The Hottest Dishes of the Tartar Cuisine

by Alina Bronsky

  At first I just cleaned up. There was enough work. John’s wife had been sick for a long time. I was curious to know what she had looked like, but there weren’t any photos. John’s daughter said she had taken them all away because they made it more difficult for John.

  One day John came out of his bedroom. He asked me if it would bother me if he sat in the living room. I said, “Not at all, it’s your living room after all.”

  He sat down on the couch. I dusted and then wiped the wood flooring. It didn’t bother me that John was watching me. But when I turned to him I realized he wasn’t watching me at all. He had taken out a book without my noticing and was reading.

  He didn’t even look up from his book when the doorbell rang.

  “Do you want to get that?” I asked.

  When he didn’t react, I went to answer the doorbell myself. In front of the house stood a young man. He handed me a tray with food on it—like on an airplane.

  “Meals on Wheels,” he said as he helped me balance everything. I must have looked pretty confused.

  “Aha,” I said, as if I understood. I wanted to go back inside to get money to tip him, but he was in a rush.

  “John, Meals on Wheels is here for you,” I said, placing the tray on a small wooden coffee table in front of him. He looked up from his book. I lifted the plastic cover.

  “Here is . . . uh . . . soup, and here . . . um . . . looks like some kind of meat.”

  “What am I supposed to do with it?” he asked.

  I didn’t really know either.

  Later I found out that his daughter had arranged it for him. She couldn’t cook for him every day. And he needed to eat. Meals on Wheels, I surmised, was something like a pizza delivery service for old people in Germany. I shared my thoughts with John.

  “Yes, except without the pizza and without the service,” John said, laughing for the first time.

  He never touched the yoghurt on his tray. I always took it home with me because Aminat loved it.

  “If you’d like, I could cook something for you,” I said.

  “Not necessary,” said John.

  “You haven’t tried my cooking yet,” I said.

  When I resolve to do something, I follow through. That’s the way I am.

  One Sunday at eleven, I stood in front of John’s door with a sack of groceries. I rang the bell. Nobody answered. Then I jiggled the door. I had a key. I had told him I was coming. I knocked with my fist. Then I unlocked the door.

  Everything was clean. I’d been there two days before. I went into the kitchen. Several trays of food were there. I lifted the tops and found them completely untouched. I put down my bag.

  “John, Rosa’s here!” I called.

  Silence. I ran up the stairs and tore open the door to John’s room. It was the only room I hadn’t been in. Not yet. You could see right away: it was a dreadful space, full of books, papers, and garbage. An empty bed with sheets that were none too fresh. I should have had a look in here long ago.

  “John!” I called.

  Next I went to the bathroom. The door was locked. I shook it and put my ear to the keyhole.

  “John!” I called into the silence.

  Fortunately, nothing phased me. I’d been in a lot of houses and knew which ones had doors that could easily be opened even when locked. This was one of them, thank God. I found a coin in my pocket, put it into the slot, and turned. The door opened.

  John lay in the bathtub. His long body barely fit. His head was above water, but it was hanging worryingly to the side. The water wasn’t bloody. He didn’t look good. I braced his head and tried to pull him out. Then, on the spur of the moment, I decided to hold his nose closed. That’s how I woke him. John coughed, shook his head, tried to free himself from my grip, and cursed—first in English, then in German.

  “What are you doing here?” he asked. “Are you a nightmare come to life?”

  He still seemed disoriented. I felt the water. It was cold. I didn’t expect any thanks for saving him.

  “Why don’t you get out,” I said, looking around, finding a large towel, and offering it to him.

  He slowly stood up. Yes, his face was the oldest thing about him. I couldn’t resist looking at him. I hadn’t seen a man in a long time. And an Englishman—never. He stood there and water streamed down off him. Then he stepped still dripping wet from the tub. A puddle formed at his feet. He ripped the towel out of my hands and wrapped it around himself.

  “I fell asleep. Do me a favor and get out,” he said.

  “I need to mop up,” I said.

  I grabbed a cleaning rag and wiped the floor dry. John didn’t wait around for me to finish. From his bedroom he asked, “What are you doing here anyway?”

  “I told you I was going to cook for you today.”

  “You’re a pain in the neck,” said John. “Get out of here.”

  “After I cook.”

  He closed the bedroom door. I heard the key turn in the lock. He was stubborn, but his stubbornness was nothing compared to mine.

  I ran the cold water and scrubbed the bathtub clean. And all of this out of the kindness of my heart.

  I went to the kitchen and started to cook. It had been ages since I had a proper kitchen at my disposal. Today John’s kitchen belonged to me. There hadn’t been a woman in here for years. Everything was clean—I’d polished it myself—but it had been a long time since the kitchen’s contents had been caringly handled and used. That was something I had in common with the kitchen. I wanted to warm it up again and bring it back to life with my hands.

  I rinsed a chicken in cold water, took out the needle I’d brought, and sewed the body cavity shut. At the neck, I carefully separated the skin from the meat and blew into the gap. Anyplace air came whistling through, I stitched the hole closed. I beat eggs and cream with a little salt and pepper and poured that mixture between the skin and meat. Then I tied off the skin at neck of the chicken, wrapped the whole thing in a cloth, and placed it in boiling salt water.

  This chicken was called tutyrgan tavyk, a dish that Kalganow’s country relatives used to make. It had occurred to me today—at just the right moment. Not by accident, but because Dieter and I were discussing it. Or to be more precise, because Dieter reminded me of the recipe. He knew both what it was called and how to make it. The things he mentioned brought it to mind, and I realized I knew what he was talking about but had simply forgotten about the dish.

  The chicken took an hour and a half and was a genuine traditional Tartar dish. I set the table in the living room. I already knew where everything was. I got out starched napkins and dusty glasses that I washed and polished by hand while the bird cooked. I turned off the stove and freshened up in the bathroom. My face was slightly flushed from cooking. I cooled it with water and applied fresh makeup. Then I knocked on the door to John’s bedroom.

  “Go away,” said John.

  I put everything back where I’d found it and left. Indeed, things didn’t always work out on the first try.

  Elegant and agile

  It came to my attention that I still lacked a few skills. Everyone here knew how to swim, for instance—even the little kids. Even though you saw four-year-olds still in diapers, five-year-olds running around with pacifiers, and kids who started school unable to read or add. Even those spoiled children knew how to swim. They were taken by their mothers—my clients—to swim classes, the trunk of the car filled with bathing suits, towels, inflatable floatation devices, kickboards, and pool noodles. And in the summer they all drove to the beach.

  I told Dieter he should take our child to the beach. Aminat could barely swim and I couldn’t swim at all. That was a situation that had to be remedied. We shouldn’t be any less skilled than the rest.

  Dieter said maybe the year after next—there was no way he could do it on short notice. It was winter.

  God consoled me: no sooner had I said this to Dieter than one of my clients asked whether I had time the following week to go with her
family to the mountains. She wanted to take her husband and two kids to Switzerland. She had planned to take her mother-in-law to look after the pair of spoiled brats each afternoon. But the mother-in-law had intestinal polyps and had to undergo an operation.

  When I was younger, Kalganow went cross-country skiing in the forest almost every weekend. Sometimes I went along, but for the most part I wasn’t bothered with such idiotic pursuits. So I could ski, though I’d never been to the Alps. Aminat didn’t know how to ski and also had never been to the Alps.

  My client and her husband agreed to let Aminat come. They agreed to everything.

  They drove there ahead of us and took our luggage with them. My client had given me a snowsuit she no longer fit into and a red ski jacket for Aminat. I bought a pair of sunglasses and two pairs of pants and we were all set. We took the train, transferring in Basel and getting out in Chur. There I caught sight of the mountains, very high, gray with snow-covered peaks. From Chur we got in a bus that wound its way up mountain roads. We sat directly behind the driver. It was the spot where you had the best chance of survival in case the bus fell off the edge of the cliff.

  Aminat had turned all green beneath her pimples. She didn’t do well on bus and car rides. She had inherited too much from her mother. We drove past forests, snowdrifts, and little villages. When the bus arrived at the next to last stop and we got out, Aminat threw up in the snow. Thankfully she was all finished before my client showed up to take us back to their vacation condo.

  I had forgotten what it was like to be around so much snow. It glittered and smelled like watermelon, just like in my childhood.

  The condo had two bedrooms. One had a double bed for my client and her husband, who was a senior government prosecutor, and the other had bunk beds. My client’s children, Julius and Justus, slept next to each other on the top bunk. Aminat and I shared the lower bunk.

  My employer was glad I was there. She didn’t have her kids under control. In the morning, Julius and Justus went to skiing class. The senior government prosecutor plunked helmets on their heads, put their feet into ski boots, and pulled them on their skis to a little igloo, where other little brats were standing around on tiny skis.

  It was my duty to pick up Julius three hours later, cook him lunch, and put him down for a nap. We picked up his older brother later. After naptime I put Julius on a sled and pulled him around. We went to the bottom of the ski lift and watched people swooshing down the hill. I couldn’t get enough of it. They all looked so graceful. In this setting, Aminat’s scowl suddenly bothered me. Her facial expression was ruining my stay, and probably that of my client as well. I told Aminat she had to wipe that look off her face.

  The first night I made goulash and spaetzle. My employer and her prosecutor sat at the table with red cheeks, and the children were too tired to whine. Well-fed contentedness reigned.

  “You’re a jewel,” said my client.

  “I know,” I said.

  Now there was only one more thing I needed: to ski.

  I was the first one up in the morning and made coffee and toast, and set the table. The children were difficult to wake. They slept soundly and were still tired, but they had to get to their skiing class. I executed all my duties flawlessly. By the time the parents emerged from their room, their kids, Aminat, and I were seated at the table.

  “Do you know how to ski?” my client asked me.

  “I’ll be a quick study,” I said in my unimpeachable German. “And so will Aminat here.”

  I didn’t ask her for anything. She booked spots for us at the ski school on her own. We rented skis and went to meet our private instructor at the lift. In my jacket pocket I had the prosecutor’s mobile phone. If the kids got into any trouble, I would get the call, not their parents.

  I had already realized the men around here were good-looking and very healthy. These weren’t men who sat around the office. They did lots of exercise out in the fresh air. Wiry, not too tall, with black hair and blue eyes. Our instructor was named Corsin. He led us to a kiddie slope and showed us how to ski. I mastered it immediately.

  “You’re talented,” Corsin said to me. I found him charming. He took a very informal tone with me, which normally bothered me. He probably didn’t realize how much older I was than him.

  Aminat embarrassed me. All the other girls her age could ski very well. And they looked good. Aminat, on the other hand, was a clumsy beginner whose basic motor skills stood out for their awkwardness. She didn’t have good coordination like me.

  My employer was prepared to pay for three mornings of private lessons. I wanted to be able to ski like everyone else at the end of those three days.

  On our last morning together, Corsin took us up the mountain on the lift. I shared a T-bar with Corsin; Aminat had one to herself. We could see her from behind. Several times she looked as if she was going to fall off the lift. I wished it would just happen. She clung with every ounce of strength to the lift, flailed with her legs, and got her skis tangled with each other. It was a wonder that she didn’t fall. The way down was just as disastrous for her. I skied on ahead, elegant and agile.

  After the final session Corsin gave me a piece of paper with his number on it. It looked like something a little kid had made in art class to look like a business card.

  “Give me a call if you come back next year,” he said.

  I didn’t let myself feel sad. In fact, I was happy—in the mountains, on skis, living very close to the way I felt befitted me.

  The mountain didn’t want me

  The next morning Aminat refused to continue practicing. I was sorely tempted to smack her in the face, but my client and her prosecutor were still in the apartment and I didn’t want to make a bad impression. I left Aminat in the apartment with a book.

  I got dressed, took my skis, and went by myself to the lift. I was just as elegant and confident as the arrogant bitches that came here every year and wore their mirrored sunglasses pushed up on top of their heads.

  Once at the top, I started down, gliding along behind the skier in front of me and matching his speed. Below me everything was white. Everything all around me was white, too. Then suddenly I realized that it was white above me, as well. I slowed and then fell down. I was taken by surprise by the snow. The flakes swirled around me and I could no longer distinguish the sky from the ground. The wind blew tiny pieces of ice into my face, making my eyes water.

  I couldn’t see a thing. The tears froze on my eyelashes, blinding me. The mountain didn’t want me. I’d been too brazen for its taste, and now the mountain wanted to kill me.

  I had stopped myself just in the nick of time at the edge of not just a drop but an abyss. My legs were shaking. I asked God whether my time had come and God answered with a flash of inspiration: Corsin!

  That’s right, Corsin, who could ski even better than I could, who said he knew every slope around here like the back of his hand. I stripped off my glove and pulled the prosecutor’s mobile phone out of my pocket along with the piece of paper with Corsin’s number on it. For a second, my fingers were too stiff to move. Then I pulled the antenna out. It was the first time I’d ever used a mobile phone. I breathed on my fingertips and then started to push the buttons with the number. Calling a Swiss number was probably going to cost a fortune, I thought.

  There was a tooting sound in the earpiece and then someone answered. It wasn’t clear whether the voice belonged to a woman or a child. I had forgotten for an instant that even though Corsin skied like a god, he spoke like a five-year-old.

  “Help me!” I yelled.

  I shouted the name of the slope I’d started down, but Corsin—if it was even him on the line—didn’t understand. He just kept asking: “What? Who’s there?”

  The wind howled in the phone. It was probably difficult to understand me, but then again understanding wasn’t Corsin’s strength anyway. In any event, I was lost.

  I shouted, “Drop dead!”

  The mountain was saying the exact
same thing to me.

  I hung up on Corsin and tried to reach my employer. It was futile.

  I shoved the phone back in my pocket, put my glove back on, and grabbed my ski poles. I looked down at the slick, ice-covered wall below. This must have been what they called a black diamond trail. I tried to calculate how many shifts in direction I’d have to make to get down the hill—or rather, how many I could survive.

  Just as I was crossing myself with my cramped fist, a fleck of red appeared in the swirling snow. A person, maybe a man. I was just getting ready to start skiing, and had with superhuman effort positioned my skis parallel to the cliff edge. Now I shouted and waved my poles to draw attention to my precarious position. The person in red stopped just below me, hanging on the wall of ice like a fly on a window. I saw a flash of teeth through the snow soup, and Corsin’s soft little-girl voice said, “Hold on to me, I’ll get you down.”

  I was nearly paralyzed with happiness and relief. Corsin took the ski poles from my hands and tucked the ends into his waistband. He stood with his legs wide apart and reached out his hand to me. I slid toward the wedge Corsin had formed, my legs weak and shaking. The wind whooshed in my ears as I followed Corsin’s broad shoulders, braking just enough to avoid planting my face on his red jacket. It felt as if it took an hour, maybe even two, and by the time we reached the parking lot at the base of the ski run, blood was dripping from my lips because I had bitten them so badly. Corsin smiled—he hadn’t so much as broken a sweat.

  “You’re a brave woman,” he said. “Going up the mountain alone even though you can’t ski.”

  “How did you know it was me?” I asked.

  He put his hand on the left chest pocket of his jacket and said, “I had a feeling.”

  I came out of the mountains like a conquering hero, slightly bronzed and with the bearing of a ski queen. The only problem was that I couldn’t say the same of Aminat.