dream

is so fantastic that it seems almost implausible? What if ‘a fairly respectable

result’ isn’t good enough? Well, then you take your Abbott College education, you

take the ambition and the values to which Dean Riley referred, and you go after your

dream like the Devil itself is on your heels! ‘Exorcise!’” The room erupted

 “That brings me to my next point, the one nobody really wants to talk about.

Sometimes, the monster under the bed is real.”

 ~How to Bake a Chocolate Soufflé, page 5

~~~

 Author Biography:

Carly Ellen is a food traveler and writer who loves incorporating delicious recipes into her stories. She is happily entangled in a long standing, unashamed love affair with Europe, whose narrow roads and great cathedrals never fail to keep her Train stations, corner bistros, and old museums serve as her collective Carly Ellen has a minor obsession with French boulangeries, and is sublimely happy with a fresh baguette and cup of espresso in any cobblestoned square.  How to Bake a Chocolate Soufflé is her first novel.

Author Links:

 Amazon (Paperback and Kindle):

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Carly+Ellen+Kramer

 Crowded Earth Kitchen: (Author Signed Copies): www.crowdedearthkitchen.com

 Goodreads (Ratings, Reviews, and Author Information):

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/8597207.Carly_Ellen_Kramer