Cream Puff Murder (8 page)

The sausage was heated through, and it smelled delicious, the chicken breast less so. Hannah returned it to the oven hoping that some of the sausage flavor might migrate behind the closed, sealed door, and turned her attention to dishing up the sour cream and the applesauce.

“Almost ready,” she called out to Mike once she’d checked her pancakes, found them browned nicely, and flipped them over. “What would you like to drink?”

“I’d like a Cold Spring Export, but I’ll settle for coffee. I’m on duty tonight.”

“I know. What’s the latest? Are Jessica and the baby going to be all right?”

“They think so, but it’ll be touch and go for another couple of days. Bridget and Cyril are keeping Rick’s oldest, and Rick’s staying at the hospital with Jessica.”

Hannah bit her tongue. She really wanted to ask if Mike knew the truth about Rick and Ronni, but that would be fishing for gossip. It wasn’t her business. She didn’t need to know. But oh, how she wanted to!

“Rick said they’d been fighting about Ronni. Jessica got really upset, and he thinks that’s why she went into premature labor. He feels horribly guilty about it.”

He ought to if what I heard is true, Hannah thought, but of course she didn’t say it. She said nothing and waited for the floodgates to open and Mike to go on.

“Nothing happened, you know. Ronni told me that. She said Rick had a little crush on her, but she handled it without hurting his feelings.”

“Oh?” Hannah said, but she thought something different. And just how did she do that? her mind queried.

“She told him he was very attractive, but she never dated married men,” Mike answered her unspoken question.

I’ll bet! Hannah’s mind said sarcastically, but her mouth said, “That’s good.”

“I thought so. But you know how young guys are. They think with their…uh…libido and not with their brain.”

“Right.” Hannah removed the sausage from the oven, cut it into serving-size pieces and paired it with the six small potato pancakes she’d fried for Mike. Once she’d grabbed the coffee carafe to pour more into his mug, she headed out to the coffee table to deliver his dinner.

“That sure smells good,” Mike commented, staring down at the plate Hannah placed before him. “What kind of sausage is that?”

“Polish. I got it from Florence, and she said it’s handmade at a tiny sausage factory near Red Wing. And those are potato pancakes. Help yourself to sour cream, or applesauce, or both.”

“Thanks, Hannah.” Mike clearly wanted to dig in, but he looked up at her instead. “What are you having?”

“Chicken breast and salad, but don’t worry about me. I’ve got all night to eat. Just start and I’ll fry you up another batch.”

“Okay,” Mike said, forking a piece of sausage and popping it into his mouth. “You’re the best, you know? Sometimes I wish you’d taken me up on that marriage proposal. Then I could eat like this every night.”

That was the reason he’d asked her to marry him? Hannah’s eyebrows approached lift velocity. But she wasn’t being fair, and she curbed her impulse to make a sharp retort as she headed off to the kitchen to fry up another batch.

LAZY POTATO PANCAKES

3½ cups frozen hash brown potatoes

2 eggs (2 extra large or 3 small)

¼ cup grated onion (or ½ teaspoon onion powder)

1 teaspoon season salt

½ teaspoon black pepper

2 Tablespoons cracker crumbs (matzo meal or flour will also work)

1/8 cup butter (¼ stick, 1 ounce) for frying

1/8 cup good olive oil for frying

Toppings for the Table:

sour cream

applesauce

cherry sauce
_*
_

blueberry sauce
_*
_

apricot sauce
_*
_

Hannah’s 1 st Note: Great-Grandma Elsa used to make these in a cast iron frying pan she called a spider. She peeled and grated her own potatoes and put them in a bowl of cold water, salt, and lemon juice so they wouldn’t turn brown. I added the word “lazy” to the title of her recipe because when I’m in a hurry, I use frozen hash browns.

Place the frozen hash browns in the bowl of a food processor. Use the steel blade, and process with an on-and-off motion until the potatoes are finely chopped. (If you don’t have a food processor, you don’t have to go out and buy one to make these. Just lay your frozen potatoes out on a cutting board in single layers, and chop them up into much smaller pieces with a chef’s knife.)

Leave the potatoes in the food processor (or on the counter) while you…

Crack the eggs into a large bowl and beat them with a fork or a wire whip until they’re fluffy.

Stir in the grated onion (or the onion powder if you decided to use that), and the salt and pepper.

Mix in the cracker crumbs.

Let the mixture sit on the counter for at least two minutes to give the crumbs time to swell as they soak up the liquid.

If you used a food processor, dump the potatoes on a cutting board.

(If you used a chef’s knife, they’re already there.) Blot them with a paper towel to get rid of any moisture. Then add them to the mixture in the bowl, and stir them in.

If the mixture in your bowl looks watery, add another Tablespoon of cracker crumbs to thicken it. Wait for the cracker crumbs to swell up, and then stir again. If it’s still too watery, add another Tablespoon of cracker crumbs. The resulting mixture should be thick, like cottage cheese.

Place the ¼ stick of butter and the 1/8 cup of olive oil in a large nonstick frying pan. (This may be overkill, but I spray the frying pan with Pam or another nonstick cooking spray before I add the butter and olive oil.) Turn the burner on medium-high heat.

Once the oil and butter are hot, use a quarter-cup measure to drop in the batter. Don’t try to get all of the batter out of the measuring cup. Your goal is to make 1/8 cup pancakes, and if you don’t scrape out the batter, that’s approximately what you’ll get.

Keep the pancakes about two inches apart, and cover the bottom of the frying pan with them. Flatten them very slightly with a spatula so the potatoes spread out and don’t hump up in the middle.

Fry the pancakes until they’re lightly browned on the bottom. That should take 2 to 3 minutes. You can tell by lifting one up with a spatula and peeking, but if it’s not brown and you have to do it again, choose another pancake to lift.

Once the bottoms of the pancakes are brown, flip them over with your spatula and fry them another 2 to 3 minutes, or until the other side is brown.

Lift out the pancakes and drain them on paper towels. Serve hot off the stove if you can, or keep the pancakes warm by placing them in a pan in a warm oven (the lowest temperature that your oven will go) in single layers between sheets of aluminum foil.

Serve with your choice of sour cream, applesauce, cherry sauce, blueberry sauce, or apricot sauce.

Yield: Approximately 24 small pancakes, depending on pancake size.

CHERRY, BLUEBERRY, AND APRICOT SAUCES

1 small can pitted cherries, blueberries, or apricots

1 small jar cherry, blueberry, or apricot jam

Hannah’s 1 st Note: It doesn’t really matter how large the can of fruit or jar of jam is. If you want a lot, buy large cans and jars. If you don’t want so much, buy small cans and small jars.

Drain the can of fruit, reserving the juice. You may need it later to thin your sauce if it’s too thick.

Place the canned fruit in a food processor with the steel blade or in a blender. (If you’re using cherries, it’s a good idea to squeeze them a little when you put them in to make sure they’re all properly pitted.)

Process or blend until the fruit is pureed. Transfer it to a bowl and let it sit on the counter while you…

Heat the fruit jam. You can do this by removing it from the jar and placing it in a microwave-safe bowl to heat in the microwave. You can also put the jam in a small pan over medium heat on the stove and stir it until it’s melted. (If there are whole cherries in your cherry jam, you might want to cut them up a little. Then again, big pieces are nice, too. The same goes for some apricot jam—it may have large pieces, too.)

Add the melted jam to the bowl with the pureed fruit. Mix it all up thoroughly. Let it sit on the counter to cool, and then check for consistency. If you think it’s too thick to drop onto the top of a hot potato pancake, stir in a little of the reserved fruit juice.

Store your sauce in the refrigerator in an airtight jar or container, but remember to take it out to warm to room temperature an hour before you plan to serve your pancakes.

Hannah’s 2 nd Note: You can make sauces from almost any canned fruit. I’ve used peach, raspberry, and pear. I’ve also served my Lazy Potato Pancakes with rhubarb sauce, but I don’t think you can buy canned rhubarb. If you live in Minnesota, you won’t have to buy it, or make your own, for that matter. I’ve got a whole cupboard full of rhubarb sauce and jam that my customers canned and gave me last summer.

Lisa said she tried pineapple sauce (that’s Herb’s favorite fruit) and it was wonderful. Since she couldn’t find pineapple jam at the Red Owl, she used apple jelly.

H annah was sitting on the rug in the middle of her living room floor when the phone rang. Scraps of paper were scattered all around her in little piles that Moishe assumed were his duty to destroy, and it took her a minute to find the receiver. Once she had, she punched the proper button and answered. “Hi, this is Hannah.”

“Hello, Hannah. It’s Norman.”

Hannah started to grin. As if she wouldn’t recognize Norman’s voice! But it was proper phone etiquette, and she guessed that was important. “Hi, Norman. What’s happening?”

“My electricity’s out, and I’m calling you on my cell phone. I was wondering if you’d let me come over and watch some movies with you. I rented Sabrina.”

“The original? Or the remake?”

“Both. I wanted to compare them. How about it, Hannah? I’m sitting here all alone in the dark.”

“Where’s Cuddles?”

“She’s spending the night at the clinic. There’s a mouse in my office, and when I tried to take her home tonight after work, she wouldn’t let me put her in her carrier.”

“She wouldn’t let you?” Hannah was amused by his choice of words.

“That’s right. She stuck all four legs straight out in different directions so she wouldn’t fit. I could get her front legs in, but not her back legs. And then, when I finally managed to get her to bend her back legs so I could push them in, she pulled out her front legs and I had to start all over again. I’ve put her in her carrier before, and she’s always been very cooperative. I don’t know why it didn’t work this time.”

Hannah laughed. She couldn’t help it. “It didn’t work because you tried to force her and she didn’t want to go. You can’t force a cat. Even a very good-natured cat like Cuddles will fight you every inch of the way.”

“What should I have done then?”

“You should have left enough food and water for the night, locked up the clinic, and driven home without her.”

“And I shouldn’t have tried to put her in the carrier in the first place.”

“Exactly right. It’s very dangerous to come between a cat and her mouse.”

“Tell me about it! I’ve got scratches on both arms. I’ve had a rough day, Hannah. Can I come over so you can make things all better?”

“Of course you can come, but I’m going to extract my pound of flesh.”

“Feeling carnivorous are we?”

“Feeling just plain hungry is more like it.”

“Then Mike was right when he told us that you went on an exercise regime and a high-protein, low-fat diet to lose weight?”

Hannah was about to confirm it when she realized Norman had used the word us, as in plural. “Who’s us? Don’t tell me he mentioned it in front of your patients!”

“Of course not. I don’t allow anyone except relatives in the treatment rooms and that’s only when the patient is a child. Mike came in while I was having lunch at Hal and Rose’s Cafe. And by the way, he told us all that he’s very proud of you.”

Hannah gave a little groan of dismay. “I wish he’d be a little less proud and a lot more silent. Now everybody in Lake Eden is going to ask me how my diet’s going.”

“So you are on a diet?”

“Yes, at least until Mother’s book launch party.”

“Have you eaten dinner yet?”

Hannah thought briefly about the skinless, boneless chicken breast waiting for her in the kitchen, and decided that Moishe could have it for breakfast. “No, not yet.”

“Then I’ll stop at The Corner Tavern and get us steaks to go. You want yours rare, right?”

“Extra rare. Tell them it’s for me. They know how I like it.”

“Can you have a baked potato on the side?”

Hannah hesitated and decided to skip it. For the calories she’d save, she could take one small bite of the cookies she was planning to assemble for Calvin’s birthday party. “I’d better pass on the potato. Just bring me a small dinner salad, no dressing.”

“You got it. Anything else?”

Hannah glanced down at the photograph in her lap and flipped it over to reread the list of ingredients that were written on the back in pencil. “Yes, but you can’t get what I need at The Corner Tavern. Do you have time for a stop on the way?”

“I’ve got nothing but time. Where do you want me to go?”

“Pull in at the Quick Stop and pick up a box of vanilla wafers and some chocolate-covered cookies.”

“Sure. What kind of chocolate-covered cookies?”

“It doesn’t really matter as long as they’re round and flat on the top and the bottom, and they’re covered in melted chocolate. I’m not sure what brand Sean and Don carry, but I know they’ve got them.”

There was a lengthy silence, and then Norman cleared his throat. “Am I helping you break your diet?”

“No, you’re not. I need to make something for a catering job, and they’re on the list of ingredients. I’m curious, though. Would you bring me the cookies if I told you I was going to break my diet and eat them?”

“That’s a difficult question.” Norman was silent for another long moment, and then he cleared his throat again. “Is this some sort of a test?”

“Maybe. As a matter of fact, I’m pretty sure it is.”