“That’s the food critic Frank Bruni,” my mother said under her breath.
Jonah moved on to kiss the cheek of a heavyset woman in a flowered silk dress squeezed into the booth beside Bruni. Mom paged through the headshots in her program. “That has to be the novelist Sigrid Gustafson,” Mom whispered, tapping the page. “She must have used an early photo. LOL.”
“Mom, behave!” I whispered back.
Jonah continued to wind through the seated panelists, shaking hands with a petite Asian woman, massaging the shoulders of an elegant woman in black with a grand sweep of white-gold hair. Finally he returned to the lectern.
“We have message boards brimming with blustering amateurs and unsuspecting diners following them like rats after Pied Pipers into the bowels of dreadful eateries. We have ridiculous modernism overtaking plain good food. Let’s face facts.” He pounded on the podium, his voice rising several decibels with each word. “This is one hell of a challenging time to write about food—or even to choose a restaurant meal! We can’t afford a fluffy weekend seminar focused on extolling recipes and patting the backs of our illustrious guest writers. They must be held accountable for every word they write.”
The audience lurched into a second ragged standing ovation. Dustin hovered in the wings, just off stage left, looking as though he might explode into the spotlight and drag Jonah off.
“Please sit,” Jonah begged us. He strode to the center of the stage, his own golden hair glinting in the stage lights. Too perfect to be natural, I thought. “I promise, you’ll be exhausted by the end of the night. And you must save some energy for the awesome opening party. And there’s so much more coming this weekend.”
As we took our seats again, he headed back to the podium and adjusted his notes.
“In my opinion, today’s food writers are listing toward endorsing the esoteric and precious and superexpensive. Of course, if we wait long enough, the trends will circle back around. We’ll be reading about mountains of creamy mashed potatoes and pot roast that melts into its gravy instead of musk ox sprinkled with elderberries and served on twigs. But while we wait, isn’t it our job to call the emperor on his nakedness? Must we endure, or even encourage, the bizarre and the inedible?” He pivoted to the panelists behind him and opened his arms. The food writers rustled, their smiles frozen.
“He’s absolutely right,” said the woman in front of us.
Jonah clicked one leather-clad heel against the other and spun back to the audience. “I say no. Which is why I feel I must address the ‘best of’ restaurant lists. My God, what does it mean when a meal in the number one restaurant in the world costs in the neighborhood of six hundred dollars and is gathered from the woods nearby? The woods, people. And can someone spare us from Twitter-driven hyperbole in restaurants’ popularity? Since when do untrained palates get to tell us what’s good?”
He paused for what seemed like minutes, the auditorium deathly silent. He was asking for trouble—the hoi polloi loved to wax on about what they ate. And many of them were warming the seats of this auditorium. And the critics who wrote the reviews he was criticizing sat right on the stage with him.
“Here’s what I think. Critics must push forward to take their territory back from the amateurs. We professionals cannot abandon this job to the Chowhounds and Yelp boarders. A, many of these people have no training. And B, they have all kinds of agendas aside from criticizing food. And we must be excruciatingly honest. If we shy away from criticizing bad or ridiculous food, if we only publish positive reviews, do our words not become worthless?”
“What the heck’s a Yelp boarder?” asked the lady in front of us.
“It’s a food Web site,” Mom said. “Shhhh.” The lady turned around and looked daggers at us as Jonah continued.
“From the restaurant perspective—and as Dustin mentioned, I’ve walked a mile in those moccasins, too—when an establishment chooses to open, they must take the chance of negative publicity. It’s like publishing a book: Reviews ensue. When a meal leaves the kitchen, the chef leaves himself open for criticism.
“I can sum up the problem quickly: Honesty is lacking from public figures. I can’t fix national politics.” He clapped his hand to his heart and heaved a sigh.
“You can say that again,” said the woman in front of Mom.
“But we can start right here in the food world. I’ve learned this as I’ve prepared to tour the country with my new book: Telling the truth and encouraging my colleagues to do the same has freed me up in ways I never imagined.”
He ran a hand over his chin, the blond stubble of a new beard glinting in the spotlight. “You people—our public—deserve having the curtains pulled back, not only on the food you eat and the professionals who prepare it, but also on the people who criticize and write about it.” He wheeled around again to face the faux diner. “Writers and critics—and you know who you are—you must step up to a higher standard. Food is not just about eating. Food is the very soul of our country.”
His voice grew softer. “I am so looking forward to the panel discussions and to all my conversations over this fabulous weekend. Caveat emptor: My policy of utter transparency will be in full effect.”
I finally took a breath.
Like all of the other four hundred plus attendees at the opening, I was dying for a drink by the time Jonah Barrows finished his lecture. I suspected some of them were thirsty for blood as well, and I hated to miss one second of the fireworks. But Mom had other ideas: a leisurely stroll down the busiest blocks of Duval Street with her camera in action on the way over to the reception at the Audubon House. She chattered nonstop the whole way.
Had I seen the woman with the mop of curly hair in the back row of the diner? That had to be Ruth Reichl. And the small adorable man with dimples and dark hair? Definitely Frank Bruni, another former restaurant critic for the New York Times. She’d recognize him anywhere—except he was smaller than she’d imagined for a man with such a grand writing voice. She loved him sight unseen for the way he loved his mother. And Billy Collins, former poet laureate—he looked, well, just like a real person. She could not wait to get books signed by each of them. And she could not wait to see how Jonah Barrows challenged each of those writers. From the grimacing and rustling on the stage behind him, it sure looked like it was going to be a lively weekend.
And she was thrilled with the weather—maybe seventy degrees with a breeze just strong enough to rattle the palms overhead.
“Did I tell you we’re expecting our first snow in New Jersey this weekend?” she asked. “Not just a dusting either.”
“You did, Mom,” I said.
I listened to her with one ear while trying to formulate a pithy summary of Jonah Barrows’s remarks and then a worthy journalistic response. Wally would expect something, if not tonight, certainly by tomorrow morning. Jonah had sacrificed a lot of sacred cows: amateurs on food boards and their Twitter-driven hysteria, endorsements of precious foodie trends, lack of transparency and fortitude from chefs and the writers following them. In forty-five minutes, he’d managed to spurn every cutting-edge trend in the food world. And some of them well deserved it. What could I possibly add to his brilliant dissection? And would I have a strong enough stomach to do so, anyway? And whom exactly did he plan to wrestle to the mud over the next two days?
“Hayley, wait! Isn’t this the bar Hemingway used to drink in after he finished writing for the day?”
My mom stopped in front of Sloppy Joe’s, where the noise roared out onto the street. Sunburned customers clustered around the tables covered with plastic tankards of beer and baskets of French fries and burgers. More people spilled out onto the sidewalk to smoke and drink beer. A trio of ponytailed men in tropical shirts played aggressive, pulse-pounding rock music on electric guitars at the far end of the bar. I’d never set foot in this place and I doubted that Hemingway would have enjoyed it, either.
“Let me get your picture here,” Mom said, pushing me toward the painted sign
that read ESTABLISHED IN1933 and sighting through her viewfinder. “Now, smile!” She snapped four photos in succession.
“Hey, what’s that?” She pointed to a camera fastened to the underside of the roof overhanging the sidewalk.
“It’s the Duval Street webcam, Mom,” I said. “They have it mounted on their Web site so people who aren’t in town can see what they’re missing. Remember when I first moved here last fall, I tried to get you to watch it and you couldn’t get it to load on your computer? Let’s get going. I have a lot people I’d like to meet. And wouldn’t it be awful if they ran out of wine?”
“Or food,” said my mother, tucking her camera into her handbag and trotting ahead of me up the street.
By the time we reached the Audubon House, a long line of hungry people snaked out of the gated white picket fence onto the Whitehead Street sidewalk. The ladies Mom had chastised in the auditorium—twice—were just ahead of us.
“What is this a line for anyway?” asked the woman with the helmet of silver hair.
“The bar,” answered the other. “You would think they could plan better. This is not relaxing.”
A waiter in a white shirt passed by with a platter of shrimp toast and I managed to snag two pieces just before the plate was snatched clean by the unhappy woman in front of us. Mom nibbled at hers and pronounced it delicious.
“I think they used fresh tarragon. And the mayo is definitely homemade. Oh, Hayley”—she learned over to kiss my cheek, her hazel eyes bright with sudden tears—“I’m having so much fun already.”
I looked up from the notes on my smart phone and smiled. “I’m glad.” I felt a needle of regret that I wasn’t enjoying having her as much as she was enjoying being here. I swore to myself that I’d try harder not to allow my nerves or my reactions to her well-intentioned motherly ministrations ruin the visit. As we inched forward toward the bar, the pressure on my bladder grew intense.
“Mom,” I said. “I’m going to run to the ladies’ room. Will you hold my stuff?”
I handed her the canvas bag containing my phone, notebook, wallet, program, and the copy of Jonah’s book I’d brought in case I ran into him, and dashed down a long brick walkway, passing groups of people chatting at tall cocktail tables with plates of nibbles and glasses of wine. Twenty yards to the right, one serving station was dishing up tiny lamb chops. The smell of roasted meat and garlic called to me like metal filings to magnet but I decided it would be rude not to wait for my mother. At the next station, more waiters were setting up coffee, tea, and enormous trays of chocolate-covered strawberries. Those I could not resist. I veered over and popped one into my mouth, savoring the bright burst of berry coated in a crisp shell of dark chocolate with the smallest hint of orange—no resemblance to the greasy, grainy, overly sweet chocolate I’d had from wedding fountains. I’d pick up one for Mom on the way back.
At the far corner of the property, at the end of another long brick walkway, I located the restrooms in a small white clapboard building shaded by dense green foliage—palms, ferns, and bougainvillea vines covered in hot pink blossoms. As a woman climbed the steps ahead of me, I recognized the white-blond hair and slim, black-draped figure of Olivia Nethercut, one of my food-writing heroines. Jonah was spectacular and controversial and brilliant, but I could picture myself having a career like Olivia’s—food critic, philanthropist, and cookbook writer. My psychologist friend, Eric, had told me more than once that people who wrote down their goals achieved them more often than those who didn’t. So on page one of my notebook, I’d dashed off a list for this weekend. Number one: an exclusive interview with Olivia.
“Ms. Nethercut,” I said, panting a little as I caught up with her. “I’m Hayley Snow and I just wanted to say how thrilled we are to have you in town. Speaking at the conference.”
She nodded blankly. My face flushed, suddenly realizing that accosting her in the ladies’ room would probably be considered a journalistic faux pas. On the other hand, it was way too late to pretend I hadn’t seen her. I started to hold my hand out, then realized my fingers were covered with melted brown goo.
I began to stammer like a waitress with her first table. “Isn’t it a gorgeous night? They’re so lucky that squall blew by to the south. I don’t think they had any rain plan at all.”
She ducked into a stall and I took the one next to her.
“I loved your book A Marrow Escape,” I chattered. “And I sent a check off to your foundation at Christmas.” So what if it was ten bucks? That was all I could swing working only part-time at my friend Connie’s cleaning service before starting at Key Zest.
“Thanks,” she said in a muffled voice. “You’re very kind.”
Feeling disappointed and slightly brushed off—she hadn’t shown one smidgen of curiosity about who I was or what my connection might be to the seminar—I told myself that once we came out and were busy with the less personal task of hand-washing, I’d announce my credentials and request an interview. But by the time I’d exited the stall, she was gone.
I stumbled back down the stairs, mentally pinching myself for acting like a groupie instead of the professional critic and writer I was supposed to be. Though I was a foodie groupie, like my mother before me. What was wrong with that?
Maybe I’d annoyed her with my gushing. Maybe I’d broken some unwritten rule of courtesy by even speaking to her, even if it was to admire her cutting-edge criticism, gorgeous writing, and generosity. Maybe I’d crave the same kind of distance from scruffy fans in the unlikely event I ever got famous. In that case, why the heck attend a food-writing conference?
I wandered off to collect myself on one of the black metal benches by the reflecting pool in the corner of the property before rejoining the party. Lush staghorn ferns and mother-in-law tongues shielded the seating area from the restrooms. Two large metal birds—more egret in shape than flamingo—were posed gracefully in the water, and clusters of water lilies floated over most of the surface. I took a seat and tried to slow my whirling thoughts: This weekend could be fun if I would only relax.
A trickle of water burbled out from a pipe in the pool’s wall, and I noticed that something was pushing the lily pads up, something surfacing from the dark recesses of the water. The wind gusted, causing the palm fronds overhead to clack like castanets and bringing a whiff of roasted meat that now smelled more rancid than enticing.
I edged a step closer, my heart ratcheting up to uneven thumps like a KitchenAid mixer loaded with dough. A third bird statue appeared to have been broken off at the shins and was lying on the bricks next to the pool, the sharp metal beak pointing to a sodden mass of—something.
An Appetite for Murder Page 24