Vanilla Salt (21 page)

And that’s not all. After the first days of refusing to help, Àlex is now contributing towards the smooth running of the dining room.

“Have you taken the Raimat Cabernet they’ve asked for at Table 6?”

“Have they got bread at Table 4?”

“No, that dessert isn’t for Table 2. They haven’t finished the duck yet!”

All this suggests that he’s trying to make sure things are working well in the dining room. Sometimes Annette stares at him, looking for symptoms of illness, depression or some kind of covert rebellion, some sign that might explain this docility, but she can’t pinpoint anything in particular and his attitude remains positive.

Dinner time is almost upon them and Àlex appears in the dining room.

“Hi there, lad. Haven’t seen you for a while. Are you OK?”

“Yes, fine thanks. What about you?”

Òscar’s not sure how to behave with Àlex. Their relationship has changed and so has Àlex, and Òscar’s not overjoyed about the fact that Àlex has lost the crabby contrariness he used to find so amusing. He’s not wholly delighted either that Àlex should have accepted the situation and agreed to do commercial, conventional cooking, even though the restaurant’s adaptation to the tastes of the wider public has been successful.

“I’m OK. We’ll have to chat another time. I’ve got to get moving in the kitchen. We’ve got a busy night ahead!”

“I’m very pleased for both of you, Àlex.”

“…and for your pocket,” Àlex mumbles to himself, now out of earshot.

Òscar asks timidly, “Can I give you a hand in the kitchen tonight, like we used to do?”

“You’ll have to ask Madame about that. She’s in charge of everything and I’m on a very short leash nowadays. Did you see we served tomato quiche on the lunchtime menu today? What do you have to say about that, eh? Of course I didn’t make it. It was a success. There’s almost none left.”

“Yes, I saw that. Well, man, if it’s good, it’s not surprising that it sells.”

Without asking Annette’s permission, Òscar goes into the kitchen and puts on an apron. He’ll do what he bloody well likes. He’s the owner. He wants to cook with Àlex and that’s that.

Everything goes smoothly, even though almost all the tables are full. Òscar observes the interaction between Annette and Àlex, and it’s evident that something’s going on because there are too many nuances. Conclusion: they’re madly in love. Their struggle to hide the fact gives them away. Àlex is always badmouthing Annette, referring to her as “this woman”, or “that Canadian” or “Madame”. He overdoes it. Anyone can see it’s a smokescreen behind which he’s trying to hide his true feelings. Both are doing their best to act like professionals, but their emotions simmer on the surface whenever they speak, even in the brief exchanges they have in the middle of cooking and serving. If they shout at one another there’s no sign of Àlex’s former malice. If Annette makes a mistake, Àlex’s way of telling her is as smooth as his béchamel sauce.

When the last customers leave, Òscar sits down at the kitchen table. “Hey maestro, that was a great success. We’ve earned a bite to eat.”

“Sorry Òscar, but the foodie parties are a bygone thing. When we finish work these days we toddle off to bed. The boss won’t let me invite anyone to the smallest breadcrumb. She’s Anglo-Saxon through and through and doesn’t understand how we Mediterraneans revere the table, or that we don’t sit down to stuff ourselves but to share, to please, to have fun and to love. We might have to sleep in a sleeping bag, use a bowl to wash ourselves and get around on a skateboard, but we never skimp at the table. In our culture “table” means much more than a plank of wood on four legs.

“I remember one occasion, by the sea, where a family was having a picnic under some pine trees. It was in the middle of summer. They were half-naked, didn’t have a portable fridge or an umbrella, but they had a full table, laden with food. I walked by and the granddad raised his hand, offering me a slice of watermelon, with a bite out of it! They asked me to join them. I didn’t accept, of course, as I had to go to work, but I was grateful, not only for that, but because I saw the essence of
the Mediterranean world in their offer of a wobbly table, a family and a bit of – half-eaten – watermelon. That’s what they had and that’s what they offered… to a stranger, a passer-by. Everything for everyone.

“This story, which is trivial but also essential, would never happen in a cold place like Quebec. The weather won’t let them eat outside, they don’t have watermelon and the culture of the table doesn’t exist. The table is here in the Mediterranean and the house is there in the Atlantic. When they want to be hospitable they open the door. We put another plate on the table.”

Although he’s facing away from the door and can’t see her, Àlex knows that Annette is standing just outside the kitchen listening to his words. She doesn’t wear perfume, and he has a faint whiff of a subtle scent he wouldn’t know how to define, the one he picked up even before being introduced to her, a fresh, lemony, tangy fragrance. Annette deliberately makes a noise, but Àlex, unperturbed, continues with his speech. However, he’s no longer addressing Òscar but Annette.

“She comes from a land of potatoes, tubercles buried in the darkness of wet soil. They have to eat cakes for dessert, because the sweetest fruit they have is the carrot, and they cover everything with butter, which clogs up their arteries and brains. You can’t get through to the soul of someone who lives in a place where vines won’t grow.”

“It seems Monsieur le chef he know my country but he never visit there.” Annette is riled. “If you would make effort to visit us one day you see the kitchen is centre of house, with fire always burn for to receive visitors in comfortable way and cook many foods for table which is pride of room. Now we sit down,” she orders in an almost martial tone. “Òscar he deserve his dinner and I have a special dish today.”

“You’re full of surprises, Annette,” Àlex exclaims. “When you’re worked up, you’d put the great Catalan philologist Pompeu Fabra to shame.”

Òscar watches the conversation as if at a tennis match. Àlex has sent a hard serve, but Annette has very energetically returned the ball to his court.

She offers a small slice of tomato quiche left over from lunch and some
botifarra
, with a Penedés Merlot to drink. Òscar’s enjoying watching them together. He’s increasingly convinced that they’re madly, desperately in love. Hearing them squabbling, one might conclude that they deeply dislike one another, even if the scorn-laden words they use are distinctly puerile. In their stolen glances, when one looks at the other when sure it won’t be noticed, the candour of their gaze is total.

Àlex stares at Annette adoringly, as if her curves were the fragile outline of a Romanesque statue of the Virgin, a wonderful work of art. The unmistakable sign that he’s head-over-heels is that he eats everything she serves him, reverentially, as if taking communion.
The body of Annette. Amen
.

“God, this
botifarra
is amazing. How did you do it?” Òscar breaks the mystical silence that has descended on the kitchen in Roda el Món.

“Very good, Annette. It really is,” Àlex says, “but I’m sure you’re tricking us and you didn’t make it yourself. Where did you find it?”

“I no buy it. I give little drink of Caol Ila if you find secret ingredient.” Annette is amused.

Òscar actually knows that this sausage is filled with haricot beans, but holds his tongue, because it’s clear that Annette wants Àlex to make the effort to guess the secret. But Àlex has no intention of activating his taste-bud memory. He’s not in the mood for playing culinary riddles.

“I haven’t got a clue what you’ve got hidden in this
botifarra
and I couldn’t care less. The main thing is that it’s full-flavoured and smooth, with a slightly earthy taste that balances the pork fat. It’s a metaphor for life. Flesh kindles desire, earth holds us firm, and fat is our reserve for surviving life’s ups and downs.”

“I no understand nothing. When you say this philosopher talk you impossible.” Annette sighs loudly, as if bored to death and looks heavenwards.

“Annette’s right. You’re a better chef than philosopher,” Òscar intervenes. “I think he’s trying to say that even if we like a woman a lot we have to be rational, keep our feet on the ground and our head well stocked in order to cope with problems and always be prepared. Is that what you meant? Were you comparing the
botifarra
with love?”

“Exactly,” says Àlex, staring at the
botifarra
and unsure how to continue the conversation after his absurd homespun philosophizing, which has left him fairly well unmasked. “The secret ingredient, as you like to call it, is haricot beans. I haven’t eaten them for more than two decades, but the taste is unmistakable and it’s branded on my memory with a white-hot iron. The clever thing is putting the beans inside the sausage and thereby making one single product out of the two things,
botifarra
and
mongetes
, which is supposedly the quintessential Catalan dish. This is totally ignorant of course, and shows how little people know about our cooking. When I hear people spouting this nonsense I feel like throwing up.”

“It’s long debate, Àlex. Food, Catalan or Québécois, no is inert thing but it live and it change. Cooking we do today no is cooking of yesterday. You want to keep still, you go against movement of world. It no have sense.” Annette’s tone conveys all the weariness of a long struggle against all the elements.

“Well, I happen to think that if we don’t preserve the identity of our cuisine by establishing its basic structure, we’ll end up eating sushi rice casserole with wasabi peas. What do we miss when we’re away from home? Cupcakes? If we want to feel we’re part of a culture, we’ve got to protect what we have and stop being so permeable.”

“Umberto Eco he explain that incorporate new products in diet of Catalans, Spanish and Europeans it was essential for to save them. He
say protein from dry beans help to make multiply European population after Middle Ages. But it also seem that people of Europe eat dry beans before America discovered, but this kind very primitive and vulgar. American bean, it very more resistant and better taste, so substitute other bean. When it arrive to Catholic lands in sixteen century, the people they reject it and it only start like them for to eat in middle of eighteen century, but now everyone they say Catalans they only know to eat haricot beans!” Annette counters.

“Yes, you’re right. Catalans would live exclusively on potatoes, tomatoes and beans, whatever the order,” Àlex notes. “My cooking was risky, taking a leap to maximum difficulty and a challenge that’s almost impossible to meet today, because it was based on what people ate before the arrival of food coming from the New World. In my resistance against using these products that are so deeply rooted, despite having such distant origins, I had a lot of fun. I wanted to see if I could avoid them in all my recipes and to test how far I could stretch the tolerance of my customers. This radicalism, in addition to my impeccable technique, got me listed as one of the most daring and best-rated chefs in Spain. I wanted to pique the curiosity of the food critics and, when I succeeded, I was acclaimed. Of course, the whole thing got me nowhere and has been nothing but a resounding failure.”

Òscar and Annette stare at Àlex in amazement. He’s never given such a clear and serene explanation of his reasons for rejecting New World products.

“It hasn’t been such a resounding failure. Not totally. We’re here, aren’t we? And it seems that the restaurant’s doing well.” Òscar tries to tone down the drama. “In any case, you get ten out of ten for this
botifarra
, Annette. You must put it on the menu. By the way, since you’re so well informed about the origins of food, do you know why beans are called
mongetes
– like the word for little nuns – in Catalan, and
judías
– like
the feminine form of the word for Jews – in Spanish? It looks like a contradiction, doesn’t it?”

“In the popular etymology people they say the nuns… um – how you say them? – ah yes, the
monges
, they eat always this bean they think is kind of white pea, so the people give name
mongetes
, like ‘little nuns’. In Spanish they call these beans
judías
because the Jews they torture by putting in boiling water like the beans. But these no very scientific theories, and I think they no come from serious studies, but someone tell stories by fireside,” she says with the solemn air of a senior lecturer in anthropology.

“Yes, Annette, you should put this
botifarra
on the menu. It’ll be a winner.” Àlex winds up the conversation. “Goodnight.”

Òscar makes the most of the occasion to leave, in case he ends up having to wash dishes or dust shelves, or worse, Annette might ask him again for help in advertising and positioning Roda el Món on the Internet.

Annette doesn’t feel like clearing up their dishes. She feels lighter somehow, and reasonably happy. The conversation tonight has been enjoyable and even civilized. She bounds upstairs and, as she goes past Àlex’s door, she hears music. Haydn? How beautiful! She impulsively knocks at the door. Àlex takes a few seconds to answer. He knows it’s Annette. Who else could it be? He’s in his underpants.

“Anything wrong?”

“No. All good. I wanted… I wanted… Is very beautiful, the music.”

“Yes, I like it too. Do you want to come in?”

“No… um yes. I no know. Yes, I think,” she dithers. “I wanted… I wanted talk with you, but it very late maybe.”

“It’ll be a while before I go to sleep. I have a bit of trouble dropping off. You can come in, but there’s just one condition. I don’t want you to tell me about the history of food, whatever the kind. We’ll listen to
music and that’s that.” His gentle tone changes to brusque. “Come in, girl, come in. I’m bloody freezing out here in the passage.”

What is she, the boss, doing in Àlex’s room listening to classical music, and him wearing only underpants? She has no idea but it feels good.

“So, what did you want to talk about?” he asks.

“It no important. Days ago, many days you say, ‘I still miss my brother.’ Talk about it is good sometimes. It just this. If you want… you can to tell me,” Annette stammers.