Chocolate Quake

by Nancy Fairbanks

  “Later, the people in booking spent an inordinate amount of time asking me questions about my gang affiliations and my criminal record. On both counts I had little to offer, so I was turned over to someone who was trying to decide whether I might be psychotic or suicidal. I pointed out that, although not psychotic or suicidal, a woman my age might well drop dead from police harassment and lack of sleep.

  “They must have taken that suggestion seriously because they walked me up here for a disgusting breakfast, after which I insisted on taking a nap rather than attending a seminar on breaking a drug habit.”

  The guard had just announced that we had one minute left, so I asked for the telephone number of the lawyer.

  “I don’t see why you need that, Carolyn. What you should do is move into my apartment, where I can call you collect. You’ll be there awaiting word from me. Presumably, I can leave messages on my own answering machine, which you can retrieve, if you really have to go out.”

  “But how, if we’re not home and there’s no one to accept a collect call—”

  “I’ll purchase a phone card at the commissary if necessary. The telephone charges are outrageous. Over three dollars just for a connection and three minutes.”

  “At least tell me the name of the lawyer,” I begged, afraid it might have been erased from the answering machine.

  “There’s no need.”

  “Very well, Vera, I’ll tell Jason that you refused to let us help you,” I said sternly. “I won’t even tell him about the apartment and the phones.”

  My mother-in-law looked astonished. “Goodness, Carolyn, you just threatened me. I believe you’re developing a bit of spunk in your middle years. But don’t let that persuade you that you should wander around San Francisco trying to investigate this foolish mistake by the police. They can figure it out on their own. One of the homicide detectives on my case is a woman, so I’m quite optimistic—”

  “You gotta leave, ma’am,” said Deputy Kinesha Jones. On the other side of the glass, deputies were bearing down on Vera.

  “Her name,” I demanded in the voice I had used when the children were going through rebellious stages.

  “Just tell her, you old bat, so we can get her out of here,” snapped the deputy, but it was too late. The telephone had been yanked from Vera’s hand, and she was dragged roughly to her feet.

  “Well, never mind, honey,” said Deputy Jones. “I can get you her lawyer’s name. She ain’t much nicer with family than anyone else, is she?”

  “Thank you so much for your help,” I replied, and allowed myself to be escorted away.

  5

  Citizen Cake

  Carolyn

  Deputy Jones found both home and office numbers for the lawyer, Margaret Bryce Hanrahan. Quite an impressive name, I thought, hoping that her credentials would prove as impressive. First, I called her home number from a public phone booth on the first floor of the Hall of Justice and was told that Mrs. Hanrahan was at the center catching up on work she’d missed Wednesday and Thursday because she’d been passing a kidney stone. Well, that explained why she hadn’t come to Vera’s rescue Thursday night. Kidney-stone passage, as I understand it, is a very painful experience. Poor woman, I thought as I dialed her office number; and after such a debilitating experience, she’d gone right out the next morning to help Vera.

  When a booming, low-pitched female voice answered the telephone, I introduced myself and mentioned my visit to my mother-in-law in jail. “I thought I should talk to you as soon as possible since you are her lawyer.”

  “Well, phooey. When I heard your name, I hoped you were calling to say Vera wanted another lawyer.”

  “I’m afraid not.”

  “Ah well. Then we do need to talk. Since I’m in the mood for something sweet, let’s meet at Citizen Cake.”

  What a wonderful name. Perfect for a column. San Francisco had an Italian confectionery in 1849. Was Citizen Cake Italian? Or perhaps it would be like the confectionery shops in 1868 where wealthy women, elaborately dressed, stopped for a lunch of ice cream, cake, and gossip after a hard morning of shopping on Montgomery Street, San Francisco’s high-fashion boulevard.

  “Just catch a cab to 399 Grove Street. I’ll see you there in fifteen minutes.”

  “Thank you.” Would I be able to get there in time? When I finally found a cab three blocks away from the Hall of Justice, I promised the driver a good tip if he’d drive me to Citizen Cake as fast as possible.

  “Get in, lady,” he said. “I can see you’re having a snack attack.” And off we went. It turned out to be a short trip, but he did drive fast, so I gave him what I thought was a generous tip (he evidently didn’t think so) and carefully wrote the cab fare into my tax deduction notebook. I fully intended to write about whatever I had to eat, unless it was awful. In that case, I’d have to erase the cab expense. Would I have to pay for the lawyer’s meal, too? Well, if so, Jason could ask his mother for a refund. Of course, she’d refuse.

  The neighborhood was more industrial than high fashion, but the interior was tempting. I stood in the entrance to the right of the bar, looking for Mrs. Hanrahan and taking in the décor. Very modern. A pastry counter behind me full of luscious offerings. A long bar with high stools, bare wooden floors, large black pipes, raftered ceiling, rust-red walls, large windows looking out on greenery with occasional sheer white drapes combating sunlight, peculiar white plastic triangles hanging from the ceiling, and casually dressed employees. A tall girl in worn jeans was coming toward me when I heard, “Blue?” shouted in my direction.

  The owner of the voice had risen from a table by the window, waving energetically. Margaret Hanrahan was a very large woman, tall, stout, and bolster-shaped, weighing well over two hundred pounds. I needn’t have bothered with my conservative pants suit for her sake; she wore a long, moss-green, fringed dress with beads, and her hair was pinned around her large head in a thick, gray braid. As I headed in her direction, I found myself hoping that she didn’t appear in court dressed like that.

  Since Mrs. Hanrahan took the chair, I had to squeeze onto the bench seat behind the table and in front of a huge window. “Dessert first, business second,” she announced. Then she passed me the dessert menu, and ordered for herself: The “Mixed Berry Shortcake with Rosemary Ice Cream and Vanilla Syrup” and the “Seven Cookies.” The first was $8.50 and the second $7.00. I glanced over the menu and chose the “Hazelnut on Chocolate on Hazelnut on Chocolate.” It sounded wonderful, pot de crème, hazelnut ice cream, and espresso vinaigrette, $8.50.

  “Oh, what the hell,” said Mrs. Hanrahan to our waitress. “I’ll have the ‘Exquisite Tropical Parfait,’ too.” I glanced back up the menu. Her third choice contained coconut tapioca, mango bavarois, ginger gelee, and caramel, $8.00. There were only two other items on the menu, and I hoped that she wouldn’t expect me to order those.

  She didn’t. Instead, she asked if I wanted a sandwich since I’d only chosen one dessert. The waitress said they weren’t serving sandwiches yet. I asked if I could keep the menu. She looked at me askance but agreed. I asked if I could have a recipe for my newspaper column. She shrugged and said she’d consult with management.

  While we were waiting to be served, Mrs. Hanrahan told me that Vera’s case was a real problem, not the least of which was Vera herself. “She’s not taking this seriously. She thinks the police are going to realize she didn’t kill Denise and let her go, and in the meantime she’s going to do good work among her fellow prisoners and the jail guards. She’s already set her sights on two new clients that need my aid, as if I don’t have enough grief thinking about her situation.

  “Bad enough that someone killed Denise at the center, but to have our big-name consultant charged—well, it looks terrible. Bad publicity for us, bad for poor Denise who got killed, bad for me—maybe I’ll stick one of the rainmakers at my husband’s firm with Vera’s defense. That should make them sorry they never voted another woman after me into the partnership. They’re already
ruing the day I quit.”

  Mrs. Hanrahan had a laugh as ear-catching as her voice. When she let out a huge, delighted chortle over the pro bono complaints of her husband’s partners, heads turned all over Citizen Cake.

  “And of course bad for Vera. If she doesn’t get a grip, she’s going to find herself in the state prison instead of the San Francisco jail. I’m not sure which would be worse from her point of view.”

  “Have you ever tried a murder case, Mrs. Hanrahan?” I asked diffidently.

  “Call me Margaret. Of course I have, but always women killing men—spousal abuse, battered-wife syndrome. I’m good at those. Never had one with a woman killing a woman. Not that I think Vera killed anyone, but the evidence does look bad.”

  “What evidence?’

  Before she could answer, our desserts arrived. Mine was gorgeous, a tall, narrow tower of delicious-looking nuts and chocolate and whatnot. I was gazing at it with admiration when the plate gave a jump and the luscious tower toppled over. I experienced a moment of queasiness and glanced toward Margaret Hanrahan, who had started to consume, with gusto, the Exquisite Tropical Parfait. I noticed that her Mixed Berry Shortcake with Rosemary Ice Cream seemed to be put together somewhat haphazardly. “What happened?” I asked.

  “You mean the murder?” Margaret helped herself to one of the Seven Cookies, the one that was resting on the table.

  “The plates—jumped.”

  “Maybe we had a tremor,” she replied nonchalantly, putting the half-eaten cookie back on the plate and scooping up more of the parfait. Noticing that I seemed fascinated by her dessert sampling, she added, “I’m saving the shortcake until last.”

  “Tremor as in earthquake?” I asked, a tremor in my voice.

  “Goodness, dear, it was nothing. We’ve had five hundred or more since the mid-nineteenth century.”

  “I’m sitting by a big window. Isn’t that dangerous?”

  Margaret waved vaguely toward the other customers. “You don’t see anyone taking notice, do you? Now eat your hazelnut thing. It looks wonderful.” Then she gave into temptation and tried the disheveled shortcake with a sigh of delight.

  “What evidence?” I asked, trying not to look and feel terrified. The Hazelnut on Chocolate, etc., helped. Even in disarray, it was delicious. “She didn’t kill anyone, so there couldn’t be evidence that—”

  “Well, she was covered with Denise’s blood. Not that I saw her. Pictures, of course. The cops took pictures. But I didn’t see the real thing. I was passing a kidney stone at the time, which is, believe me, worse than giving birth, and then you don’t have anything to show for it. But that’s the last one, believe you-me. They’re going to put me in a bathtub and blast my kidneys with a laser. New technique. Turns a kidney stone to powder.”

  She’d finished off the parfait and two more of the cookies. “Besides the blood all over your mother-in-law, there was the argument. They had a humdinger—Denise and Vera—just that afternoon. Something about feminist books. Denise said there wasn’t enough money for a library of them. Vera got very shirty, as the English say. Lord, I could hear them all the way in my office, one section over and one floor up. And poor Denise. She doesn’t like to argue, and she only took over as the center’s accountant and fund-raiser because Myra Fox got breast cancer. Myra kept the books before she went under the knife, and Denise headed the Battered Women’s Advocacy.

  “So there you are. Discovered at the scene of the crime with the victim’s blood all over her after a nasty argument just that day, and then Vera admitted to the police that they were back on the subject of books in the office that night.”

  “No she didn’t,” I protested. “She told them Denise said the word books twice before she died. Vera didn’t say anything, except to call out for help when she saw that Denise had been attacked. Did they find the weapon?”

  “Not that I know of. If they did, they’ll have to say so on discovery.”

  “Well, how could Vera have used it, got covered with blood, hidden it, and then come back to help her victim? That’s both impossible and implausible.”

  “Very good point, my dear. Something the cops should look into. They won’t, of course. They think they’ve got their murderer.”

  “A small, elderly woman? That’s ridiculous. Couldn’t they tell from the angle of the wounds that someone taller did it? In fact, it had to be a man. What woman would kill another with multiple stab wounds?”

  “And with a big knife, according to my sources at Homicide.”

  “There. You see. Where would Vera get a big knife?”

  “Beats me. The kitchen?”

  “She’s not at all domestic.”

  “Good point. What’s your first name, dear?”

  “Carolyn.”

  She had finished off the shortcake and the other cookies as we talked and was draining her coffee cup, which had been refilled twice at her request. “Well, I’ll tell you what I’d do, Carolyn. I’d get a good private detective to look into who might have killed Denise if it wasn’t Vera. Unfortunately, the center doesn’t have a detective. We’re lucky to have a rent-a-cop at the front door. So I can’t provide one, and Vera would probably refuse if I could. However, I’m sure the city is full of them. The famous detective William Burns, who eventually had his own agency, was hired to help clear out our crooked politicians after the 1906 quake. Sometimes it takes a good shaking up to set things to rights in this town.”

  I hoped that she wasn’t wishing a major earthquake on the city, and I had to agree that my mother-in-law was unlikely to favor hiring a detective. However, I myself could ask questions at the center if the police weren’t willing to do so. In fact, I should probably talk to the police. Maybe I could convince them to investigate for me, which would leave me free to explore San Francisco, and its eating establishments.

  Margaret and I split the bill. Her suggestion, which was-n’t at all fair since she’d had three desserts and three cups of coffee while I’d had only one of each. But I guess it was better than being expected to pay the whole bill because she was offering free legal advice to my mother-in-law.

  Hazelnut on Chocolate on Hazelnut on Chocolate

  This recipe is complicated to make, but the end result is delicious. If you visit Citizen Cake in San Francisco, you can just order it and save the trouble. If, however, you have to prepare it yourself, take comfort. You’ll have not only the complete dessert, but also hazelnut custard and hazelnut ice cream if you don’t use it all.

  POT DE CRÈME

  • Bring 1 qt. heavy cream and 4 oz. whole milk to a simmer in a medium saucepan.

  • Whisk 6 egg yolks, 1 whole egg, and 1/4 cup of brown sugar together.

  • Mix a little hot cream mixture into the egg and sugar mixture; then, pouring slowly, mix the rest in.

  • Stir over medium heat until custard begins to thicken.

  • Pour over 12 oz. chopped bittersweet chocolate and 1/4 cup hazelnut paste (Nutella can be substituted). Stir until chocolate is melted into custard.

  • Pour into shallow dish or individual molds and chill until set.

  HAZELNUT ICE CREAM

  • Combine 24 oz. milk and 8 oz. cream in a saucepan with 8 oz. fresh roasted hazelnuts (roast in oven at 350 degrees for 12 to 15 minutes until browned) and steep for 1/2 hour or more.

  • Combine 7 oz. brown sugar and 6 egg yolks in a bowl and whisk together.

  • Pour hot milk/cream slowly, stirring, into the yolk mix.

  • Return to stove and cook over low heat until it begins to thicken.

  • Strain and chill.

  • Add 1 tsp. salt and 1 oz. brandy and churn in ice cream machine.

  ESPRESSO VINAIGRETTE

  • Whisk together 1 shot fresh espresso, 2 tsp. sugar, pinch of salt, 1 tbs. orange juice, and 1 tsp. lemon juice.

  • Slowly add 2 tbs. hazelnut oil and 1/4 cup canola oil to emulsify.

  CHOCOLATE CHOUX

  • Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

&nb
sp; • Drop to 350 to bake.

  • Combine 4 oz. whole milk, 1/4 tsp. salt, 2 tsp. sugar, and 1.5 oz butter in a saucepan and bring to boil.

  • Add 2 oz. flour and 2 tsp. cocoa powder all at once and cook as choux off heat.

  • Return to medium heat and stir with a wooden spoon until dough forms a mass.

  • Add 2 eggs, one at a time, and stir until smooth.

  • Pipe small discs , 2” diameter, on a baking sheet.

  • Bake 20 minutes and cool completely before using.

  BUILDING THE DESSERT

  • Place the choux on a plate.

  • Place a spoonful or quenelle shape of the pot de crème custard on this.

  • Place bittersweet chocolate shavings on the custard.

  • Place another spoon of custard on this and make an impression with the back of a spoon.

  • Place a small scoop of the hazelnut ice cream on this and garnish with fresh roasted hazelnuts and more chocolate shavings.

  • Drizzle vinaigrette around the plate.

  This delicious recipe was provided by Elizabeth Falkner, executive pastry chef/managing partner of Citizen Cake in San Francisco.