Devil's Food (32 page)
‘Oh, lovely’, I cried. Jason gave me a fast hug. ‘Happy birthday,’ I said, handing him a box. He put it on the small table which was filling up with presents. The Pandamus family, who had cared so devotedly for Jason, were delighted with the firelit cavern. Everyone, from Yai Yai in her armchair to the smallest girl in her fairy costume, was sipping and nibbling on the delectable little munchies with which the table was littered. Nuts, olives, little frittatas, little pizzas. ‘Aha!’ I said muzzily through the next glass of wine, ‘some of these are yours, are they not, beloved?’
‘Just my recipe book,’ said Daniel. ‘I have spent the day in blameless company, dear love.’
Trudi went to the end of the room and the goods lift trundled down, revealing Jon and Kepler carrying a dented aluminium vat which smelt of lemon and cracked pepper.
‘Lentil soup,’ said Jon. ‘Do sit down, ladies, gentlemen.’
I was sitting next to my lord D’Urbanville. He was dapper and pleased. His mundane name was Tarquin, it appeared. We discussed Georgette Heyer as we sipped soup. It was the essence of fresh tastes.
‘Trudi, how did you do all this?’ asked Daniel, impressed.
‘Therese and Cherie, they told me what to nail, I nailed it,’ she said simply. ‘In the old days they used to have wine tastings and parties down here, we thought, why not again? Just needs some work, seal the chutes, put out the rubbish, clean up a bit. We maybe got better ideas when we found someone left a whole case of that red wine and also bottles of good Dutch genever. I think better in Dutch,’ she informed me, lifting the little glass full of colourless liquid.
‘And we did the flowers,’ said Kylie and Gossamer. They had borrowed goth clothes from Cherie and all three of them looked erotic, overdressed, and terribly pleased with themselves. Mistress Dread approved, but was observed pulling all their corset laces much tighter.
Soup was accompanied by my pasta douro. Then Jon and Kepler hauled in a mountain of boiled new potatoes the size of golf balls, sprinkled with fresh herbs, a smallish vat of beef stifado — I wondered at their daring, cooking a Greek dish for Greeks — and trays of stuffed eggplant. The whole was accompanied by Meroe’s fairy leaves in a delicate lemon juice dressing.
I was picking at the eggplant filling trying to work out what made it taste better than any other eggplant. Tomato, yes, and pine nuts, and — cheese? The Magnificat came to mind. ‘He hath filled the hungry with good things and the rich he hath sent empty away.’ Those Discarnates were even now dining on turnip stew. Very proper. But possibly not to be said to any devout people. I smothered my chuckle and ate more eggplant. Cumin, maybe?
‘But which of you was the witch?’ persisted Kylie. She swished her long black skirt and tapped Taz on the cheek with her fan. He blenched.
‘It was him,’ he said cravenly. Rat ducked his head.
Kylie said, ‘I think that’s very clever of you,’ and he began to smile.
‘And I was the apothecary,’ boasted Taz.
‘You’re clever too,’ said Goss.
‘Can I get you another drink?’ asked Gully.
Jon and Kepler were at last able to sit down and collect a crumb or so of the feast they had so carefully prepared. Just as Jon picked up his spoon, a little Pandamus girl came and whispered in his ear. Considerably startled, he followed her to where Yai Yai was sitting in her armchair, safely out of the way of any draughts. She laid a claw-like hand on his wrist and said something to him. He came back and Kepler said eagerly, ‘Well?’
‘She said I cooked as well as any man could,’ said Jon, quite overcome.
Dinner trailed very agreeably away to a languid dessert of fine cheese, oriental fruits and coffee in the Hellenic manner made by Del himself over a primus. I spooned up a liqueur soaked fig, really not able to eat much more. It burst in my mouth, sweet and tart and voluptuous.
The company relaxed. All’s well that had indeed ended well. I was full and a little drunk and delighted. Both my parents had gone home. I had had the confrontation which I had avoided all these years and I hadn’t been struck by lightning. Nerds Inc was still solvent but they wouldn’t be selling any more poisons or corrupting any more boys. Father Hungerford was back with Sister Blithe, Therese could devote herself to Carolus, and how I looked forward to Carolus snubbing Mrs Pemberthy’s rotten little doggie, Traddles. Daniel was still with me and Jason had fought off his family. All in all, a pretty good result.
Jason was opening his presents. I had given him a cheap watch. Baker’s watches always get ruined. Jon and Kepler had given him a chess set. Meroe had given him a book on positive dreaming, and the others had largely given him money, which was always acceptable. He beamed. His CD collection was going to get a boost. It was the only male birthday of my acquaintance where someone didn’t give the birthday boy socks. But we are a select company.
Then the lights dimmed and we saw candles. Jason bore his birthday cake into the room. He set it down carefully. It was a huge chocolate cake, covered with licks of ganache, and it looked delicious and completely inedible after the dinner we had just absorbed.
Then again, dessert goes into a different stomach. The children sang ‘Happy Birthday’ four or five times to make sure that they got it right, then everyone had to have a go at blowing the candles out. Finally Jason sliced it. Unusual. Inside, it was not chocolate brown, but red.
‘What sort of cake is this, Jason?’ I asked.
‘Devil’s Food,’ he said, and grinned.
LEMON AND LENTIL SOUP
The admirable Mark Deasey’s lemon and lentil soup I have never tasted better.
2 cups brown lentils
olive oil
2 medium–large onions, peeled and chopped
bunch of silverbeet
juice of 2 large lemons
salt and whole black peppercorns
Soak the lentils overnight or, if time presses or you forgot, cover with cold water and bring to the boil, cover and turn off the heat and leave for an hour.
Drain, cover to two centimetres with fresh water (this reduces the flatulence quotient), bring to the boil and simmer until tender (which won’t be long, don’t overcook them) — maybe five minutes. Keep tasting.
Cover the base of a heavy pot with olive oil. When hot, throw in the onions, stir, and leave to braise until they turn golden. While this is going on, wash the silverbeet well. Chop off the manky ends of the stems only, finely slice the rest and leave in a colander.
When the onions are ready, throw in the silverbeet, turn the heat to high and stir until the onions and silverbeet are mixed together. Cover closely, turn the heat down to medium and cook, stirring occasionally, until the stems are tender.
Add the lentils and enough water (if needed) to come barely to the top of the mixture. Add the lemon juice and about 20 peppercorns, coarsely cracked (do this with a mortar and pestle. Taste the difference with freshly cracked pepper and henceforth your preground pepper will gather dust at the back of the shelf ). Add salt to taste and simmer the lot together for about 15 minutes. Serve with bread or cheese scones.
ORIENTAL FRUITS (PERSIAN DELIGHTS)
6 cups dried fruit
(for example, figs, stoned dates, stoned prunes, apricots, apples, pears, etc)
a cinnamon stick
2 pieces star anise
1 long piece of lemon peel, removed with a potato peeler
1 cup dry sherry
water
Cut the fruit to an agreeable size and chop the stem off the figs. Put all the pieces into a heavy-bottomed saucepan with the cinnamon stick, star anise and lemon peel. Add the dry sherry and enough cold water to barely cover. If your tooth is incorrigibly sweet, add some caster sugar but this syrup will be fine without it.
Bring slowly to the boil, cover, reduce flame to lowest possible. Simmer 10 minutes, take off heat, and leave to sit covered for an hour or more. Reheat just before serving. Place a knot of Persian fairy floss on top and serve with Greek yogurt.
DEVIL’S FOOD CAKE
This was originally a red velvet cake, which explains why some recipes still have cochineal in them. I can see no point in this as the red colouring is entirely subsumed in the chocolate. The culinary opposite is Angel’s Food cake, now made with that abomination, white chocolate.
160 g butter
1 cup caster sugar
3 eggs, lightly beaten
70 g cocoa (I use Cadbury’s baking cocoa)
3 tsp instant coffee
2 cups self-raising flour
½ cup Kahlua or marsala
½ cup milk (or less, see how wet the batter is)
Filling
300 ml cream
Icing
80 g good dark chocolate
80 g butter
Preheat the oven to 180 degrees or moderate. Spray two 8-inch (20 cm) cake tins with oil.
Cream together the butter and sugar. Stir in the beaten eggs and beat again. Add the cocoa powder and coffee and keep beating. Fold in the flour and the milk and marsala alternately, and if the mixture is as stiff as dough add more milk until it looks like — well, cake mix. Until it can be poured.
Pour into tins and bake for about 40 minutes, until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean.
When the cakes are cool, join them with a thick layer of whipped cream.
For the icing melt the butter and the chocolate in the microwave or over boiling water. It only takes a minute. Beat the mixture until it is smooth, then let it sit until it is cool enough to handle. Slather it over the cake. It will set.
Oddly enough, this cake keeps very well. The tricky bit is testing this, because it vanishes off the table really fast.
Happy cooking!
Kala orexi!
Please do not try to lose weight by making up your own herbal tea. It will not work. It might also poison you. Blake was not joking about Caesar’s laurel crown. Just because it’s herbal doesn’t mean it’s good for you.
I have made every effort to ensure that I haven’t made any mistakes, but I will have. If they are minor, do not tell me in reproachful, or even worse, gleeful detail. It ruins my day. If they are major, of course, I apologise. Anyone who likes can email me on [email protected]
ALSO FROM ALLEN & UNWIN
Earthly Delights
Kerry Greenwood
‘
Earthly Delights
is a pleasure to read—witty, surprising, and opinionated … There is corruption and violence … but there is also redemption, and compassion, and friendship, and courage, and humour. And good food. And lots of cats. If any of these appeal to you,
Earthly Delights
probably will, too.’ —
Western Australian
Baking is an alchemical process for Corinna Chapman. At four am she starts work at Earthly Delights, her bakery in Calico Alley.
But one morning Corinna receives a threatening note saying ‘The wages of sin is death’ and finds a syringe in her cat’s paw. A blue-faced junkie has collapsed in the dark alley and a mysterious man with beautiful eyes appears with a plan for Corinna and her bread. Then it is goths, dead drug addicts, witchcraft, a homeless boy and a missing girl and it seems she will never get those muffins cooked in time.
With flair, chutzpah and a talent for kneading, Corinna Chapman will find out who exactly is threatening her life and bake some beautiful bread.
ISBN 1 74114 236 9
Heavenly Pleasures
Kerry Greenwood
‘This is a fun read with amusing one-liners, entertaining characters, delicious recipes and enchanting descriptions of Corinna’s feline companions’ —
Canberra Times
No one has less interest in mysteries than Corinna Chapman, who has bread to bake, but they seem to be arising spontaneously in the vicinity of her bakery, Earthly Delights. Between the mouthwatering distractions of loaves and muffins, of Jason her apprentice and Horatio the cat, she’s keeping an eye on the door as she waits for the exciting Daniel, her recently acquired lover, to walk back into her life.
After a week of no communication Daniel finally returns, bruised and battered from a run-in with a so-called messiah. But disturbing things are also happening close to home. Juliette Lefebvre, the owner of Heavenly Pleasures and maker of the most gorgeous chocolates in town, is distraught. Someone is spiking her very expensive chocolates. Is it an elaborate and horrible joke, or is it a warning that worse may yet happen?
Heavenly Pleasures
is the second delicious instalment in Kerry Greenwood’s Corinna Chapman series. If you’d like to find out more about Corinna, her bakery and her recipes, log on to
www.earthlydelights.net.au
.
ISBN 1 74114 512 0
