LONE STAR LITERARY LIFE: I understand that you are a seventh-generation Texan, Lisa. What do you know about the early generations of your family?

LISA FAIN: My family settled in North Texas in the 1840s, and they were primarily farmers until my grandparents’ generation. My great-great-great-great-grandfather John Coffman arrived from Tennessee with a headright for 1,000 acres in the Peters Colony, which is part of Collin County today. He was the first person in the area to have a wood-burning stove, and people would come over just to see it in action. Another great-great-great -great-grandfather, Elisha Chambers, was known as Tater Chambers because loved to grow sweet potatoes. Food has clearly played an important role in my family’s history! What’s cool is that my grandma today lives on land that’s been in the family since my ancestors first arrived, and we’ve been continuously growing things on that land since that time.

You grew up outside of Houston. Was it in a small town, suburb or "in the country"? What was that like, and how did that influence your life as a writer?

While I was born in Dallas and my family is from that area, when I was nine my dad got a job in Houston so we moved there. I grew up in the northwest suburbs, but they were on the outer reaches of the city and that area back then straddled the line between rural and suburban. I went to Cy-Fair High School, which in the late 1980s was the last stop before the town of Hempstead on Highway 290. There was nothing but farm land surrounding the school at that time, so seeing how much that area has developed since then still surprises me.

It was a typical Texan school experience in that every Friday night in the fall was spent at a football game, and there was lots of pride in our team. I still get goosebumps today whenever I hear a marching band, and I’ve used some of those memories in my work. Likewise, growing up close to Galveston gave me an appreciation for seafood and coastal culture, and I also would spend summers at my grandparents’ farm in North Texas and before I learned how to drive a car I learned how to drive a tractor. My family liked to go into Houston proper on the weekends to visit museums and see films and theater, so I also got my fair share of culture. I feel fortunate that I had exposure to many different facets of Texan life and I think this has given me much to draw from when writing.

Where did you attend college, and what did you study? What was your first job out of college?

I went to Austin College, in Sherman, Texas, and I studied English and Spanish. My first job out of college was interning at the Houston Press and waiting tables.

What made you decide to move to New York?

Ever since I was a little kid I’d been fascinated by New York City, mainly due to Sesame Street and the book From The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. To me, it seemed like the most glamourous, exciting place on earth, and when I visited for the first time in 1978 when I was nine, my thoughts were confirmed. I loved the energy, tall buildings, and attitude, though I wouldn’t return until I was twenty-five. It was then that I got a job managing a children’s bookstore on the Upper West Side and I was thrilled. That said, while New York had many wonderful things, it didn’t have good Texas food, and thus began my obsession with recreating the tastes of home.

So you moved to New York in 1995, then. When did you start the Homesick Texan blog, and what kind of reaction did it get?

When I arrived in New York and realized that it was difficult to find the building blocks of Texan cooking such as chili powder, tortillas, and salsas, I had to learn to make do if I wanted to eat Texas food and share it with my new friends. So, for instance, I could find whole dried chile peppers, so I started to cook with them instead of chili powder when making chili and enchiladas. I also taught myself how to make tortillas from scratch, and I came up with a way to make queso that wasn’t reliant on the usual ingredients of Ro-tel and Velveeta, which were difficult to find.

In 2005, blogging took off as a popular pastime, and so I started one to share with my family and friends my experiences as being a Texan in New York. At that time, I was a magazine editor, and while I’d always enjoyed cooking, I’d never thought about writing about my time in the kitchen. But the blog provided an opportunity to share stories about Texas through the lens of food, which was a lot of fun. I had no ambitions when I began except to have a creative outlet, but people besides my family started reading the blog and it just started to take off and receive attention.

What was your first break as a cookbook author?

In 2010, after my blog had been named one of the top 50 food blogs in the world by the Times of London and best regional food blog by Saveur Magazine, literary agents started to approach me. I met one woman from Houston who had had recently sold a book by a fellow blogger, and we just clicked so I decided to work with her. I wrote my proposal over a weekend and it sold quickly, so I quit my editor job and started working on my first book. It was a whirlwind time, as I not only wrote the book but also photographed it, and only had seven months to complete the manuscript.

I know a lot of cookbook authors struggle with the idea of calling themselves writers, but most cookbooks these days are vignettes of stories as well as recipes, and their creators are definitely writers. When did it start to "feel like" you were an author?

Well, I’d always wanted to be a writer (and even have an unpublished novel buried in a drawer), but it wasn’t until I wrote about food and Texas that people started to want to read what I wrote!

Can you tell us about your latest book?

My latest book is called Queso! Regional Recipe for the World’s Favorite Chile-Cheese Dip, and it’s a single-subject exploration of the beloved Tex-Mex appetizer. I became obsessed with queso when I first moved to New York and had such a hard time finding Ro-tel and Velveeta, which are the classic building blocks of home queso. So, I had to learn alternative ways to make the dish and in doing that recipe research I learned there was a whole world of chile con queso beyond processed cheese and canned tomatoes. I became obsessed and started reading anything I could find on the subject and amassed a large database of recipes and lore, so when I learned there wasn’t a book on the subject yet, I decided to write one. I could go on for hours about this, but in the book, I cover the history of chile con queso, classic Tex-Mex chile con queso, Mexican and border-styles of chile con queso, quirky chile con queso, and queso in the wild, which is queso being used as an ingredient, such as a gravy on chicken-fried steak.

When this publishes, it will be Christmas Eve. For the Homesick Texan, what Texas dishes say Christmas — and can you tell us about some of the holiday food traditions in your family? Do you have maybe, just maybe, a favorite recipe that you can share?

My family loves to serve Tex-Mex and sweets at the holidays, so an abundance of those two things say Christmas to me. For instance, we begin Christmas Day by eating my mom’s baked green chile eggs while we unwrap gifts, then for dinner we’ll have a Tex-Mex feast, so there will be chips and salsas, tamales, chili, enchiladas, beans, rice, and salad. For dessert, there will be a host of homemade treats such as candy, like pralines and divinity, cookies, like my mom’s famous raspberry bars, and there will usually be a fruit cake on hand, too. Sometimes, my grandma will also make a seasonal pie, such as lemon. And throughout the day, we’ll snack on snack mix, spiced nuts, and seasoned oyster crackers. Nobody goes hungry!

What's next for The Homesick Texan?

At the moment, I’m working through a couple of new book ideas and in the process of redesigning my blog. I’m also toying with the idea of moving back to Texas, at least part time. As much as I enjoy New York, Texas is still and will always be my home.

DIVINITY

Recipe by Lisa Fain from The Homesick Texan Cookbook

used by permission of the author

3 cups sugar

1 cup water

1⁄2 cup light corn syrup

2 egg whites, at room temperature

11⁄2 teaspoons vanilla extract

1⁄4 teaspoon kosher salt

1 cup chopped pecans

2 teaspoons finely grated orange zest

Line two baking sheets with parchment paper and lightly grease two dessert spoons.

In a tall pot, stir together the sugar, water, and corn syrup. Insert a candy thermometer into the pot and cook over high heat, while stirring, to bring the syrup to a boil. Turn the heat down to medium-low and continue to cook until it reaches the hardball stage, 250°F, or when a small amount of the syrup turns into a hard ball when dropped into a glass of cold water.

Meanwhile, with a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat the egg whites on medium speed until soft peaks form, 3 to 5 minutes.

When the syrup reaches 250°F, remove from the heat. With the stand mixer on medium speed, slowly pour the syrup over the beaten egg whites. The egg white mixture will just be a dark thick liquid at first, but continue to beat until it begins to thicken and turn white, 3 to 5 minutes. At this point, add the vanilla, salt, pecans, and orange zest. Continue to beat until the mixture is thick and no longer glossy. From the moment you pour in the syrup to this point, it can take anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes.

Once the divinity candy is no longer glossy, turn off the mixer. Scoop out about a tablespoon-size portion of the candy with one of the greased spoons and use the other spoon to slide it onto the parchment paper. It should not be shiny and should easily form into a cloud-shaped mound. Work quickly, because the candy will begin to harden in the mixer as it cools. Don’t worry if it does get too hard; you can add a little bit of warm water and beat it for a few seconds to make it soft again.

Let the divinity rest until no longer sticky, about 1 hour. It will keep in an airtight container for 1 week.

VARIATIONS: When you stir in the egg whites, you can also add dried fruit and/or shredded coconut.

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