To Brew or Not to Brew

by Joyce Tremel

  Jake’s smile stretched from ear to ear. “I’ll be there.” He leaned over and kissed me on the cheek. “You won’t regret this, Max.”

  As I watched him walk away, I reached up and felt the spot on my cheek where his lips had touched. I headed home thinking maybe working with Jake wasn’t such a bad idea after all.

  * * *

  I slept like a log. I’d dropped into bed as soon as I’d gotten home and fallen asleep in minutes. If the alarm hadn’t awakened me, I think I could have slept until noon. Two cups of coffee and a hot shower got me moving, though, and I was ready to take on the day. As I walked up Butler Street, I made a mental list of all that I needed to accomplish. By the time I reached Cupcakes N’at, I decided fortification was in order.

  I got in line behind two other customers. The first was a woman in a business suit. The other was an older bald man wearing jeans and a white T-shirt. Candy waved to me from behind the glass counter. She was decked out in her usual Steelers duds, complete with a black and gold apron.

  The man in front of me sighed loudly when Candy asked the woman she was waiting on about her kids. “For cripes sake. Hurry it up, would ya?” he said. “I don’t got all day.”

  “Keep your pants on, Dom,” Candy said. “You’ll get your jelly donut.”

  “Yeah, but in what century?”

  Candy rolled her eyes. “Don’t mind him, ladies. Dom’s always this cranky.”

  Dom? I wondered if this was the bar owner Candy had told me about. There was one way to find out. I tapped him on the shoulder. “Excuse me, but are you Dominic Costello?”

  He turned around. “That depends. Who’s asking?”

  “Don’t let him fool you, Max,” Candy said. “He’s the one and only.”

  “Max.” His gray eyes narrowed. “You’re the one that’s trying to put me out of business.”

  “Nothing of the kind.” I smiled and extended my hand. “Maxine O’Hara.”

  Dom ignored it and instead shook a finger in my face. “Don’t think you’re going to get away with it.”

  I forced myself not to step back and stood my ground. “Mr. Costello, I’m not going to put you out of business.”

  “Darn right you’re not. I’ve owned the Galaxy since 1962 and have worked long and hard to keep it going. Even when this part of town went to hell in a handbasket, I stuck with it.”

  Candy finished waiting on the other customer, who made a wide path around us, no doubt expecting a fight to break out. Without asking what Dominic wanted, Candy put two jelly donuts in a bag and held it out to him.

  “You know I only get one,” he said. “I’m not paying for two.”

  “It’s on the house,” Candy said. “Maybe it’ll sweeten you up a bit.”

  He snatched the bag out of her hand and turned back to me. “You better leave me alone. I’m not about to have some youngster serving girlie beers steal all my clientele.”

  “I don’t think—”

  “You’ll be sorry you ever messed with Dominic Costello.” He stomped to the door and shoved it open so hard the frame shook.

  The encounter rattled me. I jammed my hands into the front pockets of my jeans to stop them trembling.

  Candy came around the counter and put her arm around me. “Don’t you let him get to you. I know we talked about Dom yesterday, but the more I think about it, the more I think it’s someone else causing your problems.”

  I couldn’t believe it. “How could you say that? You saw what just happened.”

  “You don’t know him like I do. He’s a grumpy Gus. That’s it. He wouldn’t be happy if he didn’t have something to complain about. On rare occasions, he can even be pleasant.”

  “I don’t buy that at all.”

  She patted my arm and went back behind the counter. “Just keep an open mind.”

  I told her I would, but as I walked next door to the brewery after buying a couple of bagels, I couldn’t help thinking about what Dominic had said to me. He would make me sorry I’d messed with him. Was killing Kurt part of this plan?

  * * *

  The plumbing inspector arrived at eight while I was eating my bagel. I offered him the second one I’d bought but he declined. It took him less than five minutes to check the repair Mike made the day before, and it passed inspection. Not that I doubted my brother’s work, but it was a relief anyway.

  The alarm company came just after that and went to work. While they fished wires and installed motion detectors, I checked the batch of hefeweizen I’d brewed the other day. It smelled a bit like banana bread when I entered the brewing area. I tried to keep my mind on the task at hand, but I couldn’t help thinking about Kurt every time I caught a glimpse of the mash tun. I needed to use it within the next day or so, and I didn’t know how I could. I couldn’t bear the thought of even turning it on. But I had to. Kurt would have told me I was being ridiculous. He would have cleaned out the tank and moved on. He wasn’t one for sentiment. The most sentimental thing he’d ever done was ask Maura to marry him. Even she’d been surprised at that.

  I was checking the gauge on the fermentation tank when I heard Jake calling my name. “In here,” I hollered.

  He pushed through the swinging door. “Good morning.” He was dressed in black chinos and a crisp white shirt. It wasn’t the traditional chef’s tunic, but he looked ready to work. He sniffed the air. “Bananas in your brew?”

  “Nope.” I waited for the inevitable question.

  “It sure smells like it. And maybe cloves. Why is that?”

  And there it was. “Do you want the long explanation or the short one?”

  “How about the short one for starters.”

  “The beer I brewed the other day is a hefeweizen, which has a distinct banana taste and aroma—sometimes clove, too—even though the only ingredients are water, yeast, hops, and a wheat malt in place of a good portion of the usual barley.” I explained that esters released from the type of yeast used caused the banana scent as the beer fermented. While I talked, he strolled around the room checking out the various pieces of equipment.

  “So you don’t add flavorings of any kind to the beer?” Jake asked when I was finished.

  “Heavens, no.” I laughed. “I would have been expelled for even thinking something like that. There are some craft brewers who do it, but I’m not one of them. I like things pure and simple.” I shrugged. “But that’s me.”

  “I’ve found that with food, too. The simpler things are, the better. Use fresh, good quality ingredients.”

  He asked a few more questions about brewing and I gave him a mini lesson on the process and showed him the different tanks in reverse order. When we got to the mash tun, I stopped. I couldn’t seem to find the right words.

  Jake put a hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry, Max.”

  I gave him a slight smile. “Kurt would have been the first one to tell me to get a grip.” Which I needed to do. And fast. “So, are you ready to see the rest of the place and then do some cooking? I expect to be awed, you know.”

  His eyes sparkled. “Oh, I guarantee you will be.” He held the swinging door into the pub open for me. “Lead on, milady.” He bowed as I walked through.

  I never realized he was such a ham. I liked it. As we entered the pub area, I waved to one of the alarm installers, who was up on a ladder in the hallway where my office was located. The entry from the street was in the center of the room with two large windows on either side. The windows had wood blinds that matched the plank floors. I pointed out the table arrangement in the pub. “There are twelve of the square tables that seat four, and two round ones that seat six to eight, plus eight stools at the bar.” Since the floor and the bar were darker wood, I’d chosen a clear finish for the oak tables to lighten things up a bit. I considered having a variety of mismatched chairs, but in the end just picked plain straight-backed ones that match
ed the tables.

  We went behind the oak bar, and I showed him the taps for the various beers. “I’m planning on having four beers year-round—a lager, a stout, a weizen, and an IPA. I’ll add two others, depending on the season.”

  “So you’ll have six total year-round.”

  I nodded.

  “Sounds like a good plan,” Jake said. “I like the idea of the seasonals.”

  “I do, too. They won’t be the same all the time, so people will have to keep coming back. At least I hope they will.”

  “I don’t think you’ll have to worry about that.”

  Before we reached the kitchen, he picked up two grocery bags from one of the tables. “I stopped to get a few things. I wasn’t sure what you had on hand.”

  “It’s a good thing you did. Kurt only bought enough for whatever recipe he was trying out. I should have thought of that. I’ll reimburse you for whatever you spent.”

  “You’ve had other things on your mind. And there’s no need to reimburse me. It wasn’t that much.

  “This is nice,” Jake said when we entered the kitchen. “The stainless steel and the tile floor will make for easy cleanup.”

  I let him check out the equipment on his own. If he stayed on, this would be his domain, just as it had been Kurt’s. He opened the refrigerator and lifted out a bowl of cherries.

  “Kurt was working on a kirschtorte. I don’t know if they’re still good. We’d better throw them out. The whipped cream, too.” I reached for the bowl and Jake shooed me away.

  “I can take care of it,” he said.

  I decided to let him.

  He closed the refrigerator door, and said, “Anything in particular you want me to make?”

  “I’ll leave it up to you.” I wanted to see what he’d come up with, hoping it would fit in with my idea of what we’d be serving—especially since the menus were already at the printer. I left him to his own devices and went back to the brewery.

  * * *

  A short time later, delicious aromas emanated from the kitchen as I sat at my desk going over some bills that had come in the day before. My stomach growled loudly just as one of the alarm installers poked his head into my office.

  He grinned. “Whatever’s cooking smells mighty good.”

  I agreed.

  He told me they were almost finished and wanted to give me a lesson on how everything worked. I followed him out to the pub, and he showed me the keypad near the front door, how to arm and disarm the system, and how to change and add codes. He also showed me where the motion detectors were located. He had one aimed at the front door, another at the back door, and one more in the hallway near the office. He handed me a thick packet of information and said that if I forgot anything, it was all in the owner’s manual.

  As soon as they left, I headed for the kitchen. It was almost noon. Surely, Jake was finished with whatever dish he’d decided to make. I burst through the door and stopped cold. There were a half dozen plates lined up on the warmer. Jake was placing a stainless cover on the last one. I stood there with my mouth hanging open.

  Jake grinned, most likely at the incredibly dumb look on my face. “You’re about a minute too early.”

  “I didn’t expect all this.” I waved my arm over the table. “One would have been enough.”

  “Hey, you were the one who said you wanted to be awed. I took you at your word.”

  No wonder it had smelled so good in the brew house. I removed the covers one by one. The first dish held a juicy hamburger with the works on a pretzel bun with a side of some of the best-looking fries I’d ever seen. The next plate had a club sandwich made with marble rye and more fries. Three different sausages and a large mound of German potato salad rested on the third plate. The others contained a grilled chicken sandwich, a steak hoagie, and the ever-popular Pittsburgh staple—the fried fish sandwich.

  “How did you manage all this in a little more than an hour?”

  He stood back, looking very proud of himself. “I made some of this at home. After I left you last night, I asked myself, What would Max have on her menu? I came up with a list of meals—which was much longer than this, by the way—went to the grocery store, then went home and started cooking.”

  “In other words, you cheated.”

  “I’d call it being prepared. Just like when I was a Boy Scout.”

  “You were never a Boy Scout.”

  “Okay. Just like hockey, then. There was a big opening up ice and I went for it. He shoots! He scores!”

  I had to laugh. “You’re really something, Jake Lambert.”

  He winked. “That’s what all the ladies tell me.”

  The heat level in the room went up a notch, and not because of the cooking. That was not good if we were going to be working together. I couldn’t let an old crush interfere with our working relationship. After all, I wasn’t a teenager anymore. Far from it.

  I didn’t have time to ponder that any further, because I heard Candy calling my name. I poked my head into the pub. “In here.”

  Candy pushed through the door. “Are you cooking? I smell something heavenly.” She stopped when she spotted Jake. “I didn’t know you weren’t alone, Max. I’ll come back later.” She turned to go and I stopped her.

  “You’re actually just in time. You can help me sample these dishes.”

  She hesitated. “Are you sure? I don’t want to intrude.”

  “I’m sure. There’s no way I can eat all this.” I took her by the arm and led her to the table where Jake was standing and watching our exchange. “Candy, meet my new chef, Jake Lambert.”

  He reached out his hand. Candy took it, then dropped it like it was a hot potato. “Oh, my gawd!” she squealed. “You’re—you’re—”

  Jake bowed. “The new chef.”

  “No!” Candy said. “You’re that hockey player! For the Rangers!” She fanned her face and turned to me. “Max, do you know who this is?”

  “Of course I do. Jake and I grew up together.”

  “I can’t believe it.” She fanned herself again. “This is almost as good as meeting Troy.”

  “Troy?” Jake seemed completely puzzled.

  “I’ll explain it later,” I said, knowing Candy meant her beloved Steeler.

  Candy grabbed Jake’s hand and pressed it to her face. “Mr. Lambert, I am so pleased to meet you.”

  Jake’s face was as red as the tomato on the hamburger. “Jake, please. My dad is Mr. Lambert.” He managed to disentangle his hand and took a step backward.

  I probably should have warned him about Candy but, truthfully, I didn’t realize she’d be so gaga over a hockey player, especially one who didn’t play for the Penguins, let alone the dreaded Rangers. I was under the impression she was all Steelers, all the time. Come to think of it, though, I vaguely remembered her wearing a Pirates cap at one point. She must be an equal opportunity sports fanatic. Before she went after Jake again, I steered her over to the door. “Why don’t you have a seat in the pub and we can try some of this food?”

  She took one last adoring glance at Jake and disappeared into the pub.

  Jake started laughing. “Who—or better yet—what the heck was that?”

  “Shh! She’ll hear you,” I said, but I couldn’t help laughing, too. I explained my next-door neighbor as best I could while I helped him re-cover the plates and put them on a tray, which Jake carried into the pub. I followed him through the door, fingers crossed that it all tasted as good as it looked.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The food was as good as I’d hoped. After we’d put a pretty good dent in the six dishes Jake had made, Candy reluctantly went back to the bakery, but only after Jake promised her an autographed hockey puck. We cleaned up while I filled him in on exactly what his duties would be. Before he left, I gave him all of Kurt’s paperwork, which included information regard
ing the kitchen staff he’d been interviewing and training. I told him if he had any questions, we could talk about it tomorrow.

  Five minutes after he left, my phone rang. It was my brother, Mike. “Jake just told me the good news,” he said.

  “That was fast.”

  “He wanted to thank me for giving him the heads-up about the job,” Mike said. “He couldn’t say enough nice things about you.”

  I felt myself blushing. “Well, that’s good, since we’ll be seeing each other every day.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  I’d never told him, but I had a sneaking suspicion he knew I’d always had a thing for Jake.

  “How’s the repair I made?” he asked.

  Happy he changed the subject, I filled him in. He told me if I needed anything else to give him a call.

  After I hung up, I checked the tanks. Everything was in order, and for once I didn’t have anything pressing that needed attending to. Figuring this might be a good time to talk to some of the neighbors, I made sure the kitchen door to the alley was locked, then grabbed my purse and headed for the main entrance. Before I reached it, the door opened and Adam Greeley stepped inside. I set my purse on the bar. This would be one neighbor I wouldn’t have to visit. It was definitely better on my pocketbook—I wouldn’t be tempted to buy anything.

  Adam owned three boutiques on the other side of the street. Handbag Heaven sold designer handbags—everything from Vera Bradley to Coach. Fleet of Foot sold—no surprise—designer shoes. His third store, This and That, carried a little of everything.

  “I heard about the accident and wanted to offer my condolences,” he said.

  “Thank you. I appreciate it.” I pulled out a bar stool and motioned for him to sit.

  He shook his head. “I can’t stay. I don’t like to be away for too long. Can’t trust anyone nowadays. My employees will steal me blind.”