Titus Ray Thriller Recipes with Short Stories Read online

  “You said your mother was Swiss, right?”

  “Right.”

  “You also told me she was in the jewelry business, right?”

  I nodded. “She and my father own a jewelry store.”

  “You must be lying about that. Only a Swiss chef could make a dish as delicious as this one is.”

  While I was relieved to hear he wasn’t accusing me of being a spy, I should have taken his observation more seriously, because several months later, I discovered he was working for VEVAK, the Iranian secret police.

  Perhaps, if I’d taken Amir’s comment more seriously, I would have been able to stop VEVAK from arresting my assets and rolling up my network in Tehran.

  Now, whenever I make this broccoli casserole, I think of Amir and the three months I spent in Tehran hiding out from the Iranian secret police.

  (You can read more about the time I spent in Tehran in One Step Back, the prequel to One Night in Tehran, Book I of the Titus Ray Thriller Series. I’ve also included an excerpt from One Step Back at the end of this recipe book.)

  * * * *

  Titus Ray’s Broccoli Casserole

  4 cups cooked, chopped broccoli

  8 oz. Velveeta cheese

  2 sleeves Town House crackers, crushed

  1 stick of butter, melted

  Place half of the broccoli in the bottom of a greased 2-quart casserole dish. Add a layer of sliced Velveeta cheese and half of the crushed crackers. Repeat the layer of broccoli, cheese and crackers. Drizzle the butter over the top of the casserole and bake at 350 degrees for twenty minutes until hot and bubbly.

  Serves 4-6 people, including a VEVAK agent.

  The Story Behind Titus Ray’s

  Sweet Scalloped Corn

  After my run into Caracas, Venezuela to capture Hezbollah assassin, Ahmed Al-Amin, I returned to Norman, Oklahoma. Although I would have preferred to be given another assignment, Robert Ira, the CIA’s Deputy Director Operations, refused to lift my medical leave and return me to active duty status.

  Since I’d recently purchased a large farmhouse outside of Norman, I decided to make the most of my forced medical leave by becoming better acquainted with Nikki Saxon, a detective in the Norman Police Department.

  I’d shared a little of my secret life with Nikki—nothing classified, of course—because she had considered me a suspect in a murder case a few weeks after my arrival in Norman. Since then, our relationship had developed into something more than just friendship.

  I didn’t know exactly where our relationship was headed, but after I arrived back in Norman, I called her up and invited her to dinner one evening.

  “I still can’t believe you’re a cook. Somehow, it just doesn’t jive with your career choice.”

  “Spies have to eat too, you know.”

  “So do cops, but I don’t know many who like to cook. Most of us just throw something on the grill or in the microwave when we come off duty.”

  “I do that too.”

  “What specifically is in your repertoire?”

  “Everything’s in my repertoire.”

  “Is that so?”

  By the sound of her voice, I knew my bragging had probably gotten me into some hot water. However, in my defense, I was just trying to impress the lady.

  “Well, then,” she said, “I promise I’ll come to dinner tonight, if you’ll make me some scalloped corn. My house mother used to make it for us every Christmas, and it’s one of my favorite vegetables.”

  When Nikki was three years old, she was placed in an institution called The Children’s Home after her mother was sent to prison for armed robbery. Since she’d never known her father, she’d spent her entire childhood being raised by foster parents.

  “I’ll be happy to make you some scalloped corn. See you at seven.”

  I’d never eaten scalloped corn in my life.

  I didn’t even like corn. The vegetable was totally unappealing to me.

  However, I dealt with this unappealing prospect the same way I dealt with an unappealing operation—by focusing on the aspects I liked and ignoring the rest.

  In the case of scalloped corn, I mixed up a whole lot of butter, an egg, a little milk, and some crackers. Then, I threw some corn into the mixture and poured it into a casserole dish.

  Evidently Nikki liked it. She had two helpings and called me “an amazing man.”

  After hearing her reaction, I decided I might learn to like corn after all.

  (You can read more about Nikki Saxon in One Night in Tehran, Book I in the Titus Ray Thriller Series.)

  * * * *

  Titus Ray’s Sweet Scalloped Corn

  3 cans whole kernel corn, drained (15.25 oz)

  1 sleeve Townhouse crackers

  1 can evaporated milk (5 oz)

  ¼ cup chives

  ½ cup melted butter

  1 egg slightly beaten

  ½ tsp. salt

  ½ tsp. sugar

  ½ tsp. paprika

  Parsley for garnish

  Combine all ingredients, except the garnish, in a large bowl and spoon into a greased casserole dish. Bake at 325 degrees for 25 minutes. If desired, garnish with parsley and extra paprika.

  Serves 4-6 people and one very beautiful detective.

  The Story Behind Titus Ray’s

  Featherbed Rolls

  After I returned from an operation in Beirut, Lebanon in 2010, the Agency enrolled me in L'Academie de Cuisine's Culinary School in Gaithersburg, Maryland. It was a crash course, and I spent less than two weeks there. However, my handler, Douglas Carlton, assured me it was all the training I would need for my new assignment as an Executive Chef at a hotel in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

  Six months earlier, the United Arab Emirates had allowed Amir Badawi, a terrorist who had spent three years at the U.S. military prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to return to the UAE.

  Within a couple of months, Amir had resumed his terrorist activities laundering money for Al-Qaeda. When I was assigned to Operation Model Prisoner, Asad Badawi was living the good life at the Dubai International Hotel.

  Despite that, the Agency had no plans to capture Asad again. Instead, my assignment was to install a software program on his laptop to monitor all his banking transactions. The Ops Center assured me installing the program would take less than two minutes.

  First, though, I had to get access to his laptop.

  Asad loved American cuisine, which was why he’d chosen to live at the Dubai International Hotel. The hotel had a chef who specialized in American cooking, and Asad had arranged for him to prepare all his meals.

  When the American chef suddenly came down with food poisoning, the Agency made sure I was temporarily hired to fill his position. I felt sure I could handle the job. Asad’s tastes sounded pretty simple, and I figured I could cook up any entree he ordered.

  However, when he called down to the kitchen and asked to speak to the new American chef, he said he had a special request.

  “Make me some of that bread,” he said.

  “Sure. What kind of bread is that?” I asked.

  “Soft bread like they served at Gitmo. They called them rolls, and they were as light as the featherbed I sleep on here at the hotel.”

  “Okay, I’ll make you some featherbed rolls.”

  I hadn’t attend the culinary school long enough to learn bread making, but I’d often seen my mother make homemade rolls, so I was pretty sure of the process. I just hoped the rolls would be as soft as Asad’s featherbed.

  Later that evening, I personally delivered Asad Badawi’s meal to his suite on the tenth floor. Then, while he was devouring the rolls, I stuck a thumb drive in his laptop, and, within a couple of minutes, the Agency began downloading Al-Qaeda’s financial transactions.

  When the American chef returned to the hotel after his illness, I gave him the recipe for my Featherbed Rolls. As far as I know, these dinner rolls are still being ser
ved at the Dubai International Hotel today.

  (Read more about a Hezbollah deep-cover operative who had a meeting with an Iranian general in Dubai in Book III of the Titus Ray Thriller Series, Three Weeks in Washington.)

  * * * *

  Titus Ray’s Featherbed Rolls

  2 cups water

  1 cup vegetable shortening

  5 cups flour

  2 packages dry yeast

  ½ cup sugar

  3 tsp. salt

  2 eggs

  Place water and shortening in a small bowl and microwave until shortening is melted—about 3 minutes. Set aside to cool. (In order for yeast to work properly, mixture should not be used until it has cooled down to 125 degrees or lukewarm. Temperature can be measured by using a candy thermometer.)

  Mix together 2 cups of the flour with yeast, sugar, and salt. Add the lukewarm mixture to the flour mixture and beat with electric mixer until smooth. Add eggs and beat well. Add remaining flour and mix well. Dough will be of a sticky consistency.

  Cover bowl and refrigerate overnight. Knead dough on a floured surface. Grease muffin tins. Depending on the shape of bread desired, place 1-3 round balls of dough in each tin. (Three balls in each muffin cup will make a cloverleaf roll.) Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.

  Recipe yields two dozen bread rolls or enough to satisfy a hungry terrorist at a Dubai hotel.

  The Story Behind Titus Ray’s

  Texas Baked Beans

  Like most recruits, when I joined the CIA, I was sent to Camp Peary, the Agency’s training facility in Virginia, often referred to as “The Farm.” After undergoing several months of intensive training in all aspects of the clandestine life, I was sent to the field.

  Although I transferred to the Middle East several years later, my first assignments were in Latin America. After a brief stint in Mexico, I landed in Nicaragua, where my operations officer and I were tasked with organizing the oppositional rebel forces against the socialist Sandinista regime.

  However, we weren’t operating in the jungles of southern Nicaragua, where several of our fellow operatives were involved in training the anti-government forces. Instead, we were stationed in the capital city of Managua, where our mission was to bribe the judges and politicians, hoping they’d start supporting the rebel forces.

  Although I wasn’t living in the jungle for several weeks at a time, my accommodations in Managua weren’t exactly luxurious. Still, I knew I had it a lot better than my fellow officers who seldom got to eat a decent meal or take a hot shower.

  When Sam Wylie, one of the CIA officers training the rebel forces, arrived in Managua one night, he crashed in my hotel room. I’d set up a small makeshift kitchen in one corner of the room, and I offered to cook him a hot meal.

  Wylie, who was from Texas and never let anyone forget it, said, “Shoot, Titus, I’d eat an armadillo stewed in its own juices, if it was hot.”

  “I’m fresh out of armadillo today, Sam. Would you like to suggest something else?”

  “You’re not fooling me, Titus. You’re a Yankee dude, so I know you’ve never eaten armadillo before.”

  Even though I was from Michigan, I didn’t think that qualified me as a “Yankee dude,” but I didn’t argue with Wylie about my place of birth or my choice of protein.

  “I could broil you a steak,” I said.

  “Not as good as armadillo, but I’d eat it.”

  “Anything else you’d like to have with that?”

  “Yeah. Could you fix me some beans? Not some sissy green beans. I’m talking about some good hearty beans.”

  In a moment of sheer stupidity, I said, “Sure. I’ll fix you some Texas baked beans.”

  He laughed. “Texas baked beans? You’ve got to be kidding me. I’m the only one here who can decide whether or not they deserve that title.”

  In the time it took Wylie to take a hot shower, I came up with my recipe for Texas baked beans, which Wylie later called Yankee Dude Baked Beans.

  No matter what Sam Wylie called my baked beans, he couldn’t get enough of them, and, years later, when I met up with him in Caracas, when he was the CIA chief of station in Venezuela, he was still talking about them.

  (Read more about Sam Wylie and how he and Titus worked together to capture Hezbollah assassin, Ahmed Al-Amin in Book II of the Titus Ray Thriller Series, Two Days in Caracas.)

  * * * *

  Titus Ray’s Texas Baked Beans

  or Yankee Dude Baked Beans

  2 cans Ranch Beans (15 oz)

  2 cans Bush brand Baked Beans (16.5 oz)

  1 tsp. liquid smoke

  ½ cup ketchup

  ½ cup brown sugar

  4-6 strips uncooked bacon (optional)

  Mix all ingredients together except the bacon strips. Pour mixture into a large greased casserole. Place bacon strips on top and cook at 325 degrees for 2 hours.

  Feeds 6-8 people or a Yankee Dude and his Texas friend.

  The Story Behind Titus Ray’s

  Dark Chocolate Cake

  As a new Agency recruit, I had to spend several months at Camp Peary, a 9,000-acre training facility outside of Williamsburg, Virginia. To insiders at the CIA, it was known as “The Farm.”

  The Farm was where I met Olivia McConnell.

  She wasn’t in my core group, but I couldn’t help but notice her, when all the trainees were brought together for their once-a-week training event. Olivia was at least six-foot-tall and had short black hair framing a beautiful heart shaped face.

  Until we were paired up during the Drivers’ Obstacle Training (DOT) course, I’d never spoken to her.

  When the instructor called out our names, Olivia immediately walked over to me and said, “I’m sure you’ll insist on being in the driver’s seat.”

  “What makes you think that?”

  “You’re a man, aren’t you?”

  “Obviously.”

  “Well, I’m a woman. Do you have a problem with that?”

  Even though I assured Olivia her gender wasn’t a factor with me, she didn’t seem happy with my response.

  Later, I learned Olivia wasn’t a happy person—period.

  After the DOT course, I avoided her.

  However, through a series of circumstances, Olivia decided I was destined to be her friend—the one friend she had in the whole world—and it didn’t matter whether or not I was okay with that.

  Olivia lived on coffee and little else. I’d never seen her eat much of anything, which was why I was surprised when she asked me if I would bake her a chocolate cake during an operation in Pakistan.

  The two of us were in Karachi, along with several other operatives, to recruit a banker named Minz Fauzan, a Pakistani who had pledged allegiance to Al-Qaeda.

  Things hadn’t gone exactly as planned.

  Although Olivia had tried to develop a relationship with Fauzan—she had secured temporary employment at the bank where he worked—he hadn’t been the least bit interested in her.

  When Olivia brought up the chocolate cake, the Ops Center was within days of calling off the mission.

  “Make me a chocolate cake,” she said.

  “Why would I do that? You never eat desserts.”

  “Why do you always have to be so stubborn?”

  “I’m not being stubborn, Olivia. I’m being practical. Making you a chocolate cake would be a waste of time.”

  “It’s not for me. Tomorrow is Fauzan’s birthday, and I just found out he loves chocolate cake.”

  “Seriously? You think this operation can be saved by a piece of chocolate cake?”

  In the end, I relented and baked a cake for Minz Fauzan. It wasn’t easy. The safe house where the team was holed up had an oven that only worked half the time. But, as things turned out, it was worth the effort. Minz Fauzan eventually became a reliable asset and helped the Agency locate millions of dollars in Al Qaeda funds.

  (You can read about Olivia McConnell’
s friendship with Titus Ray in Book II of the Titus Ray Thriller Series, Two Days in Caracas, and find out how Olivia’s life was changed forever in Book III, Three Weeks in Washington.)

  * * * *

  Titus Ray’s Dark Chocolate Cake

  3 cups brown sugar, packed

  1 cup butter, softened

  4 eggs

  2 tsp. vanilla

  1 tbsp. baking soda

  ¾ cups baking cocoa powder

  ½ tsp. salt

  2 ⅔ cups flour

  1 ⅓ cups sour cream

  1 ⅓ cups boiling water

  Cream brown sugar and butter together. Add eggs, one at a time. Mix on high until light and fluffy. Blend in vanilla. In a separate bowl, combine soda, salt, cocoa, and flour. Add dry mixture alternately with the sour cream to egg mixture. Stir in water until blended together. Pour into four 8-inch baking pans, which have been oiled and floured. Bake at 350 degrees for 35 minutes. Cool for 10 minutes and remove from pans to wire racks to cool completely.

  FROSTING:

  1 ½ cups chocolate chips

  ¾ cup half & half or evaporated milk

  3 sticks of butter cut into tablespoons

  4 cups powdered sugar

  Place chocolate chips, milk, and butter in saucepan over medium heat. Stir constantly until thick (5-6 minutes). Remove from heat.

  Whisk in sugar until smooth. Place saucepan in ice water and beat with mixer until smooth consistency (4-5 minutes).

  Serves 10-12 people and entices a Pakistani banker to become a CIA asset.