B is the winner of Raquel’s audiobook! Watch for an email from her!
I’m delighted to welcome back Raquel V. Reyes! She is here today to celebrate the third book in her Caribbean Kitchen Mystery series Barbacoa, Bomba, and Betrayal. These books will make you long to be in Miami and eating everything she writes about! Look for a giveaway at the end of the post!
I write the Caribbean Kitchen Mystery series featuring food anthropologist Miriam Quiñones. Each book requires a lot of research as it includes historical, cultural, and culinary elements. Book three in the series, Barbacoa, Bomba, and Betrayal, is set in Puerto Rico. I lived on the island and met my spouse there. So, doing the research for the story was like a visit home!
As I write the story, I jot down all the dishes I mention. I do not know which ones I will include in the back of the book. After completing the manuscript and sending it to my editor, I take a hard look at the list. I’ll spend about a week developing and testing the recipes. There are criteria. It needs to be home-cook friendly—meaning no expensive equipment or Michelin Star chef techniques. The dish has a story that is either culturally/historically significant or personal. The ingredients are ‘relatively’ easy to acquire.
One of my favorite dishes in Barbacoa, Bomba, and Betrayal is Miriam’s Sorullitos. It is an appetizer/street food /snack. This is the introduction to the recipe from the book:
Sorullitos are sweet corn fritters. They can be made with or without cheese and are usually served with mayo-ketchup. The name translates to little cigar because the shape resembles the small hand-rolled tobacco.
Corn was cultivated in Puerto Rico by the Taíno, and there is evidence of it in the pre-Arawak Antilles since at least 2950 BCE.
The Miriam, in this case, is my mother-in-law. Yes, my main character is named after my angelic MIL, who is the polar opposite of the passive-aggressive MIL in the series. When it came time to write the recipe, I gave her a call and asked her how she makes her sorullitos. The recipe is pretty standard from one to the next. They all have butter, sugar, salt, water, milk, and pre-cooked corn meal. The trick to molding the fritters she shared with me is wetting your hands so the batter doesn’t stick to them. The savory yet sweet fried snack is delicious. I did not mind taste-testing that recipe!
Another perk of research is the cookbook library I’m building. Of course, I use the internet to find and compare ingredient and preparation differences. I also watch YouTube cooking demos. But nothing beats a GOOD cookbook. For me, that means the author includes the why and how of the dish. Why is it special? How did it come to be part of the culture? And the book must have photographs!
Readers: Do you have a favorite cookbook? What makes it special? Raquel is giving away an audiobook of Barbacoa, Bomba, and Betrayal. The audiobook will be on the audiobooks.com platform.
BIO:
RAQUEL V. REYES writes Latina protagonists. Her Cuban-American heritage, Miami, and Spanglish feature prominently in her work. Mango, Mambo, and Murder, the first in the Caribbean Kitchen Mystery series, won a LEFTY for Best Humorous Mystery. Her work has been nominated for an Agatha Award, an Anthony Award, optioned for film, and won a gold International Latino Book Award. Raquel’s short stories appear in various anthologies, including The Best American Mystery and Suspense 2022.
Find her across social media platforms as @LatinaSleuths and on her website LatinaSleuths.com
The Wickeds 
Raquel, Congrats on your recent book release. The only cookbook I can recall using a lot is the Betty Crocker Cookbook.
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Congratulations, Raquel! I’m going back to Puerto Rico on Wednesday to visit my son and his wife – I’ll look for sorullitos.
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Congratulations, Raquel! I use the heck out of Betty Crocker because it’s basic stuff and it’s my go to for “what temperature should I cook this roast at?” I do have several “pretty” cookbooks, including one for Thanksgiving and the MWA cookbook. I just don’t pull them out often because, well, I’m lazy. LOL
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congrats on the book. No favorite cookbook for me.
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Congratulations, Raquel! Classic books by Alma Lach and Julia Child on French cooking were longtime favorites of mine. Back when I actually did any cooking! I’ve turned to cookbooks on West African cuisine when I’ve wanted to duplicate meals I enjoyed in Senegal or Nigeria. My efforts were never as good as the original, alas!
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Welcome back! I love this–thanks for the inside information! I don’t have a favorite cookbook. What I use post is a binder of recipes I’ve printed out or ripped out of magazines.
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Congratulations! Can’t wait for the opportunity to read “Barbacoa, Bomba, and Betrayal”, which sounds fabulous.
My favorite cookbook is my own. After the death of our daughter and needing something to keep my mind busy, I started collecting family tried and true recipes and the stories behind some of them. My Mom’s recipes, my Granny’s recipes and those shared from friends through the years are all included. Thankfully I worked with Mom on getting the not so complete recipes down accurately into written recipes. Mom did a lot of cooking by sight, smell and taste with a pinch of this and dab of that. It took me watching Mom while cooking, taking bit poured in her hand and measuring them to write down and then experimenting with cooking to achieve getting them down correctly. After I had a written recipe, I would cook the dish and be corrected by Mom by taste to get it just right. Only then did they make it into my cookbook. Being an old Army brat having lived on base with about every nationality there is means there are a lot of handed down international dishes too. The end result was a large three ring binder with enough plastic sleeves containing two recipes each to fill it to the brim. I even made it like a lot of cookbooks having conversion charts, information about spices and old wife’s tales around cooking. The different categories are divided up (pasta, breads, meats, etc.). I dedicated the book to Jenet, our daughter. That Christmas I had three copies printed off and assembled. One for my Mom, one for hubby’s Mom and one for me. I am extremely happy that I made this cookbook and got Mom’s help in doing so before her Alzheimer took hold which would have made it all impossible and many family recipes lost forever. After the passing of my Mom, her copy went to my best friend that’s always been there for me. Hubby’s sister ended up with her Mom’s copy after her passing. Both tell me that they use my recipes often, which makes my heart soar.
2clowns at arkansas dot net
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Raquel: Thanks for sharing some insights into how you decide what foods and recipes to include in your delightful books! I enjoyed reading Barbacoa, Bomba & Betrayal. I have never tried Puerto Rican food. I never heard of culantro, either. I would love to eat mofongo and sorulittos some day!
My mom emigrated from Japan to Toronto, Canada in the early 1960s. All North American food was foreign to her. The Betty Crocker cookbook was her guide.
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One of the reasons I love cozies so much is for all of the food mentioned and the recipes included. I am still a new-ish cook and don’t have a favorite cookbook yet. I tend to rely on book/reader sites like this for ideas as well as online recipe sites. aprilbluetx at yahoo dot com
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My favorite cookbook has always been the Betty Crocker cookbook.
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Just a quick note to say that I love the cover of the new book. Especially the black and white cat! Please do not enter me in the giveaway as I don’t like audiobooks.
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Raquel Congrats on the new nre release. Looking forward to Miriam’s latest adventure. I love cookbooks. We have a bookcase dedicated to cookbooks.
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Welcome to the Wickeds, Raquel! My favorite cookbook is the one my grandmother made for me. it contains everything from old German recipes that go back generations to Campbell-soup infused casseroles from the 1960s. My second favorite is the one I’ve cobbled together from my mother’s recipes, my paternal grandmother’s, my mother-in-law’s and ones friends and family have given me along the way.
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I don’t have a favorite cookbook. I get most of my recipes online when I feel like cooking. Looking forward to reading your series.
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Congrats on the new release! My favorite cookbook is the one my grandmother hand written. She is no longer with us so this makes her cookbook is even more special to me.
Thanks for the chance!
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Puerto Rican Cuisine in America: Nuyorican and Bodega Recipes by Oswald Rivera is one of my favorite cookbooks. The recipes are very similar to the way my mom cooks.
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I love all the cookbook titles and stories!
Thank you all for the comments.
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