Raspberry Danish Murder (Hannah Swensen #22)(3)

When Hannah started her Suburban, she noticed that the engine sounded a bit sluggish. It was time to start using her engine block heater and plugging her cookie truck in every night. The garage had a strip of outlets on the wall in front of the parking spaces for that purpose. There was also a strip of outlets in the parking lot at The Cookie Jar.

As Hannah drove to work, she thought about the busy days ahead. It was Monday, and Thanksgiving would arrive soon. That meant they had to prepare for the Thanksgiving baking. The orders for pumpkin pies, pumpkin scones, pumpkin cookies, and sugar cookies decorated with turkeys and pumpkins were already pouring in. The pumpkin pies could be made no more than a day in advance and the same was true for the scones and cookies. They could, however, mix some of the ingredients together ahead of time and have everything ready for the marathon of baking that was necessary on the two days before the November holiday.

For the most part, things had gone smoothly the previous year, but there were more orders this year. Hannah was thankful that she had help. Her partner, Lisa, was a dynamo in the kitchen. They also had Jack and Marge Herman, Lisa’s father and stepmother, to handle the business in the coffee shop while they baked in the kitchen. This year, they had two additional bakers, Lisa’s aunt Nancy, who was a genius at coming up with new recipes, and Michelle, who would pitch in when she wasn’t busy with rehearsals. Part of Michelle’s college curriculum was work study, and she was in town to direct the Thanksgiving and Christmas plays that their local community theater group was performing, and also to direct the high school junior class play, which would be performed between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

There was no traffic at this time of the morning, and Hannah pulled into her parking spot in back of The Cookie Jar much sooner than she’d expected. She got out of her cookie truck, locked the doors, plugged in her block heater, and hurried to the back kitchen door. When she came in, both Lisa and Michelle looked surprised.

“I thought you were going to take time for coffee,” Michelle said by way of a greeting.

“I did, but coffee by myself was boring. I thought I’d have another cup with you two here.”

“I’ll pour some for you,” Lisa offered. “And since we already have bar cookies in the oven, Michelle and I can take a break.”

“How about a piece of Raspberry Danish?” Michelle asked Hannah. “Lisa was here early and she baked some company-size ones.” She turned to Lisa. “It’s cool enough to cut, isn’t it?”

“It should be.” Lisa turned to Hannah. “Aunt Nancy baked it for us when Herb and I went to her house for brunch last weekend. She gave me the recipe and I wanted to try it here.”

“Is it difficult to make?”

“Not at all! I thought that if you like it, we could serve it here.”

“That’s a really good idea. We’ve never served any kind of Danish before, and I’m sure our morning customers would appreciate it. Personally, I just love Danish!”

Michelle smiled. “So does almost everyone I know. I think it would go over great, Hannah.”

Lisa hurried to the bakers rack, removed a pan from one of the shelves, and carried it over to show Hannah. “Doesn’t it look pretty?”

“It certainly does,” Hannah told her. “And it smells wonderful, too. I love the scent of raspberries. If they could bottle it, I’d be tempted to use it as perfume.”

Both Lisa and Michelle laughed. Then Michelle warned, “That would be dangerous, Hannah.”

“Why?”

“Strangers everywhere would follow you around just so they could sniff you.”

“I know Herb would,” Lisa told her. “He ate three pieces at Aunt Nancy’s brunch.”

“Is it made with puff pastry dough?” Hannah asked.

“Yes, and I like it a lot better than the raspberry Danish you can buy in the bakery aisle at the store. Those taste like sweet rolls with raspberry jam on the top.”

Hannah frowned. “The puff pastry could be a problem. I read through a recipe for that once, and it took hours to make. You had to mix it up and roll it out, put chunks of butter on the top, fold it up, and refrigerate it for a while, before you rolled it out again. I don’t remember how many times you had to do that, but it was a lot. The recipe said that all the buttering and rolling was what made the dough tender and flaky.”

“We don’t have to make the dough from scratch,” Lisa told her. “I used the frozen kind this morning. Aunt Nancy said she made puff pastry from scratch once, and the frozen dough is just as good.”

“How about the raspberries?” Michelle asked her. “It’s really hard to find a source for fresh raspberries in November.”

“You can use either frozen or fresh. I used frozen and so did Aunt Nancy. She told me she uses fresh berries when she can get them, but frozen work just fine.”

“Don’t tease us by talking about it, Lisa,” Michelle told her. “Cut the Danish and give us a piece. I’ve been dying to taste it ever since you took it out of the oven. The way I feel right now, I could eat the whole thing, all by myself.”

Both Hannah and Michelle watched eagerly as Lisa placed the large Raspberry Danish on the stainless steel surface of the work table and picked up a knife to cut it. “Who wants the end piece?” she asked.