Giddy, I returned to the Jeep. “How are Miss Pargiter and her brother doing?”
“He’s got his caravan parked in her yard. I think he’ll be sticking around for a while. He’s getting old. He says he likes to travel, but with the weekend tourist crowd, this is as good a place for an artist as any.”
“Or at least as good a place where the parking is free.” I grinned.
“That too,” she said. “Joy seems to be making a go of it with the comic shop.”
“The customers are loyal. I doubt they much care who’s in charge as long as they get a steady supply of superheroes.”
“And pie,” she said. “Are you really going to stay open late next Friday for a game night?”
I shrugged. “My most faithful customers asked; I deliver.” The game night might bring new customers to Pie Town, and it had gotten us into the calendar sections of several local papers. I wanted publicity. Charlene and I had received zero credit for cracking the Case of the Bloated Bond. Shaw had ordered us to keep our mouths shut to the press. I’d gone along with the request, because Carmichael had asked me as well. I’m not sure why Charlene had agreed to it, but there were a lot more cops in Pie Town lately. I suspected she’d negotiated a quid pro quo.
“By the way,” I said, “your friend Loomis came in the other day and was asking about you.” Was romance in the air?
“Was he talking like a pirate?”
“Ye-es.”
“Delusional old fool.”
I sighed. So much for amour, but life was good. Instead of plotting how to evade the cops, I was plotting marketing campaigns. I had a home that was separate from my workplace. I’d off-loaded my wedding dress at the local charity shop. And most importantly, Mark and I were D-O-N-E done, even if he had developed an odd affection for Charlene’s cat. But Frederick had saved our lives.
Still, dissatisfaction niggled my insides. I had everything I wanted. I even had things I hadn’t realized I’d wanted. So what was the problem?
Charlene flipped the page of the newspaper. “That’s weird.”
“What’s weird?”
“Someone stole Old Man Rankin’s stuffed moose head.”
I sat down beside her and leaned closer, resting my hand on my thigh. “Only the moose head?”
“That’s what the crime report says. They broke into his condo and took the head.”
“A full-on break-in?” I asked. “That doesn’t sound like a kid’s prank.”
“You’ve read this rag’s crime blotter. It lacks detail. There’s no color. I’m sure there’s more to the story that they didn’t report.”
“Still,” I said, “it’s strange.”
“Very strange.”
“So . . . This Rankin guy—you know him?”
“He’s in my yoga class.”
“Is this a senior’s yoga class?”
She slapped the paper down and glared at me over her glasses. “What are you implying?”
“Nothing, nothing. You called him ‘Old Man Rankin,’ and that didn’t sound like the sort of person to bend himself into a pretzel for fun.”
“Yoga is an ancient art.”
“So do you know him well enough to ask him about his moose head?”
“Why?”
“Just because. It could be an interesting case, the sort of thing the police might not be able to devote resources to, especially with the city-wide conspiracies they’re dealing with now.”
Charlene draped Frederick around her neck. “We’ll take my Jeep.”
AND NOW, FANTASTIC RECIPES
FROM KIRSTEN WEISS
AND THE BAKERS OF PIE TOWN!
Recipes
Charlene’s piecrust recipe is top secret, but you can use premade crusts in the below recipes.
Spinach and Goat Cheese Totally Non-Murderous Quiche
Ingredients
1 T olive oil
2 cloves minced garlic
½ small red onion, thinly sliced
1 diced zucchini
10 eggs
2 C reduced-fat milk or almond milk
1 tsp fresh chopped thyme
1¼ tsp coarse salt
½ tsp fresh ground pepper
¼ C crumbled goat cheese
1 C chopped baby spinach
1 T grated parmesan
Baked, 9-inch piecrust
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
In a pan, heat the olive oil and sauté the garlic, red onion, and zucchini until just cooked through (from 6 to 8 minutes). Let cool.
Whisk together the eggs, milk, thyme, salt, and pepper. Unroll the piecrust along the inside of a 9-inch pie dish and crimp the edges. Layer the cooked vegetables on top of the piecrust. Top with goat cheese and baby spinach. Carefully pour the egg mixture over the vegetables and cheese and sprinkle with grated parmesan and more black pepper, to taste.
Set the pie tin on a rimmed baking sheet (to catch any spillovers!) and bake for 50 to 60 minutes, until the center is set. Remove from the oven and allow to cool for at least a half hour.
Serve warm or let it cool longer!
Gamer’s Cheesy Bacon Breakfast Pie
Ingredients
1 piecrust
2 C whole milk
4 large eggs
3 green onions, sliced
1 C shredded savory cheese (like Gouda or cheddar)
13 slices thick-cut bacon
2 C cooked diced potatoes, drained, or frozen hash
browns, thawed and drained
¾ tsp salt
¼ tsp freshly ground black pepper
Maple syrup for brushing
Directions:
Cook three strips of the bacon until crispy. Drain on a paper towel, then crumble once cool enough to touch.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the milk, eggs, salt, and pepper. Add the cheese, thawed hash browns (or cooked potatoes), green onions, and crumbled bacon. Stir and combine the ingredients.
Unroll the piecrust along the inside of a 9-inch pie dish and crimp the edges of the dough. Pour the milk and egg mixture into the piecrust.
Bake for 35 to 40 minutes. The quiche should be set enough to lay the remaining uncooked bacon on top but won’t be fully cooked yet. Remove the pie from the oven. Turn up the oven temperature to 450 degrees.
On top of the pie, weave the remaining ten bacon strips into a lattice. Lightly brush the top of each strip of bacon with the maple syrup. FYI: The bacon will shrink when it bakes, so it’s okay if the bacon hangs over the sides of the crust.
To prevent burning, cover the crimped edges of the piecrust with aluminum foil. Return the pie to the oven for an additional 10 to 15 minutes or until the bacon is as crispy as you like it. (If you like it really well done, you can stick it under the broiler—but keep an eye on it so it doesn’t burn!)
Remove the quiche from the oven, and carefully drain any bacon grease on top by slowly tipping the pie dish, or blot it with paper towels.
Allow to cool for five minutes before serving.
Pennsylvania Dutch Strawberry-Rhubarb Pie
Ingredients
2 premade piecrusts
3 C sliced strawberries
2 C diced rhubarb
1 C sugar
2 T kirsch
1 T tapioca
1 large egg plus 1 teaspoon water, for egg wash
Directions:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees F and line a sheet pan with parchment paper.
Mix the rhubarb, strawberries, sugar, kirsch, and tapioca in a bowl. Let stand for 15 minutes while you unroll one of the piecrusts inside a 9-inch pie dish.
Roll out the second piecrust onto the counter. With a ruler, mark off the crust every ¾ of an inch and cut into strips.
Fill the piecrust with the strawberry-rhubarb mixture. Starting on the outside edge, take the shortest strip of lattice and lay it on top of the pie. Taking every other strip of piecrust, gently la
y the first row of lattice across the crust, keeping each strip about ¾ of an inch apart. When you’re done with the first row, weave the remaining strips over and under the lattice strips on the pie. Brush with egg wash.
Flute the edge of the crusts by pinching your knuckle into the middle of the index and middle finger of your opposite hand and repeat along the edges of the crust.
Bake at 350 F for 45 minutes, until crust is golden.
Curried Turkey Potpie
Ingredients
2 9-inch piecrusts
¼ C butter
1 small onion, diced
1 celery stalk, diced
1 carrot, diced
½ tsp salt
¼ tsp freshly ground black pepper
2 C diced turkey
½ C diced russet potatoes, about 1 small
½ C frozen peas
¼ C all-purpose flour
1 C chicken broth
½ C half-and-half
1 to 1½ tsp curry powder
1 egg (to coat top of piecrust)
Directions:
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
Unroll the piecrust along the inside of a 9-inch, glass pie dish.
Over medium heat, melt the butter in a large skillet. Add the onion, celery, and carrots and cook until the onions are translucent, stirring occasionally so the vegetables don’t turn brown, about 10 to 15 minutes. Season the vegetables with salt and pepper.
Add the turkey, potatoes, and peas to the skillet. Stir, combining the ingredients.
Sprinkle the mixture with the flour and stir it to coat the vegetables and meat, cooking for 3 to 5 more minutes. Add the chicken broth and half-and-half to the skillet, and bring mixture to a boil, stirring frequently. Cook until mixture starts to thicken. It should take about 3 to 5 minutes.
Add curry powder to taste.
Remove skillet from the heat and allow the mixture to cool for five minutes.
Spoon the turkey mixture into the pie pan and roll the remaining round of pie dough on top. Around the lip of the pie pan, fold the two layers of pie dough under one another to make a thick edge of dough. Crimp the crust using fork tines (or flute the edge with your fingers, but I think crimping makes for a better seal).
Make five short cuts in the top of the piecrust to allow steam to escape. Whisk the egg and brush on the top layer of pie dough.
Bake the potpie for 45 to 50 minutes or until the crust is golden brown. It’s going to be hot when it comes out of the oven, so let the pie cool a bit before serving.
Keep reading for
a sneak peek at the
newest Pie Town Mystery,
Bleeding Tarts.
Coming soon from
Kirsten Weiss
and
Kensington Books
Chapter One
I gripped the pie box as the Jeep bumped along the winding, dirt road.
Charlene, my elderly piecrust specialist, yanked the wheel sideways. Her white cat, asleep on the dashboard, slid toward me and the Jeep’s open window.
One-handed, I steadied the cat, Frederick. Charlene believed Frederick was deaf and narcoleptic, so she carted him everywhere. I thought he was rude and lazy and didn’t belong on important pie-selling business.
Oblivious to Frederick’s near-sudden exit, Charlene hummed a western tune. The breeze tossed her white hair, its loose, glamour-girl curls shifting around the shoulders of her lightweight purple tunic.
Certain in the knowledge I wasn’t getting that tune out of my head in the near future, I sighed and leaned closer to the windshield. Roller-coaster fear mingled with optimism in a heady brew of nervicitement. We were zipping to a faux ghost town, as superexclusive as only an event site on the bleeding edge of Silicon Valley could be. The Bar X was so private, I’d only learned about it three days ago, and I’d been living in San Nicholas nearly nine months.
Now, not only was I going to see the old west town, but our pies would be featured in its charity pie-eating contest. If all went well, the Bar X would become a regular Pie Town client. If all didn’t go well . . . I didn’t want to think about it.
Frowning, Charlene accelerated, and gravel zinged off the Jeep’s undercarriage. “I don’t know why Ewan had to make the roads so authentically awful. Now, about our case–”
“Mrs. Banks is a lovely person.” I gripped my seat belt. “She buys a strawberry-rhubarb pie every Friday. But she’s a little distracted, and she’s not a case.”
“You mean you think she’s gaga. Not every old person is nuts, you know.” Her white curls quivered with indignation.
“I know.”
“She says when she buys groceries and brings them home, they disappear from her backseat.”
“Mrs. Banks is forgetful, and no,” I said before Charlene could object, “I don’t think all old people are forgetful. But she is. She might not have remembered to load the groceries into her car in the first place.” And the Baker Street Bakers, our amateur sleuthing club, didn’t have time for another tail-chasing case. I had my hands full with my real job.
Four months earlier, in a fit of sugar-fueled enthusiasm, I’d doubled Pie Town’s staff. Now the pie shop I’d put everything I’d owned into was barely scraping even. At the thought of the financial grave I’d dug for myself, nausea clutched my throat.
“I’ve researched Banks’s problem.” She veered around a curve, and my shoulder banged the passenger window. “I’m thinking fairies. They’re known thieves. I wouldn’t put a few bags of groceries past them.”
“It’s a well-known fact that there are no fairies on the California coast.” Or anywhere else, since they’re not real.
“You’re wrong there. There’ve been reports of fairy activity in the dog park. Of course, most people think it’s UFOs.”
“Right. Dog park. Because where else would they be?”
The late summer morning was already warm. I smelled eucalyptus and sagebrush and a hint of salt from the nearby Pacific.
“Or the cause might be ectoplasmic,” she said enthusiastically. “The groceries could be apporting.”
I struggled not to ask and failed. “Apport? What does that mean?”
“It’s when ghosts suck objects into another plane.” She made a whooshing sound. “Then the spirits make the objects reappear in different places in our dimension. I told her we’d stop by on Friday night and try out my new ghost-hunting equipment.”
I rubbed my brow. Right now I wouldn’t mind apporting to another plane. Our armchair crime-solving club was all in good fun . . . until Charlene left the armchair. “I really don’t think it’s a case.”
“We don’t know that. And it’s not as if you have other plans for Friday night.”
My cheeks heated, and I braced an elbow on the window frame. Charlene knew very well what I’d scheduled for Friday night. “Sorry, but Gordon and I are going on a date on Friday. Remember?” My insides squirmed with pleasure. It had been a long time since I’d been on a date—not since my engagement to Mark Jeffreys had gone kablooey earlier this year. Detective Gordon Carmichael and I had been dancing around going out for months, and it was finally happening.
“Are you sure it’s a date?” She quirked a white brow. “Not just two people getting together?”
“Of course it’s a date.”
“Because you two have been having a lot of not-dates.”
“We’ve been getting to know each other,” I said, defensive.
“Usually that happens on dates.”
“It’s the twenty-first century, Charlene.”
She grimaced. “Don’t remind me. Have you bought new knickers?”
“What?” I yelped.
We rounded a bend. Charlene cut the curve close and scraped the yellow Jeep against the branches of a young eucalyptus tree.
“You heard me,” she said. “You can’t be too prepared.”
I sputtered. “It’s only a first date!” Knickers? Who even talked that way anymore? It’s not like she
was from Regency England.
“High quality unmentionables—”
“Unmentionables?” Had we time traveled to the Victorian era?
“—are a confidence builder.”
And Charlene knew all about confidence. She’d been in the roller derby. Had scuba dived off the Great Barrier Reef. Even gone skydiving. And if it hadn’t been for her, there never would have been any Baker Street Bakers.
I hadn’t quite forgiven her for that.
“Besides, your date will be over by the time the ghost hunt starts. Things don’t really get going until midnight or one A.M.”
“And you know I have to be at work by five. If I’m not in bed by ten, I’m done for.” I yawned, thinking about it.
We trundled into an old west ghost town. Its single, dirt road was lined with ramshackle wooden buildings. Hills carpeted with low, green scrub cascaded from the east.
“I wonder where Gordon will take you,” she mused. “Your options are limited in a small town like San Nicholas. Maybe he’ll take you to the . . . Marla!” She slammed on the brakes, and I careened forward.
The Quiche and the Dead Page 26