1 cup yellow cornmeal
2½ teaspoons sugar
¾ teaspoon salt
¼ cup all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon baking powder
1 large egg
1 tablespoon vegetable oil, plus approximately 
–½ cup for frying fritters
½ cup buttermilk
………
SCRIBNER, 2009
(available in paperback from Scribner, 2010)
IN THIS quasi-fictionalized treatment of the life of the author’s grandmother, Lily Casey Smith, we meet a frontier spirit who lived long after the American frontier had faded into history. A ranch wife, bush pilot, bootlegger, horse breaker, and mother, Lily was born in 1901 in a one-room dugout near the Pecos River in West Texas. As Walls paints it, it was not a home for the faint of heart: all kinds of creatures made their way through the mud walls and ceilings, including a rattlesnake that dropped onto the table during a memorable Easter dinner. Lily’s father simply lopped its head off and resumed carving the ham.
Self-reliance and hard work were a way of life, even for young children, in the hardscrabble of West Texas. By the age of five, Lily was helping her father train carriage-horse teams and driving into town to sell eggs. At one point, the family’s dugout collapsed in a flood and their next home was destroyed by a twister, so, like the native tumbleweed, the Smiths rolled into New Mexico.
By age eleven, Lily was practically running the family ranch with little help from her mother, who saw herself above such work. By fifteen, she’d tamed a wild mustang and ridden off 500 miles to a teaching job in the small town of Red Lake, Arizona (it was the beginning of the First World War and many certified teachers had left the classroom for factory work). She relished both her freedom from the labors of ranch life and her independence. But when the war ended and those teachers returned to the jobs, Lily headed for Chicago, married, divorced, and eventually came back to Red Lake where she met her second husband, who would become the author’s grandfather.
The Smiths weathered the Great Depression working as managers of a huge cattle ranch. Life was spare and hard, and Lily tried to impart to her daughter (Walls’s mother, Rose Mary) that most people don’t get to do whatever they want in life, a lesson Rose Mary and her husband, Rex Walls, spent their lives trying to disprove. As recounted in the author’s first book, The Glass Castle, the Wallses lived a rootless, itinerant, and utterly unconventional life. In Half Broke Horses she travels a generation further back to add another layer to a portrait of three generations of extraordinary, irrepressible Smith women.
Lily Casey Smith’s cooking was basic. Beans and steak were her specialties and she kept her recipes simple: cook, and salt to taste. In describing her cooking, Lily says, “I didn’t make dishes the way fancy eastern housewives did, soufflés and sauces and garnished this and stuffed that. I made food.” She recalls the one time she served homemade cottage cheese to her family, which required two days of effort and was quickly wolfed down by her family. Lily decided it was “the biggest waste of time” and couldn’t believe she had “worked so long over something that was gone so quickly.”
Lily’s ranch fare inspired some excellent book club recipes. James Waldron of Lebanon, Pennsylvania, concocted cowboy hash for his Food for Thought Book Club’s potluck discussion of Half Broke Horses. “I thought of the scene in which Lily makes dinner for the cowhands by scraping up beef and vegetables, throwing them into a pot and cooking it,” says Waldron. “The recipe seemed to match the description in the book.”
1 tablespoon canola or vegetable oil 1 pound lean ground beef 2 tablespoons Homemade Taco Seasoning (see below) ½ cup water 2 cups corn kernels |
3 ½ cups (total approximately 28 ounces) ranch-style or chili-style canned beans Cornbread Fritters (see below) Shredded Mexican blend cheese for topping (optional) Sour cream for topping (optional) Hot sauce for topping (optional) |
Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Sauté ground beef until browned, then drain fat.
Add taco seasoning and water and stir.
Add corn and beans, stir, and bring to a boil; reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer for 10 minutes.
Serve over Cornbread Fritters (see below). Top with cheese, sour cream, and/or hot sauce, if desired.
Yield: 4 to 6 servings
1 tablespoon chili powder 1 teaspoon paprika 2 teaspoons ground cumin 1 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon onion powder |
¼ teaspoon garlic powder ¼ teaspoon dried oregano ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper ¼ teaspoon ground black pepper |
Mix ingredients in a small bowl.
Yield: About 3 tablespoons seasoning
When Lily first sets out on her own, she meets Priscilla, who is half-Navajo. Priscilla mixes Lily’s cornmeal with some fatback to make Indian cakes, which she cooks on a heated rock.
We paired cowboy hash with a recipe Deborah Prozzo of Forestville, Connecticut, prepared for her Book Bites Book Club. While researching “cowboy food” for her meeting, Prozzo came across many recipes for cornbread. “The fritters seemed more authentic to the book because Lily kept the cooking basic,” says Prozzo. “I could picture her making this simple recipe.”
1 cup yellow cornmeal 2½ teaspoons sugar ¾ teaspoon salt ¼ cup all-purpose flour ½ teaspoon baking powder |
1 large egg 1 tablespoon vegetable oil, plus approximately ½ cup buttermilk |
In a medium bowl, stir together cornmeal, sugar, salt, flour, and baking powder. In a small bowl, beat together egg, oil, and buttermilk. Stir liquid mixture into dry ingredients. Mix well.
Heat approximately –½ cup vegetable oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Drop batter by tablespoonfuls into hot oil, flattening slightly with spatula. Fry until lightly browned on both sides, approximately 2 minutes per side. Drain fritters on paper towels and serve hot.
Yield: About 2 dozen small fritters
NOVEL THOUGHTS
The College Street Book Club of Toronto had one of its more animated discussions when the group met to discuss Half Broke Horses.
“We wondered how much creative license the author took in telling the very entertaining story of her grandmother,” muses Christine Taranco, a member of the club. “Some of the situations were so far-fetched, yet if true, her grandmother truly was a remarkable woman, and way ahead of her time. What surprised us was the independence and freedom this woman had: She traveled across the desert on her own on her horse without incident. She disciplined school children and was a strict schoolmarm yet couldn’t discipline or raise her own children properly!”
To enhance their discussion, the evening’s host served a black bean soup, guacamole, and fennel-and-citrus salad, “a Tex-Mex theme reminiscent of the southwestern locations in the book,” adds Taranco.
The men and women of the Food for Thought Book Club in Annville, Pennsylvania, share food at each meeting, and explain how these foods connect to the book they are discussing. “It’s fun to hear how creative everyone gets in making their foods relate,” says Stacy Foley. “Each dish might be a food mentioned in a book, a food based on the author’s home country or state, or a dish that’s a play on words, such as tuna salad ‘catch of the day’ on rye for The Catcher in the Rye. It’s become a monthly literary gourmet feast, of both tomes and treats!”
“One of the best features of our book club is that we all contribute something to eat every month,” says Pat Mecham. “I love the potluck nature of it.”
Their Half Broke Horses menu included foods mentioned in the book: watermelon, herb biscuits, cowboy hash (see recipe), and sparkling peaches, a concoction of frozen peaches and 7-Up. Cristin Edwards made her favorite bean dish. “Lily made beans and it seemed like a great, simple recipe for someone on a ranch in the middle of nowhere,” explains Edwards. “You had to use whatever you had on hand at the time.”
“In Half Broke Horses, Lily kept cooking simple,” says Betsy Lasch of the Book Bags of New Prague, Minnesota, “and our menu was absolutely delicious and so simple, just like Lily’s cuisine.” The Book Bags enjoyed steaks on the grill, Lily’s baked beans, and Lily’s peach crisp.
The Book Bags choose a wine with a title and label that fits the book they are discussing, as well as the food. “We paired Half Broke Horses with Wild Horses, a great Cabernet Sauvignon,” adds Lasch.