1903. Vegan and non-vegan pies

Maia was between a rock and a hard place. She detested Luke, her brother-in-law, ever since he married her sister, and her sister and Luke had squandered the family inheritance. Now he was coming to stay – just for a few days. He said on the phone that it would be a helpful way to come to terms with the death of Maia’s sister, his wife.

Maia’s problem was this: all her murderous, noxious-filled, undetectable poisonous recipes involved meat, and her brother-in-law was vegan. This was a murder that Maia had wanted to accomplish for many a year and she wasn’t going to let this opportunity slip through her fingers. She was in need of a recipe that was undetectable, delectable, and kind to animals.

Usually Maia, when she had murderous intent, would make the most scrumptious looking steak and kidney pie. (For those not heavily into steak and kidney pie, I apologize). The offending poisonous recipe she had downloaded off the Net several years ago, and it worked a treat. Gradually Maia was able to clear inconvenient personages from her life and live free from nosy, noisome, niggly nerds. The most difficult victim was in fact her sister. She ate meat, but was a picky eater; in fact she picked out the pieces of kidney and ate only the chunks of steak. Thank goodness the downloaded recipe had specifically said to make sure both kidney and steak were to be carefully poisoned.

After quite extensive research, Maia settled on concocting a poisonous sweet potato and lentil shepherd’s pie for Luke. Maia had to admit that it smelled delicious, but of course she couldn’t taste it – not even a tiny sliver sliced surreptitiously from a corner. She didn’t want to poison herself!

Luke arrived. “I’ve made a sweet potato and lentil shepherd’s pie for dinner tonight,” said Maia.

“That’s lovely,” answered Luke. “I knew you weren’t vegan and would go to trouble, so I baked especially for you what looks to be a lovely steak and kidney pie. I downloaded the recipe off the Net.”