Peach Cobbler Murder

by Joanne Fluke

  Once Lisa was back, Hannah smiled at the friends who were left. “You’ve really been a big help. And as long as you think my peach cobbler is good just the way it is, I’ll write up the final version and put it in my recipe book.”

  “What are you going to call it, Aunt Hannah?” Tracey asked.

  “I haven’t even thought about that.” Hannah knew Tracey wouldn’t have broached the subject of naming the peach cobbler unless she had something in mind. “What do you think I should call it?”

  “Minnesota Peach Cobbler. That way people will know it’s from here, and not from someplace else.”

  “Good idea,” Hannah said, giving her niece a thumbs-up. The name was pure genius and it tapped directly into the issue of Minnesota pride. Only a traitor would prefer Southern Peach Cobbler to something from his or her home state.

  “Do you think we should have some Minnesota Peach Cobbler at the reception?” Herb asked Lisa.

  “That would be wonderful, but Hannah might be too busy to…”

  “I’ll do it,” Hannah promised, interrupting her partner’s attempt to lighten the wedding workload. She was already making two kinds of cookie cakes, but she’d gladly bake all the desserts for the buffet table if that’s what Lisa and Herb wanted.

  “Could you bake one for me tomorrow?” Jack Herman asked. “Marge is taking me in for my final dose of brain juice, and I want to give something nice to the nurses.”

  “Brain juice is what Dad calls the drug cocktail they give him in the clinical trial,” Lisa explained, even though everyone had guessed what Jack meant.

  “My memory gets better after I take it, and there’s only one drawback as far as I can tell.”

  “What’s that?” Andrea asked.

  “It makes me remember all the dumb things I did before I took it.”

  “That’s ridiculous, Jack.” Marge was the first to defend him. “Your memory wasn’t the best before. We all know that. But you’ve never done anything dumb.”

  “Oh yes, I have. And it’s something I’m probably going to regret for the rest of my life.”

  Jack looked very serious and Hannah reached out to pat his arm. “I’m sure it’s not as bad as you think it is. Tell us about it and maybe we can help.”

  “I don’t think anyone can help. You can’t un-ring a bell.”

  “I know that one!” Tracey spoke up. “I heard a lawyer use it on Court TV, but the judge ruled against him.”

  “What particular bell are you talking about?” Hannah asked, quite amazed that Lisa’s father was speaking figuratively. Before the clinical trial had begun, Jack had taken everything literally.

  “I was so excited that Lisa and Herb were getting married, I invited someone who wasn’t on Lisa’s guest list.”

  “That’s okay, Dad,” Lisa was quick to assure him. “There’s always room for one more…right, Andrea?”

  “Absolutely,” Andrea responded with a smile. “Don’t concern yourself for a second, Jack. St. Peter’s can seat over two hundred and I reserved the whole restaurant at the Lake Eden Inn for the buffet reception.”

  “Oh, I figured there’d be room for one more at the church and the reception. That’s not the problem. It’s just…I don’t think Lisa wants this person at her wedding.”

  Lisa gave a merry little laugh. “I don’t know who you could be talking about, Dad. I invited practically everyone in Lake Eden already.”

  “Not this one. I checked the list.”

  “Really?” Lisa frowned slightly. “Well…if I forgot someone we know, it’s probably a good thing you remembered. I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings.”

  Andrea set her laptop computer on the table, unzipped the carrying case, and powered it up. “Really, it’s no problem, Jack. Just let me pull up the file. This laptop comes in so handy. I absolutely couldn’t live without it!”

  Hannah just shook her head. Although there were things she’d hate to lose, food and oxygen were the only two she absolutely couldn’t live without.

  “Here we are. I pulled up the guest list,” Andrea announced, after a symphony of important-sounding multi-toned beeps. “Just give me the name and I’ll add it. And then I’ll hand-deliver an invitation this afternoon.”

  “Okay, if you say so.” Jack glanced at his daughter. “You’re not going to like this.”

  Lisa gave him a reassuring smile. “Sure I am. One more guest is no trouble at all, and I like everyone in town. Who is it?”

  “Someone I invited before I knew I shouldn’t.”

  “I understand, Dad. Just tell us who it is.”

  Jack took a deep breath and let it out again. Then he cleared his throat and complied. “Shawna Lee Quinn.” And when Lisa’s smile slipped, he said, “I’m sorry, honey. I knew you weren’t going to like it.”

  MINNESOTA PEACH COBBLER

  Preheat oven to 350 degrees F., rack in the middle position.

  Note: Don’t thaw your peaches before you make this—leave them frozen.

  Spray a 13-inch by 9-inch cake pan with Pam or other nonstick cooking spray.

  10 cups frozen sliced peaches (approximately 2½ pounds, sliced)

  1/8 cup lemon juice (2 Tablespoons)

  1½ cups white sugar (granulated)

  ¼ teaspoon salt

  ¾ cup flour (no need to sift)

  ½ teaspoon cinnamon

  ½ cup melted butter (1 stick, ¼ pound)

  Measure the peaches and put them in a large mixing bowl. Let them sit on the counter and thaw for 10 minutes. Then sprinkle them with lemon juice and toss.

  In another smaller bowl combine white sugar, salt, flour, and cinnamon. Mix them together with a fork until they’re evenly combined.

  Pour the dry mixture over the peaches and toss them. (This works best if you use your impeccably clean hands.) Once most of the dry mixture is clinging to the peaches, dump them into the cake pan you’ve prepared. Sprinkle any dry mixture left in the bowl on top of the peaches in the pan.

  Melt the butter. Drizzle it over the peaches. Then cover the cake pan tightly with foil.

  Bake the peach mixture at 350 degrees F. for 40 minutes. Take it out of the oven and set it on a heat-proof surface, but DON’T TURN OFF THE OVEN!

  TOP CRUST:

  1 cup flour (no need to sift)

  1 cup white sugar (granulated)

  1½ teaspoons baking powder

  ¼ teaspoon cinnamon

  ½ teaspoon salt

  ½ stick softened butter (¼ cup, 1/8 pound)

  2 beaten eggs (just stir them up in a glass with a fork)

  Combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt in the smaller bowl you used earlier. Cut in the softened butter with a couple of forks until the mixture looks like coarse cornmeal. Add the beaten eggs and mix them in with a fork. For those of you who remember your school library with fondness, the result will resemble library paste but it’ll smell a whole lot better! (If you have a food processor, you can also make the crust using the steel blade and chilled butter cut into 4 chunks.)

  Remove the foil cover from the peaches and drop on spoonfuls of the topping. Because the topping is thick, you’ll have to do this in little dibs and dabs scraped from the spoon with another spoon, a rubber spatula, or with your freshly washed finger. Dab on the topping until the whole pan is polka-dotted. (Don’t worry if some spots aren’t covered very well—the batter will spread out and fill in as it bakes and result in a crunchy crust.)

  Bake at 350 degrees F., uncovered, for an additional 50 minutes.

  Minnesota Peach Cobbler can be eaten hot, warm, room temperature, or chilled. It can be served by itself in a bowl, or topped with cream or ice cream.

  Chapter Five

  Valentine’s Day dawned bright and clear, and Hannah was up with the first pale rays of winter sun that crested the snowbanks. She made short work of feeding Moishe, chug-a-lugging a mug of strong coffee, and showering before she was fully awake. She pulled on jeans, donned a vivid red sweater in honor of
the holiday, and grinned at her reflection in the mirror. Her curly red hair was sticking out like Little Orphan Annie’s, but there was no need to pull it back to accommodate a health department mandated hair net today. The Cookie Jar was closed.

  The Cookie Jar customarily did a booming business on Valentine’s Day, selling heart-shaped cookies with red and white icing, pink frosted cupcakes with hearts drawn on the top in red, Cherry Pies with crusts cut out in heart designs on the top, Strawberry Flips, the cookie that Hannah had invented for last year’s holiday, and Cherry Bombs, maraschino cherries baked in cookie dough and dipped in powdered sugar. This year Hannah and Lisa had sold their treats early and while their profits hadn’t come close to that of past years, several dozen of their regular customers had come back. Hannah wasn’t sure if this was due to her mother’s efforts, or if the locals simply wanted to come in the day before Valentine’s Day to see how Lisa, the imminent bride, was doing. It didn’t matter why they’d come in, just that they had. The Cookie Jar had almost broken even for the first time since the Magnolia Blossom Bakery had opened, and that was a step in the right direction.

  Today was Lisa’s wedding and there was no way Hannah was going to let her work on this most important of days. That was why she’d put a notice in the Lake Eden Journal to tell everyone that they’d be closed. Lisa deserved to sleep in, relax all morning, and think of nothing but the happiness that awaited her.

  “I know,” Hannah said to the orange and white tomcat that sat on her bed. “I never wear this unless I’m staying home, but we’re closed today.”

  “Owwww,” Moishe howled, staring at her for a moment and then turning his back. Since Hannah wasn’t sure whether that was a comment about the way her sweater clashed with her hair, or a reminder that his food bowl was empty, she didn’t reply.

  Fifteen minutes later, with Moishe breakfasted for the second time and Hannah the first, the industrious part-owner of The Cookie Jar got ready to leave. While it was true they were closed, Hannah still had baking to do for Lisa’s wedding and their industrial ovens would hold a lot more than the small oven she had at the condo. The wedding cakes were ready. She’d done that last night, preparing a bride’s cake and a groom’s cake. They weren’t fancy and they hadn’t required any baking at all, but she was almost positive that Herb and Lisa would love them.

  The project had taken a little research. Doing her best to be surreptitious, Hannah had asked about Lisa’s favorite cake as a child. The answer had surprised her, as had the answer Marge Beeseman, Herb’s mother, had given. Both Lisa and Herb had liked what was known in Lake Eden as “Cream Stacks,” one of the easiest cakes to make since there wasn’t a bit of baking involved.

  Cream Stacks were cookies stacked up like little skyscrapers with pudding between the layers. They were refrigerated overnight so that the cookies could soften and the pudding could set, and then they were frosted with whipped cream. Lisa had preferred graham crackers held together with chocolate pudding mortar, while Herb had favored chocolate wafers cemented with vanilla pudding. Once Hannah had learned all that, she’d started to ponder the question of how to make Cream Stacks festive enough for a wedding cake.

  Hannah was nothing if not resourceful and she’d experimented for several days with the ingredients. It was like playing with building blocks and she’d enjoyed herself almost as much as she had as a child. But even though she’d come up with some interesting shapes, including a tower that was worthy of Rapunzel, the Cream Stacks still weren’t special enough to serve at the wedding reception.

  The solution to her problem had come several nights ago. She’d been watching a cable cooking show with Moishe, and the featured dessert had been an English trifle. As Hannah watched the too-slim-to-have-tasted-any-of-her-own-cooking pastry chef dish out the trifle, the lightbulb went on over her head. There was no reason in the world why she couldn’t make Lisa and Herb’s Cream Cakes in trifle bowls, unmold them, and frost the resulting layered domes with whipped cream.

  The official wedding cake, the one that would appear in the photographs, was being created by Sue Ganske, Lisa’s cousin twice removed. Since everyone on Lisa’s mother’s side was Norwegian, it would be a towering, twenty-layer Kransekake, the traditional wedding cake of Norway. As Sue had warned, when she phoned The Cookie Jar with her offer to bake the wedding cake, “You’d better plan on having another cake to serve. Kransekake is a sculpture dessert like the French Croquembouche. It’s so beautiful, nobody wants to eat it.”

  Hannah could understand that. She’d seen Croquembouche, the French dessert made with miniature cream puffs coated with caramel syrup and arranged in a pyramid. Usually displayed on a fancy serving plate, it was drizzled with more caramel syrup spun out into golden threads and then dusted with powered sugar. The elaborate dessert had been displayed at a formal catered dinner Hannah had attended while she was in college. It had looked scrumptious, but none of the guests had tasted it. The Croquembouche had made it through the entire party intact, since no one had wanted to be the first to break off a piece.

  That college party had taught Hannah an important lesson, and it was the reason the meringues on her pies weren’t absolutely symmetrical, and her cookies were usually slightly irregular. When a dessert crossed the line from pretty to a flawless masterpiece, people were afraid to touch it. Hannah had no doubt that the same Croquembouche was still making the rounds of the formal college parties, and if anyone ever worked up the nerve to take a taste of the petrified pastry, they’d need extensive dental work.

  “I’ll be back by three at the latest,” Hannah announced to the cat whose head was buried up to his ears in his food bowl. “I have to get dressed for the wedding. You won’t mind eating dinner that early, will you?”

  Moishe’s head snapped up and he stared at her with an expression Hannah interpreted to mean, Are you kidding? I’ll eat any time you feed me. And speaking of food, why don’t you fill up this bowl before you leave?

  “Okay, okay.” Hannah unlocked the broom closet door and filled his bowl with kitty crunchies. Then she tossed him a salmon-flavored treat shaped like a fish, relocked the door, and shrugged into the long green parka coat Andrea and her mother had given her for Christmas. Once that was zipped up, Hannah clamped a matching knit cap on her head, pulled it down to cover her ears, retrieved her car keys from the saddlebag purse she then slung over her shoulder, and pulled on her fur-lined gloves. Although this whole process had taken less than three minutes, she was already overheated inside the quilted parka, and it was a relief to step out the door and into the sub-zero freezer that Minnesota provided for its residents free of charge during the winter.

  The first thing Hannah did when she got out of her car in the parking lot at The Cookie Jar was to unwind the extension cord that was wrapped around her front bumper. One end of the cord was attached to the head-bolt heater that was installed under the hood of her cookie truck. She plugged the other end into the strip of outlets on the outside of her building and mentally congratulated herself for remembering. She’d caught the tail end of the weather on KCOW radio during her trip to town. The current temperature was minus eighteen degrees and the predicted high for the day wasn’t expected to reach the zero mark.

  It took Hannah several tries to get her key in the lock, but she didn’t take off her gloves. Her palms were sweating a bit inside the fur lining and she knew how painful it could be to grasp the metal knob with a moist hand. The moisture would freeze almost instantly upon coming into contact with the cold metal. Then, when Hannah removed her hand to step inside, the top layer of skin on her palm would stay on the outside of the door-knob.

  Once inside, Hannah headed straight for the kitchen coffeepot. She’d invested in one with a timer when they’d gone on sale right after Christmas and it had been money well spent. Hot coffee awaited her and it was just what she needed after her long, cold commute.

  Hannah was about to take her first sip of coffee when the phone rang. Should she answer it? It c
ouldn’t be a business call. Everyone in town knew they were closed for Lisa’s wedding day. It had to be someone she knew. And that meant she practically had to answer. Hannah took a quick sip that burned her lip and reached for the phone on the wall. “Hello?”

  “You didn’t say, Hello, Mother.”

  Hannah was silent for a moment. Perhaps they had a bad connection, or maybe she was still half asleep. But to her ears, Delores had sounded almost disappointed. “Every time I do that, you tell me that I shouldn’t answer the phone that way.”

  “That’s true. You shouldn’t. But you’ve done it so often I’ve come to expect it. I called to ask you an important question, dear. How’s business?”

  “There isn’t any. We’re closed today.”

  “I know that. When I said business, I meant business in general. I need to know if all the public relations work I’ve been doing at my clubs is working.”

  “I think it is,” Hannah answered reluctantly. She really hated to discuss her business with Delores now that she was an adult living on her own. But her mother was concerned and Hannah knew she had her best interests at heart. “It’s a whole lot better than it was, Mother.”

  “But it’s still not good enough.”

  “You’re right,” Hannah admitted. It seemed that the unexplainable mother-daughter radar was working again, and Delores had caught the worry behind her daughter’s words. “A couple dozen of our regulars are back, and that’s good. And quite a few of the ladies from your groups came in.”

  “So every day a few more of your former customers come back?”

  “That’s right. Yesterday was a pretty good day. Everybody that came in wanted to wish Lisa well before the wedding.”

  “So you showed a profit?”