It's

Cozy Food Friday!

That means it's time to share a recipe from 

another great cozy mystery!

This week I have picked

AGAINST THE CLAW

Book 2 in the Lobster Shake Mysteries

by Shari Randall

Finger-licking delicious, Shari Randall's Against the Claw is the second in the Lazy Mermaid Lobster Shack series.

Welcome back to the seaside village of Mystic Bay, where someone’s been found sleeping with the fishes. . .

Ballerina Allie Larkin is still back home, healing up from a broken ankle and lending a hand at her aunt’s Lazy Mermaid Lobster Shack. But now that the famed restaurant is branching out into the world of catering, Allie’s help is needed more than ever―even on the lobster boat. The last thing she expects to find once she’s out on the bay, however, is the dead body of a beautiful young woman.

When days pass and not even the police can ID the corpse, Allie takes it upon herself to learn the truth about what happened. Her investigation leads her all the way from the local piers to the secluded estates of Mystic Bay’s posh elite. But how can she crack this case when everyone seems dead-set on keeping their secrets beneath the surface?

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AUNT GULLY'S LOBSTER LOVE SAUCE AKA LOBSTER BISQUE

Photo property of allrecipes.com

Photos  found via Google Images and or Pintrest, and their contributors, with many thanks. 

Your finished dish will vary in appearance.

If you can't visit a real, waterside lobster shack, you can cook up Aunt Gully's Lobster Love Sauce for a taste of the award-winning Lazy Mermaid Lobster Roll. Lobster Love Sauce is a rich bisque, which you can enjoy by the bowl or spoon on top of lobster meat in a buttered and toasted hot dog roll. 

Aunt Gully always has plenty of lobster carcasses---the lobster body and shells left behind after all the meat has been picked for lobster rolls. Start cooking 4 (1-1½ lb.) lobster---there are lots of good tutorial online for this step. Then enjoy a lobster feast or use the meat to make lobster rolls.  

Ingredients

4 cooked lobster carcasses, remove intestinal tract and sac behind head, break     up shells

4 tablespoons butter

1 medium onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, smashed

1 medium carrot, peeled and chopped

1 bay leaf

4 sprigs fresh thyme or ½ teaspoon dried thyme

1 cup sherry (or you can substitute a dry white wine)

1 cup diced tomatoes (canned is okay)

4 cups chicken stock

1 cup heavy cream

Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Photo property of gimmesomeoven.com

Directions

   Over medium heat, melt 2 tablespoons butter in a large saucepan or Dutch oven. Add onion, garlic, carrot, bay leaf, and thyme. Stir until the onion is soft. 5 to 10 minutes. 

   Add the lobster carcasses and any extra shells and cook, stirring, about 5 minutes.

   Add the sherry and tomatoes. Turn the heat to medium-high and bring to a boil, then turn down the heat to low, cover and cook for 10 minutes.

   Add stock, turn heat to high and bring to a boil. Turn heat to low, cover and cook 20 minutes. Remove the bay leaf, thyme springs and lobster shells. 

   Puree bisque in a heavy-duty blender or food processor. Strain well. Return soup to the pot and bring to a boil. Turn down heat and add the remaining butter in small pieces, let melt fully. Stir in the cream, heat through. Season with salt and pepper. 

    Serve as a soup with crusty bread and a green salad, or spoon over lobster meat layered in buttered, toasted rolls. 

   Serves 4.

   Enjoy! 

Photo property of fishforthought.co.uk

I wouldn't mind this filling my belly on a crisp, fall evening. How about you?

Oh. My. Goodness. Going into this book with high hopes after reading the first in the series, I was prepared to love every word. Well, the only way I could have loved it better is if it had been served with a lobster roll (or two) on the side!

Written in amazing detail by author Shari Randall, I could smell the salty air mixed with the delicious scents emanating from the Lazy Mermaid Lobster Shack. Even as I write this review, I can hear water lapping at the shore. Sigh.

In, AGAINST THE CLAW, I was thrilled to be back in the seaside town of Mystic Bay. And unlike the characters, I was ready and willing to find a body and get to sleuthing! I was not disappointed. Soon a body is found, and the way it was found gave me chills. Of course, protagonist Allie Larkin finds a clue straight away, and it doesn’t take long for her to immerse herself, and me into the investigation. Author Randall lead me on a whodunit so clever, trying to solve it was like trying to find my way out of a lobster trap!

Trust me. You don’t want to miss AGAINST THE CLAW. If you haven’t read the first in the series, CURSES, BOILED AGAIN, I’d say you can read this as a standalone. But why would you want to? Get them both and read them back to back!

📕📖📘📖📙📖📗

Please keep reading to check out my 

installments of 

Book Beginnings on Fridays

and

The Friday 56

Both the BB and 56 are from

📚📖📚📖📚

Book Beginnings on Fridays is a meme hosted by Rose City Reader

Share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading.

The Friday 56 is a meme hosted by Freda's Voice

Rules: *Grab a book, any book. *Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader (If you have to improvise, that's okay.) *Find any sentence, (or few, just don't spoil it) that grab you. *Post it.

My Book Beginnings

Tuesday, June 30

For all her MBA, fancy Boston job, and perfect French manicure, my sister Lorel was still at the mercy of her passion for the bad boy of Mystic Bay, Connecticut, Patrick Yardley.  

My 56

"No, it's---" How did I start? I wasn't a cop. He'd probably think I was some ghoul. But still, I had to ask.

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