Sten

by Chris Bunch

  "Juniper berries—they grow wild here; two local spices, basil and thyme, that I planted twenty years ago,” he explained. He rubbed berry juices on both sides of the split salmon, then crushed the leaves and did the same.

  * * * *

  "More fish, Colonel?"

  Mahoney burn-cured a slight case of the hiccups with a shot from their second jar then shook his head.

  After the birchwood fire'd burned down to coals, the Emperor had put the salmon on the sapling grill. He'd left it for a few minutes, then quickly splashed corn liquor on the skin-side and skillfully flipped the slabs of fish over. The fire flared and charred the skin, and then the Emperor had extracted the fish. Mahoney couldn't remember when he'd eaten anything better.

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  THE COURT OF A THOUSAND SUNS

  The Emperor's Angelo Stew

  "What the clot is Angelo stew?"

  "You don't need to know. Wouldn't eat it if you did. Cures cancer ... oh, we cured that before, didn't we ... Anyway ... Angelo stew's the ticket. Only thing I know will unfreeze our buttocks."

  Sten watched as the Emperor worked. From what Sten could gather, the first act of what was to be Angelo stew consisted of thinly sliced chorizo—Mexican hard sausage, the Emperor explained. The sausage and a heaping handful of garlic were sautéed in Thai-pepper-marinated olive oil. Deliciously hot-spiced smells from the pan cut right through the Stregg fumes in Sten's nostrils.

  The Emperor stopped his work and took a sip of Stregg. Smiled to himself, and tipped a small splash in with the chorizo. Then he went back to the task at hand, quartering four or five onions and seeding quarter slices of tomatoes.

  He turned and pulled a half-kilo slab of bleeding red beef from a storage cooler and began chunking it up.

  The Emperor shut off the flame under the sausage and garlic, started another pan going with more spiced oil, and tossed in a little sage, a little savory and thyme, and then palm-rolled some rosemary twigs and dropped those in on top. He stirred the mixture, considered a moment, then heaped in the tomato quarters and glazed them. He shut off the fire and turned back to Sten. He gave the young captain a long, thoughtful look and then began rolling the small chunks of beef into flour first, and then into a bowl of hot-pepper seeds.

  He paused to turn the flame up under the sausage and garlic, then added the pepper-rolled beef as soon as the pan was hot enough. He stirred the beef around, waiting until it got a nice brown crust.

  The Emperor finished the beef. He pulled out a large iron pan and dumped the whole mess into it. He also added the panful of onions and tomatoes. Then he threw in a palmful of superhot red peppers, a glug or three of rough red wine, many glugs of beef stock, a big clump of cilantro, clanked down the lid, and set the flame to high. As soon as it came to a boil, he would turn it down to simmer for a while.

  * * * *

  The stew was done now. The Emperor rose and ladled out two brimming bowlsful. Sten's mouth burst with saliva. He could smell a whole forest of cilantro. His eyes watered as the Emperor set the bowl in front of him. He waited as the man cut two enormous slices of fresh-baked sourdough bread and plunked them down along with a tub of newly churned white butter.

  The Emperor spooned up a large portion of stew.

  "Eat up, son. This stuff is great brain food. First your ears go on fire, then the gray stuff. Last one done's a grand admiral."

  Sten swallowed. The Angelo stew savored his tongue, and gobbled down his throat to his stomach. A small nuclear flame bloomed, and his eyes teared and his nose wept and his ears turned bright red. The Stregg in his bloodstream fled before a horde of red-pepper molecules.

  "Whaddya think?” the Eternal Emperor said.

  "What if you don't have cancer?” Sten gasped.

  "Keep eating, boy. If you don't have it now, you will soon."

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  The Emperor's Barbecue Sauce

  The Emperor sniffed his simmering sauce: Mmmmm ... Perfect. It was a concoction whose beginnings were so foul-looking and smelling that Marr and Senn, his Imperial caterers, refused to attend. They took a holiday in some distant place every time he threw a barbecue.

  The original creation was born in a ten-gallon pot. He always made it many days in advance. He said it was to give it time to breathe. Marr and Senn substituted “breed,” but the Emperor ignored that. The ten gallons of base sauce was used sort of like sourdough starter—All he had to do was to keep adding as many ingredients as there were beings to eat it.

  He dipped a crust of hard bread into the sauce and nibbled. It was getting better.

  The secret to the sauce was the scrap meat. It had taken the Emperor years to convince his butchers what he meant by scrap. He did not want slices off the finest fillet. He needed garbage beef, so close to spoiling that the fat was turning yellow and rancid. The fact that he rubbed it well with garlic, rosemary, and salt and pepper did not lessen the smell. “If you're feeling squeamish,” he always told Mahoney, “sniff the garlic on your hands."

  The sauce meat was placed in ugly piles on racks that had been stanchioned over smoky fires—at this stage the recipe wanted little heat, but a great deal of smoke from hardwood chips. The Emperor liked hickory when he could get it. He constantly flipped the piles of meat so that the smoke flavor would penetrate. In this case, the chemistry of the near-spoiled scraps aided him: They were drying and porous and sucking at the air.

  Then he—and his echoing waldoes—dumped the meat into the pot, filled it with water, and set it simmering with cloves of garlic and the following spices: three or more bay leaves, a cupped palm and a half of oregano, and a cupped palm of savory to counteract the bitterness of the oregano.

  Then the sauce had to simmer a minimum of two hours, sometimes three, depending upon the amount of fat in the meat—the more fat, the longer the simmer.

  While he was waiting for the meat to simmer to completion, he could drink many shots of Stregg and prepare the next part of the sauce at his leisure.

  There were many possibilities, but the Emperor liked using ten or more large onions, garlic cloves—always use too much garlic—chili peppers, green peppers, more oregano and savory, and Worcestershire sauce.

  He sautéed all that in clarified butter. Then he dumped the mixture into another pot and set it to bubbling with a dozen quartered tomatoes, a cup of tomato paste, four green peppers, and a two-fingered pinch of dry mustard.

  A health glug or three of very dry red wine went into the pot. Then he added the finishing touch. He stirred in the smoky starter sauce that he had prepared in advance, raised the heat, and simmered ten minutes. The sauce was done.

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  THE REVENGE OF THE DAMNED

  The Emperor's Nuked Hen

  The Emperor was preparing a dinner that he had promised Mahoney was perfectly suited to a war motif. He called it “nuked hen".

  Using his fingers and the hollow of his palm as measuring spoons, he dumped the following ingredients into a bowl: a pinch of fresh cayenne, two fingers of ground salt, ground pepper, a palm of dried sage, and finely diced horseradish. He moved the bowl over to his big black range. Already sitting beside it was a bottle of vodka, fresh-squeezed lime juice, a half cup of capers, and a tub of butter.

  The Emperor took a fat Cornish game hen out of a cold box and placed it on the metal table. He found a slim-bladed boning knife, tested the edge, and then nodded in satisfaction. He turned the hen over, back side up, and started his first cut alongside the spine.

  He picked up his knife. “You might want to watch this, Ian,” he said. “Boning a hen is easy when you know how, but you can chop the clot out of it and yourself if you don't."

  Very carefully, the Emperor cut on either side of the spine. He pushed a finger through the slit and pulled the bone up through the carcass. Next, he laid the hen flat, placed a hand on either side of the spine, and crunched down with his weight.

  "See what I mean?”
he said as he lifted the breastbone out.

  The Emperor moved over to his range and fired up a burner. “First, I'm going to burn the clot out of this hen,” the Emperor said, turning to his range. “The whole trick is getting your pan hot enough.” The Emperor turned the flame up as high as it would go and then slammed on a heavy cast-iron pan. In a few moments, the pan began to smoke, and fans in the duct above the range whirred on. A few moments more, and the pan stopped smoking.

  "Check the air just above the fan,” the Emperor said. “It's getting wavery, right?"

  "Right."

  "As the pan gets hotter, the air will wave faster and faster until the whole interior is a steady haze.” The haze came right on schedule.

  "So it's ready now?” Mahoney asked.

  "Almost, but not quite. This is the place most people foul up. In a minute or two the haze will clear and the bottom of the pan should look like white ash."

  As soon as the ashen look appeared, the Emperor motioned for Mahoney to duck back. Then he dipped out a big chunk of butter, dumped it into the pan, and moved out of the way. Mahoney could see why as flames flashed above the pan. As soon as they died down, the Emperor moved swiftly forward and poured the spices out of the bowl and into the pan. He gave the mixture a few stirs in one direction, then the other. Next he tossed in the Cornish game hen. A column of smoke steamed upward in a roar.

  "I give it about five minutes each side,” the Emperor said. “Then I spread capers all over it and toss the hen into the oven for twenty minutes or so to finish it off."

  The Emperor dumped the thoroughly blackened hen into a baking dish. On went the capers, and into the oven it went—at 350 degrees. He cranked the flames down on the range, shoved the pan of drippings back on the fire, and stirred in two Imperial glugs of vodka and a quarter glug of lime juice. He would use the mixture to glaze the hen when it came out of the oven.

  "I sort of get the idea,” Mahoney said, “that you're in the process of heating up a pan for the Tahn."

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  THE RETURN OF THE EMPEROR

  Raschid's Eggs of Pattipong

  Pattipong described them on the menu as Imperial Eggs Benedict. For some reason, the name bothered Raschid. He argued—mildly. Pattipong told him to get back to the kitchen. “Imperial good name. Thailand ... best elephants. Royal Elephants. Or so I hear."

  Raschid had made sourdough starter a week or so before—warm water, equal amount of flour, a bit of sugar, and yeast. Cover in a nonmetallic dish and leave until it stinks.

  He used that as a base for what were still called English muffins. They were equally easy to make. For about eight muffins, he brought a cup of milk to a boil, then took it off the stove and dumped in a little salt, a teaspoon of sugar, and two cupfuls of premixed biscuit flour. After he beat it all up, he let it rise until double size; then he beat in another cup of flour and let the dough rise once more.

  Then open-ended cylinders were half filled with the dough. Raschid did not mention that the short cylinders had been pet food containers with both ends cut off. Even in this district, somebody might get squeamish.

  He brushed butter on his medium-hot grill and put the cylinders down. Once the open end had browned for a few seconds, he flipped the cylinder, browned the other side and lifted the cylinder away, burning fingers in the process.

  He added more butter and let the muffins get nearly black before putting them on a rack to cool. For use—within no more than four hours—he would split them with a fork and toast them.

  He next found the best smoked ham he—or rather Pattipong—could afford. It was thin-sliced and browned in a wine-butter-cumin mixture.

  Raschid went back to his recipe. The browned ham was put in a warming oven. He had lemon juice, red pepper, a touch of salt, and three egg yolks waiting in a blender. He melted butter in a small pan. Then his mental timer went on. Muffins toasted ... eggs went into boiling water to poach ... the muffins were ready ... ham went on top of the muffins ... two and a half minutes, exactly, and the eggs were plopped on top of the ham. He flipped the blender on and poured molten butter into the mixture. After the count of twenty, he turned the blender off and poured the hollandaise sauce over the eggs.

  "Voila, Sr. Pattipong."

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  VORTEX

  The Emperor's Bombay Birani

  "The theme tonight is India,” the Eternal Emperor said.

  The Emperor held up a mound of cubed meat. About two pounds worth, Sten noted. “This is goat,” the Emperor said. “I had a field constructed for him and his brothers and sisters. Had the field planted with the same stuff his ancestors ate in India—mint, wild onion, you name it.” He plunked the mass into an ovenproof casserole.

  He started shaking out spices over the lamb. “A little ginger,” he said, shifting to the recipe again. “Ground cloves, cardamom, chili, cumin ... heavier than the others ... couple of squeezes of garlic, and ye olde salt and pepper."

  He dumped in some yogurt and lemon juice, and stirred up the whole mess, then set it to the side. He started frying onions in peanut oil.

  He dumped half the fried onions on the lamb and mixed it up. He pulled the rice off the range. The water had been boiling for about five minutes. He drained the rice, stirred it up with the onions, and spread it out over the lamb.

  "A little butter drizzled on the top,” the Emperor said, “and ... voila! I call this Bombay Birani, but basically it's an old goat stew.” He slammed on a tight-fitting lid, popped the casserole into the oven, and set it for bake.

  "Now, I'm going to cheat,” the Emperor said. “The way this is supposed to go is, you set it at 380 degrees. Bake one hour. Then cut it to 325 and go for an hour more."

  "But Marr and Senn, bless their souls, have come up with a new oven. Cuts real time half or more. And I can't tell the difference."

  * * * *

  It was an incredible dinner. Unforgettable. As usual.

  There were mounds of food all over the table. Dhal and cucumber cooler. Three kinds of chutney: green mango, Bengal, and hot lime. Real hot lime. Little dishes of extra hot sauces and tiny red peppers. And fresh griddled flat bread—chapatties, the Emperor called them. Plus the Bombay Birani. Fragrant steam rose from the casserole.

  "Dig in,” the Emperor said. Sten dug.

  EMPIRE'S END

  Sten's Ultimate Steak Sandwich

  Sten was rather morosely preparing himself a solitary meal, trying to remind himself that the best revenge is living well. Yet another pastime he had sort of picked up from the Eternal Emperor.

  His meal was, by description, a simple Earth sandwich. Its filling would be a rib-eye steak from a steer.

  But it may have been the Ultimate Steak Sandwich.

  Earlier that day, before the paperwork and Go Higher And Hither orders had a chance to consume him as usual, he'd cut diagonal slices in the three-centimeter piece of meat. The steak went into a marinade—one-third extra-virgin olive oil, two-thirds Guinness—the remarkable dark beer he had been introduced to just before his last face-to-face meeting with the Eternal Emperor—salt, pepper, and a bit of garlic.

  Now it was ready for the charbroiler.

  He took softened butter, and beat a teaspoon of dried parsley, a teaspoon of tarragon, a teaspoon of thyme, and a teaspoon of oregano into it. He spread the butter on a freshly baked soft roll, foil-wrapped the roll, and put the roll in to warm.

  Next he sliced onions. A lot of onions. He sautéed them in butter and paprika. As they started to sizzle, he warmed, in a double broiler, a half liter of sour cream mixed with three tablespoons of horseradish.

  Next he'd charbroil the steak just until it stopped moving, slice it on the diagonal, put the meat on the roll, onions on the meat, sour cream on the onions, and commit cholesterolicide.

  For a side dish he had thin-sliced garden tomatoes with a vinegar/olive oil/basil/thin-chopped chive dressing and beer.

  Marr and Senn's Dinner P
arty

  Sten wiped chicken gore on his apron and took the message from the runner. He scanned it.

  "It's official,” he said. “The Zaginows will be here tomorrow night."

  Senn fretted. “Not much time."

  "It'll do, Senn, dear,” Marr soothed. “Otho's pantry is far better stocked than I imagined. We shouldn't have to cheat too much."

  Sten hoisted a cleaver and resumed whacking chicken into parts. “Not that I doubt your abilities,” he said, “but I don't see how you plan a menu for something like this."

  "Well ... We want them to be impressed,” Marr said. “So the dinner should reflect on your success. However, we want to do business with these people..."

  A claw taloned out of the exquisite softness of Marr's fur. It speared a tomato and plunged it into boiling water. “We want them to like us. We don't want them to think we believe we're better than they are, for heaven's sakes."

  Marr lifted the tomato from its hot bath—spun it toward the opposite paw. Where another claw whisked away the skin. Snip. Slide. Just like that. Sten's jaw dropped.

  On automatic, Marr speared another tomato and repeated the process. And another tomato was peeled. Snip. Slide. Just like that. “Haute cuisine is definitely out, out, out,” he said.

  "It wouldn't do,” Senn agreed. “Not at all.” His wickedly sharp claws were blazing through a stack of yellow onions. Skinning and chopping so deftly, Sten didn't feel the slightest sting in his eyes.

  "We've decided on native dishes,” Marr said. “Food one might imagine came from an ordinary being's kitchen. But still a little exotic and daring because it is from someplace else."

  "Also, it gives us a theme,” Senn said, disposing of another onion. “A Flag of All Nations sort of theme. It fits with the jumble of beings that make up the Zaginows."

  "We like themes,” Marr said.

  Sten was only half-listening. He was busy gaping at the Milchens’ skills. They were living kitchen machines. Full of all kinds of little tricks.