Berry Smoothie #Recipe by Maya Corrigan

When I wrote my first culinary cozy mystery, I had no expectation of writing more than three books and no idea that I'd end up including more than fifty recipes in the books. I’m putting the finishing touches on my 9th Five-Ingredient Mystery and as usual I’m testing recipes at the last minute before the manuscript is due. 

In A Parfait Crime I needed to get my sleuth, Val, to a gala open house at a fancy spa, where some nefarious things are going on. Val isn’t the type to visit a high-end spa, so I had to give her a catering gig there. She’s hired to run a smoothie bar at the spa’s grand opening festivities.

Needless to say, one of the recipes in the book, which comes out in 2023, has to be for a smoothie. As someone who enjoys chewy and crunchy food, I’d never tried smoothies though there’s a chain eatery devoted to them less than a mile from my house. Today I’m passing on a recipe for a delicious berry smoothie. It turned out so good that I'll make it again and try other homemade smoothies. Before selecting the flavor, I checked out recipes for different kinds of smoothies, including many made with kale and a Greek salad smoothie with tomatoes, cucumber, Kalamata olives, and feta cheese. A dessert smoothie appealed more to me, but the vegetable ones would be healthier.

This recipe makes two small smoothies or one big one. I used an immersion blender to make it. You can easily double or triple the recipe, but you'll have to use a standard blender or make the smoothies in batches. The restaurant near me that features smoothies often makes them with fruit sherbet. This recipe calls for sorbet, which has less fat and a stronger berry flavor than sherbet. 

Ingredients

10 ounces of raspberry sorbet

1/3 cup milk (I used 2% milk but any kind of milk or a vegetable-based milk alternative like Ripple would work.)

4 ounces of plain Greek yogurt (or any kind of plain yogurt)

1/3 cup fresh or frozen raspberries

1/3 cup fresh or frozen blueberries

Adapted from a blueberry smoothie recipe on bellyfull.net

The instructions are simple: Put all the ingredients in a blender and whirl them until the smoothie is the consistency you like.

I made the smoothie in the container that came with my immersion blender

Pour the mixture into glasses and serve with or without a straw.

Do you enjoy smoothies? Any favorite flavors?

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Maya Corrigan writes the Five-Ingredient Mysteries featuring café manger Val and her live-wire grandfather solving murders in a Chesapeake Bay town. The 8th book in the series, Bake Offed, comes out in November 2022. Maya lives in a Virginia suburb of Washington, D.C. Before writing crime fiction, she taught American literature, writing, and detective fiction at Northern Virginia Community College and Georgetown University. When not reading and writing, she enjoys theater, travel, trivia, cooking, and crosswords.

Try a Five-Ingredient Mystery for Halloween . . .

CRYPT SUZETTE: ​​When a murder masquerades as an accident, Granddad's ghost-busting and Val's foray into a haunted house turn up clues to the killer. 

THE TELL-TALE TARTE: When Val serves a dessert at a book club dinner, she uncovers a fraud that embroils her and Granddad in a murder among deadly serious Edgar Allan Poe fans. 

Visit my website for easy recipes, mystery history and trivia, and a free culinary mystery story. Sign up there for my newsletter. One subscriber wins a free book each time I send a newsletter.

Follow me on Facebook.

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Quick Breads History by Maya Corrigan Potluck Monday

Photo by Craig David via Pixabay

Bread was leavened with yeast for most of human history, but alternatives to yeast became popular in the last few centuries. Native Americans introduced settlers to pearl ash, a yeast alternative. The first American cookbook writer, Amelia Simmons, included bread recipes made with pearl ash (potash) in her American Cookery. Published in 1796 and reprinted multiple times in the following decades, American Cookery isn't just the first cookbook published in the U.S., but probably the one with the longest title.

Library of Congress 

Pearl ash, which didn’t dissolve easily and or work well for batters with a lot of fat, was largely replaced in the mid-19th century by baking soda and baking powder. These products gave rise to quick breads (pun intended).

Unlike yeast, baking powder and baking soda react immediately when exposed to a liquid, so you don’t have to wait for the dough to rise. In fact, you’re supposed to bake quick breads as soon as you combine all the ingredients. Irish soda bread is one of the original quick breads, dating back to the 1840s, when baking soda was introduced into Ireland.

Here's a selection of quick bread recipes from the Mystery Lovers' Kitchen archives. Several of them are perfect for the Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas holidays.

Coffee Can Pumpkin Bread by Jenn McKinlay

Lemon Zucchini Bread by Valerie Burns

Krista Davis’s raspberry quick bread

Thanksgiving Irish Soda Bread by Sheila Connelly

Savory Quick Bread shared by Lucy Burdette

Coffee Can Pumpkin Bread

Raspberry Quick Bread

Savory Quick Bread

What is your favorite quick bread? Mine is banana nut.

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Maya Corrigan writes the Five-Ingredient Mysteries featuring café manger Val and her live-wire grandfather solving murders in a Chesapeake Bay town. Maya lives in a Virginia suburb of Washington, D.C. Before writing crime fiction, she taught American literature, writing, and detective fiction at Northern Virginia Community College and Georgetown University. When not reading and writing, she enjoys theater, travel, trivia, cooking, and crosswords.

Halloween is on the horizon . . .

CRYPT SUZETTE: ​​When a murder masquerades as an accident, Granddad's ghost-busting and Val's foray into a haunted house turn up clues to the killer. 

THE TELL-TALE TARTE: When Val serves a dessert at a book club dinner, she uncovers a fraud that embroils her and Granddad in a murder among deadly serious Edgar Allan Poe fans. 

Visit my website for easy recipes, mystery history and trivia, and a free culinary mystery story.

Follow me on Facebook.

📚

Salmon with Pesto #recipe by Maya Corrigan

We eat salmon often and we make a lot of pesto with the basil from our community garden plot. This recipe combines salmon, basil pesto, and a crust of breadcrumbs and Parmesan cheese. The salmon came out moister than plain baked salmon, probably because the pesto blanket added oil and flavor while the fish was cooking. 

A note on the pesto: When our basil leaves are ready to be picked, we make enough to freeze. I made this dish once with defrosted pesto and once with freshly made. It came out well both times. The recipe I based this on suggested pesto in a jar from the supermarket.

Ingredients

10-12 ounces of salmon filets

2 Tbsp fresh, frozen, or store-bought basil pesto

1/3 cup breadcrumbs

1/3 cup finely grated Parmesan cheese

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

Line a baking pan with foil or parchment paper, and place the salmon filet on it. 

Mix the breadcrumbs and cheese together.

Spread the pesto on the salmon. Top it with the breadcrumb mixture. 

Bake for 10 minutes or until done to your likeness. Baking time will vary depending on the thickness of the salmon and your own tastes. 

Do you like basil? If so, what's you favorite way to use basil?  

📚

Maya Corrigan writes the Five-Ingredient Mysteries featuring café manger Val and her live-wire grandfather solving murders in a Chesapeake Bay town. Maya lives in a Virginia suburb of Washington, D.C. Before writing crime fiction, she taught American literature, writing, and detective fiction at Northern Virginia Community College and Georgetown University. When not reading and writing, she enjoys theater, travel, trivia, cooking, and crosswords.

Halloween is on the horizon . . .

CRYPT SUZETTE: ​​When a murder masquerades as an accident, Granddad's ghost-busting and Val's foray into a haunted house turn up clues to the killer. 

THE TELL-TALE TARTE: When Val serves a dessert at a book club dinner, she uncovers a fraud that embroils her and Granddad in a murder among deadly serious Edgar Allan Poe fans. 

Visit my website for easy recipes, mystery history and trivia, and a free culinary mystery story.

Follow me on Facebook.

📚

Tarte Tatin #Recipe by Maya Corrigan

In honor of Edgar Allan Poe's birthday this week (Jan 19th), I'm sharing a recipe for tarte Tatin from my 4th Five-Ingredient Mystery, The Tell-Tale Tarte. When my sleuth Val caters a dinner for a book club discussing a novel set in Paris, she serves a French apple tarte. The dessert exposes the truth about a crime, as the tell-tale heart does in Poe's story of that title.

I'd eaten tarte Tatin in a French restaurant, but never made it myself until I had to come up with a recipe to include with my mystery. My first step was to read half a dozen recipes from reliable sources. The recipe I found most helpful was "Foolproof Tarte Tatin" by Julia Moskin, The New York Times, October 22, 2014. Though I use the same ingredients, I changed the recipe to cook the apples before adding the pastry. I also altered the cooking time on top of the stove and in the oven.

In a previous post, I showed how to make a personal tarte Tatin, an easy dessert. The full-sized version of this upside-down apple dessert isn't easy or quick, but it's well worth the effort. It's the most daunting dessert I've ever made because it requires turning a hot cast iron skillet upside-down to release the baked tart onto a platter. 

Have you ever tried making a daunting dish?

Ingredients

6 - 8 large apples, peeled, cored, and quartered (A mix of Granny Smith and Honeycrisp apples works well.)

6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) softened unsalted butter

2/3 cup sugar

1 frozen puff pastry sheet (defrosted according to package instructions)

Equipment: a seasoned 10-inch cast-iron skillet

INSTRUCTIONS

Slice the bottom off each apple to give it a flat base. Peel and quarter the apples lengthwise and remove the cores.

TIP: Cut the apples 1 - 3 days before making the tarte to dry them out. Otherwise, you may end up with too much juice in the tarte. Put the cut apples in a lightly covered bowl in the refrigerator. However, if you don't have time to let the apples dry out, put a piece of foil on the wire rack under the skillet when it goes in the oven to catch any drips. 

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees when ready to cook. The apples cook first on top of the stove and then in the oven. They go into the oven twice, first without the pastry on top, and then with the pastry on.   

Spread the butter on the bottom and sides of the seasoned 10-inch cast-iron skillet and sprinkle the sugar evenly on the bottom.

Arrange the apples vertically in the skillet, standing them on the flat end, in concentric circles. Pack the pieces close together so they support one another. Apples that stick up higher than the pan rim will shrink down as they're cooked.

Cook the apples you've placed in the skillet over medium high heat, 15 - 25 minutes until the juice is bubbling and a deep golden or light brown color.

Put the skillet in the oven and bake the apples for 20 minutes at 400 degrees (F).

Prepare the pastry while apples are baking: roll out defrosted puff pastry on a floured surface until it is 1/8-inch thick. Put a 10-inch plate upside-down on the pastry and use a sharp knife to cut out a circle the size of the skillet's top.

Once the apples are ready, lay the pastry circle over the apples, and tuck it around the apples. cover them with the pastry circle.

Put the skillet in the oven with the pastry on top and bake for 20 minutes at 400 degrees (F).

Remove the pan from the oven, 

The raw pasty on top of the apples 

Bake the tarte at 400 degrees until the pastry is browned, approximately 20 minutes. Check it after 15 minutes to make sure it doesn't get too dark. You want the crust to be a nice golden brown. If it still looks pale after 20 minutes in the oven, bake it a few more minutes.

The pastry after baking

FINAL STAGES

Move the skillet to a rack and cool at least 10 minutes and up to 30 minutes. If the tarte stands longer than 30 minutes after being baked, heat it over low heat for 1 - 2 minutes before turning the skillet over.

Put a cutting board or platter over the skillet. Use potholders to hold the skillet tightly against the board or platter. Turn the skillet upside-down. If apples stick to the skillet, add them to the top. 

Cut the tarte in wedges and serve warm with vanilla ice cream or whipped cream, or just eat it plain.

Serves 8

The top of the tarte Tatin after inverting it

I made this tart in the final hours before The Tell-Tale Tarte book was due to the publisher, so I didn't stop to take a lot of photos. However, the fabulous baker and mystery writer Kim Davis featured this Tarte Tatin recipe on her blog, "Cinnamon and Sugar and a Little Bit of Murder." She also created a video illustrating how to make the Tarte Tatin. 

Five-Ingredient Mystery #4

It’s a cold January in the Chesapeake Bay area, but Cool Down Café manager Val Deniston has plenty to sweat over—like catering a book club event, testing recipes for her Granddad’s cookbook, and catching the author of a deadly tale of murder . . .

The last thing Val needs in her life is an unsolved murder, especially when the victim, an actor famed for impersonating Edgar Allan Poe, happens to be dressed exactly like her Granddad. To keep an eye on Granddad, whose latest job takes him to the home of Rick Usher, a local author inspired by Poe, Val gets herself hired as a cook in Rick’s House of Usher. When she discovers the actor wasn’t the only one doing an impersonation, separating the innocent from the murderous becomes a real-life horror story. But Val must decipher a killer’s M.O . . . or she can forget about finding POE-etic justice.

🍎🍎🍎

Maya Corrigan writes the Five-Ingredient Mysteries featuring café manger Val and her live-wire grandfather solving murders in a Chesapeake Bay town. Maya lives in a Virginia suburb of Washington, D.C. Before writing crime fiction, she taught American literature, writing, and detective fiction at Northern Virginia Community College and Georgetown University. When not reading and writing, she enjoys theater, travel, trivia, cooking, and crosswords.

Visit her website to sign up for her newsletter. One subscriber wins a book each time a newsletter goes out. Check out the easy recipes, mystery history and trivia, and a free culinary mystery story on the website.

What's the most difficult recipe you've ever tried?

Cornish Hen #Recipe by Maya Corrigan #Thanksgiving

Orange-glazed Cornish hens are especially good on Thanksgiving when you don't have enough people for a turkey dinner. They work well for any festive occasion, and they're easy enough to make for an everyday dinner. 

This recipe uses marmalade made with sugar. It can be the low-sugar type, but not marmalade made with corn syrup or artificial sweeteners. 

Serves 4.

Ingredients

4 tablespoons orange marmalade

1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon balsamic vinegar

1 teaspoon dried thyme

2 Cornish hens approximately 1.5 pounds each

Vegetable cooking spray

Orange slices for garnish (optional)

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

To make the glaze:

Combine the marmalade, the vinegar, and the thyme in a microwavable cup.
Microwave the mixture for 1 minute at half power. 
Stir to mix the ingredients. Microwave for 30 seconds at half-power.
Repeat the 30- second microwaving until the mixture is soft enough to brush on the hens.
Set it aside and keep it warm.

To prepare the hens:
Discard any giblets. Rinse the hens under cold water and pat them dry. Remove the skin and split the hens in half lengthwise.

Coat a rack with vegetable cooking spray and put it in a shallow roasting pan. Place the hens on the rack, with the meaty side up. 

Brush the hens with half the glaze mixture. Bake at 375 degrees for 30 minutes. 

Brush the hens with the remaining marmalade mix, and bake an additional 20-25 minutes. 

If you have larger hens, increase the baking time. 

Check the temperature of the hen by putting a thermometer into the thigh. It should read 165 degrees Fahrenheit when done. Take the hens out of the oven, cover with foil, and let them sit for 10 minutes before serving. 

Serve with an optional garnish of orange slices.

Just as pretty as any turkey, and Cornish hens won't leave you with days of leftovers!

Do you enjoy eating Cornish hens? 

🐔

This recipe appears in my 4th Five-Ingredient Mystery, The Tell-Tale Tarte. The book's title derives from an Edgar Allan Poe story about a murder, “The Tell-Tale Heart.”

The victim and suspects in The Tell-Tale Tarte include an actor famed for his one-man Poe show, an author who riffs on Poe stories, a professor who specializes in Poe, and an aspiring writer and Poe lookalike. When café manager Val Deniston serves a tarte Tatin at a book club dinner, the dessert reveals a fraud, embroiling her and her grandfather in the investigation of a murder. The search for the killer takes Val and Granddad to the home of the bestselling author, Rick Usher. Stranded there by an ice storm, they spend a harrowing night in the “House of Usher.” Then, in the shadow of Poe’s tomb, they try to prevent another murder and mete out some POE-etic justice.

Maya Corrigan writes the Five-Ingredient Mysteries featuring café manger Val and her live-wire grandfather solving murders in a Chesapeake Bay town. Maya lives in a Virginia suburb of Washington, D.C. Before writing crime fiction, she taught American literature, writing, and detective fiction at Northern Virginia Community College and Georgetown University. When not reading and writing, she enjoys theater, travel, trivia, cooking, and crosswords.

Sign up for Maya's newsletter on her website. One subscriber wins a book each time a newsletter goes out. Check out the easy recipes, mystery history and trivia, and a free culinary mystery story on the website.

Spinach Catalan #Recipe by Maya Corrigan

 

After tasting spinach prepared Catalan style in a local tapas restaurant, I tried re-creating it at home as a side dish. Moorish influence on the cuisine of Catalonia, a region in Northeastern Spain that includes Barcelona, results in a combination of sweet and savory elements in dishes. Most of the Catalan spinach recipes I found online include toasted pine nuts and golden raisins. Chef José Andrés has a version made with diced apple. Almonds and orange pieces were used in the spinach I ate at the tapas restaurant.

 

For my variation I used dark raisins, because I always have them in the pantry, and oranges, because they add color and flavor. Either type of nut or raisin works with this dish. This dish is quick to prepare and attractive enough to serve guests.   

Ingredients

1/4 cup raisins
One orange, peeled and with pith removed, and cut into pieces
2 medium garlic cloves—peeled, smashed, and chopped
1/4 cup pine nuts or slivered almonds
12 to 16 ounces of baby spinach 
1 Tbsp olive oil
 Salt and pepper to taste

Cover the raisins with warm water and let them stand until plumped, about 10 minutes. Drain them before adding them to the dish. 

Cut a peeled orange into sections.

Heat olive oil in a large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add the chopped garlic and cook it for 30 seconds. Add the spinach. Sauté for 3 minutes until it’s wilted, stirring it now and then. Note: If you have mature spinach instead of tender baby spinach, you should steam it before putting it in the pan. 

Add salt and pepper to taste. Stir in raisins, nuts, and orange pieces. Cook 1 to 2 minutes.

Serve immediately.

Serves 2-3 as a side dish.

I lack the patience to peel a whole orange, divide it into sections, and remove the pith from each section. Instead, I slice the orange first, cut the rind off each piece, which I then slice in half.

The photo above shows the same spinach dish made with Cara Cara oranges and almonds.

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Tomorrow is the birthday of a towering literary figure, Edgar Allan Poe. His spirit hovers over my 4th Five-Ingredient Mystery, The Tell-Tale Tarte. Its title derives from Poe's story about a murder, “The Tell-Tale Heart.”

The victim and suspects in The Tell-Tale Tarte include an actor famed for his one-man Poe show, an author who riffs on Poe stories, a professor who specializes in Poe, and an aspiring writer and Poe lookalike. When café manager Val Deniston serves a tarte Tatin at a book club dinner, the dessert reveals a fraud, embroiling her and her grandfather in the investigation of a murder. The search for the killer takes Val and Granddad to the home of a bestselling author, Rick Usher. Stranded there by an ice storm, they spend a harrowing night in the “House of Usher.” Then, in the shadow of Poe’s tomb, they try to prevent another murder and mete out some POE-etic justice.

Themes that Poe explored in his writing emerge in The Tell-Tale Tarte: guilt, vengeance, and even burial alive. The book offers a solution to real real-life mystery–the identity of the elusive Poe toaster, who, annually for decades, left roses and cognac at Poe’s grave on his birthday, January 19th.

You can read more about this book and Poe on my website: 

• Did Poe really invent the detective story?
• What does he have in common with Abraham Lincoln?
• What does he have in common with Jane Austen?
• Test how much you know about Poe

Read an excerpt and find out where to buy The Tell-Tale Tarte.

You've probably guessed that I'm a Poe fan. Are you? 

⚑⚐⚑

Today we remember and celebrate a towering figure in American history, Martin Luther King Jr. His message of nonviolence resonates, especially his year. Wishing you a peaceful MLK day. 

Ratatouille by Maya Corrigan #Giveaway

The colors of this Southwest Ratatouille, made with corn and other fresh vegetables, remind me of candy corn, maybe because I just saw the Halloween candy on display at the supermarket. Don't miss the GIVEAWAY. Scroll down and leave a comment about corn or candy corn for a chance to win a Five-Ingredient mystery.

Southwest Style Ratatouille

Corn, jalapeño pepper, cumin, and coriander give a twist of Southwest flavor to the classic French vegetable stew, ratatouille.

Ingredients

1-2 tablespoons olive oil

1 medium onion, chopped 

1 large garlic clove, minced

1 medium zucchini, lengthwise into four segments and then crosswise into 1/2-inch pieces

Corn cut from one ear, uncooked or cooked (in a pinch, use frozen corn)

1/3 cup chopped red bell pepper

1/2 to 1 teaspoon minced fresh jalapeño pepper (wear rubber gloves when cutting)

1/2 cup diced tomatoes, fresh or canned

1/4-1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

1/4 teaspoon ground coriander or 2 tablespoons fresh chopped cilantro leaves

Salt and pepper to taste

Most of the work in this dish is in the chopping and mincing of the ingredients. A corn stripper speeds up the job.

DIRECTIONS

Cover a 10-inch skillet with oil. Cook the onion in the oil over medium heat until softened. Stir in the garlic and cook for 1 minute.
Add zucchini, bell pepper, and raw corn. If the corn is already cooked, add it at the end just to warm it.
Cook the vegetables for 2-3 minutes until softened.

NOTE: I had a baby eggplant from the garden so I added it along with zucchini. This is a very forgiving recipe. You can take liberties with the ingredients and quantities, depending on what you have available.

Add jalapeño pepper, tomato, and cooked corn.
Stir in the cumin and coriander. Sprinkle salt and pepper to taste.

Maya (Mary Ann) Corrigan combines her passion for food and detection in her Five-Ingredient Mysteries featuring café manager Val and her live-wire grandfather, who solve murders in a historic town near the Chesapeake Bay. Each book has five suspects, five clues, and Granddad’s five-ingredient recipes. Visit her website for book news, five-ingredient recipes, mystery trivia, and a free culinary mystery story. Sign up for her newsletter to enter a drawing for a free book. One subscriber receives a free book each time a newsletter comes out.

Visit Maya at her website

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Sign up for her newsletter

GIVEAWAY

The winner can choose between these books. There's a clue-filled eerie house in both of them.  

Crypt Suzette: When a deliberate murder masquerades as an accident after a Halloween costume party, it takes Granddad's ghost-busting, Val's haunted house visit, and a Halloween ruse to rip the mask off a killer. 

The Tell-Tale Tarte: A dead-of-winter eerie tale. When an actor famed for his role as Edgar Allan Poe is murdered, the search for his killer takes Val and Granddad to a Poe-inspired author’s creepy “House of Usher” and to the cemetery where Poe is buried. 

Leave a comment about corn or candy corn with your e-mail address by Sept 17 for a chance to win your choice of a haunting Five-Ingredient Mystery. The book giveaway applies to US addresses only.