Where were we? Ah, yes: last time we spoke, I had just arrived in Seattle. I am now home, tired but happy, and I thought I would share a few more thoughts and highlights from the final week of my US book tour, between Seattle and San Francisco.

Sharpie. In under two weeks, I managed to go from not knowing what a Sharpie was — this brand of marker doesn’t exist in France — to being very particular about the Sharpie that I used: if it’s a fine point, I need it to be brand new, otherwise the line is too thick; if it’s an extra fine point, I need it to have a bit of mileage, otherwise the line is too thin.

Bookplates. Before I left New York, my publicist gave me a bundle of bookplates, a.k.a. ex libris — in my case, just blank stickers with a small Broadway Books logo at the bottom. This turned out to be a smart move (unsurprisingly so, for my publicist is a smart person) because we usually ran out of books to sell at the different events. The last people to arrive would look disappointed that they couldn’t get a copy, until I whipped out my stack of stickers and said, in my consolation prize voice, “Would you like me to sign a bookplate for you?” To which most people responded with a vigorous nod, and asked if I could sign one for their sister-in-law and their best friend, too.

A chef’s take on my recipes. About half of the events of the tour were booksigning dinners or lunches, i.e. meet-the-author events hosted at restaurants, during which our guests could eat, drink, and mingle. The chef could — but didn’t have to — plan the meal around recipes from the book, and a large part of the fun for me was to see what they’d done with them. They all did a great job, obviously, and after my initial feeling of relief (1- the guys in the kitchen do not smirk at me; 2- the food tastes great), I relished it when they took creative license with the dishes and made them their own.

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I am writing this post from above the clouds, somewhere between Chicago and Seattle*. I am about halfway through my book tour, and because I’m all for sharing the behind-the-scenes details, I thought I would tell you a bit about the life of a touring author.

Media escorts. In each city that I visit, a media escort has been hired to accompany me: this is someone who knows the area well, who has my schedule, and who drives me from one engagement to the next so I don’t have to worry about taxis or driving directions.

This person (man or woman — it’s not that kind of escort) can sometimes act as a food stylist, too, if there is a TV appearance scheduled, and usually makes a point of showing me the sights and sharing little bits of trivia as we drive around, which I really appreciate. I had no idea such a job existed and I don’t know how well it pays, but it strikes me as a rewarding occupation, which allows you to meet engaging authors (present company not included) and attend a variety of events — in any case, the ones I’ve met seemed quite happy.

Schedule. The events listing is really just the tip of the book tour iceberg: in addition to these engagements, the goal of a book tour is also to reach out to the local media — television, radio, or print — and get a chance to spread the word about the book.

You’ve read about my segment on the Today Show, and I am scheduled to appear on KNTV‘s Bay Area Today sometime between 10 and 11am this Thursday Friday, but I’ve also had a chance to visit a few radio studios, which I’ve always found mysterious and cool and fascinating, for some reason, but had never realized were that chilly (note to self: don’t forget the sweater). As for the print media, journalists either choose to attend a booksigning event, or we have a one-on-one conversation that usually takes place in the bar area of my hotel, which makes my life easier.

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As some of you have already reported, my cookbook was featured on the Today Show* this morning — you can view the segment online. This was my very first television experience, and it was a fun, fascinating, and rather nerve-racking one: I’ll admit I didn’t sleep so well the night before, and the jetlag can’t have helped.

But the segment was so short — just three and a half minutes — that it was over before I had time to even realize it had started, so the part I enjoyed the most was the peek behind the scenes (the brand-new kitchen set; the so-called “green room” — not green at all — where assorted guests eat cookies as they wait for their turn; the make-up room, from which they emerge with glossier lips, shinier hair, and a heart that beats noticeably faster) and the advance prep work.

Because I was a guest from (way) out of town, a food stylist named Deb was to prepare the food that would be shown during the segment. I had been in touch with her and the segment producer a couple of weeks before, to decide which recipe I would be demonstrating (the Two Tomatoes and Parmesan French Toast) and what other dishes would be displayed as beauty shots on the set (the Very Chocolate Cookies, the Zucchini Carpaccio, the Pan Bagnat, and the Cumin Cheese Puffs).

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[Carrot and Peanut Muffins]

In the interminable list of blessings that come with having a food blog is this one: readers will come forward and share their favorite recipes with you.

I am always honored to receive these gifts and the stories that are delivered with them, and even though I seldom get around to making the dishes (my epitaph will read, “So Many Recipes, So Little Time”; I’ve left instructions), they do contribute to my inner culinary landscape. I file them away in my bulging stash, complete with donor information so I can give proper credit if and when I take the recipe for a ride.

Today’s muffins were born from such a contribution, a recipe sent to me recently by a San Francisco-based, Spanish reader named Alex, who has come up with the formula to reproduce a carrot and hazelnut cake he had tasted at a tea parlor in Barcelona.

I’ve adapted the recipe a bit (“She Could Not Leave A Recipe Alone,” my tombstone will read also, in smaller letters), baking it as muffins instead of a cake, substituting ground peanuts (bought from an Ivorian shop the other day) for the ground hazelnuts, decreasing the amount of baking powder, using Olivier Roellinger’s poudre équinoxiale spice mix in place of lemon zest, and just adding the whole eggs to the batter instead of incorporating the stiff-beaten egg whites separately.

The latter two changes were for convenience’s sake: I had no lemons and, because I was baking these as a short diversion from my work, little time. The batter was quick and easy to assemble — no mixer or elbow grease needed — and the resulting muffins just the sort of gratification I needed on an industrious Saturday afternoon: the size of a child’s fist, they were moist, lightly crusty, and full of warm flavors, which bloomed even further over the next few days, as the muffin tops softened.

It occurred to me that there were distinct similarities between these muffins and my flourless orange and ginger cake (the proportions are comparable, and the grated carrots and boiled oranges play a similar part in the texture), which makes me think that one could omit the flour from these muffins.

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