I have read and reviewed a couple of the books in A. Gardner’s Poppy Peters Mystery series and was delighted when I saw she had a new series, the Bison Creek Mysteries. I picked up ICED SPY, the second book in the series and was captivated!
Synopsis
Essie Stratter is the lead fitness trainer at Pinecliff Mountain Resort in Bison Creek. Her younger sister, Joy, along with Joy’s ex-husband (and now back to being a boyfriend) are her roommates. Joy decides she needs to test her maternal instinct and brings home a Cocker Spaniel puppy, Miso. Somehow as the resort prepares for the Sugar Mountain Bake-off, Essie is left caring for the puppy. While on a walk, Miso gets away from her and runs towards the lake. He leads Essie towards a body, half buried in the snow. The victim is Sarah Henson, one of Essie’s clients. It’s apparent she’s been murdered and her two dogs have disappeared into thin air.
The local Sheriff has hired Essie as a consultant to bring him all the town’s gossip to help solve crimes. However, the mayor has hired his young nephew as the new detective, who is at odds with Essie and doesn’t want her involved. When Essie finds that Sarah had been spying on the town’s residents and logging all the juicy details in journals, she realizes the suspect pool could be huge. To make matters worse, both the mayor and his wife’s escapades are in the discovered journals. When Essie is attacked and left for dead, Miso comes to her rescue and saves her life. Essie realizes she’s getting close to the truth but can she find the killer before they strike again? Can she trust the new detective or will he hinder the investigation to protect the reputation of his family?
My Review
I loved this new series and the characters pulled me in! Even though I started with the second book it was easily read as a stand-alone. There is an underlying mystery surrounding Essie, who was adopted as a very young child, that appears to run throughout the series…and it certainly has piqued my curiosity! The murder mystery provided plenty of suspects and red herrings, which kept me guessing until the very end. The premise of “rooming” with her sister and ex-husband lent itself to some humorous, laugh out loud moments while Miso, the adorable Cocker Spaniel puppy, made the story more endearing. The author is setting up some romance for Essie which, in my opinion, will add to the story in future books. Book 3, FROSTED BAIT, is already available on e-book and is on my to read list!
The author always has amazing recipes included with her books and ICED SPY is no exception! I chose to make Anne’s Mississippi Mud Bites…a brownie-like cake chock-full of chocolate chips and pecans, then topped with baked marshmallows and a decadent chocolate buttercream frosting. The author “warned” me that these were rich and to serve in very small pieces… I made them for my granddaughter’s school for Teachers’ Appreciation Week and I think a few teachers swooned! Thank you, A. Gardner, for allowing me to share these very delicious bars!
Thank you to A. Gardner for providing an e-book copy of ICED SPY for one lucky winner! Please use the Rafflecopter box located below the recipe to enter. Contest ends Monday, May 23, 2016 at 11:59 pm PST. Winners will be announced on this page and on Cinnamon & Sugar’s Facebook page, as well as notified by email (so check your spam folder!)
Anne’s Mississippi Mud Bites
A sweet southern treat! This dessert is very rich, and best served in bite-size squares after sitting in the refrigerator overnight.
Ingredients
Chocolate Squares
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (I used Hershey’s natural cocoa)
1-1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup pecans, chopped
1 cup chocolate chips
3 cups mini marshmallows
Chocolate Frosting
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
6 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder (I used Hershey’s Special Dark cocoa, but regular is fine)
3 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup milk
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees (F).
Chocolate Squares
In a large mixing bowl, cream together the butter and sugar.
Add the eggs, and vanilla extract, and mix well.
In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, cocoa powder, and salt.
Add the dry mixture to the butter mixture, and stir until it forms a chocolate batter.
Stir in the pecans and chocolate chips.
Pour batter into a large, greased casserole dish (9″x13″), and bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 35 – 40 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean.
Place the mini marshmallows on top, and bake for an additional 3 – 5 minutes.
Let the dish cool completely before frosting.
Chocolate Frosting
Whisk together butter, and half the powdered sugar.
Add the cocoa powder, milk, and the rest of the powdered sugar, and mix until smooth.
Gently frost over the melted, cooled marshmallows, and set the dish in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes.
Cut into small squares and serve.
Tips
Remove the pan from the oven before adding the marshmallows to the top of the bars and then return the pan to the oven for additional baking. I will neither confirm nor deny whether a small fire may or may not have occurred when a few marshmallows fell on the bottom of my hot oven.
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I’ve had my share of minor kitchen disasters, such as having marshmallows burst into flames when I dropped them in my oven 🙂 I’ve also caught potholders and dish towels on fire! It’s no wonder my husband has put 2 fire extinguishers in my kitchen and stands close by whenever I use a handheld kitchen torch!
Besides burning food? LOL! Parchment paper catching on fire isn’t fun and I learned a lesson! Yummy recipe and cute book!
Kitchen disaster? So many I wish to forget…burnt birthday cakes, oven fires, missing ingredients for big party on a ‘store is closed’ holiday, creativity gone haywire. Some very interesting cooking tales to tell…
Sounds like a great book to add to my cozy challenge list. Thanks for a chance to win a copy.
Kitchen disaster — trying to tweak a banana bread recipe in a bread machine where all measurements are supposed to be exact ( I know that now!) It overflowed and took forever to clean out the machine and all the parts that the banana goop had stuck onto! My husband still reminds me of the banana bread incident whenever he catches me changing a recipe, and every time I use my bread machine, I swear I can still smell bananas!
Oh, yes, many kitchen disasters. But, the funniest one is when my husband and i were dating. I fixed spaghetti for him for lunch, went to drain the noodles and dumped them in the sink. I didn’t tell him until years later that I scooped up the dirty sink noodles and served them to him. He’s a sweetheart! He just laughed. Married 37 years and still going strong.
Kitchen disasters… Indeed, I have had my share… Out of the frying pan and into the fire! Meatloaf bursting into flames that roared from the oven door, catching the dish towel afire… Pot holders smoking and burner covers roasting,.. Tea kettles boiling dry… I am ever away with the faerys with my head stuck in a book rather than keeping an eye on the stove! 😉 I have added ICED SPY to my TBR List. It sounds like a fabulous read… and the recipe looks delicious. Thank you for this delightful chance. Happy reading and writing. ❤️☕️?
Somehow my daughter managed to catch pancakes on fire. Not sure what she did but all of a sudden I heard mom help/
My goodness, that look decadently good!
Kitchen disasters? The best story is my husband’s. His mom was cooking spinach in a pressure cooker (way back when everything got cooked in one and why would you need to pressure cook spinach?). It exploded and went all over the ceiling, except for the bit that fell on his Dad’s head when he went in to find out what had happened.
The stain was there for years.
I’m not a reader of electronic books, but, I appreciate your introduction to a new-to-me author & series. Ah ha! Now I know how Essie can eat those scrumptious Mississippi Mud Bars…she’s a fitness trainer! Burns those calories off lickity split!
I had a almost bad kitchen disaster. I was cooking french fries and the grease was too hot. So i put the fries in and a fire shot up to ceiling and it shot across to the other side. Scared the death out of me.
I once put a TV dinner in the oven without taking it out of the box…I was very young and very inexperienced at cooking back then..LOL
Kitchen disasters never happen at the best of times. The one I really can remember the most was when I was making french fries on the top burner of my stove with a deep pan and it caught on fire. Also had my oven catch on fire and fried it. Needless to say they both happened when my mother-in-law was present.
Yes. I have forgotten a pot on the stove several times and the food burnt.
I am unfamiliar with this series, but it looks right up my alley and like great fun! One of these days I’m going to do a culinary mystery series on my blog complete with review and recipe. We need to spread the word about this great genre of mysteries!
On year I got a KitchenAid mixer for Christmas and I decided to make a Red Velvet Cake from scratch with my mother’s recipe. I don’t know what I did, but the cake was so heavy and a total disaster. These Mississippi Mud Bars look amazing , I think I will give them a try next time I need to bring a dessert to a party. Looking forward to reading the book, sounds like a good read.
I’m the type of person that forgets that I’m cooking (these books don’t read themselves!) and sometimes things end up a little too done.
This sounds like a great book!
Well, only if you count the oven catching on fire during the self-clean cycle because I hadn’t wiped out enough turkey grease one Thanksgiving.
The only kitchen disaster that I can remember is when my friend left the burner on after making breakfast and I didn’t realize it and put an empty pan on it and then when I went to pick it up to put water in it burnt my fingers.
This sounds like a great book!
I’ve had more kitchen disasters than anyone should… But I think we’ve all had those… Horrible spills, burnt food… Anything. One time, my beloved mother made brownies. For whatever reason, she was supposed to add a tsp of vinegar …. She added a cup!!!! Worst brownies ever!!! But I’d give asking to be back in the kitchen with her baking brownies our just embracing I’m a hug.com miss her terribly.
I wanted to learn to use pressure cooker, so a relative said she’d teach me-then forgot to fully lock the top down (how this occurred, we never figured out)so pressure began to build, but explosion with potatoes everywhere! I’ve never used a pressure cooker since that terrible “teaching time”! !
Yes many. One in particular was I took a hot bowl out of the microwave and kinda threw it because it was hot and I had hot sticky oatmeal all over my kitchen. Everywhere you looked there was sticky oatmeal. Learned a valuable lesson with that one.!!!??
I am a kitchen disaster! My worst disaster wasn’t even cooking although there have been many of those and always at the worst time. One evening as a gathering of friends was starting to wind down, I decided to let the pans soak in the sink. Just as I got started, I got called to handle a minor disaster elsewhere (sick dog to clean up after). When I returned to the kitchen, several people were standing around looking at me. They were waiting to see my expression when I realized that the water had overflowed. These dear friends left it for me to see the soap bubbles flowing from the sink all the way to the carpet in the hallway. It was worse than the time I put liquid dish soap in the dishwasher.
My disaster was when I first got married. I was trying to impress my hubby on Valentibe’s day. I made a heart shaped cake. It had egg shells in it and was so hard you could have uses it as a door stopper.
Great recipe will have to give this a try the kids will love it. Thank you for the giveaway chance as well.
Quite a few, I’m afraid! I’m easily distracted when I have a pot of rice on the stove and I’ve destroyed a few pots because of this.
Yes! I burned popcorn in a frying pan of grease! Lots
O f smoke!! Scorched pan too. Also tried grilled cheese in the toaster sideways and it caught fire. I threw the toaster out in the snow!
Yes, I sometimes forget to add the egg in a recipe.
Besides all the times my mother set pans of oil on fire while frying chicken, there were a few times she baked biscuits and cornbread until they were charcoal. I believe I may have inherited her culinary talents. I have had a few overcoming incidents involving lots of smoke and infrequently, even flames.
I’m such a great cook, the smoke detector is used to signal that it’s time to remove the food from the oven or turn off the burner.
I have had some bad ones but fortunately, none recently. A few fires, tried to catch a pan of falling hot oil, dropped a decorated birthday cake. Nothing to exciting. …at least nothing killed anyone.
Yes and it is one I will never forget. I was cooking with my foster mother and we put something in the pressure cooker. Well a little while later I thought it was getting loud but she said i was hearing things and after she said that the lid exploded and all this food went all over. It was such a disaster that she made me clean up and I am scared to death of a pressure cooker but when we can my husband does that part as i can;t anyway as i am disabled but i leave the room when it is in use.
Many disasters as a young bride who never was allowed to cook before her marriage. If it hadn’t been for my Better Homes & Gardens cookbook, my husband would have starved. That red and white checked cookbook has many, many grease stains on its pages!
Connie
cps1950 (at)gmail (dot)com
GOOD LUCK WITH YOUR BOOK AND THANKS FOR THE GIVEAWAY! YES I HAVE HAD A DISASTER OR TWO IN MY PAST!