The City Baker's Guide to Country Living

by Louise Miller

  I sneaked a look at Martin from the corner of my eye. He sat on the edge of the folding chair, leaning forward. The fiddle was pressed into a spot under his collarbone, as if he were pressing it into his heart. His eyes were closed. He moved the bow effortlessly across the strings, as if it were an extension of his hand. His knee bounced up as if his boots were spring-loaded. The folding chair threatened to collapse beneath him. If I had been deaf, I could have heard this tune by his gestures alone.

  It was as if I were watching another person entirely. He played with the grace and strength of a long-distance runner. I had never seen his face look so unguarded. When his lips curled up as he leaned into a double stop, I found myself wishing he would smile like that for me.

  At the end of the third round Tom stuck out his foot and everyone ended on the same note. Without realizing it, while watching Martin I had turned in my seat to face him directly. When he opened his eyes, I swiveled back to face the center of the room, dabbing with the back of my hand at the sweat that had beaded along my hairline.

  “So, Livvy. Think you can keep up?” Tom asked with a grin.

  I braced my banjo squarely between my knees and strummed an open chord, my thumb plucking the fifth string with a bright twang. “Let’s give it a whirl.” And with my foot tapping in time to Tom’s whispered countdown, I frailed my first chords with the Hungry Mountaineers.

  • • •

  When I stepped out of the barn, the droplets of sweat instantly froze on my skin. Reluctantly I zipped up my fleece and made my way to the station wagon in the dark. Light pooled from the car when I opened the door.

  “Come on now, Salt.” I scanned the darkness, straining my ears to hear the jingle of his tags.

  “He’s right here.” Martin appeared on the other side of the pickup next to mine.

  “He likes you,” I said. I patted my thigh and whistled a short loop. “Come here.”

  Salty walked around the truck and leaped onto my backseat. I closed the door and opened the driver’s side.

  “Have you played with them long?” I asked, leaning my arms on the roof of the car.

  “I used to—back in high school. Now I’m just sitting in.”

  “They’re all older than you, aren’t they?” I guessed that Martin was only in his late thirties at best. “Was that strange?”

  “I think Tom’s around fifty, so yeah. Not a lot of options in a town like this.”

  I tried to imagine being a teenager without record stores or coffee shops or the sweaty crush of strangers in the mosh pit, and failed.

  “So why Salty?” Martin asked, leaning against his truck, still clutching his hard, black fiddle case.

  “It’s short for Old Salt. Doesn’t he look like the Gorton’s Fisherman?”

  Martin raised his eyebrows.

  “You know.” I took a deep breath, then sang, “Trust the Gorton’s Fisherman.”

  “The fish sticks commercial?”

  “Exactly!”

  Martin peered into the backseat of the station wagon. “I guess a little around the eyes.”

  I laughed. “It probably helps that I found him in Gloucester. Right by the Fisherman’s Memorial statue, in fact.” I gazed through the fogging windows at Salty’s long frame. “I never really wanted a dog. I sat by the statue for hours waiting for someone to come looking for him, but no one ever did.”

  “You don’t like dogs?”

  “No, I love dogs. It’s just . . . too much responsibility. Anyway, he looked so pathetic, all alone.”

  Martin took a sudden interest in something on the ground. “You play beautifully.”

  “You’re not bad either,” I said. In fact, he was the most remarkable fiddle player I had ever seen.

  Martin barked out a laugh. “Thanks a lot.”

  “Thanks for getting Tom to invite me,” I said shyly.

  “It seemed like a good fit.” He slid into the driver’s seat. “I’ll see you tomorrow for practice.”

  “See you.” Waving, I ducked into my own car.

  Martin started the truck’s engine, stretching his arm around the bench of the cab as he backed up. I watched his taillights snake up the hill and turn onto the main road, disappearing into the dark night.

  • • •

  I stopped at the inn to make a phone call before feeling my way back to the sugarhouse. Raphael was my old specialty-foods rep, and he owed me a favor because I’d introduced him to his now-husband, Charles. Margaret hadn’t said another word about the bake sale, but I knew that it wasn’t just a casual charity event. And I had to admit that there was a grain of truth in what Hannah had said: I needed to make a good impression. Every private club from Boston to DC had almond macaroons on its dessert menu, but mine were legendary. Crisp on the outside, fragrant with the scent of bitter almond, the center tender with just enough chewiness. They were sweet without being cloying, rich without being heavy. My first magazine write-up had been about my macaroons. They had established me as a notable chef and given me job security at the Emerson; in situations like this one, they were my secret weapon.

  When I told him I had a special event a week away, Raphael agreed to overnight me a can of my favorite almond paste and a pound of Belgian cocoa powder, extra dark. I was not going to take any chances with ingredients. I could make macaroons blindfolded, but the key to perfection lay in the oven being precisely 325 degrees, and I just hadn’t developed that kind of trust with the oven at the Sugar Maple. When my package arrived, I stayed late in the kitchen. I measured the almond paste, sugar, and cocoa powder into the bowl of the stand mixer and set it in motion. The mixture began to make a swish-swish sound like maracas being shaken. The inside of the bowl sparkled like a black-sand beach as the tide went out, the almond paste perfectly cut by the sugar and cocoa. After adding egg whites that had been whisked together with instant espresso powder and a drop of rum, I stopped the mixer, pinched off a piece of raw dough, and popped it in my mouth—the mixture melted on my tongue. All right, Guthrie bakers. Bring it on.

  Chapter Five

  “You have to try this.”

  All of my favorite conversations began this way. Chef Al handed me a small wedge of a dark orange cheese. I took a bite and purred. The nutty flavor spread across my tongue in salty waves. “What is it?”

  “It’s an aged Gouda that Betsy has been fooling with. She gave us the first wheel.”

  All the ingredients for the harvest dinner were locally sourced. Betsy, an amateur cheese maker from a neighboring farm, was one of our purveyors. “I hope she kept better track of how she made it than the Camembert.”

  Chef Al chortled. “That was a shame, wasn’t it? That first taste was a revelation, then . . .”

  “Every wheel after was a complete disaster.” I shuddered as my tongue remembered the sour bite and mealy texture. “She has to keep better notes.”

  “We can only hope.” Al wrapped the chunk of Gouda in a sheet of waxed paper and headed to the sink to wash his hands.

  I popped the rest of the wedge into my mouth and turned my attention back to brushing a sheet of phyllo dough with clarified butter. You could tell by the length of my daily prep list that the festival was two days away. All week my workdays had started and ended in complete darkness. I juggled making desserts for the dining room with preparing for both the harvest dinner and the bake sale. The list was only half crossed off when the night crew began to trickle in. I hadn’t realized how lonely I had been in the mornings until I found myself in the middle of the dinner rush, squeezing past the dishwasher to grab a clean spatula, shouting, “Behind you!” to the waitstaff as I raced from the stove to the sink with a smoldering pot of molten caramel. Suzanne and Helen, who waited tables in the evening, were warm, full of gossip, and always willing to try a bite of whatever I was working on. In the back, Chef Al had an easy grace, and we fell into a comfortable rhythm. He co
uld perfectly flip an omelet while giving relationship advice to the hostess. He had a way of looking like he wasn’t doing anything but chatting, but at the end of the night hundreds of ears of corn had been husked, bushels of Brussels sprouts had been trimmed, and the kitchen was spotless, even though the dining room had been full just hours earlier.

  After the third time Salty showed up, whining, at the back door of the kitchen, Margaret relented and allowed him to hang out in the front sitting room while I worked, saving me from having to feel my way through the orchard to collect him for his evening walk. I occasionally caught her talking to him in the foyer, and one afternoon I found them both dozing on the same love seat.

  • • •

  “I hope I made enough,” I said for the hundredth time on the morning of the dinner.

  “You did,” said Al as he rubbed olive oil onto the small bodies of cipollini onions. He spread them onto a sheet pan with his slick hands and slid the tray into the oven.

  “But what if I didn’t?”

  “Stop worrying. It’s a five-course meal. We don’t want them stuffed with bread.” Al turned his attention to his corn consommé, gently simmering on the back of the stove. “Now, what we should be worrying about is this soup—does it have any flavor at all?”

  Al ladled a small portion into a coffee cup and handed it to me. I blew on the soup lightly and took a sip.

  “Alfred,” I sighed, “it’s like drinking a summer picnic.”

  Al beamed. “Does it need salt?”

  “Nope.” I took another swallow and gave him back the cup. He refilled it and handed it back to me.

  “Too much butter?” he asked.

  I licked my lips. “Well, now that you ask, I do feel like I need to wipe my chin.”

  Al snapped his dish towel at my hip. I shrieked and began to pelt him with the bits of bread dough that I had been scraping off my fingers. “It’s perfect and you know it.”

  “So, Livvy,” Alfred began, his voice suddenly formal, like he was going to make a speech. “Are you going to the contra dance tomorrow evening?” He had removed the red bandana that he wore to keep his gray curls from getting into the food and was twisting it in his hands. His hair was a shaggy mess, like he had just rolled out of bed.

  Heat rose up my neck. I turned my attention to the bread dough in my hands. “I’m playing in the band.”

  “Oh, I didn’t know that.”

  “I just joined a week ago.”

  Alfred still stood by my table. “I thought maybe I could accompany you.”

  I had never seen him look so awkward. Go chop something, I silently pleaded as I pressed my palms into the dough. “Like a date?” I asked.

  Margaret walked into the kitchen through the back door, accompanied by two men in suits. She waved her hand and said, “This is the kitchen,” without acknowledging either Alfred or me, then led the men into the dining room.

  “If you are saying yes, then yes. If not, then no, strictly a professional invitation.”

  I laughed. “Alfred, under different circumstances I would say yes,” I answered truthfully. “But I just got out of a relationship with someone I worked with, and it didn’t end well.” And by “not well,” I thought, I mean in flames.

  “That’s the problem with being a chef,” Alfred lamented. “The only people who can understand your life are the people who won’t date you. Maybe I’ll get lucky and you’ll get fired.”

  I sank the edge of a serrated knife into the crust of a loaf of apple bread, trying to saw away the uncomfortable realization that, actually, I didn’t want to get fired. I wanted to stay.

  • • •

  There is a moment after the prep is done and before the theater of the dinner service begins when I love to escape the kitchen. Dusk had fallen, and when I stepped outside, I was drawn to the light spilling from the barn, golden and inviting. I poked my head in. Margaret had outdone herself. The long tables were covered in cream linen. Squash-colored tapers stood tall in sparkling silver candelabras. Fat bouquets of sunflowers, goldenrod, and black-eyed Susans stuffed into mason jars were surrounded by tiny pumpkins and crab apples. I looked up to see a thousand white Christmas lights hanging from the rafters. The whole room glowed. I pictured Martin sitting at the table, the lights reflecting off his eyeglasses.

  “Not as nice as that fancy club of yours, I imagine.” Margaret’s voice brought me back to reality.

  “It’s stunning.”

  “Well. It’s an important night. I expect everything will go smoothly?”

  “Of course it will,” I said, running my prep through my mind for the millionth time.

  “Good. I have some important guests coming. Remember, you are representing the inn, not just yourself.” She looked me up and down for a long minute. “Come into the kitchen. I have something for you and Alfred.”

  Margaret led me back into the inn, which had been decorated to match the barn and smelled like wood smoke. I lingered in the doorway for a moment, watching the guests sip brandy and chat by the fireplace, before making my way to the back of the house. Alfred had the waitstaff slicing the loaves of peasant bread and stuffing them into baskets. The dishwasher was feverishly trying to keep up as Chef Al tossed him pan after pan. I tied an apron around my waist and walked toward my workbench. Margaret came out of her office with a large plastic bag and handed it to me.

  “I thought you would want something special to wear tonight.” She looked strangely uncertain.

  I unwrapped the plastic. It was a cream-colored chef’s jacket with the Sugar Maple’s logo stitched onto the right lapel and my name embroidered over the left breast. I hugged the jacket, then dropped it on my table and wrapped my arms around Margaret.

  “I love it!” I shouted, squeezing her. It was like hugging a day-old baguette.

  “There’s one for Alfred as well,” she said as she pried herself out of my embrace. She removed the other jacket from the bag and handed it to Alfred. “I expect you can keep your expressions of gratitude to yourself.”

  Alfred untied his apron and slipped the jacket over his concert T-shirt. “Thank you very much, Margaret.” Alfred bowed. “It’s sharp.”

  “Keep it clean. We can’t afford to buy you both a week’s worth.”

  With one hand I tugged my old coat open, popping off a button, which shot across the kitchen.

  Chef Al watched, blushing.

  “Good Lord, child!” Margaret exclaimed, turning away.

  “I’m wearing a tank top!” I laughed as I slipped my arms into the new coat and buttoned it up. Suddenly, I felt like a real pastry chef again. “Tonight is going to be perfect!” I called over my shoulder as I made my way to the walk-in to check on the pumpkin crème brûlées.

  • • •

  The large white tent from which we would serve the dinner had been set up behind the barn. Steaming chafing dishes sat on top of one of our improvised tables made of wooden doors balanced on sawhorses. The servers for the event, all kids from the high school, giggled with one another in the corners. They looked cute in rented tuxedo pants and white button-down shirts. Sarah paced the edge of the room, trying to keep them together like a border collie herding a field full of sheep.

  Margaret poked her head into the tent promptly at ten past seven. “Everyone’s seated.”

  “Okay, people. We’re on the fire,” Chef Al called.

  Al lined up the trays of soup cups that were being kept warm in a rented proof box. I spooned kernels of roasted corn into each cup as Al poured the corn consommé from a giant steel pitcher. The waitstaff were right behind us, grabbing each cup as it was filled.

  “Remember, kids, serve from the left!” Sarah called as the first tray of soup was carried out of the tent.

  Al and I kept our heads down in concentration until the last cup was taken. I ran my sleeve across my forehead and blew out a breath. />
  “One down, four to go.” Al smiled down at me.

  From the rented refrigerator we wheeled out a stainless-steel rack with trays of salads. With latex-gloved hands I fluffed up the red oak leaves, which had flattened under their blanket of plastic wrap.

  “They love the soup, and it’s going fast,” Sarah called as she bustled into the tent. “I’ll start clearing in two minutes.”

  “You dress and I’ll put on the croutons?” I asked Al. He nodded, already shaking a squeeze bottle of maple vinaigrette back and forth. I carefully laid a crouton on each plate of greens. The goat cheese was soft from the heat, barely holding its shape on top of the slice of apple bread. The waitstaff hurried into the tent, chatting in pairs, gossiping about who was sitting with whom at the table.

  Margaret appeared a few minutes after the last salad was served. She looked elegant in a coal gray dress and black stockings. A sterling silver brooch with tiny diamonds in the shape of a maple leaf sparkled at her throat. “So far, so good,” she said, nodding. “How are things going in here?”

  “Smooth sailing, thanks to Livvy here,” said Al. “It’s nice to have an experienced pair of hands to work with.”

  I beamed. “They’re having a good time?”

  “I expect so.” Margaret smoothed her skirt. “About five minutes to the main course.”

  I rolled the rack of cheese plates out of the refrigerator as Al gave a final polish to the silver platters that would hold the prime rib, roasted Brussels sprouts, and mushroom risotto.

  Sarah came bustling back into the tent. “They’re clearing the salad plates. We’ll pour more wine before serving, so you still have a couple minutes.”

  I smiled over at her. “How’s it going?”

  “Great. The plates are clean, and everyone is chatting up a storm.”

  I looked over at Al. “Clean plates.”

  He shook his hands over his head in a silent cheer. “Halfway there.”

  Al began to slice the roast. The main course was being served tableside. Since Al didn’t need my help plating, I focused my attention on the cheese course that would follow. I spooned dollops of my blackberry preserves onto the coins of chèvre. Tiny cubes of homemade quince paste sat next to the traditional Vermont cheddar. Next to each small wedge of sheep’s-milk blue cheese I carefully draped a succulent slice of ripe pear.