Henry lets Hooperman escape, and Fisher takes the opportunity to suspend his retirement.

Henry has to solve a series of thefts from lorries and gets unexpected help from private security firm Troubleshooters. Their accuracy is such that he is suspicious of how they came to know of the crimes and believes that there is a possible informer within police ranks feeding them information for a reward. Troubleshooters are due to play the police eleven in an important football match. Both teams boast an ex-professional, in the police team's case Kirk Flowerbridge, who has a murky past and a liking for the drink. Fisher tasks Henry with minding Kirk and keeping him sober for the match. In the process of helping Kirk,Henry gets to identify the informer.

A delusional cop seeks to bring Fisher's ally down, and Henry recruits a new waiter.

Fisher's younger daughter has left home after a row and thrown in her lot with a group of squatters. He asks Crabbe to find the girl and try and persuade her to return home. Henderson has bought a new field to add to his market garden, but is horrified to find that it has been invaded by travellers. He appeals to Henry for help, whereupon Henry finds that the two cases have a common thread.

Henry and Margaret spend a day at the races with her new client Bob Bishop, who is resisting a take-over bid for his cider brewery. A mysterious man shadows Henry and then the corpse of stable lad Ben Tucker is found in a horse-box. Bob's brother Tony owns the stables, which are failing, and he is very curt with Henry when he comes to investigate. On the night he died Ben had argued with another stable lad Jerry Lawless over female jockey Jude O'Brien but he too is murdered and Bob's daughter Liz, another jockey, is found in his caravan with a bag full of bank-notes.

Liz claims the money is winnings from a bet and Henry releases her but notes that Jerry too has a healthy bank balance and surmises he was trading inside information for cash. Tony apologizes to Henry but tries to push Bob into accepting the take-over and Henry's mystery man proves to be a private eye, since Tony has been fixing races and the Jockey Club have hired him to get proof. Henry believes Tony got Jerry to nobble his horses and killed Ben when he found out. He has the correct motive but the wrong suspect and it's Margaret who literally stumbles on the real killer and has a close call with them. Meanwhile Nicola is annoyed when a spoilt school-friend appears to be making a play for Gary, though she is actually trying to poach him for her restaurant - unsuccessfully.

Henry Crabbe (Richard Griffiths) is posted to guard a jury deliberating in a fraud case, who have been sequestered in a ghastly hotel. Crabbe has to find out who is intimidating the jurors, and how the villain is getting to them. Meanwhile he comes to the aid of the hotel's talented cook (John Thomson) who is cruelly oppressed by the jobsworth manager. Back at Crabbe's restaurant an obnoxious customer is giving new waitress Sally (Marsha Thomason) a hard time.

Fisher sends Henry and the squad to a meat factory where animal rights protesters are demonstrating against the owner,Mr. Trubb's use of veal in his Trubbs' Thunderbolt sausages. However, Henry finds to his surprise that the sausages contain soya and are wholly meat-free. Margaret, meanwhile, is concerned when her friend Julia, a wealthy widow, falls for a pilot much younger than herself and agrees to finance a bucket shop for him.

Henry and his team are called to a private boarding school where police Commander Colin Stilwell's son Alex has been beaten up by local youths. Henry initially encounters a wall of insular hostility from the establishment before Alex points him to another pupil, who has blackmailed the Chemistry teacher into manufacturing Ecstasy tablets, which he is selling around the school. Gary meanwhile creates a new blend of mustard and attracts the attention of a large food manufacturer who offer to market it. However, they want to alter the recipe, making it taste more bland, whereupon Gary, taking a leaf from Henry's book, puts his culinary principles first and tells them that the deal is off.

Pie in the Sky becomes the scene of a corruption sting, but Henry acts in favour of his customer.

A narcotics investigation ends in a bitten hand for Fisher, and Henry finds a new source of escargots.

The girlfriend of Henry's dry cleaner is kidnapped by a psychotic ex-lover.

Henderson's neighbour finds a dismembered corpse, which may prove the innocence of an imprisoned man.

Medium Faith Revelle has received a number of threatening letters and seeks police help. Freddy Fisher, having once sought advice from her in solving a case, wants the whole matter dealt with quietly. But someone has alerted the press. Henry Crabbe and Sgt. Cambridge are assigned to guard Miss Revelle.

Fisher drags Crabbe down to the West Country to investigate the apparent murder of an undercover woman police officer. While Henry is away a burst pipe causes havoc in the restaurant's kitchen.

Henry supplies the catering at his friend Alistair's pheasant shoot, where Fisher is among the guests. Another member of the party is shot and killed and it looks as if Fisher accidentally shot him but Henry's investigation reveals a crime of passion involving a love triangle, a jealous husband - and a cover-up.

Di Crabbe and DS Cambridge are assigned to investigate a spate of garden thefts carried out while the owners are away for a few days. It's not just a few plants that are being stolen - whole gardens are being stripped. The only person appearing to benefit is landscape designer Alan Wellbeloved, who becomes the prime suspect for the robberies. Returning home, Henry is horrified to discover that Margaret has hired Wellbeloved to redesign the restaurant's back garden to provide an outdoor dining area.

DI Crabbe's first job with his new team of PC Guthrie and WPC Morton is to guard a new housing development which has been subjected to vandalism. Nearby villagers claim that one of the houses is built in the path of a centuries old right of way. Henderson is in trouble for growing and selling varieties of tomatoes not approved by the E.E.C. And the new waitress in the restaurant gets the cold shoulder from Gary, who is missing the recently departed Nicola.

As Fisher launches a campaign to make the police more popular with young people a boy called Nicky comes to Pie in the Sky, claiming he is there for work experience. Henry uses him in the kitchen and he impresses everyone but then the till is robbed and Nicky, who was not sent by any school, goes missing. His mother last saw him a week earlier, the night an off-licence was robbed by a violent teenage gang. Henry tracks Nicky down to a childhood haunt and finds out that he was bullied into joining the gang and now regrets it, which he proves by leading them into a police trap.

The Crabbes holiday in London in a flat owned by ex-policeman Nick Spencer whilst he is in America on business. However Margaret finds his packed suitcase under the bed and hears an answer-machine message from his daughter warning that her violent ex-con boyfriend Danny is on his way to see him. Henry discovers Nick in hiding whilst Margaret discovers Danny's corpse in the dust-bin, killed in self-defence by Nick. Henry's loyalty is put to the test, as is the patience of Sally and Gary when the agency staff turn out to be a quarrelsome married couple.

Henry cooks a banquet for a visiting Japanese delegation, and tracks down a criminal from his past, who was presumed dead.

Henry uncovers two separate wine scams in Middleton.

Margaret and Henderson side with Reynard the Fox in opposing a new bypass, while Henry must question his loyalties.

The Chen family appear to be victims of racial harassment when their Chinese takeaway is set fire to but widowed Mr. Chen will not go to the police so his daughter Mei asks Henry for help, It turns out that Chen is a gambler deeply in debt to a restauranteur in London's Chinatown who has been has been threatening him for the money he owes. When Pie in the Sky makes it to the final of the Great British Grub contest being held in London, Henry uses the trip to visit Chinatown and act as go-between. A winner and a loser return to Middleton come the end of the day.

The restaurant is heavily in debt, and the Crabbe's new bank manager is unsympathetic. Steve and John have left for pastures new, and an agency chef is unsatisfactory. Crabbe learns that Dudley Hooperman is dead, and resurrects his hopes of early retirement. Meantime there is a surveillance operation to be run on a dodgy pizza delivery business.