by Ann B. Ross
Because of Emma Sue’s proclivities, I was always leery around her for fear she’d give me something to do. That’s the problem with these active do-gooders: They try to rope everybody else into their enthusiasms. Whenever I know I’m going to see her, I make a mental list of all I have to do so I have a ready excuse not to take on anything else.
When we were settled at Emma Sue’s table—cups of hot spiced tea before us—and I’d told her about the cookbook I was putting together for Hazel Marie, a look of profound gratitude swept over her face. Emma Sue was essentially a needy person, who, I’m sorry to say, rarely got the credit or acclaim that she both craved and deserved.
“That is so thoughtful of you, Julia,” she said. “And to think you want my recipes.”
“Well, not all of them. Just a few favorites to remind Hazel Marie of you and only those you think she can manage to fix. I know you have some excellent main dish recipes that wouldn’t be too involved for her. Remember that she is nowhere near your level of expertise.”
As Emma Sue glowed under my complimentary words, I mentally asked for forgiveness because, in reality, she was a terrible cook. A willing, eager, and generous one, but terrible even so. The few times a year she had a luncheon or, even rarer, a dinner party, I snacked before leaving my house because I knew half of what she served would be inedible—undercooked, overcooked, or a concoction of flavors no other cook would ever put together.
I learned the reason for that one time when I offered to help her in the kitchen: She substitutes. I watched as she looked through her spice shelf for paprika to sprinkle over a plate of deviled eggs.
“Oh, well,” she said, grabbing a jar, “I guess I’m out. But all I want is a little color, so this’ll do.” And she covered those eggs with enough cayenne pepper to burn a hole in the roof of your mouth.
And she once told me of the time, not long after she and the pastor were married, when they were in their first pastorate. They were serving a small, rural church of some sixty or so members, barely half of whom attended services on a regular basis, so naturally, she said, she and the pastor were eager to receive a call to a larger congregation. Every stranger who appeared for Sunday worship put them in a state of high anticipation because he could have been a member of a pastor-seeking committee checking out the pastor’s expository style and delivery before issuing a call.
On a certain Sunday, she told me, when the ladies of the church had prepared a covered-dish luncheon, a nattily dressed stranger had appeared and, being warmly greeted, had stayed for lunch. Emma Sue had prepared a chocolate pound cake as her contribution to the luncheon, but unhappily found as she’d mixed it early that morning that she was out of vanilla extract. It was too early for a grocery store to be open, which wouldn’t have helped her anyway since the pastor frowned on unnecessary purchases on the Lord’s Day. So Emma Sue had substituted lemon flavoring in the chocolate cake.
Knowing what she’d done, the pastor tried everything he could think of to steer the stranger away from Emma Sue’s cake, but the man was having none of it. He took a large slice, ate it with relish, then declared it was the best cake he’d ever tasted.
Emma Sue still credited her cooking skills with setting the pastor on his rise up the ladder of ministerial success.
“Stop writing a minute, Julia,” Emma Sue said after she’d recommended a particular recipe from the cookbooks she’d spread out on the table. I’d been concentrating on copying a few of them into my notebook and had not noticed how quiet she’d become.
Putting down my pen, I glanced up at her, noting the look of stress on her face. “What is it, Emma Sue?”
“Well, I know you’re not a Bible scholar, but you do have some common sense and I’d like to have your opinion about something.”
Have I mentioned that Emma Sue could be blunt to the point of giving offense? I’ve never forgotten the time she ran up to a woman she barely knew one Sunday after the services and asked her forgiveness. “For what?” the woman had asked.
“For thinking so badly of you because of all the eye makeup you wear,” Emma Sue had answered. “I’m terribly sorry and I hope you’ll forgive me.” She was perfectly sincere about it, even though the woman had been completely unaware of Emma Sue’s disapproval of eyeliner.
I leaned back with a sigh. “I’ll try, Emma Sue. What is it?”
“It’s about Mary and Martha. I just can’t figure it out.”
“I don’t think I know them.”
“Yes, you do. The two sisters, you know, from the Book of Luke, where it tells about Jesus coming to visit and Martha doing what any hostess would do. She stayed in the kitchen, cooking and preparing a fine meal for all the guests, then was left to clean up by herself. And all the time she was working her fingers to the bone, her sister was sitting at the Lord’s feet, listening to Him talk without lifting a finger to help. And when Martha complained about it, the Lord rebuked her and said that Mary had chosen the better part. And I know I shouldn’t question it, but it just seems to me that somebody had to feed those people.”
I sighed because Emma Sue couldn’t get those two sisters off her mind, and I’d heard this story from her before. “Well, as you say, Emma Sue, I’m no Bible scholar, but maybe we’re not supposed to take it literally. Maybe it’s figurative or something.”
“Oh, I know that,” Emma Sue said. “It teaches us to put spiritual matters first and not fill our days with mundane busy work like Martha, who was cumbered with much serving. While at the same time her sister was sitting around doing nothing, yet it says that was the good part. Now it seems to me to be saying that both of them should’ve just let everybody—and I’m talking about guests in their home—go hungry.
“Oh, Julia,” she went on, as the tears I’d been expecting filled her eyes, “I try so hard to choose the better part, but I’m forever in the kitchen, and if I never had to put a foot in it again I’d be happy. But Larry expects three meals a day, every day except for when Rotary meets. And I thought when our boys were grown and gone, we might just occasionally eat out somewhere.” She snatched a napkin from the holder in the middle of the table, knocking over a salt shaker, and pressed the napkin to her overflowing eyes. “I get so tired, and I’m just so . . . so cumbered.”
“There, there,” I said for lack of anything else to say, as I put a comforting hand on hers. “I understand, Emma Sue. People load you down with work because you’re so willing and eager to help. But sometimes you have to put your foot down and say, ‘No.’ You can’t do everything, you know. And as far as the pastor’s concerned, he’s like any other man. If he comes home and dinner’s on the table, he’ll eat it and not give it another thought. But what if he came home and dinner was not on the table and not even started? What if you simply announced that the two of you were going out to eat?”
“Oh, Julia, I couldn’t do that. He expects dinner on the table. And if it wasn’t, all he’d do is look disappointed in me and go fix a peanut butter sandwich.”
“Then let him while you go out.”
“By myself?”
“Why not? Sometimes you have to show a husband that you mean business.” Of course, all the while I was telling her what to do, I was recalling the long, dry marriage to my first husband and realizing that there was a lot of Wesley Lloyd Springer in Pastor Larry Ledbetter. Both had unshakable ideas of what a woman’s job was and where her place was, as well. I would’ve never dared to contradict Wesley Lloyd or failed to have his dinner, via Lillian, on the table when he walked in at 5:45 every evening except Thursdays, when, unbeknownst to me, he was visiting his paramour while I thought he was doing bank business.
But those days were gone forever for me, now that I had Sam, who was the most thoughtful of men, except when he took off fishing or world traveling for days at a time.
So, having been through a similar marriage as Emma Sue was currently in without being able to make
any changes, I was a poor one to be giving advice. Gradually, Emma Sue’s tears dried up and, as she wiped her face, she said, “I’ll be all right, Julia. I just get down sometimes, but whatever cross I’m given to bear, I know the Lord will help me carry it.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. All I could think of was what a crying shame it was for a wife to think of her husband as the cross she’d been given to bear. Of course, Wesley Lloyd had been mine to bear until a sudden heart attack in his new Buick Park Avenue lifted it from me.
Emma Sue blew her nose, then, as she lifted her head, a troubled frown appeared on her forehead. “Wonder what she served,” she said.
Still thinking of bearing crosses, I was confused. “Who?”
“Martha, of course,” Emma Sue said. “Imagine a dozen or so people dropping in for lunch. What in the world would she feed them?”
“I don’t know, Emma Sue, but lamb would be my guess. Or a fatted calf. Maybe in a stew so she could extend it with other things.”
“Well, I guess she’d have to, especially after her brother was raised from the dead. Do you realize he hadn’t eaten in four whole days!”
It took a while but I was finally able to distract Emma Sue by praising the tuna casserole topped with crumbled potato chips that she’d taken to the last covered-dish supper. Then I was able to turn her attention to my mission by asking for the recipe for her famous dump cake that she dumped on anybody who was ill, pregnant, or celebrating some event.
Emma Sue’s Famous Dump Cake
21-ounce can cherry pie filling
2 cups yellow (or white) cake mix (about half a box)
1 stick margarine, cut into small pieces
1 cup chopped pecans
Preheat the oven to 350°F. Butter an 8 × 8-inch square baking dish. Dump the cherry pie filling into the dish. On top of the pie filling, sprinkle (don’t stir) the cake mix. Scatter the margarine over the mix. Then sprinkle the pecans over the top. Bake for 35 to 45 minutes until the top is brown. Serve with ice cream.
VARIATIONS: Use apple, blueberry, peach, strawberry, or pineapple pie filling instead of cherry pie filling. You also may sprinkle shredded coconut over the top along with the pecans.
Serves 4 to 6.
(This recipe is justly famous, Hazel Marie, and you know why—it’s Emma Sue’s signature dish for any occasion. She’s brought it to us often enough.)
“Hazel Marie will be thrilled to have this recipe, Emma Sue,” I said. “And I know her family will enjoy it.” I didn’t mention that Hazel Marie herself didn’t like dump cake.
“Well,” Emma Sue said, wiping the last of her tears away, “tell her she should use a square tinfoil pan if she’s taking it to somebody. That way she won’t have to worry about getting her Pyrex back. I figured that out after I realized I was spending a fortune on Pyrex dishes. Nobody ever returns them.”
“I’ll be sure to do that. But now I need a main dish recipe and, remember, it should be one that you won’t mind showing her how to make. And, by the way, what day would be good for you? Next week is all taken care of.”
We studied the calendar and she chose Tuesday of the following week. “I can do it then,” Emma Sue said. “I have a ten o’clock meeting that will run through lunch. I could go by Hazel Marie’s about one, before the Christmas pageant committee meets. We’ll have time to throw it together in between.”
“Well, Emma Sue, I don’t know about throwing something together. Hazel Marie needs details.”
“Oh, she won’t have any trouble with this,” Emma Sue said. “Really, throwing together is all you do. Here—read it and see.”
Emma Sue’s Good Beef Stew
3 pounds lean stew meat, trimmed and cubed
Preheat the oven to 300°F. Put the meat in a large Dutch oven, then drain each of the following (saving juices) and add to the meat:
16-ounce can English peas
16-ounce can sliced carrots
16-ounce jar small onions
16-ounce can green beans
Then add:
16-ounce can whole tomatoes (plus juice)
103/4-ounce can beef consommé, undiluted
1/2 cup dried bread crumbs
1/2 cup dry red wine
1/3 cup flour
1 tablespoon brown sugar
2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
2 teaspoons salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1 bay leaf
1–2 teaspoons Kitchen Bouquet, for color
Mix well, cover, and put in the oven for 2 to 3 hours, stirring occasionally and adding small amounts of drained juices if needed. Remove the bay leaf. Serve over wide egg noodles.
Serves 8.
(This recipe looks as if it will feed a crowd once or your family for two or three days.)
“Now, Julia,” Emma Sue said, “I know it calls for wine, but don’t let that upset you. I use cooking wine, which is nonalcoholic and perfectly fine for a Christian cook.”
If I stayed around Emma Sue for any length of time, she could send me around the bend. I looked her straight in the eye. “I’m not upset because I didn’t even notice. Besides, I doubt that a half a cup of wine that will cook down anyway would corrupt any cook—Christian or not.”
“Oh, Julia,” she said as tears sprang up in her eyes.
I had to quickly reverse myself, apologize, and thank her again and again. Then I got myself out of there before I said something worse.
Chapter 13
When I got home, I expected to find Sam up early because he’d be spending the night in his own bed instead of staying with James. With Mr. Pickens back home, we would be reverting to our normal sleeping arrangements, and that thought was putting a spring in my step. Our bed had been awfully lonesome the last few nights.
As I passed through the kitchen on my way to him, Lillian stopped me with an announcement. “Lloyd, he say to tell you he gonna eat at his mama’s an’ spend the night, too.”
I turned to her. “Where’s he going to sleep? Every bed in the house is taken.”
“He say the couch’ll do him, an’ Mr. Sam, he say he already take a million naps on it so Lloyd won’t have no trouble gettin’ a good night’s sleep.” Lillian washed her hands at the sink as I started toward the living room. “Oh, an’ Lloyd say his mama’s cookin’ smell real good, so he stayin’ to try it.”
“Well, good. Let’s hope she gets it on the table the way it’s supposed to be. Did Mr. Pickens get home?”
“Yes’m—that’s another reason Lloyd stayin’.”
I smiled at that, my heart melting at the thought of how good a father Mr. Pickens was proving to be. Hazel Marie could’ve done a lot worse than to choose him. In fact, in the past she had done a lot worse.
“Go on home, Lillian,” I said. “Sam and I can put something together for dinner, or . . .” I stopped, recalling my conversation with Emma Sue. “Or we’ll go out for a change.”
Sam and I had a lovely evening in the clubhouse dining room, our catching-up conversation interrupted now and then to greet people we didn’t often see. Sam and I had each been members of the country club before we married, although neither of us played golf or tennis or, for that matter, lolled around in bathing suits at the swimming pool. Wesley Lloyd Springer, my unmissed first husband, used our membership to entertain bank customers and to make sure he was seen among the movers and shakers of the community. In his business, he’d said, it was essential that he appear socially involved, although I had been cautioned against using the membership too often.
Sam said he had joined so that he could play bingo every Tuesday night, which made me laugh at the thought of him hunched over trying to fill his card while all the widow ladies hovered around. The last thing Sam Murdoch would be interested in was bingo, much less a swarm of hovering widow ladies.
While
we ate I told him all about Brother Vern’s embarrassing appearance, as well as about Hazel Marie’s cooking lesson, reiterating my admiration for Ida Lee. And he told me of his nights alone with James and, taking my hand across the table, how he was looking forward to being in his own bed. My face glowing, I glanced around to see if anyone had heard him.
“James should be able to manage the stairs to his place in a day or so,” he went on, sliding his hand back as an unobtrusive waiter offered coffee. “That ankle is still swollen but not as badly as it was, and I think there’s an old walking stick stuck back in a closet somewhere over there. I’ll look for it tomorrow and let him try walking around a bit.”
“Just don’t let him fall and break something else. But I’ll tell you this, Sam—James will be more than ready to be back in his own apartment. He’s still not getting along too well with Brother Vern.”
“Well, who does?” Sam laughed. Then turning serious, he said, “But when James is able to go back, you know what that’ll do, don’t you? It’ll free up a nice private room and bath downstairs for Brother Vern, and he may settle in for a long stay.”
“Oh,” I said, rolling my eyes, “I’m hoping Mr. Pickens will nip that idea in the bud. But you know how easily swayed Hazel Marie is—Vernon Puckett will play on her compassion, make her feel sorry for him, and she won’t be able to turn him out. She may end up having to choose between her uncle and her husband.” I leaned forward and lowered my voice. “I tell you, Sam, it’s a recipe for trouble any way you look at it. We may have to resort to making things so uncomfortable for Brother Vern that he’ll want to leave.”
