Case #5: He’s-No-Angel Case of Identity Cupcakes

 

Mrs. Hudson does not normally have the temerity to disagree with Mr. Holmes about his cases. I’m sure I know my place as his landlady. However, the conclusion of A Case of Identity didn’t sit right with me. What, not tell a woman that her lover is really her stepfather trying to cheat her out of her money? How awful! Mr. Holmes made some excuse about a woman’s “delusions” as if that made it alright. We women are romantic creatures, it’s true, but when faced with the truth I'd say we can accept it as well as any man and better than some.

Well, nothing left to do but bake about it now. This is not a fancy recipe, but you can have fun with it by playing a little game with your guests.

The ironic alias "Hosmer Angel" makes me think of Angel Food Cake, and since Mr. James Windibank turned out to be a devil in disguise, we should have Devil's Food Cake, too. For this recipe, you need to bake a batch of each in opaque cupcake liners and frost them so that the two varieties look identical. Anyone selecting one of these cupcakes will get a surprise flavour--a much nicer surprise than finding out that your soft-spoken suitor is your mother's husband! 

When I served these cupcakes upstairs at 221B, Mr. Holmes acted like distinguishing between the two varieties was no mystery to him. So typical of his conceit. Then, when he chose an angel food cupcake, he had to pretend to be delighted with it, even though I happen to know he's devoted to chocolate. 

It's not a lot towards getting Miss Sutherland a bit of her own back, but it's something.

The Cupcakes

Make a batch of angel food cupcakes and devil's food cupcakes. You can either bake them from scratch using a standard recipes, or take advantage of modern convenience foods, like Mrs. Beeton's line of cake mixes. 

Mrs. Hudson decided to make it easy on herself this time.

It's important to use opaque liners for the cupcakes so that the different colours of the cake batter don't show through. Metallic liners are ideal for this, or use any dark shade of paper liner. In the first photo you can see that I also added a second liner at the end, which gave a pretty, layered effect.

The cupcakes prior to the final frosting disguise

The Frosting

The cupcakes are frosted with a buttercream frosting tinted purple in an homage to the lovely dress Miss Sutherland wore to the Gasfitters' Ball. 

Frosting ingredients 

1 cup Butter 

4 cups Icing Sugar

3 tbsp Cream

2 tsp Vanilla Extract

Pinch of salt

Food colouring 

Mix together the butter and icing sugar, then add in the rest of the ingredients and whip until the mixture is smooth and fluffy. You could spread the icing on the cupcakes with a knife, but piping gives a more consistent coverage which will make it harder to see the cakes underneath. 

Which would you choose?

Case #4: Jabez Wilson’s Spicy Ginger Nuts

A little edible glitter added to the finished biscuits is purely optional,
but it is reminiscent of the “3 gilt balls” hanging outside Jabez Wilson’s pawn shop.

I was very taken with Mr Jabez Wilson’s blazing red hair when he visited 221 Baker Street during The Adventure of the Redheaded League. Any recipe devoted to that story has to feature ginger in some way, so I’ve chosen ginger nuts as a starting point. These old fashioned biscuits are normally rather simple (like Mr Wilson himself, poor soul,) but we can’t stop with just the sort of basic bake you could find in any shop. We’ll aim, like Mr Holmes, at something “outside of the conventions and humdrum of everyday life.” This variation on a classic is brought to you by the letter A, since that’s the section Mr Wilson was copying so laboriously from the Encyclopedia Brittanica.

To a basic ginger nut recipe we’ll add Aniseed, Allspice, Apples, Apricots, and Almonds. Strangely enough, ginger nuts don’t usually contain nuts. They got that name because they are traditionally very  hard and crunchy, like a tough nut. This version, by contrast, does contain nuts and is actually rather soft and chewy due to the addition of the dried fruit and liquid sweeteners. To make these biscuits gingery enough for even the Redheaded League, there will be freshly grated and candied ginger in the mix in addition to the usual powdered variety. I’m also going to put in a little hot pepper. It doesn’t start with A, but it does go with fiery red hair.

I must tell you that when I mentioned the name of my new recipe to Dr Watson he laughed rather coarsely and said something about the carpet matching the drapes. I never understand that man’s pawky sense of humour. I’m sure there’s never been anything wrong with the carpet or drapes in this house! Well anyway, he still ate a whole plateful of them when they were warm out of the oven.

Ingredients

1 1/4 cups all purpose flour 

2 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp allspice 

1 tsp cayenne or Aleppo pepper 

1 tsp baking soda 

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 cup unsalted butter 

1 cup granulated sugar 

1-2 inch knob of fresh ginger, grated

1 egg

1 tbsp water

2 tbsp honey

2 tbsp corn syrup or molasses 

1/2 cup toasted and chopped almonds *

1/3 cup chopped dried apples *

1/3 cup chopped dried apricots *

1/3 cup chopped crystallized ginger *

* I chopped my fruit and nuts fairly small, but you can change that if you want a chunkier biscuit.

Optional: edible gold glitter for decoration 

Three gingers

The “A” team. Almonds, apples, apricots, aniseed and allspice.
Add some cayenne pepper—or Aleppo if you’ve got it!

Combine the flour, spices, baking soda and salt in a bowl. In a larger bowl cream together the butter and sugar until light and smooth. Mix in grated fresh ginger. Mix in egg. Mix in water and liquid sweeteners until well combined and light. 

Add the flour mixture in about three steps and incorporate well. 

Add almonds, apples, apricots and crystallized ginger. Chill the dough for about 30 minutes and preheat the oven to 350°.

The ginger nut dough just before incorporating the fruit and nuts

Putting in a bunch of ingredients based on the alphabet isn’t usually how I’d develop a recipe. However, I tasted the dough at this stage (because I live in the 19th century and I’m not worried about raw eggs) and I think these ginger nuts are going to be really good!

When the dough is chilled and the oven preheated to 350° take about a tablespoon of the dough at a time and roll it into balls. Set them onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and bake until golden brown. This takes about 8-10 minutes depending on the size and the oven. To keep the ginger nuts soft and chewy, be sure not to over bake them.

You can finish the cookies with a sprinkling of edible glitter when they’ve cooled down if you would like to reproduce the effect shown in the photo at the top of the blog.

Serving suggestion: enjoy with a cup of coffee or tea, a good book, and—if possible—a redhead.

Case #3: Scandalous Bohemian Tart

 

Scandalous Bohemian Tart under a sugar cage bonnet with edible flowers 

Mrs Hudson is not calling Irene Adler a tart, you understand. 

Indeed, I quite admire The Woman—the way she made her way in the world, and the way she bested Mr Holmes. It’s also a relief not having him making merry over the cleverness of women of late, having myself been the subject of too many of those jokes.

However, if we’re going to create a recipe for “A Scandal in Bohemia,” it should be inspired by the adventure’s  famous heroine, and I can think of no dessert better suited to eclipse all others than a fresh fruit tart of several components—ripe, juicy, buttery, crumbly, creamy, boozy, crunchy, flowery-sweet.

[Note: the prune purée should be started the night before.]

The Shortbread Crust

1 stick unsalted butter 

1/3 cup sugar 

I rounded cup all purpose flour 

Pinch salt

1/2 tsp vanilla extract 

Cut together ingredients with two knives, then work lightly with your fingers until everything is combined into small crumbs. Press into tart pan. Poke the bottom with a fork. Chill for 30 minutes, then bake at 350 for about 30 minutes until golden brown. Let cool while you prepare the fillings.

The Fillings

Pastry cream: 

1 1/2 cups milk

1/4 cup sugar

1/8 cup cornstarch 

2 egg yolks (or 1 egg)

2 tablespoons butter 

1 tsp vanilla extract 

Whisk the cornstarch, egg yolks and 1/4 cup of the milk in a medium bowl and set aside. Bring the rest of the milk, the sugar and the pinch of salt to just short of boiling point in a small saucepan over medium heat. Pour the hot milk into the egg and cornstarch mixture in a slow, narrow stream while whisking quickly to avoid cooking the eggs. Pour this mixture back into the saucepan. Cook over medium heat, whisking constantly until the mixture thickens. Take off the heat, add the butter and whisk to incorporate. Cool completely in refrigerator and then put into piping bag.

Prune purée:

2 cups pitted prunes

Brandy 

Vanilla extract or orange zest

Put the prunes in a bowl. Pour brandy over them. Cover and leave overnight so the prunes soften and absorb the brandy. You’ll need enough moisture to make a smooth purée. If there’s not enough liquid when it’s time to purée, you can add a little hot water, orange juice, or more brandy. (Mrs Hudson doesn’t judge you.) Add a teaspoon of vanilla extract or orange zest for flavour, and purée to a smooth, pipeable consistancy. Put in a piping bag.

A note about prunes: Mrs Hudson can hear you, you know. I’m standing right here. Not everyone loves prunes, but trust me on this. This is not your grandmother’s dried plums. A vanilla-scented purée of brandied prunes is a delicious treat. If you have some purée left over after making the tart you can do as the French do and pipe it into plump whole prunes. Maybe you don’t like the idea of prune on prune, but are you going to argue with the French over patisserie? 

Pipe the pastry cream and prune purée side by side into the cooled tart shell, using any design you like. 

The Fruit and Glaze

Get the ripest plums you can find. Slice them and let them drain a bit in a colander if necessary. Arrange them on top of the filling. Heat a small amount of apricot jam and brush on top of them. This helps to keep the fruit fresh and adds shine.

The Sugar Cage Bonnet 

Granulated sugar

Water

Corn syrup or glucose (optional)

Edible flowers 

Ok, are we ready for this part? Mrs Hudson has never made a sugar cage before, but let’s give it a try.

Get a metal or Pyrex bowl big enough to fit over your tart. Grease well or spray with cooking spray. You can use the inside or outside of the bowl. I used the inside for mine.

Put a cup of sugar in a saucepan and add about a quarter cup water. The exact proportions aren’t very important but there should be mostly sugar in the pan. If you have corn syrup or glucose on hand you can put a tablespoon in to help with texture but it’s not essential. Bring the mixture to a boil. You can use a wet pastry brush to brush down any sugar crystals that form on the side, but don’t mix after the boiling starts. Heat slowly to about 150 C/300 F or until brittle strands form when a bit of the mixture is dropped into water. At this point you’ll see that it has become thicker and is just starting to turn gold. Don’t let it burn.

MRS HUDSON WOULD LIKE YOU TO BE VERY CAREFUL ABOUT THIS NEXT PART.

Boiling hot sugar can cause very serious burns. Don’t let children do this part. Don’t do it yourself unless you’ll take care to keep the sugar away from your skin.

Take the pot off the heat as soon as it reaches the right stage. Working quickly (but safely) use a spoon to drizzle sugar over the greased bowl, creating a sort of basket with a lacy network of strands. Let cool enough to set.

If you have a preferred deity, this would be a good time to enlist his/her/their help. Gently loosen the sugar network, and then place the bowl over the tart, hoping it will slide out.

It did! A little breaking here and there but it mostly created a solid dome. Hooray!

Now pretty up your bonnet with some edible flowers. 

A photo of the finished tart is a the top of this post. Below is a serving suggestion.

Case #2: Agra Treasure Curried Vegetable Pie

Mrs Hudson thinks that “The Sign of the Four” is one of Mr Holmes’s most exciting adventures. So fascinating, with the Indian elements, those peculiar twins, and the one-legged man and his friend the tiny gentleman with the poisoned dart.

All that lovely treasure sunk to the bottom of the Thames, though. It doesn’t bear thinking about. For this adventure I’ve decided to memorialize the lost treasure in a pie full of golden roasted vegetables. I’ve been hearing about the wonderful curries Her Majesty the Queen enjoys at the palace and I think we should add some Indian flavours via a creamy sauce. The star of the dish will be pearl onions. They remind me of the beautiful pearls belonging to that nice Miss Morstan that married Dr Watson.

Agra Treasure Pie with Sign of the Four decoration

Ingredients 

Pastry for single crust pie, plus a little extra for decorations. Any recipe for flaky pastry is fine as long as it's unsweetened. Frozen pie crust will also work. 

Vegetable filling:
5 cups of roasted vegetables. In this recipe I used about 15 pearl onions, 1 yellow pepper, 3 parsnips, 2 medium potatoes, 2 medium sweet potatoes, and a cup of sliced heirloom baby carrots. You can use any combination you like. 

1/2 cup unsalted roasted cashews, chopped

Curry sauce for filling:
2 cups diced canned tomatoes, drained
1 small onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic. minced
3 tbsp butter or ghee
1 tbsp cumin
1 tsp powdered ginger
1 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp garam masala or curry powder
1 cup heavy cream

Yogurt sauce for serving:
1 cup of plain thick yogurt 
1 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp salt 
1-2 tbsp chopped cilantro 

A selection of vegetables for the filling

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

To prepare the filling, cut up the vegetables, toss in a bit of oil, salt and pepper, and roast in batches in a 400 degree oven. Large pearl onions should be cut in half, or if you'll be serving this to small children, cut them all in half. (Mrs Hudson is paranoid that way.) Put them aside in a large bowl. Stir in the chopped cashews.

To prepare the sauce, heat the butter or ghee in a wide saucepan. Add the onions and garlic and sauté for about 3 minutes or until the onions become translucent. Add all the spices and sauté for about 3 more minutes. Add the chopped tomatoes, and simmer for about 10 minutes. Add the heavy cream and simmer for another 10-15 minutes until you have a thick sauce. I pureed mine with a hand blender to make a smooth sauce, but that's optional. Pour the sauce into the bowl of vegetables. It's a good idea to pour in the sauce in stages. Only add enough until you get a creamy, but not liquidy, filling. 

Roll out the pie dough and put in the pie pan. For a decoration,  cut out 4 + (plus) signs from a bit of leftover dough. I baked these separately so that they wouldn't burn, and added them on top of the pie afterwards.

Pour the vegetable filling into the pie pan and cook until the filling is hot and the crust is browned. This will probably take about 30 minutes.

While the pie is baking, prepare the yogurt sauce by mixing all ingredients together and chilling in the refrigerator until serving.

Roasted vegetables and pre-baked decorative "Sign"

Spicy curry sauce

Serve the pie warm with some of the cool yogurt sauce. This recipe can be adapted in many ways. You can use different vegetables, but to suit the treasure theme be sure to include some onion pearls and golden root vegetables. The yogurt sauce can be made more like a proper Indian raita, or you could use your favorite herb and spice combination. If you think cilantro leaves taste like soap, by all means pick something different. Do whatever you like--Mrs Hudson is not the boss of you.

Case #1: STUDmuffins

Hello again!

Mrs Hudson has returned from a six year hiatus to continue celebrating the cases of Mr Sherlock Holmes through baked goods. One thing I’d always wanted to do is to create a recipe for every adventure that Dr Watson set to paper. Here we’ll start with the first of these, “A Study in Scarlet.” I’ve heard that many of Mr Holmes’s devotees abbreviate this title as STUD, so our recipe will be “STUDmuffins.”

The recipe starts with a whole wheat muffin base, harkening back to the golden fields of wheat that John and Lucy Ferrier found in their would-be promised land of Utah. The next essential ingredient is the “scarlet thread of murder,” which we’ll represent with a ribbon of raspberry jam. The muffins will also be studded with fresh or frozen raspberries, and topped with cream cheese icing anchoring two jelly beans to represent the two pills in Jefferson Hope’s game of Russian roulette.

Ingredients for 12 muffins:

• 1 cup whole wheat flour 
• 1 cup all purpose flour 
• 1/2 cup sugar 
• 1/3 cup brown sugar 
• 1 teaspoon baking soda 
• 1/2 cup butter
• 1 egg
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla 
• 1 cup milk or buttermilk 
• 1/2 cup fresh or frozen raspberries 
• 1/2 cup raspberry jam

Ingredients for frosting and decoration:

• 1/2 cup cream cheese 
• 1/4 cup unsalted butter 
• 1 1/2 cups icing sugar 
• 1 teaspoon vanilla 

• Jelly bean “pills” in colour of choice 
• Cheerios for an additional wedding ring garnish, if handy

Mix together the two flours. Heat jam in microwave about 30-40 seconds to loosen it up and put aside. (Mrs. Hudson’s microwave is from 1895 so it took a little longer.) In another bowl, cream together the butter, two sugars and baking soda. Mix in the egg and vanilla. Add the milk and stir until well combined. Add the flour and mix until combined—don’t over mix. Gently stir in raspberries. If frozen, do not defrost them first. 

To create the scarlet thread of murder, pour the jam onto the batter in a few places and run a knife gently through the batter to make a ribbon. Ladle the batter into muffin cups set into a muffin pan. (Gently again so as not to disturb the jam ribbon.) Bake at 400 F for about 15 minutes. The top of the muffin should spring back a bit when touched.

Using large muffin pans yields 18 muffins.

Optional topping and decoration:

Unadorned, the muffins make a good, not-too-sweet breakfast option. To fancy them up, combine butter, cream cheese, powdered sugar and vanilla until creamy. Spread on top of the cooled muffins and top with two jellybeans in scarlet or pink or whatever colour you choose. If you like, add a piece of oat ring cereal for Lucy’s wedding ring.