Here in New Zealand it is Christmas Eve, and I’m about to make the first of a number of celebratory salads for Christmas dinner. In honour of the role that food plays in our celebrations, I thought I’d post a piece about food. But if your characters manage to get through your work in progress without eating, perhaps you have a drink or even a foodless celebration to share with us.

Here’s mine, from Embracing Prudence. Not a celebration, but certainly food—with an added ingredient in one of the items:

She transferred the contents of the tray to a table beside Miss Diamond’s chair: the pot, a cup, a plate of neatly sliced ham, cheese, pickles, and bread, and a plate of tiny iced cakes. Madame watched and Miss Diamond sat compulsively eating one marzipan shape after another. “That will be all,” Miss Diamond said. “Dupont will serve me.”

Dupont followed Prue across the room and closed the door firmly behind her.

Would there be time to get into the book room while they were occupied? She could at least find out whether she could easily pick the lock with the tools she had been carrying in her apron pocket all afternoon.

She had just taken them from her pocket and bent to examine the lock when a loud scream from below sent her jerking upright then plunging back downstairs.