White Truffles in Winter: A Novel Read online

  “His assistant?”

  “Dismissed.”

  “The butler?”

  “Gone.”

  “The head housekeeper, then?”

  “Only on Tuesdays now.”

  “A nurse, perhaps?”

  Sabine picked up a half-plucked chicken from the sink and shook it. “I am very busy, but I will tell everyone that you have left a bounty of gifts,” she said and handed him the empty wicker baskets and held open the back door so that he could easily take his leave. There was not even the offer of a single glass of wine.

  “I see,” he said again.

  Sabine didn’t want another mouth to feed, not even for one meal, and if he stayed one more minute, lunch would have been expected. And that was impossible. The family—all the children, grandchildren, grandnieces and grandnephews—had returned to the house. She had been baking bread and cleaning chickens since dawn.

  “I’m sure Monsieur Escoffier sends his profound gratitude,” she told the Frenchman whose wrinkled linen suit smelled of duck fat and garlic, and then locked the door behind him.

  “Au revoir,” she shouted out the window. “Ciao!”

  Monsieur Heursel turned back for a moment. He looked confused, and so she waved. It was a dismissive wave—more like a shooing away—but it was the best she could do. She didn’t want to encourage the man. He did not wave back, but huffed rather loudly and then made his way through the garden and then out into the street, weaving back and forth, walking from one shaded area to another.

  He must be from Provence, she thought. They hate the sun so much there that they all walk sideways, like crabs.

  His motorcar started with a bang. He drove away in a cloud of exhaust.

  Finally.

  And yet, when Sabine turned back to the table, she regretted sending the man away so quickly. What is to be done with all of this? Geese, she understood. Rub with salt, cover with lard, and roast with potatoes. At what temperature she would roast the birds was a mystery, but she was quite sure that an hour would be long enough. An hour seemed like an eternity to wait for anything.

  But to roast geese in the spring was unheard of. Maybe in Provence, she thought. They do many odd things in the countryside. But Monaco was the playground of the rich, of royalty, and with the warmth of February most began taking la sieste in the afternoon again. To eat roast goose with the promise of summer on everyone’s mind would be absurd.

  And truffles. She had never eaten them nor could she understand why anyone would want to. They were so black it seemed as if you’d have to scrub forever to get them clean. She sliced one in half. It was black inside, too. It had a fine grain, like marble. The provinces are filled with fools. And while she had indeed heard of foie gras, and knew it was a delicacy, it looked disgusting. Huge. Pale. These particular lobes of fatted liver were as big as her foot, at least two pounds. And Sabine was supposed to touch them. Ridiculous.

  She knocked on Escoffier’s door. Silence. Then knocked again.

  “I can hear you breathing.”

  “I am working.”

  “I will feed it to the cats.”

  Sabine could hear the old man’s chair slide away from the desk, hear the floorboards of his room creak. Escoffier slowly opened the door. He looked as if he hadn’t slept all night. His eyes were red-rimmed and dull.

  “You are an impossible woman.”

  “It is true.”

  Soon, under Escoffier’s watchful eye, Sabine was chilling her hands in ice water, so she could handle the liver. It made her wish she’d fed it to the cats after all.

  “Foie gras is sensitive to heat,” he told her. “It must be kept at a constant temperature of about three degrees Celsius.”

  Her fingers were certainly 3°. They were white, numb and shriveled. “I hope this is worth the suffering of the cook.”

  “As a chef, it is your job to suffer.”

  Escoffier leaned against the counter as if trying to keep his balance. He coughed into his handkerchief. More blood, she thought and looked at him closely. His skin was gray. His hands shook. He was obviously unwell. He quickly stuffed the handkerchief into his coat pocket. He washed his hands in scalding hot water, then cold.

  “Ready?” he said.

  “Non.”

  “Good.”

  The lobes were packed in ice. Escoffier ran his fingers over the surface with a series of quick taps. And then gently pressed the liver, holding it with his thumb underneath and four fingers on top.

  “Now, see how I touch? If it is firm, it has too high a fat content and it will shrink when you cook it. If it is spongy, it has too little fat and it will burn. It must have the appropriate amount of give when you touch the flesh.” He tapped it quickly again. “This is perfect. See how there is a slight imprint of my thumb? Now you.”

  Sabine’s fingers were so cold that she could barely feel anything. She tapped the liver once, with her thumb. “Perfect.”

  Escoffier frowned. It was clear why people called him “Papa,” he had her father’s look, a disappointed look that Sabine knew well. He took her hand in his and tapped her fingers against the liver repeatedly.

  “Now. Do you now understand what texture we are looking for?”

  “No.”

  “Then you are not trying.”

  “That is true.”

  “Sabine . . . ”

  “Why did you not soak your own hands in ice?”

  “I am Escoffier.”

  Apparently, that was all the explanation that was needed.

  Sabine washed her hands repeatedly in hot water, rubbed them until the circulation returned to her fingertips, until any trace of the liver was gone. And then she washed them some more.

  “If you are quite through—”

  She wiped them on her starched white apron. Escoffier cocked an eyebrow and said, “That is unsanitary. You are a professional. Act like one. Clean towel always. Now wash again.”

  And so she did. The old man joined her, filling the kitchen again with the scent of olive oil soap and lavender. When they were finished, “Let me see,” he said and inspected her hands closely.

  “What are you looking for?”

  “Some suggestion that you work for a living. Your hands are perfect. Your nails are meticulously manicured. No one trusts a cook with beautiful hands.

  “Now, what do we do next?” he said.

  “I boil the liver, as you have attempted to boil my hands, to make certain that it is cooked?”

  Escoffier closed his eyes. Tapped the side of his nose. He seemed to be trying to compose himself.

  “Foie gras d’oie is the liver of the goose and very fatty, more so than the duck. I have even made ice cream from it. You do not boil it. That would render the fat and make it tough.”

  “Ice cream?”

  “It was not green as you are right now and thereby appetizing to all.”

  Escoffier lifted the large liver from the ice and placed it on the cutting board. Examined it closely. Sniffed it.

  “Very good. This has very few veins. Most will be kept so that it retains its shape. A small knife, Sabine?”

  Sabine pulled a paring knife from the block. It was the only sharp one left.

  “Now,” he said. “Which way do veins run through the liver? Look closely. Can you tell? It is important that large veins be removed or the remaining blood will discolor the foie gras when it’s cooked.”

  He gently tapped the lobes of liver. “Think of this as if it were your own organ.”

  “I’d rather not.”

  “Then think of it as mine. Now, which way do the veins run?”

  Escoffier blotted the liver with a clean towel. There were a few bits of white membrane clinging to the outside. He peeled them away ge
ntly and then trimmed a few green spots. He pulled the lobes apart with his hands and offered them to Sabine.

  “See? A vein connects the two. Take the knife and cut it.”

  Sabine held her breath and sliced the vein quickly.

  “Good. Now pull it out. Slowly, gently, an even motion.”

  “Out?”

  “Out.”

  “I am sure you could do this much better than me.”

  “Pull.”

  Sabine, squeamish, pulled the vein very slowly.

  “Does it help to imagine that it is my liver you are dismantling?”

  “It does, yes.”

  “Good.”

  He laughed for the first time that she could remember. The house was so quiet that his laughter rang through the room, slid under the door, pealed. She imagined the nurses thought it scandalous to laugh at such a sad time, with Madame so gravely ill, and so she laughed, too.

  Escoffier opened his cookbook to foie gras cooked in brioche. “Read,” he said. “Then cook.” He was suddenly sweating but the room was cold. His hands began to shake again.

  “And the geese?” she said.

  “Confit. First, cure with one-quarter cup of sea salt for each pound of meat.” He took a pen from his pocket and began to write on the inside cover of the cookbook. Suddenly he coughed, long and hard. Sabine poured him a glass of rose hip tea that she had set out in the windowsill to steep. He drank, cleared his throat, and started to write again.

  “To cure the goose, you must add salt, cumin, coriander, cinnamon, allspice, clove, ginger, nutmeg, bay leaf—make sure it’s Turkish—thyme, and garlic. After two days, take it to the Grand and ask for—”

  “Bobo?”

  “How do you know Bobo?”

  “Madame told me—”

  “That he thinks he is a rogue?”

  “Yes.”

  “Of course she did,” he laughed. “Madame cannot keep a secret, that is why she is a poet. The truth is, Bobo never leaves his kitchen. He does not even come out to greet the ladies. Let us not hold that against him. Tell him to simmer this in duck fat.”

  “I can boil a bird.”

  “You can barely boil water. Bobo is a good man. He will take the care needed to make sure the geese do not go tough. When done correctly, the meat will flake away when poked with a knitting needle.”

  “But I can boil a bird.”

  “No. You can pick the meat from the bones, cover them with the duck fat and a layer of salt, and pack it into jars for the cellar. You can also convince Bobo to give you the rendered goose fat to brown potatoes. He will do anything for a beautiful woman, he meets so few of them.”

  “What of Madame?”

  “She need not know you did not cook the bird. We won’t mention it.”

  “No. I meant should we not make a dish for her with the goose? Something special?”

  “She enjoys confit.”

  While that might be true, Sabine was not sure that she did. It sounded horrible. She was hoping for something more—something, perhaps, with veal. “Confit is so common. Perhaps you could create something for Madame that includes champagne?”

  “A dish in her honor?”

  “Yes. Maybe not with the goose, but, perhaps, with champagne. And maybe oysters.”

  “No.”

  “We still have several cases of champagne. And it would be simple to get oysters. The fishmonger willingly brought langoustines . . . ”

  “No.”

  “Caviar?”

  “No.”

  “Veal? Veal can be so lovely.”

  “Yes. Veal is lovely. But no.”

  “Madame so wants a dish: something with her name on it. Something rich, expensive and complicated so that we must make it many times and taste it to be sure that it is correct.”

  Escoffier looked at Sabine closely. “She has told you this herself?”

  Sabine nodded.

  “Well, it is impossible,” he said and then walked out of the kitchen.

  Hours later, Sabine had packed the geese away in the spiced salt mixture and baked the foie gras d’oie. Despite its rather tough and burnt brioche crust, she sold half of it to the first café she saw in Place d’Armes. It was only worth a couple of francs to them.

  “No one has money for such things anymore.”

  “But Escoffier himself baked this.”

  “I didn’t know he was still alive.”

  Heathens.

  The shops were closing but Sabine reached the tobacconist just in time. “Lucky Strikes,” she said. “For the house of Escoffier.”

  Being American, the cigarettes were more money than she had, more money than most had, but Sabine suspected that wouldn’t matter.

  “I have heard Escoffier is dying?”

  Sabine conjured up the spirit of Sarah and nodded with such sadness she felt it in her bones. “And Madame also.”

  The small thin man pushed the francs back across the counter. “Tell him his money is no good here.”

  This could be easier than I thought.

  That evening Sabine set the sideboard with three roast chickens, cold stewed tomatoes and what remained of the foie gras with bread. She had cut away the burnt crust and sliced it so cleanly that the truffles retained their shape. In the pantry, she’d found a bottle of oil marked “Olio di Tartufo” and drizzled some over the slices and tasted a bit. It had a complexity that she had never tasted before—darkness with a hint of chocolate. The richness of the foie gras, so like butter, and the earthy perfume of the truffle oil made her laugh with pleasure but it needed wine. In the cellar, there were four bottles marked 1932 Bordeaux “Grand Cru Classé.” Sabine had no idea what that meant or what it would taste like, but could see it was red and she liked red wine, so that was all that mattered.

  She uncorked the wine and tasted it. It seemed bitter and weak. Good enough for them, she thought and poured two bottles into carafes, and set them on the sideboard, rang the dinner bell, and waited.

  The dining room was still warm from the day. The foie gras quickly began to melt. She rang the dinner bell again. By twos and threes the family arrived, ignored the tomatoes, sniffed at the foie gras, and ate the chicken. While they were still eating, Sabine removed the liver and placed it in the icebox.

  Idiots. How can the children of Escoffier not know fine food when they see it?

  She opened another bottle of the Bordeaux and poured a glass. The doctor had given her strict orders not to enter Madame’s room under any circumstances and so she sneaked up the backstairs with a plate and a glass of red wine. She opened Delphine’s door slowly so that she would not be caught. The nurses were bathing her.

  “Go away.”

  Sabine took the tray to Escoffier’s room. Knocked. “Supper.”

  “Leave it by the door.”

  “But it is wonderful.”

  He opened the door. “Truffle oil?”

  She nodded.

  He picked up the plate and sniffed it. “Very nice element.”

  “Perhaps you could name this for Madame.”

  He took another sniff. “You burnt the crust, no?”

  “I removed it. No one knew.”

  “Did they eat it?”

  “No.”

  “Then they knew. And do not serve red wine with foie gras. Sauternes or Monbazillac. Something sweet.”

  “I like red wine.”

  “Unless you are Queen Victoria, no one cares. This is the Saint-Émilion?”

  “Grand Cru Classé.”

  “You have no idea what that means, do you?”

  “None whatsoever.”

  “Then learn. Taste the wine. Study it. But do not drink it with the foie gras. Go. I am working.
”

  And then he closed the door.

  By the time Sabine cleaned the kitchen and washed all the dishes, most in the grand house were either asleep or taking a late night walk around the square. La Villa Fernand was once again quiet.

  Burnt crust or not, Sabine ate the remaining foie gras at the dining room table on the Canton blue plates and wondered what it would be like to travel to places like China where people spoke different languages and ate different things. The foie gras did not taste burned to her and she enjoyed the red wine with it. In fact, she drank the last bottle herself, the bottle that, surprisingly, was no longer harsh and thin but felt full and ripe in her mouth.

  At 2 a.m., Sabine was still dressed, lying across the small bed in her room, dreaming of a China where all the houses and people were as blue as porcelain, when the service buzzer went off, just as it did every night. It was Escoffier wanting his nightcap, his “youth elixir,” as he called it.

  The yolk of one fresh egg beaten with several spoonfuls of sugar, mixed with a pony of champagne and a glass of hot milk. Sabine could barely stomach it. She was dry-mouthed and dizzy from the wine. A few minutes later, she held the tray in her shaking hand and knocked softly. “Monsieur Escoffier?”

  He opened the door in a panic. “She’s crying again.”

  The house was quiet. All Sabine could hear was the sound of the sea, the waves crashing along the shore.

  “Madame?”

  “Yes. Can’t you hear it?”

  Sabine could not. “We’ll call the nurse.”

  “She is sleeping. You can hear her snoring.”

  Sabine listened for a moment. “I hear nothing.”

  Escoffier took her by the arm and roughly pulled her into his room. Tapped the wall. “Listen here.”

  She put her ear to the wall.

  “I hear nothing, Monsieur. Perhaps you fell asleep at your desk. Perhaps you were dreaming.”

  Escoffier sank back into his desk chair, held his head in his hands. Sabine placed the tray on the desk next to him, glancing around the room. She had never been inside of his room before. It was worse than the kitchen, a jumble of things.

  On top of the bookshelf was a reproduction of a passenger train sculpted in sugar. Over the desk was a picture of a tiger created with tiny kernels of rice pasted on canvas. There were menus everywhere, too, richly painted as if greeting cards. Some with geishas bearing Moët, some were obviously for royalty painted with jeweled crowns, ermine and red velvet, and some were funny—one had a group of monkey chefs cooking atop a camel in the desert sun.