Matcha Green Tea Blast Smoothie

Happy New Year’s Eve!

As tradition, we always end the year with a drink!

This year it is a smoothie I borrowed from JaneAustenRunsMyLife.

Ingredients:

• 1 Tsp of Matcha Green Tea Powder
• 1 Cup of Milk (your choice)
• 1/2 Cup of Plain Sorbet
• 1/2 Cup of Frozen Vanilla Yogurt
• 1 Cup of Ice

Directions:

1. Place ingredients in blender and blend.

Thoughts After Making:

It was delicious, just like the ones they make at Jamba Juice (but cheaper)!

For more drink recipes, go to Strawberries and Cream Oatmeal Smoothie

For more smoothies, go to Apple Pie Smoothie

For more from JaneAustenRunsMyLife, go to Matcha Latte (Hot or Cold)

For more holiday posts, go to King Arthur Fudgy Brownies

For more New Year’s Eve posts, go to Banana Peanut Butter Smoothie

 

So be sure to drink responsibly! Unless you are making this smoothie-then drink as much as you want, LOL! Have a safe and fun New Year’s Eve!

The Cradle Will Fall

The Cradle Will Fall by Mary Higgins Clark

Katie Callahan DeMaio is a widowed county prosecutor. Katie has a rare condition in she loses too much blood on her period, causing lightheadedness, blackouts, etc. One day she is driving home from work and this causes her to crash.

But she survives. However, she and her sister decide its time to take care of it. They plan to do an operation when she has recovered a bit, her becoming a patient of the Dr. Edgar Highly. She is given medication, but doesn’t take all of it and awakes in the middle of the night-seeing a man move a dead body?

Meanwhile, celebrated physician and miracle birth, Dr. Edgar Highly, is facing a very large problem. One of his patients is unhappy with his care and going to go to her former physician. He has to take care of her quick, or else his experiment will be uncovered.

Dr, Highly kills her in his office and prepares to take her dead body to her house…but did someone spot him in the window?

Hmm…

Katie hears of the suicide and starts investigating, will she uncover the truth or be the next victim?

Thoughts After Reading:

I LOVE this book!!!

I can read it over and over and each time it gets me. It is a fantastic book, one of Clark’s best!

For more by Mary Higgins Clark, go to We’ll Meet Again

For more mysteries go to Lowcountry Bordello

King Arthur Fudgy Brownies

Thoughts Before Baking:

So I had originally wanted to post a Christmas mystery, but I just didn’t have very many-I’ll have to step it up next year, so you are all getting a recipe instead.

Christmas is coming and I continued my yearly tradition of baking cookies for certain families as their Christmas gift!

I thought that instead of making three dozen of one cookie, I would do three different cookies. That way I would be sure to have something everyone would love. So of course I did Rice Krispies Cookies, as everyone loves them.

The second cookie I decided on the Crispy, Chewy Matcha Green Tea Cookies. 

With the third cookie I decided to consult my The King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion: The Essential Cookie Cookbook and settled on Fudgy Brownies.

Yes Brownies are cookies, they are called bar cookies.

From the Cookbook: “Many of us here at King Arthur decided that our perfect brownie should be fudgy but not gooey, and rich enough to satisfy on its own. It should be assertively flavored and able to stand up to hot fudge sauce and vanilla ice cream. Also, it needs to have a crisp top layer-as one of the kids said, “Just like the ones from a box.” The following recipe fills the bill. Chocolate Chips will provide tiny molten pockets of chocolate within the greater brownie landscape. Add them if your desire for fudginess is limitless.

Ingredients:

• 3/4 Cup (1.5 sticks) of Unsalted Butter
• 2 Cups of Sugar
• 1 Cup of Dutch Process Cocoa Powder
• 1 Teaspoon of Salt
• 1/2 Teaspoon of Baking Powder
• 1 Tablespoon Vanilla Extract
• 3 Large Eggs
• 1 Cup of Unbleached Flour
• 1 Cup of Chopped Walnuts or Pecans
• 1 Cup of Chocolate Chips

Directions:

1. 1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F.
   2. Lightly grease a 9×13-inch pan
   3. In a medium microwave safe bowl, or medium saucepan set over low heat, melt the butter.
   4. Add the sugar and stir to combine.
   5. Return mixture to heat, or microwave, briefly until it is hot, but not bubbling-it will become shiny when you stir it. Heating the mixture the second time will dissolve more of the sugar, which give the brownies a shiny top.
   6. Stir in cocoa, salt, baking powder, and vanilla.
   7. Whisk in the eggs, stirring until smooth.
   8. Add the flour, nuts, and chocolate chips-stirring until smooth. 
   9. Spoon the batter into the prepared pan.
   10. Bake the brownies for 29-32 mins, or until a cake tester/knife is inserted and comes out clean or with only a few amounts of crumb clinging to it.
   11. The edges of the brownies should be set, but the center still soft.
   12. Remove brownies from the oven and cool on rack before cutting and serving.

Thoughts After Reading:

These brownies are AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!!

I wanted to eat them ALL!!!!!!!

Merry Christmas!!!!!

For more from the King Arthur Cookie Companion, go to Sugar Puffs

For more brownies, go to The “Best” Brownies

For more Bar Cookies, go to Lemon Bars

For more cookies, go to Chocolate Chip Cookie Mix in a Mason Jar

Chocolate Chip Cookie Mix in a Mason Jar

Have you ever wanted to make cookies, but want the work to be mostly done for you? Have you ever loved those mason jar cookie dough starter gifts but don’t want to shell out $20 for something you can easily do at home? Well then, this recipe is great for you.

When I was eight I received one of those cookie dough in a jar starter and thought they were just so cool. Years later, I wanted to make them for my coworkers as they are easy and in expensive, and I thought I would share how to do it with you.

This how-to comes from D***Delicious. 

Ingredients:

• 1 Pint Sized Mason Jar
• 3/4 Cup of All-Purpose Flour
• 1/2 Tsp of Baking Powder
• 1/2 Tsp of Baking Soda
• 1/8 Tsp of Salt
• 1/2 Cup of Old-Fashioned Oats
• 1/3 Cup of M&Ms or Chocolate Chips
• 1/4 Cup of Brown Sugar, Packed
• 1/4 Cup of Sugar

Directions:

• In  the mason jar, (using a funnel if you have one), layer flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, oats, M&Ms or chocolate chips, brown sugar, and sugar. Be sure to pack each layer down tightly.
• Add a ribbon or cloth, or both.
• Add a note or tag with the following instructions:
  • To Make Cookies
    • 1/4 Cup of Butter or Margarine, melted
    • 1 Beaten Egg
    • 1/2 Teaspoon of Vanilla
  • Directions:
    • Preheat oven to 375 degrees F
    • Empty jar of cookie mix into a large mixing bowl, mix well.
    • Add in butter, egg, vanilla, and mix until blended.
    • Roll into 1-inch balls and place 2 inches apart on ungreased cookie sheet.
    • Bake for 12-14 minutes or until edges are lightly browned.
    • Cool on cookie sheets for about 5 minutes and then transfer to wire rack.
    • Makes ~1 dozen cookies.

Thoughts:

I love this. It is so easy to do and makes a cute gift, especially if you pair it with cocoa.

For more cookie recipes, go to Crispy, Chewy, Matcha Green Tea Cookies

For more from  D***Delicious, go to Crock-Pot Sausage, Spinach, and White Bean Soup

For more Chocolate Chip Cookies, go to Eggless Cookie Dough

For more desserts, go to Glazed Sugar Cookies

Lowcountry Bordello

Ready for our final Christmas mystery?

Here we go:

Lowcountry Bordello (Liz Talbot Mystery #4) by Susan M. Boyer

It’s Christmastime in Stella Maris and P.I. Liz Talbot is preparing the last few things she needs to complete for her wedding, only days away. She’s interrupted when her cousin and bridesmaid, Olivia, calls to say that she discovered her husband’s dead body.

When Liz heads out to Charleston to meet with Olivia they discover the body is “missing” and Olivia’s husband is alive and well. Liz thinks it is all in Olivia’s imagination, that is until a dead body matching the description is found not too far away.

Hmmm…

Even though she is swamped with wedding details and the upcoming Christmas holidays, Liz decides to investigate. Things take an even more surprising turn as Liz discovers the house in which Olivia found the dead body is not only Olivia’s aunt’s house but also a bordello.

I know, right?

When it turns out that the person murdered was about to blow the whistle on it, Liz finds the case brimming with suspects; five mistresses, six johns, and an illegitimate relative that’s always wanted his due. To make matters even more difficult, Olivia is arrested for the murder and if Liz doesn’t solve the case before her wedding, she’ll be out one bridesmaid and her best alive friend.

Thoughts After Reading:

Susan M. Boyer has done it again. I’ve never been a big fan of mysteries in which one of the main characters was a spirit helping aid the detective, nor Southern mysteries; but Boyer’s incredible storytelling and writing is able to push past any reservations I might have. Not only is Boyer’s mystery amazing with its colorful and endearing cast of characters, but also provoking and challenging as we have multiple crimes and multiple suspects; with surprises and twists at every turn of the page.

I thoroughly enjoyed this novel, finding it practically impossible to put down. Even when I wasn’t reading the book, part of my mind continued to contemplate, guess, and wonder what the reveal would be. Boyer has created another masterpiece and I am looking forward to the next one in the series. I give this book a five out of five stars!

For more Liz Talbot Mysteries, go to Lowcountry Boneyard

For more by Susan M. Boyer, go to Lowcountry Bombshell

For more Christmas mysteries, go to And Only to Deceive

For more private investigators, go to The Key to Midnight

For more female private investigators, go to The Case of the Invisible Dog

Crispy, Chewy, Matcha Green Tea Cookies

Stuff happened this week that kept me from my computer, you know the holidays! So I am borrowing from my sister blog.

janeaustenrunsmylife

So today I had originally planned to review Pride and Prejudice and Mistletoe the movie, but unfortunately bad Jane Austen films scare me too much.

Just, kidding. I just haven’t had a chance yet. So then I decided that I would review YULETIDE audiobook, but the review isn’t completed and I need it to be as good as the audiobook. Nothing subpar!

As I haven’t finished that, I decided to instead share the Matcha cookies I mad last night as a Christmas gift to a few people.

So this recipe comes from Kirbe’s Cravings.

Ingredients

• 2 3/4 Cups of All-Purpose Flour
• 1 Tsp of Baking Soda
• 1/2 Tsp of Baking Powder
• 1 Cup of Butter (Softened)
• 1.5 Cups of White Sugar
• 1 Egg
• 1 Tsp of Vanilla Extract (I ran out, so substituted with Maple Syrup)
• 2.5 Tsp Matcha Green Tea Powder

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F
2. In…

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The Blood Stained Pavement

So we should be reviewing a Christmas mystery, but…

And I have been reviewing short stories from The Tuesday Club Murders AKAThe Thirteen Problems.

I typically review short stories on Sundays, but decided as these are the Tuesday Club Murders, I’ll be posting on Tuesday! So we are taking a quick break from Christmas to review this

 

“The Blood Stained Pavement” from The Tuesday Club Murder by Agatha Christie

PLOT SYNOPSIS:

So Miss Marple is an elderly woman who has lived in her village St. Mary Mead all her life. But even though she grew up in a small town, she has the observational skills of a hawk.

So one night there is a gathering at Miss Marple’s home: Miss Marple; Raymond West, Miss Marple’s nephew and a writer; Joyce Lempriére, an artist; Sir Henry Clithering, former commissioner of Scotland Yard; Dr. Pender, the elderly clergyman of the parish; and Mr. Petherick, solicitor.

They are enjoying themselves, when Raymond starts talking about unsolved mysteries.

Joyce decides they should start a club and meet every Tuesday and present a mystery. One they know the answer to and call it: The Tuesday Night Club. 

Our fourth mystery is shared by Joyce Lempriére, artist, and is one of my favorites in the collection.

This happened five years ago, when Joyce was visiting Cornwall, in a little village called Rathole. Joyce was getting ready to paint a scene when it was interrupted by a car and couple.

A man and a plain women get out, but thankfully get back in and move the car up. Unfortunately, as they do, another car drives up in the spot-ruining the view Joyce wished to paint.

The woman-in bright red chintz frock and large straw hat gets out but drives a bit up. Then Joyce overhears the three people greeting each other as the man in the couple, Denis, knows the scarlet woman, Carol, and introduces her to his plain wife-Margery.

Joyce doesn’t mean to, but as she paints she overhears their conversation. They all decide to go bathing, swimming in the USA, but disagree on how to get to a famous cave. After much deliberating, Denis and Margery would boat around and Carol would walk around the cliffs and meet them there as she hates boats.

Hearing them talk about painting, made Joyce want to as well-as she has grown hot and dissatisfied with how her painting has turned out. She decides to take a break and return after a swim.

She returns that afternoon, noticing that the group from earlier must have returned as well as she notices a dark blue swimsuit and a red on hanging out to dry at the Inn the group was staying at.

Something is off about her picture, and Joyce isn’t sure what…

When she looks up she notices a Spanish man in seafaring clothes and paints him into her picture. After she captured him on the canvas, he came over to speak to her and tells her a story of when the Spanish attacked in the 15th Century, speaking of blood-blood being spilt on the pavement and no being able to wash the stain out.

As he was talking Joyce continued to paint and realized that as she painted she painted in blood stains, drops of blood on the pavement…blood that it seems only she can see as her companion can not.

Joyce quickly starts to put her things together as she needs to leave that spooky space, she and her companion are interrupted by the man from earlier, Denis. He asks them if they have seen Carol, while his wife clears the clothes from the balcony.

Both Joyce and her companion say they have not seen Carol, and the man yells up to his wife that Carol isn’t here and they need to get to Penrithar-driving off in the car.

Meanwhile, Joyce goes to the street and looks for the blood she saw but finds…nothing.

Her companion sees her looking for the blood and shares an old Cornish saying: “If anyone sees those bloodstains that there will be a death within twenty-four hours.”

As Joyce was heading to the cottage she was renting she spots the red hatted and clothed Carol coming down the cliffs…red like blood.

It would have been a bit of fancy, except two days later Joyce read about a “Sea Bathing Fatality”. Mrs. Margery Dacre, wife of Captain Denis Dacre, drowned at Landeer Cove. They were staying at the hotel when she went swimming, while her husband golfed as he felt the water was too cold. When she didn’t return he became worried, and he and his friends went searching for her. A week later they discovered her body, and that she had a bad blow on her head, probably hit her head on a rock swimming. The estimated time of death came out to be 24 hours after Joyce saw the swimsuit.

So of course this The Tuesday Club Murders, but how was Margery murdered and why?

Thoughts After Reading:

I love this mystery as it has the spookiness of what Joyce saw paired with the logical truth of what Miss Marple figures out. I could see this as the basis of a film.

For more Agatha Christie, go to Ingots of Gold

For more from The Tuesday Club Murders, go to The Idol House of Astarte

For more Miss Marple, go to The Tuesday Club Murders

For more short stories, go to The Strength of Their Attachment

 

 

Glazed Sugar Cookies

Merry Christmas!

For our first Christmas recipe we have a sugar cookie from the cookbook Christmas Cookies.

Cookie Ingredients:

• 1 Cup of Butter Softened
• 1 Cup of Sugar
• 1 Large Egg
• 1 Teaspoon of Vanilla Extract
• 3 Cups of All-Purpose Flour
• 1/4 Teaspoon of Salt

Glaze Ingredients:

• 1 16-oz Package of Powdered Sugar
• 4-6 Tablespoons of Hot Water

Royal Icing:

• 1 16-oz Package of Powdered Sugar
• 3 Tablespoons Meringue Powder
• 6 Tablespoons Hot Water
• Liquid Food Coloring (Optional)
• Edible Gold Dust
• Clear Vanilla Extract

Directions for Cookies:

1. Beat butter and sugar at medium speed with an electric mixer until fluffy.
2. Add egg and 1 teaspoon vanilla, beating until blended.
3. Gradually add flour and salt, beating just until blended.
4. Divide dough in half; cover and chill for 1 hour.
5. Roll each portion of dough to 1/4 inch thickness on a lightly floured surface.
6. Cut dough into desired shapes with a 3.5 inch cutter, and place on lightly greased baking sheets.
7. Bake at 350 degrees F for 8 minutes or until the edges are lightly browned.
8. Remove to wire racks to cool.
9. Dip cookies in glaze; place on wax paper to dry.
10. Decorate with Royal Icing.
11. Combine 1/4 Teaspoon gold dust and 1/4 teaspoon of vanilla extract with a small paintbrush.
12. Working quickly, brush on gold accents, add 1 drop of clear vanilla extract at a time, as needed, to moisten gold dust.
13. Sprinkle on more gold dust if desired.
14. Yields about 16 cookies

Directions for Glaze:

1. Whisk powdered sugar and hot water until smooth. Yields 1 1/3 cups.

Royal Icing:

1. Stir together the powdered sugar, meringue powder, and hot water until smooth.
2. Add in food coloring, if desired.
3. Pour into a decorating bag or zip-top freezer bag.
4. Snip a tiny hole in the corner of the bag and decorate if desired.
5. Yields about 3 cups.

Thoughts After Baking:

So first of all, I didn’t decorate these, I had 3-5 year olds do it so they don’t look as nice as they would have, if I had done it. They were delicious, and the kids loved them.

For more Christmas Cookies, go to Braided Candy Canes

For more Sugar Cookies, go to Sugar Puffs

For more cookie recipes, go to Eggless Cookie Dough

For more desserts, go to The “Best” Brownies

And Only to Deceive

So every year in December leading up to Christmas I try and post a Christmas mystery. This year I had a really difficult time and had to go out on a bit of a limb. This book isn’t a “Christmas Mystery” but Christmas does play a role so it counts.

And Only to Deceive (Lady Emily Mystery #1) by Tasha Alexander

Lady Emily is a widow.

But she isn’t sad as she never loved her husband.

Lady Emily Ashton is an only daughter and all her life her mother has been plotting and planning and maneuvering to get her daughter married off to a wealthy and eligible bachelor.

Emily chose Viscount Phillip Ashton as he seemed less chauvinistic and someone who would be okay to live with-and  of course by marrying she would be free of her mother.

Phillip was interested in the hunt, captured his quarry, and then went on a big game hunt to Africa were he became sick and died.

Emily was given freedom, money, large houses-she had to be absent from society for two years but that was okay as she didn’t really care for it. Life was solitary but it wasn’t bad.

Everything changed when her husband’s best friend came to visit after a year and a half. Mr Colin Hargreaves came to speak to Emily about how he made sure her Greek Villa was all in order, and she is free to go there anytime, just let him know and he will arrange the trip for her, Kallista.

Emily is completely surprised as her husband never said any thing about a villa and he never called her Kallista.

Emily is baffled by this and even more when her butler let’s her know that he fired a footman who was digging in her late husband’s desk. She starts looking to see if anything is missing,-although how would she know as she has never been in there really-and discovers a threatening note.

This is just the firsts in a series that makes Emily realize she knew very little, if anything about her husband. It turns out that he was an avid collector or Greek art-throughly knowledgeable in it and Greek history.

Hmm…

She also finds his journals and reads about his love for her (in incredibly sweet journal entries).

Emily’s interest is piqued and she begins reading Homer’s The Odyssey and researching into Greek art and mythology.

She discovers more things do not add up and that her husband was caught up in a fake antiquary scam. Could it be that he was duped, with all his knowledge and expertise? Or was he the ringleader?

Emily cannot believe the later, and as she reads her husband’s journals, she starts to fall in love with him, and remember wonderful and romantic gestures he would do, but took for granted at the time.

Emily isn’t sure who to trust, besides her old friend Ivy and new friend Lady Cécile du Lac. Colin spends a lot of time around her, and then she discovers that he has been watching her. Why? Could he be the ringleader?

Hmm…

She also meets another friend of her husband, Andrew Palmer, who is fun, light, sarcastic, and likes to party and go out. He gives Emily a lot of attention and she enjoys it, as anyone who has been sent to the sidelines would. He is from noble stock, but has no money. Could he be after her wealth, or is he really interested in her.

Hmm…

Colin and Andrew were both on the hunting trip with her husband, could one of them have killed him?

Then Emily gets a note about her husband being alive! Is he a criminal hiding out? Or was he betrayed by a friend and in need?

Emily sets off on a trek to Africa, will she be happy with what she finds? Or is she heading into a trap?!

Thoughts After Reading:

I really enjoyed this mystery as I liked that Emily was an independent woman with a strong personality and ideas about what she wanted, but at the same time she was still a woman of her times. I hate when people write historical fiction and the people are too much a product of our time. It makes zero sense.

I can’t wait to read the next book in the series!

For more Christmas Mysteries, go to Mail Order Murder

For more historical fiction, go to The Secret Keeper

For more mysteries about widows, go to A Quiche Before Dying