December Recipes – Panettone

by Sandra Antonelli

Christmas: When It’s Perfectly Acceptable to Have Cake For Breakfast.

As an advocate for eating a good breakfast there is nothing that gives me more joy than Christmas because Christmas means cake for breakfast!

If you know me you’ll know I’m not usually a cake-eater. I’m more of a cookie inhaler, but this cake is different. This cake is Italian and who does love Italian food? This cake is light, a wee bit spongy and full of raisins and zest. I’m talking orange and lemon zest. I’m talking Panettone.

You’ve probably seen panettone before. It comes in a box. Sometimes it comes in a pretty decorative tin that you pay up to $50 for, but trust me, the basic panettone in a box is always, and I mean always better. Yes, a cake in a box—and it’s already made. No mixing! No baking! No cracking of eggs required! That is, no cracking of eggs until it comes to eating this cake for breakfast, because this festive cake is actually a kind of bread, and bread as you know IS the staff of life.

Panettone is a Christmas staple at my house. There are, at present, four boxes of beautiful Italian panettone sitting on my dining room table, and they are all destined to be…French Toast.

Honest. This cake, this bread, this Italian Christmas delight makes the most amazeballs French Toast you will ever have. The best thing is, there are only three steps.

Step 1: Slice panettone as you would bread for a sandwich

Step 2: Dip in beaten egg

Step 3: Fry until golden, in a pan with a bit of melted butter, turning once.

Plate up and serve as you would the usual day old bread French Toast, with a ton of butter (well I slather on a ton of butter because butter) and maple syrup.

Then prepare to have your tastebuds blown.

Have a Holly Jolly One, Kids!

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A new, quick-witted, quip-heavy romance for grown-ups from Sandra Antonelli about facing your fears — because love is the greatest risk of all.

It’s Valentine’s Day Again…

and we know what that means – you’re all desperately seeking fabulously romantic books to read. Without further ado, may we present:

Country story seeks romance reader wanting to be whisked to remote rural town in Snowy Mountains. Must like tall vets with genuine shy smiles. Sympathetic nature regarding runaway city girls searching for a fresh start vital. (Interest in cute pigs of use but not essential.)

Express interest here.

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Super fit and active book, seeks plenty of hot times with an open-minded reader. Sharing a love for the beach, mountains, delicious food and fruit salad would be beneficial but not essential.

Express interest here

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Fun, wacky, chaotic book seeks fun, wacky, chaotic reader who likes fun, wacky stuff, and chaos. And strippers. Male strippers. Or one, at least. Must also like to ride on emotional rollercoasters and go from laughter to tears, and not be afraid of ghosts. Bonus points if you can dance and sing a pitch perfect rendition of All The Single Ladies.

Express interest here.

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This grown-up tale is ready for romantic comedy readers who like quick-witted heroines and smart-assed heroes who grew up watching Star Trek. A flair for following quips that speed along like a Formula 1 race is an advantage. Must face the fear of claustrophobia and deal with reappearing horrid ex-husbands. Prospective readers may laugh at funky wedding cakes, quibbling bridesmaids, and a bride who sounds like Foghorn Leghorn. Knowledge that love doesn’t end after forty is crucial. Drooling while reading ice cream scene is obligatory and reader may want to be supplied with napkins.

Express interest here.

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Superhero fantasy with a touch of farce seeks reader with offbeat sense of humour and appreciation of the simple pleasures in life – pizza, beer, and repeats of Buffy. Must not take oneself or others too seriously, and be open to wild rides through the crime-fighting universe. Ideal date: breaking into an “unbreachable” containment facility for kicks before taking on a frenzied band of circus performers threatening to destroy the city.

Express interest here.

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This sexy romance is looking for a partner to trip the light fantastic and shake their groove thang.  This fish out of water tale feels most at home amid the sequinned backdrop of competition ballroom dancing.  Readers who like the sex appeal of Latin dance and the idea of an unlikely hero won’t put a foot out of place with this ensemble story.

Express interest here.

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Exotic romance seeks reader with a taste for adventure and a sense of justice to ride the sand dunes of Africa together. Must have heart and believe in true love.

Express interest here.

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Angsty, yet adorably cheesy romance, searching for a patient, dedicated reader. A love of the wine country is a must, and of course, a partiality to divine food, great music, and a charming winemaker who’s ripe for the picking. Show me your unwavering resolve and trust and I’ll give you everything you’ve been searching for.

Express interest here.

The Top 5 Reasons Why Halloween is Totally Bitchin’

by Sandra Antonelli, who is running a Hallowe’en promotion on her blog that you should totally check out here.

1. Candy Corn… because candy corn.
2. Costumes, costumes, costumes! Ever wanted to be a pirate? Thought it would be cool to get your cheese on and channel a Slice of Pizza? Thought cross-dressing would be fun, but worried what your friends would think? Now’s your chance to do one or all of these things because it’s Halloween and wearing a costume, a mask, and makeup is totally acceptable!
3. Jack-o-Lanterns: Carving them, seeing them, and ahem, even smashing them. OH! The Power of Pumpkin! The appeal of pumpkin is, sadly, misunderstood Down Under, and only eaten as a roasted with potatoes, garlic-n-onions savoury dish, rather than a cinnamon-nutmeg-ginger Festival of Pumpkin-Spice-Everything in the USA.
4. Provides a much-needed buffer between the end of Summer (or beginning of Spring, depending on what hemisphere you live in) and the Christmas advertising onslaught, which, I kid you not, started here in Australia on September 12^th.
5. Bobby ‘Boris’ Pickett’s The Monster Mash. My friend Cindy does this right. She combines all that is Halloween in lights and song!
   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NidpDhJAWJ4

Everybody dance now!

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A new, quick-witted, quip-heavy romance for grown-ups from Sandra Antonelli about facing your fears — because love is the greatest risk of all.

Levelheaded Olivia Regen walks away from her car-racing career and the wreckage of a bad marriage to take on new work that’s far removed from the twists of racetrack. Her new life is about control, calm and the good friends that she adores.

But her first task on her very first day involves getting up close and too personal with her claustrophobic boss, alone in a broken elevator. Her unconventional solution for restoring his equilibrium shocks them both and leaves Olivia shaken.

Determined to stick to her plan, Olivia drives headlong into work and planning her best friend’s wedding, leaving no room for kissing, elevators, or workplace relationships. But Emerson is not one to be out-manoeuvred. Can he convince Olivia that her fear of falling in love again is just another kind of claustrophobia – one that is destined to leave them both lonely?

September springs new releases!

It’s a great month for new releases – and a great month to dip your toe into our Magic Realism sub-genre, with three titles being released under that banner today!

From best-selling, award-winning author Frances Housden comes the gripping, sensual, suspenseful follow-up to The Chieftain’s Curse...

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Mixing romance, humour and a sparkle of magic, Juliet Madison is back with a new full-length, Magic Realism romance about a bride-to-be, a mystery and the stripper next door.

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From Cate Ellink comes a sun-soaked, sandy, seaside erotic novel about a tropical paradise, two athletes used to getting physical, and a sex-filled, no-strings holiday fling. 

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Magic realism mixes with romantic comedy in this new novel from Sarah Belle about the dangers of internet shopping – and using magic to solve real world problems.

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A new, quick-witted, quip-heavy romance for grown-ups from Sandra Antonelli about facing your fears — because love is the greatest risk of all.

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Mixing romance, history, and a touch of the unexplained in a new magic realism novel from Jacquie Underdown about love that needs to cross oceans and time before finding a place to come true.

Get Your Freak On – Top 10 Phobias

by Sandra Antonelli

You may know, on a deep cognitive level, that you are 5 billion times bigger than that itsy, bitsy spider on the garden spout, that thunder is just God bowling with the angels, and that the elevator you are trapped in with your new boss is not going to run out of oxygen, which is what Olivia tries to explain to wigging out claustrophobic Emerson in my new smart-ass romantic comedy Driving in Neutral.

Everyone’s afraid of something. So what scares you? Odds are it’s one of these Top Ten Phobias.

1. Arachnophobia: The Fear of Spiders, Research shows arachnophobia affects more women than men. No surprises there.

   

   Your mileage may vary

2. Acrophobia: The Fear of Heights.

   

3. Cynophobia: the fear of dogs.

   

4. Agoraphobia: The fear of crowded places or any place where a quick exit is not possible.
   

5. Claustrophobia: The fear of confined spaces (like elevators)

   

6. Coulrophobia: The fear of clowns. Seriously, WHO thinks clowns are fun?

   
   

    

7. Ophidiophobia (or Herpetophobia) The fear of snakes, which, if you live in the Land Down Under, where 9 of the 10 most venomous snakes in the world are found, makes good sense.

   

8. Aichmophobia (or Trypanophobia) The fear of needles or sharp pointy things that can stick a person.

   

9. Aviatophobia or Pteromerhanophobia: The fear of flying. Oddly, when you ask people what’s scary they often say they are afraid of the plane crashing, rather than the actual flying part.

   

10. Mysophobia: The fear of germs. It’s flu season, kids, cough and blow responsibly. And wash your hands.

    

What scares me? War, loud noises, large crowds that can squish me, and xenophobia (yes, I have a phobia about people who fear people from other cultures and places), but I am not afraid of elevators.

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A new, quick-witted, quip-heavy romance for grown-ups from Sandra Antonelli about facing your fears — because love is the greatest risk of all.

Levelheaded Olivia Regen walks away from her car-racing career and the wreckage of a bad marriage to take on new work that’s far removed from the twists of racetrack. Her new life is about control, calm and the good friends that she adores.

But her first task on her very first day involves getting up close and too personal with her claustrophobic boss, alone in a broken elevator. Her unconventional solution for restoring his equilibrium shocks them both and leaves Olivia shaken.

Determined to stick to her plan, Olivia drives headlong into work and planning her best friend’s wedding, leaving no room for kissing, elevators, or workplace relationships. But Emerson is not one to be out-manoeuvred. Can he convince Olivia that her fear of falling in love again is just another kind of claustrophobia – one that is destined to leave them both lonely?