by Ruth Reichl
“Needs more salt.”
“Reminds me of that Paula Wolfert dish, the one with warka.”
“Why’d you use achiote?”
Ten minutes later, they were still talking. I opened my oven door, and as the carnival scent of gingerbread came spilling out, they all looked toward me before resuming the conversation.
I turned the cake out of the pan and let it cool for a few minutes. I had just finished glazing it when Maggie stalked over. “How long do you let it cool?”
“I like to eat it while it’s still a little warm.”
“Taste!” she bellowed. I jumped back as the outstretched forks came rushing toward me.
“It smells incredible,” said one of the cooks.
Maggie, a practiced jouster, shoved his fork aside. “I’ll take the first bite,” she said, lopping off a chunk. She put it in her mouth and her lips twisted, as if she’d swallowed a mouthful of vinegar. For a minute I thought she hated it. But then she said, reluctantly, “Oh, God, this is fantastic. Jake’s going to love it.”
Spring Cheese
Dear Genie,
It was the gingerbread, of course; when Jake tasted it, he said anyone who could turn the world’s most banal cake into something so compelling—he actually used that word—belonged at Delicious! He said he had to hire me if only to get the recipe.
As if I’d give it to him!
Everything’s happened so fast. Two weeks ago I was heading back for senior year, and now I’ve got a job in New York, an apartment, a whole new life. If I let myself think about it, I get terrified, so it’s a good thing I’ll be busy: Jake said I’ll sometimes have to work till after midnight. And the pay’s so low. Dad says he’ll cover my first year’s rent, which is pretty serious, considering how much he hates me dropping out of school. And how much he’s going to miss me. Aunt Melba keeps texting me, reminding me to call him. She thinks he’s going to take this hard, but, then, she’s always worrying about Dad.
I found the most incredible place, a fifth-floor walk-up on the Lower East Side. It’s like the place I’ve always dreamed of, so perfect I sometimes think I must have conjured it from my imagination. It’s tiny, but there’s tons of light, and it’s in a great old neighborhood. If I keep the windows open, I can hear people’s voices as they walk down the sidewalk, and if they’re loud enough I catch intriguing little snatches of conversation. It goes on all day and all night; there’s always something happening on Rivington. I love that.
My first night here, I went out at midnight—midnight!—to grab a bite at the little Chinese place on the corner. Then I went to the bookshop. Even that late at night, it was filled with people who looked like they led interesting lives.
I just wish you were here to share this. I feel so lonely. And then there’s the question of clothes. I’m heading off to my first day of work, and I’m hopeless. All those mornings I watched you getting dressed—if only I’d paid attention.
Miss you.
xxb
Stately, gracious, old, the Timbers Mansion seemed to soak up all the sunshine on the street. I walked slowly up the soft stone steps, taking in the worn bricks and faded marble columns. A hundred years ago, in 1910, when Delicious! magazine moved in, Greenwich Village must have been full of houses just like this, but now the mansion was the last one standing on this narrow tree-lined street.
Inside, the high-ceilinged lobby was dark and cool. The guard at the antique desk glanced up. “First day, right?” He waved me toward the staircase. “Jake’s expecting you. Second floor.”
The day of my interview, I’d been too nervous to notice much, but now I looked around, taking in the details. How amazing to be working in this gorgeous old house, surrounded by marble, carved oak, and chandeliers. There must be a fireplace in every room, and ancient windows with wavy handblown panes captured the sun and drew it inside.
Jake was waiting on the second floor beneath a silver chandelier. His dog was there too, leaping ecstatically to greet me as if I were his favorite person in the world. I reached down to pat him, but he jumped up, put his paws on my chest, and tried to lick my face. I laughed.
“Good thing you like dogs.” Jake pulled him down. “That temp they sent was terrified of Sherman.” He tugged gently on the dog’s silky ears. “But you didn’t think much of her either, did you, boy? The woman was a disaster. Poor Billie’s got no idea what a mess she’s walking into.”
I liked the sound of that; it was bound to make me look competent. As he led me down the quiet hall, I imagined a desk piled with papers reaching to the ceiling, imagined myself efficiently creating order out of chaos. I figured the sooner I could please him, the sooner he’d start throwing small writing assignments my way.
Jake gestured at the closed doors around us. “By ten, most of them will be here.” He said it apologetically, as if his entire staff had failed the work-ethic test. At the moment the empty corridor, with its thick carpet and graceful torch-shaped sconces, felt more like a fancy hotel than a place where any work got done.
The illusion ended when we got to my “office,” which was a dreary little cubbyhole, sparsely efficient, with nothing but a desk, a phone, and a computer. Jake didn’t stop, so I followed him through into his office, blinking at the sudden burst of light pouring through the large arched windows.
Sherman went to the desk, circled three times, and flopped down beneath it. I looked around, studying my surroundings. The room was an even bigger mess than last time—books, manuscripts, and newspapers were scattered everywhere. It smelled like leather and lingering wood smoke; apparently the fireplace worked. There was a round table in front of it, heaped with books and magazines that probably hadn’t been touched in the ten days since my interview.
Jake sat down in the chair behind the desk. “Sit down, sit down,” he said, waving vaguely.
Where? The scuffed leather sofa beneath the windows held even more manuscripts and magazines than the table did. The two deep armchairs weren’t any better; they too were piled with manuscripts and folders. I glanced at the little end table, but the bronze elephant sculpture on it had sharp edges. In the end I went over to one of the chairs and perched on an armrest.
Jake looked amused. “You go to orientation?”
I nodded.
“So you know this is just a trial period? That it’ll be three months before the job’s official?”
I nodded again. He was watching me, waiting. When the pause got uncomfortable, he said, “Your letter of recommendation mentioned that you’re kind of quiet.”
I am. Genie’s always talked enough for both of us.
“Your professor also said you’re an eloquent writer and a, quote, awesome, unquote, cook. You looked so uncomfortable when I asked you to cook, I was sure he’d gotten that wrong. You went completely white. I admired your pluck for going through with it, but frankly I wasn’t expecting much. Then you made that gingerbread.… ”
“Even Maggie seemed to like it.”
Maybe I shouldn’t have said that. His eyes narrowed, moving over me. I sat up straighter; I’m tall and I have a tendency to slouch. Dad’s always trying to persuade me that I’d be pretty if I’d do something with my hair or buy better glasses, but he’s my father, so of course he thinks that. I tugged at the cuffs on my white shirt and smoothed the loose khaki pants. “She said you’d never hire me.”
“Maggie says that to everyone. She’s allergic to change.” He fiddled with the ebony letter opener and added, “And as you clearly noticed, she’s got something of a mean streak.” He stood up abruptly. “C’mon.” He made for the door. “I’ll take you around and introduce you.”
By now the doors were all open, and we went into one office after another: executive editor, managing editor, articles editor, fact checker, copy editor.… It was a blur of names and titles, which made it easy; all I had to do was shake hands and say hello. Everyone seemed friendly and slightly harried. No small talk required.
The last door on the hall rema
ined closed, and Sherman began to paw at it, trying to nudge it open with his nose. “Give it up, pal.” Jake pulled the dog away. “Sammy’s not here.”
I traced the letters on the old-fashioned brass nameplate with my finger. “ ‘Samuel Winthrop Stone.’ ”
“Travel editor.” Jake gave the dog’s collar another tug. “C’mon, Sherman, Sammy’s in Morocco. No smoothie for you. Maybe you’ll have better luck in the kitchen.”
At the word “kitchen,” Sherman pricked up his ears and raced for the stairs. “This dog is so smart.” Jake said it softly, as if worried that Sherman might overhear. “He loves smoothies, and he knows exactly who the suckers are. Paul even brought in a special little juicer just for him.”
I followed them up the stairs. “The art department’s on four,” said Jake, pointing. I followed his finger, noticing the graceful plaster swags and garlands decorating the walls. The Timbers Mansion really was beautiful; if Genie were here she’d be reaching for her sketch pad. “Library’s up there too, but you don’t need to worry about that: It’s been locked for years. Down here”—we’d reached the third-floor landing and he turned left, sweeping me into an enormous cream-colored room—“is the kitchen, which you’ve seen, and the photo studio, which you haven’t.”
The photo studio must once have been a ballroom. Even now, with lights dangling from the ceiling, thick electrical cords snaking along the floor, and half a dozen tripod-mounted cameras, it clung so stubbornly to the past that I could easily imagine an orchestra tuning up for the next waltz. As we watched, the door to the kitchen opened and a woman inched out backward, carefully sheltering an arrangement of vegetables.
“That’s Lori,” Jake whispered. “She’s a food stylist—and our best baker.” Taking tiny steps, she edged into the middle of the room and very slowly lowered the plate onto a pedestal in front of a huge cloth-covered camera.
“Valente?” Jake called, and a short, solid man surprised me by emerging from beneath the cloth. He shook my hand briefly and then ducked back inside the camera. Jake and I watched Lori fussing with the plate, moving microgreens and midget carrots first one way, then the other. She picked up a tiny brush from a tray sitting on a nearby table and fastidiously applied olive oil, then added flecks of cheese, one by one, with a pair of tweezers. From beneath the cloth, Valente directed the precise positioning of each tiny morsel.
“Move the parsley to the right, Lori,” Valente ordered. She pinched up a minuscule bit of green with her tweezers, moving it an infinitesimal fraction of an inch.
Suddenly the door flew open and Maggie came charging in. At the sight of her, a spark of adrenaline shot through me; was I going to have to see her every day? Buoyed by the breeze, the parsley leapt into the air, and as it floated back down, Valente appeared again. “Damn it, Maggie,” he shouted, “now we have to start over.”
“Oh, sorry.” She was unconcerned. Valente snorted and pulled the cloth back over his head. She turned to Jake. “Do me a favor? I need really good anchovies, and Thursday’s cornered the market on menaicas.” She made a face, doing that thing with her lips that made her look as if she’d swallowed vinegar. “Again. If I send a messenger it’ll take all day. Do you think the new girl could …?”
Jake seemed embarrassed, reluctant to ask me to run this errand but even more reluctant to turn Maggie down. He shrugged and turned to me. “Do you mind? Thursday’s the chef at The Pig.”
“I’ve heard of her.” You’d have to be a hermit not to know about America’s most famous female chef. “Her picture was on Eater this morning; Patti Smith threw a big party at The Pig last night.”
“I know; I was there.” Jake handed me a twenty. “Grab a cab. It’s not far, just into Chelsea, but it’ll be faster.”
FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER I was standing on 16th Street, so far west I could see the Hudson River. From outside, The Pig looked like any other scruffy tavern. I’d been expecting something fancier, or at least more exotic. In the famous Annie Leibovitz picture “Midnight at The Pig,” the restaurant has a dark, gritty glamour. The photographer had caught Keith Richards lounging across a scarred wooden table, surrounded by eccentric friends. The picture always made me think of Paris in the twenties—you wanted to be there—and I’d anticipated something with a bit more style.
I banged on the door until a tattooed man with a nose ring finally let me in. It smelled like spilled whiskey, and daylight had drained every bit of romance from the room. “Thursday’s in back,” said a man with a ponytail from behind the bar, jerking his head toward a swinging door. He tossed an empty bottle into a giant garbage can. It clattered noisily to the bottom.
I gave the battered door a push. The kitchen was dim and much smaller than an average California kitchen, so crammed with industrial equipment that there was barely room to move. Thursday was standing at the stove, swathed in a cloud of steam. She was elegantly beautiful, with an ash-blond braid reaching almost to her waist and big black-lashed eyes that hovered somewhere between gray and blue. “I’m—” I began.
“Taste this.” Thursday thrust a large wooden spoon into my mouth. Her eyes watched closely as I swallowed. She had fed me a fluffy cloud, no more than pure texture, but as it evaporated it left a trail of flavor in its wake.
“Lemon peel,” I said, “Parmesan, saffron, spinach.” She held out another spoonful, and this time, at the very end, I tasted just a touch of … something lemony but neither lemon nor verbena. It had a faint cinnamon tinge. “Curry leaf!”
“I’m impressed.” Her hands were on her slim hips and her voice was—what? Sarcastic? “But I didn’t mean it as a test. I just wanted to see if I’m getting anywhere with this new gnocchi.”
“That’s an amazing combination. The saffron’s brilliant—it gives it such a sunny flavor. But what made you use curry leaf? I never would have thought of that.”
“It kind of came to me at the last minute. So you think it works?”
“Yes! But maybe you should use a little more?”
I blushed; who was I to be giving Thursday Brown advice? But she was tasting the gnocchi, rubbing her lips together in that way that chefs do. “You think so?”
I was about to ask if I could taste it again when she cried, “Sal!” with such delight that I looked over my shoulder. A tall, broad man in a baseball cap was standing in the doorway. He had the look of a plumber come to fix a leak—blue jeans, work boots, and a plain blue work shirt. He was probably fifty, but his face had a curious innocence. When he removed his cap, a thatch of thick, graying dark hair sprang joyfully upward. Thursday scooped up another gnocchi. “We were tasting my new gnocchi.” She thrust one into his mouth. “What do you think? She—what did you say your name was?—thinks I need more curry leaf.”
“I didn’t, actually. Billie Breslin.”
Thursday looked at me now, really taking me in. “So you’re Jake’s new assistant? That should work out well. I bet there isn’t one person in a hundred—no, a thousand—who’d know there was curry leaf in there.”
“Curry leaf?” Sal tasted again. “There isn’t one person in a thousand who’s even heard of it.” He was studying me the way Thursday had, as if he were trying to see into my mind. “One taste and you could tell it was there?”
“Yeah. Curry leaf doesn’t taste like anything else. It’s like there’s an echo of cinnamon right behind the lemon.”
Sal reached into the pot and scooped up another gnocchi. “You’re right!” He sounded truly excited. He turned to Thursday. “And she’s right about using more too. But if you ask me, you’re using the wrong cheese. That’s the fall Parmigiano—am I right?—and it’s too rich. You need the spring cheese. I’ll send you some.”
Definitely not a plumber.
“I need that cheese right now!” She turned to look at me again. “Sal knows more about cheese than anyone in this city. Why don’t you go with him? Fontanari’s isn’t far, and he can give you my cheese. By the time you get back I’ll have figured out where I put thos
e anchovies.”
I hesitated. “I really should get back.… ”
“You’re new to New York, right?”
I nodded.
“Then you need to see Sal’s shop. Fontanari’s is incredible; every cook should know it.”
“I’m not a cook.”
“You aren’t?” She peered at me as if she’d just encountered a rare specimen in the zoo. “With that palate? Then what the hell are you doing at Delicious!?”
“Oh, leave her alone, Thursday,” said Sal. “You’re embarrassing her.”
I smiled gratefully. “I’d love to come with you, but Maggie wanted me to bring the anchovies right back.”
Thursday crossed her arms. “She’ll wait. I don’t even know where I put the damn jar. Go on, now!”
She made little shooing motions with her hands, and resistance seemed futile. I followed Sal out the door.
“That’s right.” Sal gave me a cheerful smile. “No point in arguing with a chef. They’re all bossy, but Thursday’s the worst. Did you know she once worked at Delicious!?” He glanced down at me. “I can see from your face that you’re wondering how that turned out. Well, let me tell you, it was pretty bad. Thursday was just out of culinary school, but even then she had to have her own way. She and Maggie …” He whistled. “All I can say is, when it comes to Thursday, there’s no point in arguing. You might as well give in at the start. Where you from?”
“Santa Barbara—”
“Now, me, I’m from right here.” To my relief, Sal was as talkative as he was kind; I wouldn’t have to say a word. “My family shop’s been on the same corner in Little Italy for a hundred years.”
“Little Italy?” I tried to remember where that was.
“Just a couple of miles,” he said comfortably. “A good walk that will take us past some of the finest food in the world. Coming from—where’d you say you were from? This is going to be a treat for you.”
