LESLIE BUDEWITZ: Happy Halloween! I hope you’ve enjoyed the treats we’ve offered the last couple of weeks, ranging from the sublime to the silly, from Pumpkin Soup to Vampire Cake and Spider Deviled Eggs! One thing we take seriously here in the Kitchen is the idea that food should be fun.
And boy, do these four-ingredient brownies fit that bill! I saw the recipe mentioned in the NY Times daily food blog and asked a friend who subscribes to get it for me. So glad she did.
If you’re still in need of a Halloween treat for the ghosts and goblins in your household, make a little vanilla icing and create a spiderweb or a few ghosts on top! Or serve with ice cream and a drizzle of blood – I mean raspberry syrup or jam!
Happy haunting!
Nutella Brownies
non-stick cooking spray
1-1/2 cups Nutella chocolate hazelnut spread (Is there any other brand?)
2 large eggs, room temperature
3/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
Heat oven to 350 degrees. Spray an 8-inch square metal pan, and line with parchment paper, long enough to hang over two sides for easy lifting.
In a large bowl, mix Nutella, eggs, and salt until smooth. Gently fold in the flour, just until the last white streak disappears.
Scrape the batter into the prepared pan. (It will not look like enough batter – don’t worry!) Bake 22 to 25 minutes, rotating halfway through, until the top is slightly crackled and puffed, and a cake tester or toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. As with any brownie, be careful not to overbake.
Cool in pan, then use the parchment paper to lift the brownie out of the pan. Cut and serve. Store tightly wrapped. These brownies freeze nicely.
To celebrate the 10th Anniversary of the Food Lovers’ Village Mysteries, my publisher is bringing out stand-alone editions of readers’ favorites from Carried to the Grave and Other Stories. The second selection, after An Unholy Death, is the holiday short story “The Christmas Stranger.”
Amid the holiday rush of keeping the shelves stocked and filling orders for the Merc, the grocery her family has run for more than a century, proprietor Erin Murphy treasures the way her tight-knit community of Jewel Bay seems to grow even closer during the Christmas season. And this year, when she slows down to do a simple favor for a mysterious stranger, he shows his thanks with a small, quiet gesture—a gift that changes lives, and so much more . . .
Available in ebook November 14, 2023 -- pre-order now!
BETWEEN A WOK AND A DEAD PLACE: A Spice Shop Mystery (Seventh St. Books, in paper, ebook, and audio)
From the cover:
It's the Lunar New Year, and fortunes are about to change.
Pepper Reece, owner of the Spice Shop in Seattle's Pike Place Market, loves a good festival, especially one serving up tasty treats. So what could be more fun than a food walk in the city's Chinatown–International District, celebrating the Year of the Rabbit?
But when her friend Roxanne stumbles across a man's body in the Gold Rush, a long-closed residential hotel, questions leap out. Who was he? What was he doing in the dust-encrusted herbal pharmacy in the hotel's basement? Why was the pharmacy closed up—and why are the owners so reluctant to talk?
With each new discovery, Pepper find herself asking new questions and facing more brick walls.
Then questions arise about Roxanne and her relationship to Pepper's boyfriend Nate, away fishing in Alaska. Between her worries and her struggle to hire staff at the Spice Shop, Pepper has her hands and her heart full. Still, she can't resist the lure of the Gold Rush and its tangled history of secrets and lies stretching back nearly a century.
But the killer is on her tail, driven by hidden demons and desires. As Pepper begins to expose the long-concealed truth, a bigger question emerges: Can she uncover the secrets of the Gold Rush Hotel without being pushed from the wok into the fire?
Leslie Budewitz is the author of the Spice Shop Mysteries set in Seattle's Pike Place Market, and the Food Lovers’ Village Mysteries, set in NW Montana. As Alicia Beckman, she writes moody, standalone suspense, most recently
Blind Faith. She is the winner of Agatha Awards in three categories: Best Nonfiction (2011), Best First Novel (2013), and Best Short Story (2018). Her latest book is
Between a Wok and a Dead Place, the 7th Spice Shop mystery.
A past president of Sisters in Crime and national board member of Mystery Writers of America, Leslie lives in northwest Montana with her husband, a musician and doctor of natural medicine, and their cat, an avid bird-watcher.
Swing by Leslie's website and join the mailing list for her seasonal newsletter. And join her on Facebook where she shares book news and giveaways from her writer friends, and talks about food, mysteries, and the things that inspire her.
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