Vanilla Salt (26 page)

Some years after they’d embarked on this upscale life in Chicago, Annette’s father fell ill and died a few months later. He had employed good managers, but without the director’s supervision serious problems began to appear. Although she had neither the slightest wish nor desire to do so, Annette felt obliged to take over. Her husband left his well-paid job and they moved to Quebec to run the company.

Annette went back to her maiden name, Chaubel, and her husband slowly took over the whole management of the business, as he believed that the old system was outdated. He introduced new production systems and aggressive sales-and-marketing strategies that were very different from her father’s clear, simple business style. Annette took no interest in the new management plan. She was very busy meeting her friends for afternoon tea, helping an NGO that was building houses in Mali, working with an amateur theatre group of some renown in Quebec and attending all the classical-music concerts at the Opera House.

It was around this time that she started getting interested in cooking and food anthropology, so she enrolled for a master’s degree in anthropology at the prestigious University of Quebec. She was busy all day long, although she also managed to find time to go to her father’s old business
ATLANTIC VIANDES
, mainly because there were always a lot of documents and cheques to sign, a result of the express wish of her father before he died that Annette keep the company in her name and not give power of attorney to anyone, not even her husband. She was the CEO, and nobody else could sign on the company’s behalf. This power was to be her downfall. She trusted her husband so much and was always so busy with classes, meetings, the NGO, concerts, theatre, food and everything else, that she never took the time to check what she was signing. Indeed, in all honesty she now admits that she wouldn’t have understood it anyway.

She and her husband were growing further and further apart. He was very busy and she had a lot of interests, so many that she didn’t notice
that he had quite a collection of lovers. As far as she was concerned, it was fine that he was so busy and keeping well out of her life. Moreover, he liked all the trappings of being a rich man. He travelled with his lovers to the most exotic places, took them out to dinner at good restaurants and had a marvellous flat for his trysts. He coveted wealth with ever greater avidity, obsessed in his quest to squeeze bigger profits from the company. He’d cooked up several different strategies, some of which were quite bizarre, until he came to the conclusion that the best way to make quick, juicy profits was to speed up the process of fattening the animals. He put his plan into action, resorting to fraudulent ways of puffing up the poor calves, giving them large doses of clenbuterol, a magical drug that quickly produced impressively bulky animals, which were heavy not in meat or fat, but fluids and chemical substances. The overdose he administered caused acute food poisoning in consumers. When the crime was revealed, all fingers pointed at Annette as the guilty party. After all, she’d signed the contracts and ordered the purchase of massive quantities of clenbuterol… unaware of what she was doing. She hit the headlines.

Annette Chaubel, owner and director of A
TLANTIC
V
IANDES
, has been charged with fraud after being held solely responsible for authorizing the use of the outlawed drug clenbuterol for fattening animals, causing ten deaths and widespread food poisoning affecting hundreds of people throughout Canada.

Before the case came to court, she became a fugitive, using her married name of Wilson and eventually moving as far away as possible from Canada. At first she hid out with some friends in Iowa, but she couldn’t stay with them indefinitely, since she feared they might get mixed up in the scandal. And she wasn’t the only one who thought so, as her friends
started dropping hints about the risks they were taking by harbouring her. Wounded by their insinuations, Annette began to think about where to go. The United States was too close. She had to put a great distance between herself and Canada, so she decided on Europe and, while still unsure about exactly where, she “bumped into” Òscar online, and after that a whole series of coincidences led her to Bigues i Riells.

“Now I here. You see I become delinquent but no know it. A totally broked fugitive and my husband – yes, he still my husband – he live like king in United States because he steal company money when he see the problems that they arriving.”

“Jesus Christ!” Àlex can’t think of anything else to say. “We’re two tormented souls, with two strange and complex stories and we’ve met up here in this corner of the world. We’ll have our work cut out to fix things.”

“We no so special. You no must think you different. All people have story but no want think about it. You no have interest for know my story until you put me in the bed. We all us alone people who share this world.”

“Well, I want to be more interested. Come on, what about the second course?”

It’s very early. The sun’s hardly up and Annette’s already at work in the kitchen. She’s slept very little and is agitated and happy all at once. Last night she opened two bottles that had been languishing for too long in the cellar, made love with Àlex and finally told him her story. She feels light and floaty with relief, but today isn’t the best day to get carried away with memories or drifting about like a teenager, sighing like
la dame aux camélias
. It’s a very important day, crucial for the future of the restaurant.

Àlex comes downstairs, looking very spruce. He’s whistling, and seems happy. They wish one another good morning, as if nothing has
happened between them. They don’t have a moment to sit down, have a cup of tea and talk about what they shared just a few hours ago. There’s a lot of work to do before the members of the press turn up for the gala presentation of Roda el Món. Nobody will be absent, because they all know Àlex and, furthermore, Carol has weighed in by phoning up the big names. Everyone’s quite excited.

Outwardly, Àlex is happy, but a terrible uneasiness is gnawing at his entrails, and this has nothing to do with all the delightful moments of his marvellous night with Annette. They made love again after she gave him her stark but complete account of her previous life, because he wanted her to understand that she had his total support and that he’d do everything within his power never to let her down.

Carol’s vile plan is the cause of his malaise.

The party is tonight and, though he’s been racking his brains, he hasn’t come up with a plan to foil her… and to make sure that nobody gets hurt. Time’s marching on, but he hasn’t worked out his counterattack. Of course he’s not going to say anything in the
Dia i Nit
interview about Annette adulterating the food and he certainly won’t poison the food. That’s for sure. He also knows that when Carol discovers he’s let her down, they’ll be felled by another kind of poison, and they might as well say bye-bye to Roda el Món.

“Àlex, you have eaten breakfast?” Annette asks.

“Have you seen me having breakfast? I don’t think there’s a bar in my room… yet. But there are definitely some empty bottles. Anyone might think there was a rave in there last night, with free drinks and all.”

“Please, you taste one thing. I make you special breakfast.”

“It’s not a day to be tasting stuff. We’ve got tons of work and we’d better get down to it.”

“I know, I know. But only one moment.” She passes him a plate of toast.

Apparently it’s a plate of toast. One slice has chopped cucumber on it, another chocolate cream and the third some slices of tomato.

“Well, if it’s a feast to celebrate our first coupling, it’s a bit low-key, isn’t it? You might have made more of an effort with French champagne, strawberries,
bellota
ham, buttery croissants, scrambled eggs… I know we’re on a tight budget but… three slices of toast, and you haven’t even tried to hide the tomato! How am I supposed to take this? Are you breaking up with me already? If that’s the case, there are plenty of other ways of doing so.”

“You be quiet, Professor Big Spoon. I no have interest for to feed you. I want you taste a thing I keep like diamond. I have very little quantity so let you taste it mean I love you, and you know that last night. If you like this taste I make aperitif for journalists. Unfortunately, I no have sufficient for to cook, but little aperitif, yes.”

Àlex tastes the toast. There is one flavour in common, despite the fact that the three toppings are totally different. He knows this flavour, tries to dredge it up from his memory, but he has to dig deep, because he’s almost totally forgotten it. When he finally grasps the aromatic sweetness of the mystery ingredient, his unconscious takes him back to one long-ago summer. He’s very little, with his parents and brother in a bar in Vielha, and crying, “I want an ice cream, I want an ice cream!” When he finally gets it, he doesn’t like the taste, so he offers it to a famished-looking dog in the street. His mother smacks him so hard that the flavour is branded into his brain for ever. The toasts have a hint of that ice cream. He likes it, yes, he likes it very much.

“What a mystery. I don’t know what you’ve put in this, but it’s magic. It completely changes the taste of the food it’s mixed with. I love it. It’s some spice, isn’t it?”

“Yes, it vanilla,” she says.

“But vanilla is sweet and with the cucumber… well, you don’t pick up that sickly sweetness.”

“How long you no taste vanilla? Good vanilla, the best, like this, no is sweet. It very, very aromatic but no have taste. I need make you a vanilla class. The tongue only catch basic tastes, salt, sweet, bitter and sour. The rest of gastronomic perceptions they stimulated by aromas, and aromas give real ‘taste’ that tongue no catch. It olfactif that it take aromas to brain and give this information of taste of food. So this vanilla no can to be sweet because tongue no catch it. This difficult for to explain, but simple with experiment. You cover the nose. Good. Keep the nose covered and I put in your mouth this little thing and then you tell me your perception.”

“Salt,” he says nasally.

“Uncover nose and what you find now?”

“Ice cream.” Not to mention his mother’s slap that summer afternoon in the bar in Vielha.

“Vanilla. It not sweet and not salty, but what you taste now it vanilla salt I make in Canada and bring here in suitcase. It my treasure, because quality it is exceptional, so I bring this from my country as a jewel, like Christopher Columbus. When he find out he no reach to India, and he no know where he arrive, but he spend already all gold the King and Queen give him for to buy spices, so he feel very disappointed. So vanilla and red pepper that I talk about before, solve his problem. Spanish people happy with spices because they conserve very good, so food last more in time when they no have fridge. So spices they very valuable. They also give new aromas to food which have very small variety. They no have the greenhouse for to grow strawberry, so they must to eat them only in springtime and no like now all the year. The spices they give illusion they eat many different things, but the principal ingredients they the same. The vanilla tree no grow in Spain, because it need tropical
place, so it different from red pepper. They must to import vanilla from distant lands, so it very expensive, only for rich people, so they think it even more better.”

“So you’ve flavoured salt with vanilla. That’s a great idea. You can make some money out of that. Set up a little stall in the market and sell salt flavoured with different spices. You can call it ‘Annette’s Aromas’.” He’s teasing her. “But till you start making a fortune selling little pots of salt at the price of spices these days, we’ve got to work and, in particular, cook for this show tonight. Otherwise when the journalists arrive we’ll only have a teaspoon of salt to offer them, and then they’ll think we’re just a couple of
salt
imbanqui leaping about with nothing to offer.”

Annette doesn’t get the joke, as she’s lost in thought, her freckles consulting the ceiling. Then she exclaims, “Àlex, what you just say for to tease me is brilliant idea. Why no? You famous chef, your cooking celebrated and many people wish to discover your secret. In home people they no have time and they cook very basic and very repeat like grill, boil, steam or sometimes vegetables in frying pan. Everyone complain that home food is boring, like we go back to the king and queen of Columbus time when they no have variety. No time, no knowledge, no imagination – it all make the food very monotonous in home. If they have your ‘secret’, the food very flavour and fun and they can to change taste without they change the food.”

“I was joking before! You’ve taken me too seriously, I fear. Are you ‘cooking up’ some new product, perhaps?”

“I no sure if you make joke, but I very serious. We have product and it very success product. You listen me. This very simple. We aromatize salt with spices and we combine spices to make bouquet salt also. When people make the grilled chicken in home they can put rosemary salt one day, and ‘Bouquet Salt One’ another day or ‘Bouquet Salt Two’ or ‘Three’ or ‘Four’… This salt it have taste of Àlex cooking, so it have melange of
spices you put in restaurant for the chicken. We can to make catalogue of many flavours of salt. The chicken it stay same every night, but it seem different chicken because it have the new flavour.”

“You’re completely batty, Annette. As if we didn’t have enough work in the restaurant without getting caught up in a new project. It’s not as easy as you think. Who’ll buy it? Our customers! All half-dozen of them?”

“I no have batty in belfry! This is very good idea. What it cost us for to make product? Few cents for the salt. Salt! It cost nothing. Salt, spices, pots we only need for to start. It no go spoil. On the opposite, salt and spices they conserve the food. Yes, we can to sell it in restaurant and try in shops also. It good business, because it cost almost zero. Listen me: ZERO!”

“Hmm. You might be right. Let’s talk about it tomorrow. Let me remind you that we have fifty journalists coming here for dinner tonight. We’ve been here in the kitchen for half an hour and haven’t as much as washed a lettuce.” Àlex ties up his apron, which means serious work.