Hello food lovers and crime readers! Today on Dining with The Dame, we are taking a look into the Hercule Poirot novel One Two Buckle My Shoe. And to snack on while we read, we have a lovely fruit filled cake called a Summer Berry Buckle. Yes, not much food in this one so again, I had to use some creative thinking for the food component. And the Summer Berry Buckle is a delight!  I loved that you got a different berry in each bite!

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One Two Buckle My Shoe -The Plot

Leaving his dentist’s office, Hercule Poirot bumps into the delightfully named, Mabelle Sainsbury Seale, a former actress.  He picks up a buckle that has fallen off her shiny new shoe and gives it to her. 

Before you can even start to get any creepy dentist vibes aka Norman Gale in Death In The Clouds, we find out via Inspector Japp that sometime after Poirot’s visit, the dentist Hector Morley apparently killed himself.  Morley’s clients between Poirot and his death included Ms Sainsbury Seale, a banker called Alistair Blunt and a rather shady Greek gentleman called Mr Amberiotis.  Another man, an American activist called Raikes leaves the office without a visit to Morley’s Partner (who is a bit of a drunk).  

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We have

  • Mr Amberiotis dying not too shortly after Dr Morley from an overdose of adrenaline and novocaine – both commonly used by dentists. Are the death’s connected?
  • A secretary called away from work on false pretenses.  Was it so she did not recognise the killer?
  • A fiance annoyed with Morley’s interference in his love life – did he kill Morley?
  • Mabelle going missing
  • A body in a trunk with her face bashed in.  
  • Two murder attempts on Alistair Blunt, one supposedly by the aggrieved fiancé.  Has he moved from killing dentists to bankers?
  • And what of the left-wing activist?  The one who left before seeing the drunk dentist?He has no love of bankers or members of the bourgeoisie.  Might he be the murderer?
  • And what of that drunk dentist?  Did he bear a grudge against his more successful partner?
  • We also have Poirot revealing himself to be a leg man!  How else would he know that a ten-inch stocking equates to a size six shoe?

Good thing we have Poirot around to sort out who did the deed!  We also have Inspector Japp in his last appearance in a novel.  😔

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There is a lot going on in this book and the plot seems quite convoluted at times.  The nursery rhyme felt far more wedged in than in “And Then There Were None” too.  While this was not my favourite novel it did give an insightful look into power and privilege and the importance of one life versus another.  
 

One, Two, Buckle My Shoe – The Covers

I was able to find a lot of covers for this one, primarily I think because it has three names. It was originally called The Patriotic Murders in the US but they changed this to An Overdose of Death in 1953.

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So many great covers here.  I think my favourite is the shoes second row second from the right which also is our very first Finnish cover!  

The Recipe – Summer Berry Buckle

I used the recipe from the New York Tmes as my recipe and I can highly recommend it. 

I served my Buckle with some labne that I had made for something else and wanted to use up and some fresh raspberries.   

Whipped cream or yoghurt could easily sub in for the labne. 

Poirot shrugged his shoulders.  He said:

I t would seem that death selected, most inartistically, the wrong man.  The Mysterious Greek, the Rich Banker, the Famous Detective – how natural that one of them should be shot!  For mysterious foreigners may be mixed up with espionage and rich bankers have connections who will benefit by their deaths and famous detectives may be dangerous to criminals”.

Whereas poor old Morley wasn’t dangerous to anybody, ” observed Japp gloomily.

“I wonder.” 

Agatha Christie – One, Two, Buckle My Shoe

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Links to The Christieverse

Poirot speaks of Countess Vera Rosakoff who we last saw in The Big Four and is the closest thing we come to Poirot having a love interest

The Case of The Augean Stables is mentioned.  We haven’t got there yet but it is one of the stories in The Labours of Hercules

Other Food & Drinks Mentioned in One, Two, Buckle My Shoe

Summer Berry Buckle

Also, apologies for this post being nearly a week late!  I dropped my laptop, and thankfully whilst nothing major was damaged, the pin on the charger bent making it impossible to charge so I had to wait for the replacement charger to arrive.  I’m going to try really hard to get the post that is due tomorrow out on time or just a little late to get back on posting track!

July’s read is Evil Under The Sun which is a great read and I have something very special planned for it. 

Have a great week!

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