Sneaky Pie's Cookbook For Mystery Lovers

Dog

BIG DOG’S DELIGHT

2 cups long-grain while rice

4 ½ cups water

4 large garlic cloves, minced

1 large beef bouillon cube

1 cup venison, cut into ½-inch cubes and cooked

Put all the ingredients into a large pot and cook on high until the water boils.

Turn off at the boil, cover, and let steam for approximately 5 to 10 minutes. As soon as the top looks “dry,” put the food into a storage container. If you overcook, it will be too dry, but you can always add more water in a pinch.

Serve 1 cup of the mixture in the morning and 1 cup at night either alone or mixed in with commercial dry food.

Helpful Hints:

We put it in the microwave for 1 minute before serving.

You can substitute any kind of meat that you want. Living in the country, we luckily have a lot of deer meat, which we freeze during deer season. It helps keep the food costs down.

APART FROM TUCKER, the Corgi, I also live with Tuxedo, a black and tan coonhound who, even I must admit, is a most remarkable dog. Then there’s Godzilla, the two-year-old smooth-coated Jack Russell bitch, who is remarkable in entirely different ways.

Tuxedo and Godzilla haven’t shown up in my mysteries yet for two reasons. One, Godzilla is conceited enough. Were she to get fan mail I don’t think I could live with her. As it is Pewter receives almost as much fan mail as I do. And Tucker gets lots of photos from other Corgis.

Godzilla would be insufferable.

Tuxedo, on the other hand, may be the sweetest canine I have ever known. He’s clean, intelligent, and biddable, just what a hound should be. And he’s big! So if I put Tuxedo in a mystery, Tucker will get jealous. On the other hand, I can think of stories where a hound’s special nose would solve the crime.

Once Mom lost her glasses. They cost $400 because they had a special light plastic lens, so she was upset. We searched the house high and low. I even crawled under the bureau in case they’d fallen behind. Not there.

We cleaned out the truck. Everything was pulled out, even the battery jumper cables. Nothing.

After a frenzied morning, we gave up.

Sitting on a fence post that afternoon, I saw Tuxedo loping across the pasture with something in his mouth. Godzilla, filthy, ran alongside.

They ran around the house. Mom was in the garden pulling weeds, the eternal chore. Tuxedo dropped the glasses next to her.

Happy, she gave everyone treats, and Big Dog’s Delight for supper.

Tuxedo and Godzilla said the packrat down by the pond stole the glasses. Tuxedo tracked the glasses to her lair. Godzilla rushed into her den to get them out … a brave dog. She said that the stash included quarters, a bandanna, one spur with a leather spur strap, and a whole pile of the plastic rings you pull off to open a gallon of milk or distilled water.

It’s curious what they find valuable. Possums carry off stuff, too, and Simon, in my mysteries, is based on a house possum that lived to the ripe old age of seven.

Crows steal shiny things all the time. I catch them pecking at the kiwi latches on the gates, a latch like a comma that is supposed to be horseproof since there’s a little ring that slips down to hold the lock. Two of the horses have figured out how to pick the kiwis but it’s the crows that play with them. The silver shine attracts them.

During bird nesting season, Mom cuts four-inch squares of tinfoil and places them on fenceposts, the picnic table, and outdoor chairs. Then we hide and watch the crows swoop down to snatch them.

I confess to liking jewelry that’s shiny. Gold is my favorite. I hide Mom’s battered gold watch and necklace under the bed pillow. She always knows where to find them.