I knew Tanner ran a successful company in Minneapolis, making T-shirts and other outdoor clothing from reused and recycled materials. I did not know, until he pulled out the cocktail shaker, that when he first started the company, he made ends meet by tending bar. That let to the Italian Princess, a cocktail he creates in TREBLE, based on one Mr. Right and I enjoyed at a wine dinner at a local eatery. Nor did I know the reason for his visit to Montana at that particular time, a turn of events that more than one reviewer said tugged at her heart.
But I knew Tanner would return in AS THE CHRISTMAS COOKIE CRUMBLES, the 5th in the series, when I first tasted champagne with St. Germain. We first tasted the liqueur in France, but hadn’t used it ourselves until a birthday celebration at a mountain lodge across the valley. We experimented a bit, discovering that bitters are an easily-overlooked but essential ingredient.
Celebrate with me, please, the release this week of AS THE CHRISTMAS COOKIE CRUMBLES, the fifth Food Lovers’ Village Mystery!
Leave a comment below for a chance to win a signed copy!
And raise a glass with me to Peg Cochran, and toast the release today of BOUGHT THE FARM, 3d in the Farmers' Daughter Mysteries from Berkley.
Tanner’s Life’s-Too-Short-For-Rehearsals Champagne Cocktail
As readers of Treble at the Jam Fest remember, Tanner loves creating special cocktails. This drink honors the bride: classic, with just the right balance of sweet and tart!
For each drink:
1 sugar cube
5–6 drops Angostura bitters
½ ounce St. Germain (elderflower liqueur)
5-1/2 ounces champagne
Lemon twist, cut with a channel knife or paring knife
In a champagne flute, soak the sugar cube with the bitters. Add the liqueur, and slowly pour in
the champagne. Add the lemon twist.
Salut!
Salut!
Tried a food or drink in your travels that you've later tried at home? Or has a friend turned you on to something you'd never have thought you'd enjoy? Tell me about it in the comments for a chance to win a signed copy of AS THE CHRISTMAS COOKIE CRUMBLES, the 5th Food Lovers' Village Mystery. (US and Canadian addresses only, please. Winner will be chose Thurs, June 7.)
"Budewitz's finely drawn characters, sharp ear for dialogue, and well-paced puzzle make Jewel Bay a destination for every cozy fan." --- Kirkus Reviews
In Jewel Bay---Montana's Christmas Village---all is merry and bright. At Murphy’s Mercantile, AKA the Merc, manager Erin Murphy is ringing in the holiday season with food, drink, and a new friend: Merrily Thornton. A local girl gone wrong, Merrily’s turned her life around. But her parents have publicly shunned her, and they nurse a bitterness that chills Erin.
When Merrily goes missing and her boss discovers he’s been robbed, fingers point to Merrily—until she’s found dead, a string of lights around her neck. The clues and danger snowball from there. Can Erin nab the killer—and keep herself in one piece—in time for a special Christmas Eve?
Leslie Budewitz is the author of the Food Lovers’ Village Mysteries and the Spice Shop Mysteries—and the first author to win Agatha Awards for both fiction and nonfiction. A past president of Sisters in Crime, she lives in northwest Montana with her husband, a musician and doctor of natural medicine, and their cat, an avid bird-watcher.
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