The City Baker's Guide to Country Living

by Louise Miller

  “Yup.”

  “At the county fair?”

  “The Coventry County Fair. Oldest fair in the U.S. It’s a big deal around here.”

  I had been to the fair every year with Hannah. It had always been one of my favorite weekends—a perfect New England autumn getaway—apple picking, a drive farther north to see the first leaves change color, then a night of fried dough and riding the Zipper at the county fair. We had just been there a few weeks earlier.

  “God, here you are.” Hannah poked her head out the door, looking relieved. “I went looking for you in the ladies’. I thought you’d been abducted.” Hannah walked down the steps and handed me my bag. She smiled at Martin and extended her hand. “Hi, I’m Hannah Doyle, Dr. Doyle’s wife.”

  “Martin McCracken.”

  “Oh, you must be Dotty’s son!” Hannah beamed, happy to know a little something about him.

  Martin stood and ground the little stump of his cigarette under his scuffed black boot. “Well.” He turned away from us, giving a tiny wave of his hand.

  “Hey,” I called. Martin turned back halfway, his profile sharp and pale against the night sky. “Thanks.”

  He grinned at me then. It was a sort of partial grin that involved only half of his face. I’ve heard experts talk about how what makes a person beautiful is symmetry, but I had a thing for odd numbers and funny angles.

  “See you around,” he mumbled over his shoulder.

  I watched him disappear into the parking lot.

  “What were you doing out here with Martin McCracken?” Hannah whispered.

  “Not getting accosted by some thick-necked giant seeking revenge. Did you see that guy in the bar? I thought he was going to burst a blood vessel. Apparently his wife, Bonnie, used to bake at the Sugar Maple.” I grabbed the metal railing and pulled myself up.

  “Oh, yes, Bonnie. She’s a nice girl, not half as talented as you.” Hannah started walking ahead, digging into her purse for her keys.

  “Hannah.”

  “That was fun, wasn’t it?” Hannah busied herself with the lock on the car door.

  “Why didn’t you tell me about the apple-pie contest?” I asked over the roof of the car. “Don’t try and fake it. You know everything that goes on in this town.”

  “Look, Margaret really needs your help. She keeps losing. Everyone in town is gossiping about it, saying she’s lost her touch.”

  “Apparently she has.”

  “Well, she’s been through a lot, the past couple of years.”

  “Is that when her husband died?” I remembered how crazy my grandmother had gone when my grandfather passed away. Nana had set a place for him at the dinner table every night until the day she finally joined him.

  “Yeah. It was really sad. They married late and didn’t have any kids, so now she’s all alone. And then these terrible rumors started spreading that he gave away all of her family baking secrets to Jane White before he died.” Hannah looked guilty for a second, like maybe she had had a part in the rumor spreading. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.” She slammed the car door shut and turned on the ignition before I could ask any more questions.

  • • •

  The red taillights of Hannah’s Volvo were just out of sight when I realized I was still too tipsy to drive. I tossed my bag onto the bench seat. My cell phone slid out, its face lit, glowing angrily up at me. Seven missed calls. I slid into the car, leaned the seat back as far as it would go, and hit Play.

  Livvy, It’s Glen. Listen. The board met today, and they were thinking it might be a good idea if you take a break, just until the fiscal new year, when the executive committee has their new budget in place. Give me a call.

  Ms. Rawlings, It’s Joseph Harmon from Federal Student Loan Services. We haven’t received a payment from you in three months. It really is in your best interest to call us. Our number here is 1-800-

  Livvy, It’s Dee Dee. Listen, I hate to ask this, but that money you borrowed a couple of months ago? I really need it. Jake and I are getting married, and we need to scrape everything we have together. I feel weird asking, but . . . could you give me a call? I dropped by the Emerson but they said you were on a break?

  I pressed End.

  At least I was now sober enough to drive.

  Chapter Three

  November

  Although we had exchanged many kind notes in my first few weeks at the Sugar Maple—his complimenting me on a huckleberry clafouti, mine thanking him for the delicious plates of leftovers he had left me for lunch—I didn’t actually meet Chef Alfred until the week after Halloween, when we scheduled a time to sit down and plan the menu for the annual Harvest Dinner.

  I had learned about the Harvest Dinner not from Margaret but from a block-print poster hanging on the White Market bulletin board, between flyers advertising free bark mulch and an autumn equinox moonlight drum circle. The poster promised “Old-fashioned New England Family Fun!” It was then that I noticed the whole town was already swaddled in bales of hay and dried corn husks. I had thought that things would quiet down in Guthrie now that the only leaves left to peep at were the stubborn crumpled-grocery-bag brown leaves on the oaks. But apparently the Guthrie Harvest Festival—capped off by the Harvest Dinner—was the social highlight of the season.

  • • •

  An older man in a tie-dyed T-shirt sat alone in the parlor, sipping coffee out of one of the gold-trimmed peony-patterned teacups. His large hand dwarfed the cup. He looked like he was drinking from his daughter’s tea set.

  “Chef?”

  “Livvy, great to meet you.” Alfred stood up and, after a moment’s hesitation, pulled me into a great bear hug. The top of my head came up only to the middle of his chest. He smelled good, like a grandfather—Irish Spring and Right Guard. “Sit, sit. So, you have to tell me what was in that buttermilk custard you made the other day. We sold out by seven o’clock. I didn’t even get to try it.”

  “Gosh, I didn’t know if that one would go over well. I’ll have to make it again this week.”

  “Do, but be sure to hide a cup of it for me.” Alfred smiled through a thick nest of gray whiskers. “Settling in okay?”

  “Everything’s good on my end. But Margaret hasn’t said much—or anything—since I started.”

  “She’s been preoccupied. I can tell you that the desserts are phenomenal. And the bread—God, that sourdough.” Al rubbed a reddened palm across his belly. “I’ve put on five pounds since you started.”

  I beamed at him. There is no better compliment you can pay a baker than to tell her she has made you gain weight. “Would you mind saying some of those nice things to Margaret? I’m afraid she’s going to boot me before my trial period is even over.”

  “I don’t think she’s thinking about making any staff changes now that the place is officially on the market.”

  “The inn is for sale?”

  “She didn’t tell you when you interviewed?”

  “Um, no. She didn’t mention it.” I felt equal parts irritation and relief. If the place changed hands, I would have an easy excuse to leave without hurting Hannah’s feelings.

  “She’s turned down offers in the past. I think she wants to make sure it will stay exactly the same. The sale could take awhile.”

  Oh, Margaret was looking for another Margaret. Good luck with that. “So, are we serving the Harvest Dinner in the barn?” I had seen a couple of high school boys dragging tables in there earlier that week. “Do we ever get busted by the health department?”

  “No, no. Our Harvest Dinner is one of the town manager’s favorite events. If he shuts us down, he can’t come.”

  “Then I won’t worry so much about the dog.” I tilted my head toward Salty, who had somehow broken out of the sugarhouse and was now sitting on a worn velvet couch scratching an ear with a hind foot.

  “Quite beautiful,” Alfred said,
“the dinner, I mean. I think you’re gonna love it. Very Martha Stewart. We serve all the courses family style, on big platters. It’s mostly locals that attend—we can only seat one hundred in the barn, and most of the tickets are sold by the beginning of the summer. All the guests who are staying at the inn can come, of course, since the dining room is closed that night.” Alfred leaned back in his chair, arms folded loosely across his tie-dyed chest.

  Whether it was served in the barn or in the walk-in refrigerator, I didn’t care. Making desserts for a big, fancy dinner put me back in my element, and I was ready to shine.

  “So, I have a couple of ideas.” I dug my spiral-ringed notebook out of my canvas bag and flipped to the right page. Alfred and I got to work, heads down, leaning over our notes—his shiny with grease stains, mine streaked with chocolate.

  “First course is a corn consommé,” Alfred said.

  “That’s brilliant. Can you do that?”

  “Just the pure essence of corn.”

  My mouth began to water. “Then a salad?” I asked.

  “Baby red oak greens with toasted black walnuts and a maple vinaigrette.”

  “With goat cheese?” I licked my lips.

  Alfred smiled and ran his fingers up and down his hairy arm. “An excellent idea.”

  “I could make croutons out of a dried-apple spice bread.”

  Alfred leaned in a little closer. “Or maybe just a thin slice of the apple bread with the goat cheese spread on it.”

  “Yum.” We weren’t even to the main course yet. “What’s next?”

  “Prime rib, with a cipollini au jus. We get the beef from the Haskell farm.”

  “Not Snowball,” I gasped. I had spent the better part of Tuesday afternoon letting the cow gum at my coat sleeve.

  Alfred laughed. “You’ll get used to it. And, no, not Snowball. She’s a heifer, for one thing. She’s used for milk and breeding.”

  I let out a long breath. Only a couple of weeks in the country and I was getting dangerously close to becoming what all chefs loathed—a vegetarian. “So what’s the wraparound?”

  “Wild mushroom risotto and roasted Brussels sprouts.”

  “I could make popovers,” I offered.

  Alfred closed his eyes. “With chives?”

  I smiled. “Done.”

  A cheese course would follow. Vermont cheddar with quince paste, fresh chèvre with homemade blackberry preserves, and a sheep’s-milk blue cheese with pears poached in port. And then dessert. Pumpkin crème brûlée baked in hollowed-out miniature pumpkins. Apple galettes with frangipane in puff pastry. Pears stuffed with cognac-soaked figs and wrapped in phyllo, baked to a crispy golden brown, the fruit inside tender and succulent. And thin chocolate shells, filled with a thick amber caramel, studded with toasted pecans and a layer of dark chocolate ganache just barely sweetened.

  Alfred and I leaned back in our chairs and smiled at each other, our foreheads glistening with sweat. All we needed was a couple of cigarettes.

  “It’s going to be a meal to remember, Livvy. If she does sell, it will be a great meal to go out on.”

  “Fantastic.” I raised my arm in the air, like I was standing in front of a roaring crowd, about to take a bow. “It could be my debut and grand finale, all in one.”

  Alfred laughed. “You know, you are nothing like I thought you’d be.”

  “What did you think I would be like?”

  Alfred rubbed his fingers in his beard, considering. “Intimidating?”

  “How intimidating can a baker be?” I asked. “We make brownies all day. Besides, my hair is purple. Nothing says ‘easygoing’ like purple hair.”

  “I love it. My mother was a hairdresser right up until the day she died. She made the ladies’ hair blue—although I don’t think it was on purpose.”

  “And she let you go gray?”

  “Oh, she tried, believe me.”

  Margaret walked into the parlor. She looked at me and at Alfred, then over at Salty asleep on the sofa. “In the kitchen, please, Ms. Rawlings. When you are done.” She nodded at Alfred before disappearing into the back of the house.

  I rolled my eyes. “I’m settling right in.” Alfred laughed as we headed back to the kitchen.

  • • •

  My last task for the day was to put together a poaching liquid, which I wanted to steep overnight. Margaret came out of her office just as the port was coming to a simmer and, to my surprise, sat down on the stool that Tom used on the mornings he delivered the milk. Silently, she watched me scrape a finger of fresh ginger with the edge of a tarnished silver teaspoon.

  “I’ve never seen ginger peeled that way,” she commented.

  “I picked it up from one of the prep cooks at the club—he was from India.” I placed the piece of ginger in the center of a square of cheesecloth that lay flat on the table before me. I had already piled a small mound of spices there—cinnamon sticks, cloves, a piece of star anise, pink peppercorns. I reached for an orange and dug into its skin with a zester, stripping it of its brightly colored flesh and releasing a burst of orange oil into the air.

  Margaret closed her eyes and inhaled deeply. Her face softened for a moment before she pursed her lips. Her back straightened. “Is this for the Harvest Dinner?” she asked.

  “Yes,” I said as I gathered the edges of the cheesecloth into a tiny bundle, which always reminded me of a hobo’s pouch, and secured the top with twine. “I’m making batches of all the desserts for you and Chef Al to taste, in case you want to make any changes.”

  Margaret looked surprised.

  “This”—I held up the cheesecloth bundle before dropping it into a pot of simmering port—“is to flavor the pears.” Poised at the stove, spoon in hand, I stared into the pot, stirring occasionally, trying to look professional. Margaret sat and watched.

  “So . . . ,” I asked after what felt like hours of silence. “Is there something you wanted to talk about?” I hated being observed. During my practical exams at cooking school I had managed to both burn all the hair off my hands and slice off the tip of my thumb. And judging by the deep channel that appeared between her eyes, it looked like Margaret had something on her mind.

  “Can’t I take a minute in my own kitchen?” she clucked. “You don’t mind Tom Carrigan sitting here all morning long.”

  Why was I always saying the wrong thing? I grabbed my knife and cut a slender slice of the apple tart. I slid it over to her, hoping she would accept the gesture of apology. Margaret stared down at the tart for a moment.

  “A civilized person would eat this with a fork,” she said before raising it to her lips and taking a tiny bite. I watched her expression out of the corner of my eye as she chewed. Nothing.

  I gathered up my courage. “Margaret, I wanted to ask if I could get a telephone line put into the cabin. I don’t have any cell reception up here.” Not that I was burning to have access to my cell phone. But it would be nice if Hannah could call me at the sugarhouse.

  “You can use the telephone here at the inn.”

  “But what if there were a family of bears keeping me trapped in the cabin? I couldn’t call for help.”

  Margaret broke an edge of crust off the tart. “Why would a family of bears trap you in your cabin?”

  “For dinner?”

  “Black bears are mostly vegetarian.”

  Just my luck. Hippie bears.

  “Well—let’s see how you do during your trial. I don’t want to pay out the expense until I know for sure that you’re the right person for the job.” Margaret pushed the tart aside and folded her arms in front of her. “There is one matter I would like to discuss. There’s a fund-raiser during the Harvest Festival to raise money for the public library. It’s a bake sale.”

  “Seriously?” I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from saying anything snarkier. The last fund-ra
iser I had baked for had been a five-hundred-dollar-a-plate black-tie gala.

  “This year it’s cookies. They did cupcakes last year. Every year it’s different.” Margaret wiped her hands with a dish towel. “The best bakers in the county donate several dozen cookies. It would be a chance for the people in the town to try something you’ve made. And it’s for a good cause.” Without another word she hopped off the stool and walked toward her office. “I’d rather you not wear that jacket in the parlor. It’s a tad ratty.”

  I looked down. Most of the last batch of raspberry coulis had ended up on my chest instead of in the squeeze bottle I was trying to pour it into. I only had one jacket. Normally, kitchens supplied coats for the chefs and sent them out to be laundered. I popped the coat open with a flick of my wrist, tossed it onto the counter, and tied the gingham apron with the dancing sheep around my waist.

  “I’d be happy to make something,” I called, my face bathing in the steam of boiling port.

  “All right, then,” she said, and slipped back into her office.

  • • •

  “You’re not going to buy that,” Hannah said the following Saturday morning as she unfolded a lace-trimmed tablecloth and spread it across a table in the church hall thrift shop.

  “Why not?” I gave the multicolored afghan I was holding a little squeeze.

  “It’s awful.”

  “You mean awfully beautiful, right?” I wrapped it around my shoulders like a cape. The scent of mothballs filled the air. “Besides, someone’s granny crocheted her poor arthritic fingers down to the bone making this thing. I can’t let it fester in the basement of a church hall for the rest of its life.”

  “Well, if you’re going for that seventies-rec-room look.”

  “Hann, I live in a one-room shack made for boiling tree sap.”

  “You live in a sugarhouse, not a shack. And besides, it’s your home. We want it to look inviting.”

  Hannah was a ruthless bargain shopper with an amazing eye. Even though Jonathan’s salary would have allowed her to furnish her whole house from the antiques shops on Newbury Street, she loved the hunt. We had spent part of every one of my visits to Vermont scouring yard sales and thrift stores, then heading to the Miss Guthrie diner to eat tall stacks of blueberry pancakes while Hannah gave me the dirt on everyone we’d run into that morning. It was our ritual.