Radine Trees Nehring fell in love with the Arkansas Ozarks
as a visitor in 1978, wound up moving there, and has since shared her love of
the region in both her fiction and nonfiction. Her eighth Ozarks-related
mystery novel, A Portrait to Die For, was released in April. Learn more about Radine and her books
at her website.
How Important Are Cooking Skills to an Amateur Detective?
Early on in
the Carrie McCrite/Henry King To Die For mystery series, readers learn for the
first time that Carrie is not a willing cook. Chapter Three of the first novel,
A Valley to Die For, opens:
"The
committee ate Carrie's brunch as eagerly as if she'd spent all morning in the
kitchen preparing it. 'There,' she thought, 'that proves it doesn't take a
zillion-ingredient recipe and stacks of dirty pans. All it takes is friends
getting together--then no one cares whether your kitchen helper was Julia Child
or the Pillsbury Doughboy.' "
Carrie's
kitchen helper would definitely be the Pillsbury Doughboy. She lived with her
parents until she was thirty and her mom insisted on doing all the cooking.
After marriage to Amos McCrite, a wealthy criminal lawyer, Carrie still spent
little time in the kitchen because he employed a full-time cook. Now, on
occasions when she does cook, (especially after Amos's death), she usually
depends on take-out, or ready-prepared meals from the grocery. We learn in A
Treasure to Die For that, before moving to Arkansas after Amos's murder,
she disposed of the many (unopened) cookbooks helpful friends gave her over the
years. ("All that woman needs is a good cookbook," they frequently
said.)
When the need
to make meatloaf comes up as part of the plot in A Treasure to Die
For, a result is "No Thaw Meatloaf." This bizarre and so-o-o easy
meatloaf shows up on the Nehring dinner table every few months and, according
to reader response, probably on many other tables as well.
At one time
Carrie apologizes to her adult son, Rob, about the lack of "home-made,
mom-cooked meals" while he was growing up. He assures her that, as a
bachelor college professor, he's grateful to have learned her meal prep methods
early in life.
Bowing to
reader requests, I always include two or three recipes at the end of each
novel.
Of course I
enjoy writing about Carrie's adventures into crime solving with her new
husband, Henry King (a retired Kansas City Police Major), and about the very
real tourist-friendly Arkansas locations where each story is set. Though it's
sometimes challenging, I also enjoy coming up with the Carrie-style recipes
used in each story. "Baggie Omelets" is one of the most popular with
readers. It's from A River to Die For.
(And yes,
special recipes even fit into my recent Carrie and Henry novel about art
crime--A Portrait to Die For, set largely in Crystal Bridges Museum of
American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas.)
Here is Carrie's recipe for
Baggie Omelets:
Ingredients
one-quart zip shut freezer bag
2 eggs
Whatever you like in an omelet: chunks of
onion, green pepper, bacon, sausage, olives, etc.
Shredded cheese of choice
Salt and pepper
One large kettle of boiling water (rolling
boil)
If using raw vegetables, soften in the
microwave. (If on a picnic, cook lightly in a pan) Cook any meat you plan to
add. Chop everything you will be adding to your omelet into small pieces.
Break two eggs into a baggie. Seal, removing
as much air as possible. Squeeze and squish until eggs are well mixed.
Open baggie. Add vegetables and/or
meat. Add seasonings.
Seal bag again, removing air, and squish to
mix.
Drop bag(s) in kettle of boiling water and
boil for exactly thirteen minutes. Remove from water and roll or spoon omelet
out on a plate. Add shredded cheese immediately.
Carrie and I think this is the best way in
the world to cook eggs. Delicious--and no cleanup of messy egg residue.
Happy cooking!
A Portrait to Die For
Carrie
discovers two versions of a supposedly original portrait in a loan exhibition
at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. When a reporter who interviewed
Carrie at the museum disappears, Carrie must choose between her promise to stop
crime-solving or work to find the woman--a college friend of her son's.
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A great idea! Thanks for the cooking tip!
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