The Feast with Adam Gottlieb (Adam, Don't Read This Post, until after Our Lunch)

11/6/2016

Adam Gottlieb playing his guitar, Epworth United Methodist Church Chicago.

Today is the day! Adam Gottlieb is coming over to talk about the anthology and editing/publication timeline. I am so excited!

I have to keep this post short because I am going to prepare a feast (Adam, don't read the rest of this post, please.) I also have to clean the house, which surprise, hasn't happened yet. (He arrives in a short five hours, and we have a parent teacher conference at 9:30a.m. today. No pressure, no pressure.)

One of my other life joys is cooking: I tend to be creative in the kitchen because I have been cooking since I was eight, and in my household, having parties and cooking for 40 was the order of the day. My only training has been watching my mom in the kitchen, for years; then cooking on my own when I left for college; and a home economics class in Jr. High (where I learned how to make pancakes and other goodies).

Here is what is on the menu (remember that Adam is vegan, NOT vegetarian. he just messaged me. thank goodness.):

Jesusa's (a delicious vegetable egg patty with carrots and red sauce. They are so good, I named them after myself.)
Potato patties
Cheese egg souffle for us
Reconstituted chiles rellenos in a garlic caldo, sin queso
Vegetable chalupas
Mexican Rice
Beans
Water and/or coffee

The meal is a tad egg heavy because I have to work with what I got, and I forgot to buy tofu, but that is so cliche. I actually love tofu, and eat a quarter of it before I prepare it, so this absence is for the best. The only real change will be not to put egg on his chiles, but they will taste good, too.

Well, I'm off to scrub and clean. My adorable husband is passed out; this fall back situation is not helping, but it is Sunday. Plus, he works so very hard watching the kids, that he should sleep in every now and then. I just wish it weren't today!

Here's to great meals with friends and a little creative Mexican fusion in the kitchen (and bedroom. ha ha ha, with my husband, of course. see results below.)

My morning buddy, Simona in the hood! At least I have one helper.

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Dr. Jesú Estrada,
Chicago, IL

I grew up on the outskirts of Yuma, AZ, close to the Cocopah reservation. Because I was ever-bored, I became an avid reader of Spanish comic books and anything in English. Then I moved onto Steinbeck and Stephen King and now read international authors like Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Atwood, and Marouf. I also read a lot of coming of age fiction.

I have been writing stories in both Spanish and English since I was six years old. My fiction and poetry focus on working class issues, primarily about laborers in the Southwest. I also write non-serious fiction, like zombie fiction (I was into it before it got popular with the Walking Dead series, which I love) and dabble in magical realism with a fusion of cuentos and folklore.

I have a Ph.D. in Rhetoric and Composition from Washington State University, a Masters Degree in English from Indiana University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelors of Arts from Northern Arizona University. I have also taught creative writing, and will do so, spring 2017. Currently, I live in Chicago and teach full-time at Harold Washington College to an amazing student population.

More about me. I am happily married, been so for over eight years, and have a fabulous seven-year-old who makes my life phenomenal: He too is starting to write short stories. I recently had a second baby, Simona, which put a temporary set-back on the publication of my first book, but made my life infinitely more wonderful. My husband is also incredibly supportive, and I have enlisted him to market whatever I do that is worth marketing.

That damned itch just won't let me be, so I'm back to my original love of words.