Mystery Mail from Scranton

So, I'm only home like, one day before I get that oh-so familiar card in the mail indicating that there's a parcel at Ye Olde Post Office that needs to be picked up. Now normally something like that would absolutely make my whole damned day, but this time, it just made me suspicious. I wasn't expecting anything in the mail and I was frankly a little concerned about what it could possibly be.

It was with a hearty dose of wariness that I accepted the package from the smiling mail-chick. Nothing on the outside of the package indicated what it could be. And it was from Scranton! Scranton, of all places! What the...? I honestly was wondering if I had managed to piss someone in Scranton off enough that I was on the receiving end of some international hate mail.

I even went so far as to put the strange package in the trunk of my car rather than the seat beside me, as I was thinking that if it was some sort of anti-veg*n letterbomb that it would do much less damage from back there.

Once home, I sliced the edge of it open with exceptional care and attention, jumping back and away just in case a big tarantula were to crawl out and bite me. But guess what? I need not have worried. I sighed in relief to see that it was just a cookbook and not a poisonous animal.

And what a cookbook! It was a big, glorious book called "Love Soup" by Anna Thomas that I had been asked to review a few months ago and had forgotten all about. Silly me. Too much going on in my life, methinks.

Now, I confess that I rarely use cookbooks, with the exception of some baking. However, I have a disproportionate love of reading them, and I can tell you that this one is very entertaining. There are 160 different recipes, all vegetarian and mostly vegan. Most are for soup, but there's also quite a few recipes for shit that you eat with the soup. I haven't yet finished looking through it (I'm saving the second half for this afternoon, to be savoured in my sunny backyard with a glass of icy white wine) but I'll get back to you when I do. I'm definitely going to be test-driving some of these recipes.

Some sound delicious (like Spicy Black Bean soup with Sweet Peppers) and others make me want to gag just contemplating them. (Like Lima Bean soup. Anna, what the hell were you thinking with that one? Lima beans are the gaggiest of the bean family, and I'd rather gargle camel snot than eat one, not gonna lie.)

I'll be getting back to you about the recipes, but just from glancing through, I can tell you that the recipes are laid out in an easy-to-read way and are arranged in the book by type and the time of year you would normally eat them. Although, contrary beeyotch that I am, I think I'll make a nice winter soup first, just because....:0)

Well, that's it for me for today. I'm off to chill the Sauvignon Blanc and lay out the lawnbed. Later, gators....