Tag: Poirot


May
2022

Sage and Onion Stuffing – Cards on The Table

categories: Dining With The Dame, Poirot

I have a special affection for Cards on the Table, the first Poirot novel to feature Ariadne Oliver.  I absolutely love the way that through the character of Ariadne Oliver, Agatha Christie gets really meta –  she pkes fun at herself, her characters and the whole business of crime writing.  There is a lovely…in the movies, they would call it a set-piece, I am not sure what the literary equivalent is…featuring sage and onion stuffing so that is what I decided to go with for my recipe.

Sage and Onion Stuffing 1

Another reason I love Cards on The Table is that during the first lockdown of 2020, looking for some comfort reading I decided to re-read a  compilation of the Ariadne Oliver novels that I had bought from the local library a few years before.  It was whilst reading Cards on The Table and the passage about the sage and onion stuffing in particular that I began to wonder if writing about the food in Christie’s books might be a thing!

Sage and Onion Stuffing 2

If you think some of my sage leaves look a bit manky – they are straight from the garden,  organically grown sage leaves and that is how they come!.

Cards on The Table – The Plot

Mr Shaitana holds a dinner party where the guests consist of four sleuths and four people who may have successfully gotten away with murder once.   During a game of bridge,  one of the possible murderers  stabs Shaitana to death.

On the side of law and order, we have:

  • Hercule Poirot – private detective,
  • Ariadne Oliver – crime fiction writer,
  • Colonel Race – Secret Service and,
  • Superintendent Battle  – Scotland Yard.

The suspects are

  • Mrs Lorimer – Keen bridge player.  She may have murdered her abusive husband
  • Major John Despard – an adventurer who possibly killed the husband of a woman he was having an affair with
  • Dr Geoffrey Roberts  who might have killed one of his patients
  • Anne Meredith –  a ladies companion who maybe swapped her employee’s  medicine for hat poison

Can the sleuths team up to find the killer?

Sage and Onion Stuffing 3

Mr Shaitana – Mephistopheles is Not Your Name

If you were the kind of person who liked to play a drinking game while you read your Christie, should you decide to take a chug every time Mr Shaitana s described as Mephistophelian you would be utterly hammered before the first half of the book is done.

Ariadne Oliver

As mentioned, I love Ariadne Oliver, first because I love the way Agatha Christie pokes fun at herself through this character.

“What really matters is plenty of bodies.  If the thing’s getting a little dull, some more blood cheers it up.  Somebody is going to tell something  – and then they’re killed first.  That always goes down well…And people like untraceable poisons and idiotic police inspectors  and girls tied up in cellar with sewer gas or water pouring in”

“I only regret one thing – making my detective a Finn.  I don’t really know anything about Finns and I’m always getting letters from Finland pointing out something impossible that he has said or done.  They seem to read detective stories a good deal in Finland. I  suppose it is the long winters with no daylight.  In Bulgaria and Romania they don’t seem to read at all.  I’d have done better to make him a Bulgar”

 

The other reason I love Ariadne Oliver is her portrayal by Zoe Wanamaker in the Poirot series.  It is mwah! Chef’s kiss perfect!

Sage and Onion Stuffing 6

Cards on The Table – The Covers

I was excited to see the covers for this because my copy is a very boring omnibus edition of all the Ariadne Oliver novels.  As usual the covers did not fail to delight.  I could only find one non-English version but it is a very cool looking Spanish edition with Shaitana looking most Mephistophelian.

The Recipe – Sage and Onion Stuffing

Normally if I was making stuffing, I would pop it into the cavity of the chicken, however for the purpose of this pot, seeing as I wanted to highlight the stuffing I did not want to hide it away.  So, I made stuffing balls and served them with a 40 cloves of garlic chicken for dinner and then also made chicken, lettuce, stuffing and mayo sandwiches for lunch for the next few days.

The recipe I used is from In the Kitchen by Alan Campion and Michelle Curtis.  I once did a cooking class with Alan Campion and he was absolutely delightful so I am very glad to be sharing one of his recipes here:

Sage and Onion Stuffing Recipe

 

I am workng as you can see.  But that dreadful Finn of mine has got himself terribly tangled up.  He did some awfully clver deduction with a dish of French beans, and now he’ s detected deadly poison in the sage and onion stuffing of the Michaelmas goose, and I’ve just remembered that French beans are over by Michaelmas”

-Ariadne Oliver in Cards on the Table – Agatha Christie

Sage and Onion Stuffing 7

Links to The Christieverse

  • In Cards on the Table, Ariadne Oliver has written a book called “The Body in The Library”.  This is also the name of a book written by Agatha Christie featuring Miss Marple. That book was published in 1942, six years after Cards on Table.
  • Anne Meredith knows that Poirot solved “the ABC crimes”.

Other Food & Drinks Mentioned in Cards on The Table

  • Whiskey Soda (nearly as common as Bacon and Eggs)
  • Apples – Ariadne Oliver is particularly fond of apples and is described at one point as having a large piece of apple core reposing on her chest!
  • Tea
  • French Beans, Michaelmas Goose
  • Coffee & hot buttered toast
  • Tea and muffins
  • Blackberry sirop
  • Brandy

June’s book will be Dumb Witness, another Poirot.  Get reading!

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Mar
2022

Macaroni au Gratin / The ABC Murders

categories: Dining With The Dame, Pasta, Poirot

Hello Crime readers and food lovers! I am excited today to be sharing a recipe for Macaroni au Gratin – aka Baked Mac and Cheese!  This month’s Agatha Christie book, The ABC Murders is dark.  It is definitely the darkest book we have read so far. So, it’s a good thing we have the comforting familiarity of macaroni and cheese to get us through!  We have my favourite trio in Christie too – Poirot, Hastings and Japp. It is however written in a mix of first-person and third-person which feels a bit clumsy.  However, it is a cracking read so do not let that prevent you from reading this.

Macaroni Au Gratin1

The ABC Murders – The Plot

We begin with Poirot receiving a letter taunting him:

MR. HERCULE POIROT–You fancy yourself, don’t you, at solving mysteries that are too difficult for our poor thick-headed British police? Let us see, Mr. Clever Poirot, just how clever you can be. Perhaps you’ll find this nut too hard to crack. Look out for Andover on the 21st of the month. Yours, etc., A.B.C.

And on the 21st Mrs Alice Ascher is murdered by a blow to the head in Andover

We have:

  • Some fun banter between Poirot, Japp and Hastings prior to the first murder.
  • A second murder – Betty Barnard strangled in Bexhill
  • A third murder – Sir Carmichael Clarke clubbed to death in Churston
  • Taunting letters to Poirot with each murder and a copy of the ABC rail guide left by the body of each of the victims
  • The diary of a man who seems to be increasingly losing his grip on reality.  The man’s name?  Alexander Bonaparte Cust.  (Just look at those initials!)
  • We have a group of amateur sleuths made up of Megan Barnard (Betty’s sister), Franklin Clarke (Sir Carmichael’s brother, Donald Fraser (Betty’s fiance) and Mary Drower (Alice Ascher’s niece).
  • There is a beautiful and very poignant bit of writing about the death of Alice Ascher and the remorselessness of the passing of time
  • This is lightened almost immediately by a lovely fun bit of banter between Poirot and Hastings concerning fruit and vegetables
  • The fourth letter leads Poirot to Doncaster.  Will Poirot be able to stop the ABC Murderer’s reign of terror here?

Macaroni Au Gratin2

What makes The ABC Murders so dark is the use of gaslighting by the villain of the piece.  Christie would not however have used that term as it only came into being in 1944, eight years after The ABC Murders was published!

The ABC Murders – The Covers

There are some very cool covers here.  The two that for me are the standouts – top row second from the left looks very Hitchcockian, Tippi Hedren fleeing from birds with evil intent maybe.  And speaking thereof…that cover with poor Betty Barnard lying dead on the beach with the seagull’s feet on her throat gives me the screaming heebie jeebies!!!!

 

ABC Collage

The Recipe – Macaroni au Gratin

I kept this macaroni au gratin very simple.  The internet abounds with fancy recipes for mac and cheese.  I love the lobster Mac ‘n’  Cheese they serve at Meatmaiden, one of my fave local restaurants!  And if you are looking to make your mac ‘n’ cheese a bit more healthy then I can also recommend Jamie Oliver’s Greens Mac ‘n’ Cheese.

Print

Macaroni au Gratin / The ABC Murders

Print Recipe

Comfort food at its finest!

Ingredients

Scale
  • 110g macaroni
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 450g milk
  • 50g butter (plus more for dabbing on the top)
  • 40g plain flour
  • 175 grated Cheddar cheese or a mix or what you have in the house.  I used some Red Leicester for this one.
  • Freshly grated nutmeg
  • Dash of Tabasco (optional)
  • Breadcrumbs
  • Parmesan cheese
  • 2 tbsp fried shallots (optional) Or more if you like!

Instructions

  1. Bring 850ml of water to the boil and cook the macaroni for 3-4 minutes less than the instructions on the pack.  (We will finish off cooking in the oven).
  2. Meanwhile, heat the milk with the bayleaf in a small pan and leave it to infuse.
  3. In another pan, melt the butter and add the flour and allow your roux to cook for a minute. Gradually add the milk, whisking all the time to remove any lumps.  Cook until the mixture reaches the consistency of pancake batter, stirring all the while.
  4. Add half of the Cheddar and stir until it melts.  Add some grated nutmeg and Tabasco sauce if using and season with salt and pepper to taste.
  5. Preheat your oven to 180C.
  6. Drain the macaroni and add it to the cheese sauce.  Place into one large or individual baking dishes Sprinkle with breadcrumbs, parmesan cheese, the fried onions if using and a few dabs of butter to help the breadcrumbs brown.
  7.  Place in the oven and cook for 10-15 minutes until bubbling around the edges.  Then turn on your grill and cook under the grill until the cheese and breadcrumbs are golden.
  8. Let this sit for 1o minutes before eating.  If you can wait that long!

Enjoy!!!!

Notes

I like to cook this in smaller dishes so I have a ready supply of work from home lunches!

The fried shallots are available at Asian Groceries and whilst by no means traditional, add a lovely French onion flavour to this fish.

I really wanted to make this with alphabetty spaghetti.  Unfortunately, I could not find any so elbow macaroni had to do!

If the fried shallots are not your bag, you can top with finely chopped chives or parsley before serving.

Macaroni Au Gratin4

 

Our first visit was to The Ginger Cat.  Situated on the seafront, this was the usual type of small tearoom.  It had little tables covered in orange-checked cloths and basket-work chairs of exceeding discomfort with orange cushions on them.  It was the kind of place that specialised in morning coffee, five types of tea (Devonshire, Farmhouse, Fruit, Carlton and Plain), and a few sparing lunch dishes for females such as scambled eggs and shrimps and macaroni au gratin.

-Agatha Christie – The ABC Murders

The Adaptations

The Alphabet Murders – 1965

Tony Randall as Poirot, Robert Morley as Hastings?  Anika Ekberg as….I’m not really sure who she was but she was stunningly beautiful whoever she was meant to be.

I was so up for watching this!

Until I started watching it.

It.  Was.  Terrible.

I lasted half an hour max and went scurrying back to my beloved trio of David Suchet / Hugh Fraser and Phillip Jackson.

I don’t know what possessed MGM to try to turn this book into a comedy but it didn’t work for me at all!

The ABC Murders – Poirot S4 E1 1992

This version is the most true to the book.  To me, this is the gold standard by which all adaptations should be judged and this episode is no exception.  And there is an absolutely touching moment at the end between Poirot and Cust.

 

The ABC Murders – 2018

John Malkovich as Poirot?  Sign me up!!!  I only watched this one recently and it blew me away.

This version has Rupert Grint aka Ron Weasley as Inspector Crome.  No Hastings, Japp dies within the first few minutes.  Poirot is old and tired and has lost his relevance. Britain is dirty and dark and xenophobia is running high. This one is DARK.

I think this one brings to life the characters of Betty Barnard and Alexander Cust in a way the other two did not. It is beautifully shot and the attention to detail is meticulous. The acting is largely superb.  Poirot, Cust, Betty, Rose Marbury, Thora Grey, Franklin Clarke – all played to perfection!!!!! It is not entirely true to the book but it goes some interesting places. This one is a much watch for any Christie fan although I’m sure some die-hard Christie fans will not be happy with the kink element, the addition of a new murder and Poirot’s backstory.

I would LOVE to see more Malkovich as Poirot!!!!

 

 

Other Food & Drinks Mentioned in The ABC Murders

 

Next month we are heading to the Middle East for a Murder in Mesopotamia. My advice on this one?  Pack your disbelief into a deep dark corner and just go with it.  The plot is largely ludicrous but we’ll have some fun on the way!

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Mar
2022

The Bee Sting

categories: Dining With The Dame, Drinks, Poirot, Tequila

Hello friends, welcome to a special edition of Dining With The Dame. In this, which is a companion piece to last week’s post I will be doing a selective deep-dive into the good, the bad and the ugly of Death in The Clouds.  And, to fortify ourselves on this journey, I am sharing a DITC inspired cocktail – The Bee Sting.  Why not make yourself one and settle in for the ride.  Fasten your seatbelts, this plane will hit some turbulence!  BTW, this post does contain spoilers so if you have are planning on reading DITC, you may want to save this one for later!

Bee Sting 1

 

The Boomslang

At the inquest of Madame Giselle, we find out that the poison on the tip of the blowpipe is from an African snake called a Boomslang.  Whilst the word boomslang sounds like something unsavoury that I would need urban dictionary to define for me, it is actually the name of a highly venomous African Snake.  I could find no verification to Christie’s assertion that if you inject the venom into a hyena, the hyena would die before the needle was withdrawn.  However, according to McGill University

Because boomslang venom is a hemotoxin it’s not surprising that it can lead to major brain and muscle hemorrhage. But the venom also causes other symptoms like nausea, headaches and sleepiness. Perhaps what is most surprising is that this venom has the ability to make the victim bleed from every possible orifice

Good lord!!!  Poor Madame Giselle!

DITC and Pop Culture

Boomslangs on a Plane?

I’m sure I’m not the only modern reader who on hearing about the boomslang wondered if just maybe DITC was, in part, an inspiration for this cinematic masterpiece!

Norman Gale

And whilst taking of pop culture references could Norman Gale be an inspiration for Norman Bates?  I can find no verification of this however, it is entirely possible that Robert Bloch read DITC prior to writing Psycho in 1959.  The similarity of the names made me suspicious of Norman Gale long before he was revealed as the murderer!

That he is a dentist also reminded me of Little Shop of Horrors:

Doctor Who

In the utterly amazing Doctor Who episode The Unicorn and The Wasp, The Doctor and Donna meet Agatha Christie.   They investigate murders in a country house, they make references to Murder on The Orient Express, Crooked House, Sparkling Cyanide and Cards on The Table,  Agatha Christie suggests that they use “ze little grey cells” to solve the murder, and the villain turns out to be a giant alien wasp!

DITC And The Poirotverse

More than any of the other books I have read so far, DITC refers to some of Poirot’s previous cases:

On page 149 of my edition, the following exchange between Poirot and Japp occurs.

“I’ve questioned the passengers, too.  Everyone can’t be lying.”

“In one case I investigated everyone was”

Which is a delightful callback to Murder on The Orient Express.

Earlier in the book, Inspector Fournier mentions that the murder of Madame Giselle likely occurred during a psychological moment.

“That is true,” said Poirot.  “I remember a case in which I was concerned – a case of poison where that very point arose”

This is a reference to Three Act Tragedy

 

 

The Ugly Side of DITC

Ok, this is where things take a turn. Take a big gulp of your Bee Sting to fortify yourself and let’s get into it.

There is a lot to like in DITC but there is also much that is repugnant.  Take, for instance, this passage regarding the budding romance between Jane Grey and Norman Gale.

The promised dinner and theatre with Norman Gale had duly come off.  It was one of those enchanting evenings when every word and confidence exchanged seemed to reveal a bond of sympathy and shared tastes.

They liked dogs and disliked cats.  They both hated oysters and loved smoked salmon.  They liked Greta Garbo and disliked Katherine Hepburn.  They didn’t like fat women and admired really jet black hair.  They disliked very red nails.  They disliked loud voices, noisy restaurants and Negroes.  They preferred buses to tubes”

Yes, you read that correctly!

I was like “loud voices, noisy restaurants and WTAF??????”

The fact that it is also mentioned in the same breath as an “enchanting evening”  only makes it more revolting.

And BTW, this is why I really wanted Norman to be the murderer.  I was only disappointed that he didn’t bump off the equally awful Jane Grey along the way!

This is not the only racist slur that occurs in DITC:

  • The jury finds Poirot guilty possibly because he is “a little foreigner”
  • Mrs Mitchell, the wife of one of the stewards is utterly indignant about the murder.  “Who’s to know what reason foreigners have for murdering each other; and if you ask me, I think it’s a dirty trick to have done it on a British aeroplane”
  • There is also an anti-Semitic slur made by one of Jane Grey’s colleagues at the hair salon

Urrgghhh…I did warn you this was going to get rocky.

Should I stay or should I go?

Reading DITC posed a real dilemma for me. It was like finding a big old turd in what had been a formerly enjoyable soup.  Not only does it put you off that particular bowl of soup, but it also puts you off soup altogether.  I did wonder if I should continue with this project at all after reading it.  In the end, I decided I would complete my Dining with The Dame project but, like here, I would call out the bad and the ugly side of Christie along with the good.

Let’s wash the nasty taste out of our mouths with our lovely sweet / sour spicy cocktail – The Bee Sting!

Bee Sting 2

Print

The Bee Sting

Bee Sting 3
Print Recipe

A citrussy cocktail with a chilli kick!

Ingredients

Scale

For the jalapeno honey syrup:

  • 2 tbsp pickled jalapeno chilies, drained of brine
  • 1 cup honey
  • 30ml hot water

For the Cocktail

  • 45ml reposado tequila
  • 30 ml jalapeno honey syrup, cooled
  • 30ml freshly squeezed lemon juice or a combination of lemon and lime juice
  • 2 slices of jalapeno chilli

To Garnish

  • A slice of Jalapeno
  • A lemon twist

 

Instructions

To Make The Jalapeno Honey Syrup:

  • Place the honey and the chillies in a saucepan.  Bring to a boil then reduce heat and let simmer for 2-3 minutes, stirring occasionally.
  • Allow to cool, then strain.
  • Mix 1 tbsp of the jalapeno honey with 30ml warm water and allow to cool to make the syrup.

To Make the Cocktail:

  • Muddle the jalapeno slices in your cocktail shaker.
  • Add the tequila, lemon juice and jalapeno honey syrup.
  • Fill with ice and shake for 15 seconds.
  • Strain and garnish with a slice of jalapeno and a twist of lemon

Enjoy!

 

Notes

This recipe was inspired by the recipe for the Bee Sting cocktail on Serious Eats and Action Bronson’s recipe for pickled jalapeno honey.

There will be a lot of the honey left over – use this to make more Bee Stings, as a drizzle over fish or chicken, in salad dressings or as per Action Bronson, serve it over flatbreads spread with ricotta and hazelnuts.

Bee Sting 3

 

Have you read Death in The Clouds?  What did you think of it?

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Dec
2021

The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding

categories: Christmas, Dining With The Dame, Poirot, Pudding

Season’s Greetings crime readers and food lovers! Today we are reading the Poirot short story, The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding and eating that exact thing!  This is the first time I have ever made plum or Christmas pudding.  I chose this recipe, which comes from an October 1993 issue of Home Beautiful  because it had apricots and no fruit peel in it.  I further tweaked the recipe to remove the raisins and figs which I am not fond of and replaced them with dried strawberries and blueberries. The fruit was then soaked for two weeks in a combination of Pedro Ximenez sherry and brandy!!!

Christmas Pudding 5

 

The Adventure of The Christmas Pudding – The Plot

As mentioned, this is a short story  – it is only  44 pages in the edition that I read so it is something that can easily be read in around an hour.  However, for such a short story there is a LOT going on!

We open with someone called Mr Jesamond, trying to persuade Poirot to take on a case.  Poirot is not so keen.

Mr Jesamond interrupted “Christmas time,” he said, persuasively.  “An old fashioned Christmas in the English countryside.”

Hercule Poirot shivered.  The thought of the English countryside at this season of the year did not attract him…he had suffered too often in the historic country houses of England”

Eventually, Poirot agrees to take the case.  A young potentate from an unnamed country has been visiting England to have some of the family jewels re-set by Cartier in order to give them to his bride to be.  However, the young man, away from his conservative homeland, has done what young men away from their conservative homelands are wont to do. Even worse, he allowed his new lady friend to wear the family ruby one night.  Needless to say, she and the ruby vanish.

Christmas Pudding 1

In order to avoid a scandal, Poirot is called to visit Kings Lacey, home of the Lacey family to find the thief and the ruby!

We have:

  • Sarah, the granddaughter of the Lacey’s who has taken up with a bounder whom she has brought home for Christmas, along with his sister who is recovering from an operation and is confined to bed
  • Several mentions of the bounder’s tight black jeans! (Ooh Aggie!!!)
  • Someone sneaking about Poirot’s bedroom at night
  • Drugs in the coffee
  • Some delightful snarkiness about Poirot’s nightcap (sadly missing from the adaptation)
  • Something that is definitely not a sixpence in the Christmas pudding!

The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding – The Covers

The covers here nearly all show a Christmas Pudding.  I do like the one where Poirot’s hat takes the place of the pudding and I also very much like the one where the Creme Anglaise on the pudding takes on the skull and crossbones.  There is a very stylish French cover, except you can’t tell because apparently there is no French translation for Christmas Pudding (hint, it is the black and yellow on).

There is also a Spanish cover that does Poirot no favours! I mean at no point do we ever hear that Poirot is particularly handsome but oof..too cruel, Spain, too cruel!

Unflattering depictions from Spain aside, I am saving my most, my worst level of scorn for the cover on the bottom right.  I mean.  WTAF unknown publisher?  The book is called the Adventure of the Christmas Pudding not The Adventure of the Blueberry Layer Cake!!!

Adventure of the Christmas Pudding Collage

The Recipe – Christmas Pudding

Christmas Pudding recipe

 

Christmas Pudding 3

 

On a silver dish the Christmas pudding resposed in its glory.  A large football of a pudding, a piece of holly stuck in it like a triumpant flag and glorious flames of blue and red rising around it.  There was a cheer and cries of “ooh – ah:.

Hercule Poirot merely surveyed the portion on his plate with a rather curious expression on his face.  A result, no doubt of finding a cryptic note in his bedroom which had read,

“DON’T EAT NONE OF THE PLUM PUDDING.

– ONE WHO WISHES YOU WELL

Agatha Christie,  The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding

Christmas Pudding 4

Other Food Mentioned in The Adventure of The Christmas Pudding

For such a short story, there is a HEAP of food mentioned here:

We usually have brandy butter and custard with our Christmas pudding but this year I am going to give hard sauce a go!  It sounds delicious!

The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding is not much of a mystery.  It is very obvious who the wrong ‘un is.  Having said that, it is an absolutely delightful and charming Christmas story so well worth a read!  It is one of the few Poirot adaptations that is not available on Youtube but the Audiobook, which is read by Hugh Fraser who plays Hastings in the series is available.

Christmas Pudding 6

 

Dear friends, I hope Santa brings you everything you want and you have a merry, happy and safe holiday season!

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Nov
2021

Pink Gin – Three Act Tragedy

categories: Cocktail, Dining With The Dame, Gin, Marple

Hello crime readers and food lovers!  Greetings from Cape Bridgewater!  We are on a little holiday mini-break in far western Victoria, staying in a gorgeous renovated church.  This is all the more appropriate because the first person to be murdered in Three Act Tragedy is the Reverend Babbington, who is felled by a poisoned cocktail!  We decided to celebrate the holiday and Three Act Tragedy with a Pink Gin!

Pink Gin 1

This is the outside of our Air BnB:

St Peter's

The first act of Three Act Tragedy is set in Cornwall, which like our current location is by the coast!

Cape Bridgewater

Three Act Tragedy – The Plot

The famous actor Sir Charles Cartwright hosts a fancy dinner for the local glitterati at his home in Cornwall.    In attendance, among others are Hercule Poirot and Mr Satterthwaite (who is a recurring character in the Harley Quinn novels).  At the dinner, the Reverend Babbington drops dead and it is later found out that his cocktail had been laced with nicotine.

Some months later, Poirot meets Cartwright and Satterthwaite in Monte Carlo.  They tell him that Doctor Bartholomew Strange (great name) who had also been a guest at Sir Charles’ dinner party has also been murdered by nicotine in his glass of port.  With the exception of Poirot, Satterthwaite and Cartwright all the guests at the second dinner had also been at Cartwrights.

Someone at those parties is a murderer.  But who?  And why?

It is up to our favourite Belgian detective to find out!

Pink Gin 2

We have:

  • A vanishing valet
  • Blackmail letters
  • A mysterious woman in an asylum
  • A third murder – this time by poisoned chocolates
  • A drunken husband
  • A secretary behaving suspiciously
  • A writer with an eye for detail who disappears
  • Poirot throwing a sherry party (the idea of this makes me a bit swoony)
  • Some fun banter between Satterthwaite and Poirot.

Sadly, there is no Hastings and no Japp but there is a delightful girl called Egg and Mr Satterthwaite who largely make up for that loss.

Three Act Tragedy – The Covers

Most of the covers through the ages focus on the poisoned cocktail or the effects of it. A few show the actor’s mask which…spoilers!!!! The American title for Three Act Tragedy was Murder in Three Acts and the German title was Nikotin. 

Three Act Tragedy Collage

And of course, it wouldn’t be a Christie cover collage without one totally bonkers cover/  This week it is a  Pan edition from, I’m guessing the 1970’s which features what I think is one of those plague doctor’s masks with spooky glowing red eyes.  None of which has any bearing on the content.

My copy is the classic Tom Adam’s cover.  Here is my attempt to somewhat copy it.  ( Note: we were about 20km away from the nearest town and I was already half a pink gin in when I thought to do this.  There were no roses in the garden and there was definitely no driving to get one but I like to think there is a vague similarity.  I feel my version lands somewhere in the middle of the covers to the left and right of it.

Three Act Tragedy Collage2

Tom Adams says of his cover (right-hand side above)

In this painting of a fading rose against a darly sombre leafy background, I was trying to evoke the menace behind the glittering company

Tom Adams, Tom Adams Uncovered

 

The Recipe – Pink Gin

The Pink Gin cocktail is not made from the Pink Gin that is usually quite sweet and flavoured with berries or rhubarb.  It is a much older creation combining angostura bitters and gin.  The bitters were given to sailors in the British Navy to help them with seasickness but they found it too hard to drink on its own.  They started mixing it with gin to make it more palatable.  Seems like it wasn’t just rum, sodomy and the lash that kept the British navy going.  It was rum, sodomy, the lash and some very pretty pink drinks!!!!  By the 1880’s it became a very popular drink on land as well as on sea.

 ‘Sitting in the underground dimness of the Seventy Two Club and sipping a martini, Egg said: “This is great fun.  I’ve never been here before.”

Freddie Dacres smiled indulgently.  He liked a young and pretty girl….

“Upsettin’ sort of time wasn’t it?” he said.  “Up in Yorkshire, I mean.  Something rather amusin’  about a doctor being poisoned – you see what I mean – wrong way about.  A doctor’s a chap who poisons other people.”

He laughed uproariously at his own remark and ordered another pink gin.  …

“It’s odd, isn’t it, ” said Egg.  “that when we meet it’s always at a death”

Agatha Christie, Three Act Tragedy

Pink Gin 5

Other Food Mentioned in Three Act Tragedy

Unlike some of the recent novels Three Act Tragedy is LOADED with food references:

Well, the curtain is falling on our third act.  If you are reading along with me, December’s read will be a  huge leap in chronology to 1960 for the seasonal short story The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding.  No prizes for guessing the likely menu item!   Although, I haven’t read it yet so let’s not get too ahead of ourselves!

Have a great week and happy reading!

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