Page 27 of From Paris, with Butter
“The menu,” Chef La Croix began, eyes boring into me, “needs to be food that you love. Food you love to cook and food you love to eat. If you don’t love it, anything you make will begarbage!” He banged his fist into his other palm with the final word, and I nearly fell off my stool.
“Understand?”
I nodded quickly.
“Good. Now, what did your family cook when you were growing up?”
The question caught me off guard. “Oh, I can’t really think of anything,” I began, but then the memories started coming thick and fast.
Waking up to the scent of baking bread and knowing that, when I sat down at the kitchen table, my mother would have a croissant spread with Nutella waiting for me. Living in Alsace, in the northeastern corner of the country, with its bountiful orchards and vineyards. I’d go apple picking, and my grandmother would turn my haul into a tarte tatin with puddles of sugar and melted butter swimming among the fruit. Gorging myself on jiggly, creamy blanc-mangercoco when my mother and I lived in Martinique. Carefully slicing apples for a pie in Washington DC and beaming with pride when my mother told me what a good job I’d done.
Chef La Croix sat silently as I poured out the stories. If he noticed me getting teary-eyed, he didn’t say a word about it. When I was done, he pulled out a ratty notebook and a pencil stub.
“Now, this is what you’re going to make.” He flipped open the notebook and began to write, explaining the reason for each course and how I should go about cooking it.
When he finished, he tore the page out and handed it to me. I took it as though it were a precious object. Which it was.
I could not have come up with a better menu if I’d dedicated a year to it. It was all food I was deeply familiar with, all food I’d grown up with and, yes, all food that I loved. It was heavy on my Alsatian background and played to my strengths as a baker. It was impressive but not overly so. It was elevated, but still comforting. There it all was, written in Chef La Croix’s loopy cursive.
Entrée: Saltfish acra(Fried fish fritters, generally served with a spicy sauce, and a favorite dish from the year my mother and I lived in Martinique. Chef La Croix had been delighted when I’d mentioned it. “A perfect start to the meal. It’s exotic, but not strange. It’s light, but not insubstantial.”)
Salad: Arugula with fig and goat cheese(“A standard, but it’s a standard because it works,” Chef La Croix had said. “People like food they know, especially after a dish they’re less used to. This is familiar and a lighter contrast to the other courses. Go heavy on the black pepper.”)
Main course: Tarte flambée(The crispy pizza-esque flatbread that was a specialty of Alsace. It’s my favorite food in the world and thus merited an instant spot in Chef La Croix’s menu. I’d made it probably a hundred times over the years and could practically do it in my sleep. According to Chef La Croix, it was essential that I feel confident in a dinner’s main course.)
Dessert: Tarte tatin(A pastry with fruit, often apples, caramelized in butter and sugar before being baked. “I could recommend no other dessert to an Alsatian,” was all Chef La Croix had said.)
I read the menu through twice, then looked up at Chef La Croix. “It’sperfect,” I breathed, tears pricking my eyes again. I nearly reached out to clasp his hand.
It was a good thing I didn’t because Chef La Croix had resumed looking terrifying. He raised a disdainful eyebrow. “Yes. I know. Now get out of my kitchen.”
I hurriedly obeyed, the precious paper still clutched in my hands.
Chapter 12
The days flew by in a flurry of work and grocery shopping until Thursday arrived, clear and sunny. I slept in late, then had hot chocolate and buttered toast on the balcony as I watched Paris go about its morning. Then it was time to get cooking.
I’d created a minutely-detailed cooking schedule, structured so that I could get most of the work out of the way before Laurent arrived. It’d been years since I’d gone more than two days without baking something, but I couldn’t remember the last time I’d made dinner for another person. Having most of the meal done beforehand would make me feel more confident.
Slightlymore confident.
I started things off easy by making the salad dressing. I went about it carefully, taste-testing throughout the process to make sure there was a perfect balance between all the ingredients: olive oil, blood orange balsamic vinegar I’d gotten specially, Dijon mustard, honey, minced garlic, and salt and pepper.
It took a bit of effort, but I was pleased with it by the time I decanted it into a glass jar and put it in the fridge.
Next, I prepped the apples for the tarte tatin, peeling, seeding, and quartering them. They got placed in the fridge as well to dry out a bit so the tart wouldn’t get soggy. It was a trick my mother had taught me.
After that, I made the puff pastry. The frozen brands at the store were usually pretty good, but I absolutely could not serve Laurent store-bought pastry after my jibe at his quiche. Plus, I always found the process of pastry-making to be soothing.
Methodically, I went through the steps: grating the slightly-frozen butter, mixing it with flour, adding just the right amount of water, and kneading it intodough.
It was late afternoon by now, and I nervously ran through the recipes again and triple-checked that I had all the ingredients. Once that was sorted, I realized that I should probably put some effort into my appearance, too.
I flailed around my closet for a few minutes before deciding on a burgundy dress that had always served me well on previous dates. (Not that this was a date. Maybe.)
A half hour before Laurent was due to arrive, I brushed my hair, leaving it down since I always wore it up for work, and did my makeup, choosing a subtle mauve lipstick. Then I put the radio on to my favorite jazz station, lit the unscented candles I had decorating the table, and stood back to survey my work.
“I think this might actually go alright,” I said. I decided that my nerves were due to the rarity of me hosting dinner and not because the dinner was for Laurent Roche in particular.
