The City Baker's Guide to Country Living

by Louise Miller

  I looked out over the rows of tents. Vermont. Full time. “Don’t get me wrong, you know I like visiting you and all, but . . . I’m not sure exactly what I would do here.”

  “You’d do exactly what you do in Boston—bake. Only when you get off work it will be pretty, peaceful Vermont instead of loud, ugly Boston.”

  I narrowed my eyes at her. Sure, I complained about living in the city all the time, but it felt like she was making fun of my little brother.

  “What I mean is, what do you really have in Boston? No house, no family, no boyfriend—not really, I mean . . .”

  “Jeez, Hann, don’t hold anything back.” I lifted my hands in surrender. At the mention of Jamie, my mind had flashed to the night before, the way he’d looked through me before I started the fire, like I was just another one of the help. “Besides—where would I live? God knows I can’t live under the same roof as your husband.”

  Hannah snorted. “I’m pretty sure the position comes with housing—the last baker lived at the inn.” She glanced at me hopefully. “I’d be right down the road. We could hang out all the time. It would be like college all over again.” Hannah was referring to the one semester I had gone to state school, before dropping out to go on tour with the Dead Darlings.

  I thought about my rejected debit card at the F&G. If the Emerson did indeed decide to have me “take a break,” I would be out of a job and, with all the back rent I already owed my landlord, a place to live. Salty wouldn’t be too happy about living in the station wagon. “I might consider it.”

  “I’ll call her when we get back. Just go look at the place.” She beamed at me, looking satisfied, as though she had done her good deed for the day. Off the hook. “You’re gonna love it.”

  • • •

  Following Hannah’s directions, I arrived at the Sugar Maple Inn shortly before ten a.m. on Monday. It was a beautiful drive from Hannah’s house in town, up a long winding dirt road. The landscape changed from tidy painted ladies to sprawling farmhouses to abandoned trailers covered so thickly with bittersweet vine that only the rusted cars in the front yard would tell you someone once lived there. Then, as the houses dropped away altogether, leaving only the dirt road canopied with oaks and maples, I thought I must be lost. Who would want to stay at an inn so far from town? But as I reached the crest of the mountain road, the trees opened up and, as if I were passing from night into day, the world became all green grass against the bluest sky. To my left was the Sugar Maple itself, a bright yellow farmhouse with attached barn, surrounded by huge clumps of zinnias in pinks and reds, faces turned toward the sun. Morning glories, now dozing for the day, climbed up the side of the barn. Rocking chairs were lined up on the porch. The front yard was scattered with garden benches and sleeping cats. To my right was a wooden rail fence, and beyond it a ridge of mountains with the steeple-dotted valley below.

  I walked up the flagstone path and hesitated at the front door, nervously picking Salty’s dog hair off my chef’s coat. Hannah had offered to lend me something, but since I am a size twelve to her six, I had politely declined. I reached for the brass maple leaf on the green door and gave a knock. Margaret swung the door open, eyed me, and then looked at her watch.

  “You’re five minutes late,” she said, blocking my view.

  “Are you sure?” I had checked my cell phone before I left the car.

  Margaret made a little huffing sound. “Well, you might as well come in.” She stepped aside slightly as I entered the foyer. I followed her slender frame, trim in a navy jacket, down the hallway. I tried to glance at the pictures that lined the walls, but she moved too quickly. Despite her pace, her silver bun stayed perfectly in place. We entered a sitting room, couches and chairs in mismatched florals arranged casually for easy conversation. Margaret led me to a small table by a window and gestured for me to sit down.

  “So, Mrs. Doyle tells me you’re a baker.” Her papery hands sat neatly folded in her lap.

  “Yes. My name is Olivia Rawlings. I’m the pastry chef at the Emerson Club. . . .”

  “Yes, I can read that on your coat.”

  I looked down at my left breast. Stupid coat.

  Margaret cleared her throat. “Now, how long have you been baking?”

  “For twelve years. Since I graduated from the CIA.”

  “You learned to bake from the government?” She scowled.

  “No, no, it’s a culinary school in New York.”

  Margaret looked out the window. “Yes, well then. Tell me, what’s your specialty?”

  “My specialty?”

  “What do you make best?” She said this louder and more slowly, as if she thought I was hard of hearing or from a foreign country.

  I thought for a moment. “Well, Chocolate Gourmand magazine requested my recipe for a blood orange and sour cherry napoleon last year. And I was nominated for a James Beard Award for—”

  “We’re a simple place, Miss Rawlings. Nothing too fancy here.” She leaned forward, hands on the table. “Can you bake a good pie?”

  “Pie?” I lifted my eyebrows.

  “Yes, you know, a flaky crust with filling inside.”

  I suppressed the urge to roll my eyes. “Well, of course I can bake a pie. An excellent one.” I leaned back in my chair.

  “How’s your apple?” She leaned back as well. The hands went back into her lap.

  “I’ve received many compliments on my apple pie.” I felt like we were playing high-stakes poker.

  “Would you be willing to bake one now?” she asked calmly.

  “Right now?” I did not succeed in hiding my irritation.

  “Yes. Why not? Don’t need a recipe, do you?”

  “You want me to bake an apple pie right now.” Being asked to test-bake in a kitchen was a normal part of the hiring process for a chef’s position, but not on the day of the interview.

  “Well, not this very second.” Margaret stood. “I have to make a few calls first. I’ll have one of the girls bring you a cup of coffee.” She walked away at her fast clip, calling out, “Sarah . . .”

  “Don’t you want to see my résumé?” I called after her, waving the sheet of paper. She had already turned the corner and was gone.

  A young woman with straight blond hair appeared with a tray. She placed in front of me a dainty teacup and saucer, filled to the brim with steaming black coffee.

  “Thanks.” I glanced up at her. “Hey, is she always like this?”

  Sarah looked over her shoulder. “Pretty much. But she’s decent to work for.” She shrugged. “I’ve been here for over two years. The tips are good. And the rest of the staff is more laid back.” She gave me a quick smile and walked back toward the kitchen.

  This was surely the strangest interview I had ever been on. I was used to being courted, not trying to convince someone I could do the simplest of tasks. It looked like Hannah was wrong about Margaret’s interest. A wave of relief washed over me. It would be easier not to get the job than it would have been to explain to Hannah why I couldn’t move this far away from . . . everything, without hurting her feelings.

  I waited for what felt like hours, making a mental list of chefs who might hire me, before abandoning my teacup and wandering around the inn in search of Mrs. Hurley. I found Sarah toward the back of the house, folding napkins in the dining room. The room was small, dressed in cream tablecloths and tarnished silver candlesticks, elegant in a Miss Havisham kind of way.

  “I think I may have been abandoned,” I said lightly.

  “Sorry. There was a problem with one of the guest rooms. She should be back soon.”

  “Mind if I look around the kitchen?”

  “Not at all. It’s through that door.”

  I pushed through a swinging door at the far side of the dining room. It opened onto a room that broke all the rules of kitchendom. It looked just like a farmhouse ki
tchen, with a yellow tin ceiling and wide maple plank floors, but it appeared to have been stretched and pulled like taffy to accommodate the eight-burner stove top and the walk-in refrigerator.

  I set my bag down on an enamel-topped wooden table. It was a regular kitchen table, sitting on stacks of Nancy Drew mysteries to make it a respectable height for chopping. I wondered how this place ever passed inspection. The table sat in the middle of the room, close to the cast-iron range. I crept about, grabbing tools that I would need for pie baking as I went. Even they seemed odd, like something you would find at a church sale, not in a restaurant supply catalog. The rolling pin was the heavy kind with ball bearings—the type I pictured cartoon housewives using on the heads of their husbands. The measuring cups were glass with painted pictures of roosters on them. I found a beautiful old pair of copper scissors and a set of tin measuring spoons so worn the fractions were unreadable. The pantry still served as a pantry, although the shelves were dwarfed by industrial-sized cans of baking powder and cling peaches. In there I found an old stand mixer, complete with its original bowl of iridescent glass, which I hauled out and placed on the table. The one thing I couldn’t find was flour. I kept searching, opening drawers and bins.

  Next to the pantry there was a small door. I pushed it open, hoping it was another storage area, and was greeted by darkness. I waved my hand in the air, searching for a cord. My fingers touched something silky and soft as I walked deeper into the stuffy room. A tickle of fabric brushed against my skin like feathers. When my hand found the light cord, I pulled on it and blinked. From the ceiling hung ribbons. Hundreds of them, all blue, their pointed tips swaying gently. They extended the entire length of the ceiling, each one emblazoned in gold with the same words: Coventry County Fair—First Place. In a large wooden display case hung larger ribbons, the heads fat with extra loops of fabric like the petals of a sunflower. These ribbons were all blue as well, with the exception of the last three. Those ribbons were red. From somewhere in the inn I heard Margaret’s voice, followed by another, this one more cheerful. I clicked off the light and slipped out of the room, easing the door closed behind me.

  • • •

  The kitchen door swung open, and a plump, snowy-haired woman bounded into the room.

  “Hello, dear. You must be Olivia!” She grabbed my hand and shook it firmly. “I’m Maggie’s friend Dorothy. You can call me Dotty.”

  Dotty was the opposite of Margaret in every way but age. She was rounded in the shoulders, with thin wavy hair that hung down her back in a loose braid. Everything about her seemed fluid.

  Margaret marched in behind her, carrying a crate of apples, and eyed the collection of tools on the enameled-topped table. “Making yourself at home?”

  “Just thought I would get familiar with the kitchen, you know, while I waited.”

  Margaret ignored me and started digging through the crate of apples.

  “So, what do we have here, Dotty?”

  “Let’s see. McIntosh, Cortland, Spartan, Northern Spy, Crispin, and Golden Delicious.”

  Margaret turned to me. “Will that do?”

  Suddenly all eyes were on me. “Sure, thank you.” I felt self-conscious and began to rifle through the crate, sniffing at the apples in what I hoped was a gesture of appreciation.

  “Well, let’s get going, then.” Margaret grasped the backs of two rocking chairs and dragged them across the kitchen.

  Showtime.

  I took what was obviously my place on the opposite side of the table from the two rocking chairs. “So, do you want me to talk about what I’m doing, like I’m teaching a class?”

  “We know how to bake an apple pie, Miss Rawlings,” Margaret said sharply as she gathered the ingredients I hadn’t been able to find. “We’re here to see if you do.”

  Margaret and Dotty settled into their chairs as I took stock. Along with the flour and a tin of salt, she had left an apron made of green gingham with tiny white lambs dancing across the fabric. This I tied around my waist, feeling a little embarrassed. God, if the boys in the Emerson Club kitchen could see me now, I would never hear the end of it. Flustered, I pulled the stand mixer toward me and removed the bowl. “Any requests?” I asked. “Crumb? Pour-through? Double crust?”

  Margaret rocked, her feet firmly planted on the floor. “Whatever is your best.”

  Remembering Margaret’s “nothing too fancy” comment from earlier, I decided double crust seemed safest. I dipped a measuring cup into the flour and swept across the top with my finger, enjoying the cool silkiness. Slipping my finger underneath its wax wrapper, I eased the butter free and began chopping it into small chunks.

  Margaret clucked. “Not shortening?”

  “I use a combination,” I said. The butter was tacky against the steel of the knife. I reached for the tin of Crisco.

  “My mother always used all shortening, but I couldn’t stand the taste,” said Dotty, nodding in agreement.

  “If you want to use all shortening, the trick is to baste the crust with butter afterward,” I offered, plopping the fat onto the flour and starting the mixture spinning. After I added the ice water, I took the lump of dough into my hands, folded it over onto itself, and mashed it into a flattened disc. After laying the dough to rest in the walk-in, I dug through the crate of apples, settling on a mix of McIntosh and Cortland, with a couple of Crispin for good measure.

  Margaret eyed the Macs. “Those’ll turn to mush.”

  “Only the Macs will, but they add flavor.” I dug into the skin of an apple with a small paring knife. Margaret stood up and put the kettle on to boil.

  “How’s Henry today?” I heard her ask. I was about to say, “Who’s Henry?” when Dotty responded.

  “About the same.” She rocked a little faster, her fingers gripping the armrests.

  The kettle whistled a sharp trill. I started at the sound. Margaret shook her head, muttered, “Jumpy girl” under her breath, and poured the boiling water into two delicate cups.

  “Martin helping out?”

  “Hmm. He’s looking after the pickers and leading the hayrides through the sugar bush on the weekends.” Dotty’s gray orthopedic shoes lifted off the ground. She looked like a schoolgirl on a swing.

  “He must be happy to be home, after all this time.”

  “You know how he is. I’m lucky if I hear him speak twice in one day. But I’m glad to have all of my boys in one place.”

  The women talked on in short clips, as if they had their own language. I gleaned bits of information about the town. The apple crop had been especially good; Jane White’s granddaughter had announced her engagement (this news was delivered with an eye roll); someone named Judith had run off with a dairy-goat farmer, leaving her husband with two children and bales full of unspun wool.

  I reached for the large knife and chopped the apples into thick slices. I looked beyond the women and out the kitchen windows as I worked. An expanse of lawn stretched out and uphill, where a line of crab apples stood, heavy with fruit. I caught myself thinking about what it would look like as the sun rose, the grass glinting with dew and frost. I tossed the pile of apple slices into a cast-iron pan with a couple of pats of butter and turned on the flame. The cinnamon scent of the McIntoshes mingled with the tang of the melting butter, reminding me of my old neighbor Mary’s kitchen, where I wove my first lattice crust.

  “What on earth are you doing that for?” Margaret asked, her sharp voice cutting through my daydream.

  “It’ll take some of the water out of the apples—keeps them from shrinking in the pie, and the filling will be thicker.” I couldn’t believe how defensive I sounded. But if she was such an expert, why was I here?

  Margaret turned back to Dotty. They resumed rocking, taking sips of tea as they gossiped.

  I pulled the dough from the walk-in and began to hammer it with my rolling pin. After sweetening the apples in
the pan, I piled the heaping mass in the pastry-lined pie plate, slipped the top crust over them, and tucked in the edges like a child’s blanket at nap time. After crimping the edges with machinelike marks, I sliced little vents in the top and placed the pie in the oven.

  “Well, there you have it.” I wiped my hands briskly on the apron. “Any questions?” I looked over at the two women. Dotty was dozing, her mouth slightly open. Margaret stood up and inclined her head toward the door.

  “She needs her rest,” Margaret explained as we returned to the dining room. “Might as well show you around the place while the pie’s baking.”

  • • •

  Margaret led me swiftly through the inn. The downstairs housed the dining room, entry hall, and kitchen, along with Margaret’s living quarters, which she declined to show me with a dismissive wave. Upstairs were the guest rooms, twelve in all, with shared baths at the ends of the halls. I followed Margaret back through the kitchen. She skipped the room with the ribbons, opening a door opposite it.

  “Here are the baker’s quarters. They come with the job.” I breathed a sigh of relief that the job came with housing, until I peeked into the tiny bedroom. It had just enough room for a twin bed, a small painted dresser, and a nightstand. “You can share my bathroom down the hall.” I tried to imagine my blue sparkly nail polish next to her tub of Noxzema.

  “That’s nice of you, but I have a large-ish dog, and I don’t think he could turn around in this room.”

  Margaret frowned. “No, a dog wouldn’t do. Especially not so near the kitchen.” She tapped her fingertips against her thigh, apparently debating something. “There is one other option. Put on your coat.”

  We walked up the hill through the crab apples, bees humming among the fallen fruit. Beyond the orchard we turned left, out of sight of the farmhouse. There in front of us stood a tiny house, square and trim, with a dainty front porch, complete with a bench and a wooden rocker. The walls were lined with windows, so you could see straight through the cabin, up into the maple trees beyond. There was a brick chimney and on the roof a cupola, its windows framed with metal shutters.