Daughter of Fortune

Isabel Allende

………

HARPERCOLLINS, 1999

(available in paperback from HarperTorch, 2001)

SET IN VALPARAISO, Chile, in the early 1800s, Daughter of Fortune is the story of Eliza Sommers, an orphan raised by spinster Miss Rose, her brother Jeremy, and Mama Fresia, the Indian housekeeper and nanny. When Eliza falls in love with Joaquín Andieta, a clerk who works for Jeremy, her appalled caretakers make plans to ship Eliza off to England. Instead, she stows aboard a ship to follow her lover to California, where he has gone, hoping to make his fortune panning for gold. The story takes Eliza and her traveling companion, Chinese doctor Tao Chi’en, through a region swept by gold fever and dotted with brothels. Her adventures, and the end of her search, bring Eliza to a realization about what she truly seeks.

Eliza grows up in Chile but lives “in exile” in America for much of Daughter of Fortune. The tastes and smells of food and the art of cooking link Eliza to Chile. Early on, we learn that Eliza “had a rare culinary gift: at seven, without turning a hair, she could skin a beef tongue, dress a hen, make twenty empanadas without drawing a breath.” Although Miss Rose considers Eliza’s culinary interest a waste of time, Eliza is not deterred. By fourteen, Eliza’s cooking skills have surpassed those of Miss Rose and Mama Fresia: “She could spend entire days grinding spices and nuts for tortes or maize for Chilean cakes, dressing turtledoves for pickling and chopping fruit for preserves.”

SPICED TURKEY EMPANADAS

It is no surprise, then, that Eliza puts the skills honed in childhood to work in her adopted country. When she and Tao Chi’en move to Sacramento in pursuit of Joaquín Andieta, Eliza sets up an empanada business. Her cooking reminds panhandlers of family dinners far away, just as the empanadas bring Eliza closer to the only home she has ever known. Allende understands Chileans’ vast devotion to their homeland and its foods. In her memoir, My Invented Country (Perennial, 2003), Allende writes, “If Marco Polo had descended on our coast after thirty years of adventuring through Asia, the first thing he would have been told is that our empanadas are much more delicious than anything in the cuisine of the Celestial Empire.”

Empanadas are small meat pies that can be made with a variety of meats and spices. When beef becomes scarce in Sacramento, Eliza experiments with other meats, such as venison, hare, wild goose, turtle, salmon, and even bear. We are partial to spiced turkey and give you our own filling recipe below. The dough recipe comes from Richard Visconte, Isabel Allende’s friend and caterer, who has prepared empanadas with this flaky crust for parties at Allende’s home overlooking San Francisco Bay. The recipe appeared in Coastal Living magazine (November/December 2003).

Serve with a salad of baby greens, fresh ripe tomatoes, and your favorite vinaigrette.

For the filling

2 tablespoons canola oil

1 tablespoon butter

¾ cup finely chopped onions

¾ cup diced red bell pepper

3 teaspoons minced garlic

¾ pound lean ground turkey or chicken

¼ cup chicken broth

¾ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon ground cinnamon

¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper

¼ teaspoon ground cumin

3 tablespoons raisins

10 pimento-stuffed green olives, sliced

1 medium tomato, diced

For the dough

5 cups all-purpose flour

1image cups vegetable shortening, softened

2 teaspoons salt

image–¾ cup ice water

3 hard-cooked eggs, peeled and chopped

1 egg yolk, beaten with a little water

  1. Preheat oven to 450°F. Line a baking sheet with foil.

  2. To make the filling: Heat the oil and butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the onions and bell pepper and sauté 2 minutes. Add the garlic and continue to cook until onion is soft. Add the turkey and sauté until cooked through. Stir in the broth, salt, cinnamon, cayenne, cumin, raisins, olives, and tomato. Cook a few more minutes until most of the liquid is absorbed but the filling is still moist.

  3. To make the dough: Combine the flour, shortening, and salt, using a fork or pastry blender until the mixture is crumbly. (Mixture should have small lumps.) Sprinkle image cup ice water, 1 tablespoon at a time, evenly over the surface; stir with a fork until the dry ingredients are moistened. Add a little more water if necessary.

  4. Shape the dough into a ball, then roll it out to image-inch thickness on a lightly floured surface. Using a cutter or the top of a glass, cut the dough into 4-inch-diameter circles.

  5. Place 1 tablespoon of filling in the center of each dough circle. Add 2 pieces of chopped egg on top of the filling. Moisten the edges of the dough with water. Fold the dough over the filling, and pinch to seal.

  6. Brush each empanada with egg-yolk wash. Transfer to a baking sheet. Bake for 18 minutes or until golden. Serve hot.

Yield: About 2 dozen empanadas

image   NOVEL THOUGHTS

A Boulder, Colorado–based book discussion group, Women of the West Book Club meets monthly at the Boulder Public Library to discuss books by or about western women. (By “west” they mean west of the one hundredth meridian, a common demarcation line running roughly from the middle of North Dakota through the middle of Texas to distinguish the western United States from the eastern United States.) The group ranks Daughter of Fortune among its top five books. The variety of places and people that the main character, Eliza Sommers, encounters on her travels speaks to the West’s cultural and geographic diversity. “The broad sweep of history and the protagonist’s experiences were delightfully rich,” says Jeannie Patton. “Following her adventures gave us plenty of opportunity to explore aspects of western history.”