Raspberry Debacle

Another brilliant thing about South London: the charity shops. Yesterday it was Lou Jane Temple’s Death By Rhubarb, tagline: “At Cafe Heaven, the souffles don’t fall, but the bodies do”.

It’s a “culinary mystery” from 1996 in which cafe-owner Heaven Lee “turns sleuth to save her restaurant”, and it has a fantastic disregard for genre boundaries. “Tonight they were sharing three Blue Heaven salads, and a double macaroni and cheese”, the main text says, and then there’s a recipe for Blue Heaven Salad. “You’re right, Pearl. What would this street do without you, you and your gingerbread?” says a character, and then there’s a recipe for Pearl’s Gingerbread Upside-Down Cake. The series also seems to be charmingly autobiographical; character Heaven runs Cafe Heaven, writer Lou runs Cafe Lulu.

There are now seven books about Cafe Heaven, including A Stiff Risotto (I feel like there’s a pun here I’m not getting?), Red Beans and Vice, and Bread on Arrival. I particularly like Bread on Arrival for being the wrong way round: instead of death being smuggled into a seemingly innocent meal, it’s a meal being smuggled into a macabre situation. Presumably ambulance attendants rush a dying patient to the hospital, and when they get him there he’s… been replaced by a life-size bread mannequin? I don’t know, the charity shop only had the first two books in the series.

The question, anyway, is whether I should take this as inspiration to rejig Raspberry Debacle as an ongoing mystery. The answer is “almost certainly not”, but I’ve been preparing possible renames, just in case:

• Rest in Peas (restinpeas.com is unfortunately already registered, though there’s nothing there)
• Vegetable Stir-DIE
• Um, Scrambled Legs?
• Fig-or Mortis?
• Capital Bun-ishment?
• I know, A Sudden Tart Attack!
• This isn’t as easy as it looks, though
• Portobello Mush Doom? Monosodium Glutafate?
• Gluten-free chocolate cake but it isn’t really gluten-free and someone’s allergic to gluten oh no, though maybe that should just be called Gluten-FULL Chocolate Cake?
• Last Dill and Testament

Ivy, Battersea’s bakingest postgrad, sighed as she looked at the body in the kitchen. “I don’t know where you’re going to keep it,” she said. “There’s no room in our fridge, and you know Patriona doesn’t like meat in hers.” Patriona was their housemate — she was a vegetarian and gluten-intolerant!

“It’s not mine,” Ivy’s boyfriend Keath replied, stroking his beard in a puzzled way, because he had one.

Ivy sighed again, and looked up the stairs. “Cory!”, she called, “is this your body in the kitchen?” Cory was their other housemate. He had short hair.

There was a bit of hilarious misunderstanding while Cory thought she’d meant his actual body, that he lived in and typed with and things, because that’s the natural assumption surely, what with people not usually leaving bodies in the kitchen. Finally, however, the misunderstanding was cleared up.

“Maybe it’s Patriona’s?” Cory said.

Ivy phoned Patriona.

“No,” Patriona said, “I didn’t leave a body in the kitchen. I’m a vegetarian and gluten-intolerant, remember! I hope you get rid of it before dinner, anyway, remember Robert and, I mean, um, Zobert and Snosh are coming over. Did you say you were making a tart?”

“Oh!” Ivy said. “The tart!” She ran to the oven, and pulled out her Rhubarb and Fig Tart just in time.

Rhubarb and Fig Tart (requires a medium-sized tart tin)
Pastry:
(This is my current favourite gluten-free pastry, but it’s quite crumbly, so if you don’t need it gluten-free then any slightly sweet shortcrust pastry is good).
110g potato flour
110g yellow corn flour
150g butter
50g caster sugar
1 egg, beaten
Cold water

Rhubarb filling:
250g rhubarb
25ml water
25g sugar
1 teaspoon finely-chopped rosemary

Almond filling:
150g butter
150g caster sugar
Pinch salt
1 egg, beaten
150g almond meal
1 tablespoon lemon juice

Topping:
2 or 3 figs
50g almond flakes

For the pastry, sift together the flours, then dice the butter and rub it into the flours until the mixture looks breadcrumby.

Make a well in the centre. Beat the egg; mix it in, and add cold water as needed to make the pastry cohere into a lump (not more than a couple of tablespoons). Split into two balls - one consisting of two-thirds of the pastry, the other the other third - wrap them separately in cling film, and chill for an hour or so.

Chop the rhubarb coarsely, and put it in a saucepan with the water, sugar and rosemary. Heat over a low to medium heat, stirring occasionally, until the rhubarb has mostly broken down into threads and the whole is thick and spoonable. Cool.

When the pastry’s chilled, take it out and preheat the oven to 180C.

Grease the tart tin. Roll out the larger ball of pastry into a circle to cover the base of a medium tart tin; use the other third to cover the sides, by taking a section, rolling it into a snake, and then pressing it along the side of the tart tin (and into the base pastry, where they touch). Given the crumbliness of the pastry, you’ll probably need to do this in four or five sections, rather than all at once.

Cover the pastry loosely with greaseproof paper and weigh it down with dry peas or pastry weights or the like, and cook for ten minutes; then take the weights and paper off and cook until the case starts to get slightly golden, probably another ten minutes or so.

Lower the oven temperature to 160C.

For the almond filling, cream the butter, salt and sugar until light and fluffy. Stir in the egg, then the ground almonds and lemon juice.

Spread a thick layer of the rhubarb mixture over the base of the tart case, filling it around halfway or just less. Spread the almond mixture over this, enough to take it not quite to the top of the tart.

Slice the figs, and press the slices gently into the top of the tart, and then press the flaked almonds around the edge of the tart.

Bake until the almond mixture is golden all over, probably an hour or so. Ideally, serve warm with some sort of delicious ice-cream, and without any poison.