The Poisened Chocolates Case with a Café Kirsch

Anthony Berkeley (Anthony Berkeley Cox) was the founder of the Detection Club, and to quote Agatha Christie "All his stories are amusing, intriguing, and he is the master of the final twist"and 'The Poisened Chocolates Case' is one of the classics of golden age detective fiction. It's sort of an expansion on one of his short stories "The Avenging Chance", where a box of chocolates is sent to a gentleman, at his club, who decides he doesn't want them. Just as he's about to bin them a fellow member takes them off his hands. After sharing them with his wife, he's very ill, she, who ate rather more, dies. So who was the intended victim, and who was the murderer?

In "The Poisened Chocolate Case' the police at something of a dead end put the problem before Berkeley's detective, Roger Sheringham and his Crimes Circle - 6 amateur sleuths. Each come up with a different solution, each one more convincing than it's predecessor - before that final twist. In this edition there's also an alternative ending from Golden Age writer Christianna Brand, and a new soloution from Martin Edwards (I dream of being something like half as productive as Martin Edwards).

The old Cocktails and drinks I'd turned up that specifically mention chocolate didn't sound very appealing (egg yolks, cocoa powder, and spirits I neither have, or want to have) and then 'The Cocktail Book' arrived. This was first printed in 1900, and is the first book devoted purely to the cocktail (earlier books, like Jerry Thomas, are more general). This edition from the British Library will be officially published in October, so I'm very grateful for my early copy.

There is a Café Kirsch in the Savoy Coctail book, but it's a little bit more complicated than this one, and what I principally like about this version is it's simplicity. It asks for half a cup of hot strong black coffee, and a pony of Kirsch. Fill a glass half full of fine ice, add the Kirsch and coffee, shake (I assume in a shaker, not stirred in the glass, but instructions are vague) strain into a Cocktail glass and drink. It's cold, light, not to alcoholic (I may have used the equivalent of a Shetland pony) and quite refreshing.

However, I made this on the night of the Perseid meteor shower, and when I went to the only place I could look for them from (the rubbish shoot on the next floor up from my flat is outside, it wasn't a great view, and a spectacularly unromantic setting, but I saw a few shooting stars and they made it magical), I used the last of the coffee to make a still warm version - which was even better. Warm enough to keep the slight chill of an August in England night and the slight bitterness of the cold coffee at bay, it also bought out the cherry flavour of the Kirsch a little more.

The cherry and coffee combination is just enough to hint at a superior (un-poisoned) liqueur chocolate without being in any way sweet or cloying, it's not so strong as to interrupt concentration, and altogether has the feeling of a slightly illicit treat to accompany a book with.