by Molly Macrae
“What is it?”
“It’s what you say when you eat them—mm-mmm.”
MEL’S PEAR-AND-GINGER SCONES
Makes 6 or 8 scones, depending on how big you want them.
2 or 3 firmish pears (about 1 pound), peeled, cored, and cut into 1-inch chunks
1½ cups all-purpose flour
¼ cup granulated sugar
1½ teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon ground ginger
½ teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into small cubes
¼ cup chopped crystallized ginger
¼ cup heavy cream
1 large egg
1.Heat oven to 375°F.
2.Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. Arrange pear chunks on parchment and roast (no need to stir) until they feel dry to the touch and look a little browned on the bottom, about 20 minutes. Slide parchment with pear chunks onto a cooling rack and cool to lukewarm. Leave oven on. Line baking sheet with another piece of parchment.
3.Whisk flour, sugar, baking powder, ground ginger, and salt together in a large bowl. Add butter cubes and cut in with a pastry blender until the cubes are about the size of baby green peas. Stir in cooled pear chunks. Give the mixture three or four quick mashes with the pastry blender (to break a few of the pear chunks, but leave most intact). Stir in crystallized ginger.
4.In a small bowl, beat cream and egg. Stir into flour mixture with a fork, just until you can bring the dough together in a ball. Don’t overmix.
5.On a well-floured board, pat dough into a 6-inch circle. Cut into either 6 or 8 wedges. Arrange wedges, two inches apart, on parchment-lined baking sheet.
6.Bake scones until firm and golden, about 30 minutes if you’re making 6, about 22 minutes if you’re making 8. Transfer to a cooling rack. Serve warm.
Unbaked scones freeze beautifully, and you can put them straight into the oven from the freezer. They’ll take only a few minutes longer to bake.
EMBROIDERED HANKIE CORNER: FORGET-ME-NOTS FOR A GHOST
Pattern designed by Kate Winkler for Crewel and Unsual, Designs from Dove Cottage, 2018
Materials:
Cotton or linen hankie
Cotton embroidery floss in light orange, medium blue, medium green
Embroidery needle
Small embroidery hoop
Instructions:
1.Use two strands of floss for all embroidery.
2.Lightly pencil heart shape on hankie corner.
3.Make dots at top center and bottom point of heart, then 4 points on each half of heart, to roughly outline shape.
4.Secure hankie corner in hoop; adjust tension as needed while working.
5.With orange, make a French knot at each dot, working around outline of heart.
6.With blue, make 5 French knots surrounding each orange knot, again working around outline of heart.
7.With green, complete outline of heart shape by working straight stitches between flowers.
8.Add lazy-daisy stitch leaves in green, ad lib, some inside and some outside the heart.
Loop Start Tip:
To avoid extra tails (which must be woven in) or knots on the back of your work, start with a single strand of floss twice as long as you need. Put both ends through the eye of your needle and bring the needle up from the back of the work—without pulling the loop through to the front. Then, put the needle down through the fabric two threads over from where it came up, and pull it and the thread through the loop, neatly securing the thread.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thank you Pegasus Books, Claiborne Hancock, Katie McGuire, and Cynthia Manson for bringing the Haunted Yarn Shop Mysteries back to life. Katie, you’re the editor every writer needs. Thanks to you, Geneva the ghost is sitting pretty on the mannequin’s shoulder at the Weaver’s Cat, waiting to see who comes through the door and what happens next. Thank you, Esther Pawlowicz, for consultation on late October colors in northeast Tennessee. Thanks to colleagues past and present in Tennessee and Illinois, for lending your names to citizens in Blue Plum—Aaron Carlin, Darla Dye, Thea Green, Debbie Keith, and Mike Rogalla. Thanks, also, to Mike and Val Rogalla for letting their Scottie Bruce come play with me in Blue Plum. Special thanks to Janice Harrington and Betsy Hearne for careful reading and thoughtful, valuable feedback. The ever-generous Kate Winkler has designed another pattern for this book. Thank you, Kate! My own Mike gets the biggest thanks of all. Not only do you put up with my long hours of typing and provide expert information about flyfishing in the creeks of eastern Tennessee, but you’ve moved beyond making the best grilled cheese sandwiches in the world and now also make the best chef salads.
CREWEL AND UNUSUAL
Pegasus Crime is an imprint of
Pegasus Books, Ltd.
148 W. 37th Street, 13th Floor
New York, NY 10018
Copyright © 2019 Molly MacRae
First Pegasus Books edition January 2019
Interior design by Maria Fernandez
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission from the publisher, except by reviewers who may quote brief excerpts in connection with a review in a newspaper, magazine, or electronic publication; nor may any part of this book be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or other, without written permission from the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.
ISBN: 978-1-64313-008-8
ISBN: 978-1-64313-112-2 (ebk.)
Distributed by W. W. Norton & Company
www.pegasusbooks.us
