New Orleans’ Best Beignets
Vic Kerry
Maurice Devereaux needed a job, and L’Enfant Bakery on Jackson Street was hiring. According to some of his sources, Denis L’Enfant would hire anyone as long as they were clean: both bathed and drug-free. Maurice could claim both, although he’d only been drug-free for a year.
The bakery looked nice. It sat between two microbreweries that popped up after Katrina. Before that, Maurice seemed to remember that an Irish pub took up one of the spaces. The other had been a cheap souvenir joint that sold Mardi Gras beads year ‘round. L’Enfant Bakery had always been there. Before the storm, it was run down; the lettering on the windows had chipped off, and few people ate there. They called it “L’Infection Bakery.” Even Maurice refused to eat there at his worst, which he thought was saying something, because he’d eaten out of the dumpsters at the Superdome and drank Hurricanes tourists abandoned on the street, even those with cigarette butts in them.
Now he, a cleaned-up man, stood outside the cleaned-up bakery. The words on the windows stared in festive New Orleans colors. The wrought iron posts out front were glossy black. All the neon in the signs glowed fresh. Voted New Orleans’ Best Beignets was scrolled in gold letters across both windows.
Maurice caught his reflection. He looked darker than before he’d been shipped off to Angola. Some smart-alacky coon-ass might even tell him he looked like one of the freshly painted columns. In the old days, he’d have fought over that. But just like his city, he’d changed through time and hardship. He hoped he was better as he stepped into the cool, sugar-scented air of the bakery. Bells jingled as he walked in. The dining area was bereft of customers, but a stout man dressed in white stood behind the counter.
“Can I help you?” the man asked.
“I came because I heard that ya’ll might be hiring,” Maurice said, twisting his hands in front of his chest.
“I think I heard Mr. L’Enfant say something about that. He’s in the back, at the soup kitchen. I’ll step back there and get him.”
“Ya’ll serve soup here, too?”
“Naw, after the storm, when he got his huge insurance check, Mr. L’Enfant said he wanted to give something back. So he bought the store that opened up from our back onto the next street and turned it into a soup kitchen for the homeless.” The man wiped his hands on his apron. “I’ll go get him. Sit tight.”
Maurice nodded and sat at a table near the door. Maybe his sources had been right. If Mr. L’Enfant ran a soup kitchen, he’d probably hire a convicted felon, too. As far as Maurice knew, the man he’d just talked to might have gotten out of Angola yesterday, just like him.
A red checked tablecloth covered the table where he sat. Powder sugar formed small hills all over the plastic cloth. Maurice remembered places—darker places—with small piles of white powder on tables. Most of the time he’d either sold the stuff on display or been stocking his supply-line. He never cared much for blow, and, as Whitney Houston had put it, “crack is whack.” Maurice only smoked weed, but had been clean since arriving at Angola. He’d been sent up on dealing, plea-bargained down from trafficking. As much as the sirens of his old life called to him, a second chance lay before him, and he wanted to give life his best shot, even if it meant frying beignets for the tourists and staying free of the reefer.
“Sure hope I ain’t been keeping you too long.”
Maurice looked up from the sugar on the table and snapped back from his daydream. A plump man wearing a white apron over blue striped seersucker pants and a light blue shirt walked toward him from the counter. A broad white smile cut through his deep dark skin.
“Mr. L’Enfant?” Maurice asked, standing and extending his hand.
“The one and only. At least in this store.”
The handshake was one good pump with a tight grip. L’Enfant’s hands were hard as rocks. Maurice never imaged a pastry chef having such hard hands. The smile continued to beam at him and sincerity bloomed from it. Maurice had seen millions of insincere smiles in his time, and it was clear that L’Enfant sold his over the top grin as well as he did his beignets.
L’Enfant motioned for them to sit at the table. He brushed the sugar from the tablecloth with a quick sweep of his hand. “Beau tells me you’re looking for a job.”
“Yessir.”
“As you can see, I need some help around here. I can’t even keep the tables clean.”
“I thought maybe you were having a dry spell seeing as how no one’s here,” Maurice said.
L’Enfant’s laughter echoed around the empty bakery like thunder rolling over the bayou. “Everybody knows that I don’t serve beignets at this time of the day. I devote this hour to my soup kitchen out back.” He eyed Maurice. “Just get out of the joint?”
Maurice looked down at the pattern on the table cloth. The large red checks were in reality a series of smaller pink and red checks. “Yessir.”
“Ain’t no reason to be embarrassed around me, son. Everybody gets in a little trouble now and then. I hire all sorts— actually I like hiring ex-cons. Gives ‘em the chance to start over.”
“I heard you hire a lot of us.” Maurice looked into L’Enfant’s sparkling, dark brown eyes. “I heard you’re a good man.”
“Son, ain’t got nothing to do with being good; got everything to do with being blessed. Katrina gave me a chance to start over and better myself. I took it. Now I offer the same to others, but without the trauma of that storm.”
The man from earlier poked his head back into the bakery. “Mr. L’Enfant, I need you back here.”
L’Enfant stood and held his hand back out to Maurice. “Congratulations, Mr....?”
“Devereaux. Maurice Devereaux.”
“Mr. Devereaux, you’ve got a job cooking beignets for me on the graveyard shift. Show up tonight ‘round midnight. I’ll wait around and help get you started.”
They shook, and L’Enfant hurried back to the soup kitchen. Maurice wanted to cheer. He’d not had a straight job since he worked at McDonald’s as a teenager. The money wouldn’t be anything like he made dealing, but the benefit of staying out of Angola was enough. He looked at his watch; he’d need some sleep before tonight. Maurice rushed out of the bakery, the bell on the door clattering loudly.
***
Maurice walked into L’Enfant’s Bakery through the front door. He couldn’t hear the jangle of the door over the crowd of customers. Glasses and coffee mugs clinked as they hit the tables. The whole dining room buzzed with chatter. A baby squealed. He looked around at all the tourists enjoying a late night pastry. Plates of powdered sugar-laden beignets covered nearly every table. A line that stopped just short of the door ran to the check-out register.
The door to the kitchen burst opened, and L’Enfant hustled out a tray of what looked like ordinary donuts. Maurice didn’t figure they sold much more than beignets. L’Enfant looked up as he placed the tray in the glass display counter.
“Maurice,” he said. “Come on back.”
Maurice broke between two people in line and walked behind the counter. L’Enfant shook his hand again with his signature firm, single pump, his thick palm sticky with donut glaze. They walked back to the kitchen. The smell of the baking pastries hit Maurice in the face like a soft punch. He didn’t mind it because it meant honest work, although it was a bit overwhelming for his personal taste.
“The first thing is this,” L’Enfant grabbed an apron from a hook and slung it at Maurice, “I don’t care too much about what you wear to work as long as you wear an apron and hair net.” He looked at Maurice’s head. “I guess you don’t need one.”
“I keep it slick. It’s cooler this way.” Maurice rubbed his shaved head before pulling the apron’s top loop over it. He crossed the side strings behind him then bow tied the front. “So what am I doing?”
L’Enfant led him to a large industrial mixer, then turned it on. It whirled with a loud mechanical noise. “You make sure the batter is nice and mixed.” The m
ixer stopped, and L’Enfant dipped a long spoon into the bowl. “If this comes up without any dry mix on it, you’re set. Easy enough.”
Maurice nodded. “I think I can handle that. I worked in the kitchen some at Angola. We never had anything nice as this, though.”
“All mixers pretty much work the same. What were you in Angola for?”
“Stupidity.”
L’Enfant roared a laugh and slapped Maurice on the back with the same force as he shook hands. “Everybody ends up in there for that or being wrongfully accused. What kind of stupidity?”
Maurice didn’t know if it was legal for L’Enfant to ask him that, but the baker had hired him with no other questions. “Dealing. Big-time dealing.”
“All right. I’ve had a couple of big-time dealers. I want to introduce you to your supervisor.” L’Enfant pointed at a small, wiry man sitting at a desk. “That’s Bruce.”
Bruce looked up with a blank expression and then back down at the Times-Picayune.
“Hey.”
“Bruce isn’t much for conversation. If you have any problems, bring them to him.” L’Enfant led Maurice away and whispered, “He’s not here as a dealer. He got out early for good behavior after murder one was brought down to manslaughter.”
“How ‘bout breaks or lunch?” Maurice asked.
“Bruce will tell you when to go. By the way, here it’s all you can eat, so take advantage of it. We make the best beignets in New Orleans, maybe the world.”
Maurice nodded and went back to this mixer. He switched it on and let it whirl. A few minutes later, he put the spoon into the batter to check the mixture, then passed the bowl down the line. Another bowl of ingredients awaited him. Before he realized it, he’d fallen into a pattern, and time passed quickly.
“Break time,” Bruce called out. His voice was heavy like lead and thick with the bayou. “Make sure to eat some of the beignets.”
Maurice looked over his shoulder. “I’m okay. I don’t like them that well.”
“Understand, on my shift you have to eat beignets.” Bruce grabbed his arm with vice-like force.
Spikes of pain shot up his arm. He turned enough to see the small man’s face; a smirk stretched his lips. Bruce meant business, and Maurice got the hint.
“I think I’m craving a beignet,” Maurice said.
The pressure on his arm went away. “We understand each other, then,” Bruce said. “I make sure Mr. L’Enfant has a certain amount of beignets eaten each night. It’s how I stay the manager. Get it?”
Maurice rubbed his arm. “Yeah, got it.”
Bruce handed Maurice a plate full of pastries. “Take it to the back in the soup kitchen’s dining room. That’s where we take all our breaks.”
Maurice took the plate and walked through the door marked Soup Kitchen. He arrived in a large empty room full of long tables. The air felt stale and smelled of the homeless. He knew the smell well. A short time before getting shipped to Angola he’d spent some time living on the streets himself. L’Enfant was a good man to spend so much time and effort helping the down and out. Maybe Maurice would volunteer some of his free time to work the kitchen.
He sat at the first table and bit into one of the beignets. Why didn’t he just throw them away instead of eating them? But that question quickly vanished from his mind when he realized how amazing they tasted. He shoved another in. If all the beignets he’d eaten tasted like these he would’ve eaten them twenty-four/seven. He shoved another in before swallowing. Then another. And another. Soon he needed something to drink. A scan of the room came up empty. But he noticed the place didn’t look right. The area where the sink and counter should have been was blocked by a metal gate that looked like a garage door. Everything seemed clean, despite the smell. It looked more like a coffee house or an upscale café than any soup kitchen he’d seen while living on the streets. Maybe that was L’Enfant’s idea. The homeless didn’t enjoy their plight, and a standard soup kitchen did nothing but remind them of who they were.
The door to the kitchen burst opened, and Bruce hustled in. The noise of the door hitting the wall brought Maurice’s focus back. He looked at Bruce. The ex-murderer looked put out, flexing his hand in and out of a fist.
“What are you doing?” Bruce asked.
“I’m on break. You forced me in here and made me eat these beignets.”
“That was forty-five minutes ago. Get back in here, we’re swamped.”
Maurice wiped his mouth on his apron and hurried back into the kitchen. True to Bruce’s words, everyone seemed to move faster and work harder. A red faced kid huffed as he moved a bowl from the mixer Maurice worked on. The boy’s shirt under his apron was too tight, and a bit of his white belly hung from it.
“Let me help you with that,” Maurice said, taking the bowl. “You look like you’re about to pass out.”
“I think I might be,” the boy said. “I don’t know when I got so out of shape. When I got out of juvie at the beginning of the summer, I could run two miles and barely be puffin’. Now I can’t walk from one end of the kitchen to the other without a break.”
It was hard to believe the pudgy kid could do anything without getting winded, but Maurice noticed that the boy’s arms had ropy muscles in them like one accustomed to the gym. The weight around the boy’s gut seemed out of place. No waddle hung from his chin like others with pronounced bellies.
“Simons,” Bruce barked. “Break time. Get your plate of beignets and get to it.”
The boy rubbed his hands on his apron and patted Maurice on the shoulder. Then Simons grabbed a plate piled with beignets and disappeared into the soup kitchen’s dining room. Maurice kept staring at the door.
“Get that bowl over here,” Bruce yelled.
Maurice shook off his thoughts and scurried across the kitchen with the bowl of batter. He passed it off to the next cook and headed back to his mixer. Bruce followed and stood behind him as Maurice started the paddles whirling in the bowl. The older man’s breath reeked of coffee and cigarettes.
“Do you have to stand behind me like that?” Maurice asked not looking back.
“I’m your supervisor. I’m supervising.”
“Am I doing an okay job?”
Bruce grabbed him by the upper arm. “Mr. L’Enfant doesn’t like his workers getting buddy-buddy. Remember that. He hires a bunch of cons like us and doesn’t need us planning out on how to knock the joint over or sell dope out of his soup kitchen.”
“I promise those days are done for me, and I was just talking to Simons, trying to be friendly and such.”
“Ain’t no need to be ‘friendly and such’ with folks like Simons. Even by our standards he’s trouble. Went up for rape, you see?”
Maurice knew that a hard con like Bruce didn’t have time for rapists. He didn’t either, but the kid looked so innocent. It was probably statutory. Pity for a young guy to get that on his record.
“How long has he been here?”
“A few weeks,” Bruce said, “but don’t get too into that. You got work to do so get to it.”
The supervisor let go of his arm and walked back to his desk and Times-Picayune. Maurice stopped the spinning paddles and tested the batter with his spoon. No dry flour. He moved the bowl down the line. As he walked past the soup kitchen’s door, he peered in at the teen gorging on beignets. If Simons had only been with the bakery a few weeks, he must have really put the pastries away. Maurice decided that he’d start throwing his out to keep from ending up with a saggy gut.
***
Maurice walked into the kitchen. Bruce sat at his desk reading his Times-Picayune as usual. L’Enfant stood by the mixing bowl area, a broad smile on his face.
“Maurice,” L’Enfant said. “Guess what?”
“I don’t know.”
“You’re getting a promotion and small raise.”
“Really, to what?”
“It seems that Mr. Simons won’t be coming back to us. Apparently, he’s blown town.”
Maurice’s stomach sank. Simons had been his only friend in the kitchen. They talked a lot. Simons just got a new girlfriend who was of age. He was happy. Maurice couldn’t image why he would blow town.
“Did he run off with his new girlfriend?” Maurice asked.
“Probably ran from the law,” Bruce said, now standing beside Maurice. “Kid was stupid, started back into his old ways soon as he got out.”
Maurice didn’t like the coldness in his supervisor’s voice. It seemed far too malicious. He also didn’t understand how Simons could have gone back to his “old ways” since it had been statutory rape with his girlfriend. True, plenty who tried going straight ended back up in their crimes. But Simons was a different breed.
“So get to work,” L’Enfant said. He poked Maurice’s belly, a belly that had started to grow pudgy. “Been hitting the beignets?”
Maurice felt his face flush a little. His stomach had grown flabby from all the desserts he’d been eating. Although he’d tried to resist them, the beignets were irresistible. He dreamed about them and woke up wet and sticky like a teenager coming out of a wet dream.
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