Hello crime readers and food lovers!  When I first thought about writing about the food featured in Agatha Christie novels I spent quite a bit of time thinking about what to call my new venture. “And Then There Were Buns” was my first idea.  It seemed equally Christiesque, food-related and appealed to my love of puns. In the end, I settled on Dining with the Dame as being a more simple title. However, the inital idea never really left my mind, and has, resurfaced, here as we begin to talk about the Christie classic And Then There Were None.  In what has become a bit of a theme around here And Then There Were None features very little actual food. Plenty of tinned tongue (🤮) but little real food.  Given it is Easter,  I decided to make Devonshire splits over a more traditional hot cross bun for two reasons. First, the novel is set on a small island off the Devon Coast and second, I don’t really like a hot cross bun.  

Oh, and I know I previously said that April’s read would be Sad Cypress but you can blame a work trip to Sydney for the mix-up.  I accidentally popped the wrong book into my bag and didn’t realise until I was on the plane. I blame the 4:00am wake up for that error!   Sad Cypress will be May’s read.  

And Then There Were None -The Plot

This one is such as classic  that I feel that it needs little explanation by me.  It is Christie’s best-selling title with over 100 million sales!  But here goes nothing – Eight people are invited to spend time on Soldier Island, off the Devon Coast.  When they arrive, they are greeted by a butler and his wife, the cook but their hosts are absent.  Each person finds a framed copy of a nursery rhyme called Ten Little Soldiers in their room and the dining table contains a tableau of ten soldiers.

As our guests are having dinner a terrifying voice booms out of nowhere that they have been gathered together as each of them has previously gotten away with murder and lists their crimes.  Panic and pandemonium ensues.  

And then they start dying in ways paralleling the Indians from the rhyme.

And with each death, one of the little figurines on the tables disappears.  

We have:

• No way off the island
• A dawning realisation that one of them is a killer
• A baffling puzzle for the police when they finally arrive on the Island.  The last death was Vera Stanhope who hanged herself.  So, given no one could get on or off the island, who moved the chair she stepped on to reach the noose away from her body and put it against the wall? 
• A confession in a bottle.  If Smashmouth was the theme for Murder is Easy, then The Police’s Message in a Bottle might be this month’s song!

And Then There Were None is so creepy and the growing fear and paranoia of the guests as the death toll rises is so well done!  It is no wonder that this is the best-selling mystery novel of all time!  Speaking of which, let’s look at the covers of some of the 100 million!

And Then There Were None – The Covers

There are some wonderful covers here!  Not sure about the significance of the fish (top right) but I really like all of the rest of them – the remoteness of the island, the way the noose forms the O in bottom left, the broken Indian, the skull shadow cast by the house are all greatly evocative of the book.  You will also notice there are also a few covers with the title Ten Little Indians which is one of the former titles of this novel.  

And I guess about now would be the right time to talk about the original title of this novel which was Ten Little N-words.  I made the decision not to include any of the covers with that particular title.  I don’t even know what to say about the original title.  Except to say I’m very glad it was changed and I think Änd Then There Were None”is a much better title than either of the others!

The Recipe – Devonshire Splits

I used the recipe for Devonshire splits from the Waitrose website.  I’ve also included it below in case the website ever takes it down.  These are also called Cornish splits in other places on the internet so don’t come at me, people of Cornwall if you feel slighted, head straight to the source.  The Devonshire Splits were delicious.  BUT I found them quite big.  Personally, I would use the amount of mixture suggested in the recipe to make 18 buns instead of the 12 suggested.  If you do this make sure that you reduce the cooking time accordingly.  

Links to The Christieverse

I could not find any links in this one.  

Other Food & Drinks Mentioned in And Then There Were None

• Gin and Ginger Beer
• Coffee (multiple times)
• Port
• Brandy (multiple times)
• Bread
• Milk
• Bacon and eggs  (Bacon mentioned twice)
• Tea (multiple times)
• Cold Ham (twice)
• Cold Tongue (tinned) (mentioned multiple times)
• Boiled Potatoes
• Cheese
• Biscuits (twice)
• Tinned Fruit (mentioned twice)
• Honey
• Whiskey

May’s read will absolutely positively definitely be Sad Cypress!

Have a great week!

Devonshire Splits