Frying Bread

When I got to the kitchen this morning, I detected the delightful aroma of frying bread somewhere in the neighborhood. If you haven’t experienced that, take another look at the DVD of “Julie and Julia.” Early on, Julie is frying chunks of a specialty bread, as she rhapsodizes about the glory of butter. When they are golden brown, she tops them with chopped tomatoes, and we don’t see what else, but perhaps some cheese, and of course, herbs, and then she probably puts them under the broiler a few seconds. As her husband wolfs these down, he talks with his mouth full and says, “This is good!”

Such a scene makes you want to go to the kitchen and prepare the same delight. But you don’t, for you know there is no butter in the house, and you know, butter is the ingredient that makes this feast delicious.

The houses in this subdivision are well insulated. Nevertheless, cooking smells often permeate the area at least as far as to the next house. Last winter, almost every work-day evening, around 9:00, I knew someone was heating up a frozen entrée, often of turkey. I wanted to put that person into a story, with the female protagonist going out into the snow to find the poor soul who has come home after a long day’s work, and has only a frozen entrée to heat up for his supper. She wouldn’t make herself known, for after all, she doesn’t know everyone in the subdivision, and she might have some surprises. It is enough for her to know who is tantalizing her taste buds. If she should be a writer, she might even concoct more to the story: yes, while the man lets his food get cold, she may learn he is also making a bomb in his kitchen. Here, in this nice neighborhood? The suspect is a business man, owner of a hardware store! If that writer’s name is really James Patterson or Robin Cook, she will really get into trouble and may not live to get out of this house again. For a while, that is. She doesn’t get rescued; she must get herself out of this mess.

Why do readers always ask, “Where do you get your ideas?” when zillions of them are floating around in your brain? The dilemma is which to choose. (That thing in your brain is called imagination. If you don’t have tons and tons of that, you’d better get out of the kitchen.)

“Kitchen” reminds me of why I wrote this. The sense of smell is not used enough to help detect crime in our fiction. I don’t mean smells of horror—which dominate plots well enough—but ordinary odors that could inadvertently lead to the bad stuff.

Why not fry yourself some chunks of bread in butter now and see if anyone comes smelling around. You may meet someone exciting. ♥