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Chapter 32 - First Courses
🕑 Added 2024-12-26 15:40:35 +0000 UTCJulienne was two steps into Cafe Julienne and his plan had already gone wrong.
Mindy had taken it upon herself to serve the previous night’s leftover bread to the Gluttons, whose numbers made up half of the sixteen guests. Julienne had hoped there would have been only two, but he underestimated Price Waldorf’s ability to get his friends on the invite list.
Grand King Flambé took up only ten percent of a fully occupied table, the other guests being his wife and son. The royal council members sat together in a table surrounded on all sides by Prince Waldorf’s entourage of Gluttons. The Chancellor of Culinary Arts sat with Prince Waldorf’s non-Glutton friends, but he seemed awfully chummy with Prince Waldorf and his lot.
The Gluttons ripped pieces of bread off with their teeth, all full of raucous laughter and speaking with their mouths full. They shamelessly turned to gawk at Mindy as she walked between the tables to Julienne.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “They were getting…”
“It’s okay,” Julienne said as he stared past her. “You made the right call. How much bread do we have?”
“That’s about half of what we had on hand.”
“Okay. Ration out the rest and serve it to…them…with each course. We need to give them something to keep them busy. Something to slow them down.”
“We could serve them crab legs?”
“Yes. Good. See if Nori knows how to convert essence into hardness. I want them needing a hammer that we aren’t going to give them.”
“Yes, Chef.”
“How are the amuses?”
“Almost ready to plate.”
“Good. Go help them.”
Mindy dashed off to the kitchen.
Julienne took a deep breath and walked toward his guests. He swallowed hard—he couldn’t have his tumultuous stomach acid causing him to burp mid-speech. He tried to calm himself. In. In. In. Out.
It was time.
“Hello, everyone. Today is a celebration. Not because it is my birthday, but because of what I represent. Centuries ago, Ambrosia started a settlement right here on this mesa that we now call Ambrosia City. It was the first time the people of this land knew of safety. Of prosperity.”
He had the full attention of the grand king and his council. Most of the Gluttons had the decency to stop speaking—not that they stopped chewing. But Prince Waldorf carried on telling a story of one of his many meals from the day. Grand King Flambé shushed him. As much as Prince Waldorf may have scowled, he still caved into silence.
“But Ambrosia’s generosity did not end there. She believed her gifts belonged to everyone, so she sent her four children out to help others, where they founded four kingdoms. One of those children, Nectarus, founded Labrusca. He helped my people, who had fled to the island of Lampuki, return to the mainland to claim a new, fertile homeland that would become home to many generations to come.
“The First King Nectarus had several children, but one stood out. Not as a diplomat or a soldier or a scholar, but as a Chef. Julienne. Ambrosia’s gift was stronger in him than in any other. Nectarus knew what he had to do. He had to give it back. And so he sent his riches with Julienne back to Ambrosia City to build Labruscella and Cafe Julienne in the style of Labrusca.
“Since then, every generation, my family has named the most promising child of each generation Julienne. And as a Julienne, it is my responsibility to continue that tradition of giving back. Today is a celebration of the relationship between our two kingdoms. The gifts we share with each other. Our storied history. And our promising future.”
Grand King Flambé clapped, his council echoing him a moment later. The Gluttons looked around with disinterest.
“Now if you’ll excuse me, your first course is almost ready.”
That got the Gluttons to applaud.
Once inside the kitchen, Julienne the entertainer disappeared, replaced by Julienne the Chef. “Status,” he barked.
“Everything’s ready for the amuses,” Yarrow replied. “Just waiting on you to plate it. We had to cut back the portions.”
“What? Why?”
“You said there would be ten. There are sixteen.”
Julienne sighed. “Prince Waldorf’s posse of monsters. Yarrow. Handle the scallops. Half and half split, consommé poured not quite to the top. Mindy. You’re on the blinis. Do your thing. I’ll handle the roe. Nori? What’s the verdict on the crab?”
She handed over a crab leg. Julienne squeezed it, unable to break it. He smacked it against the counter, but it still did not break.
“Good,” Julienne said. “Ten portions like that. And six more normal ones.”
“Yes, Chef.”
“Archie?”
Archie stirred the beginnings of the torrone. “Everything good so far. It’ll be ready within two hours.”
“Good.”
Julienne placed a fried coral mushroom that had curled up in the shape of a flower on each plate and used a set of tweezers to meticulously place orange-yellow salmon roe into the various folds of the golden-brown mushroom, making the eggs look like little sparkling gold nuggets waiting to be mined.
Yarrow split scallops into two semi-circles, placing them in the nook of deep, near-v-shaped bowls. He topped each semi-circle with a half-disk of black pudding, a patty-like blend of onion, pork fat, and oatmeal. Finally, he poured mushroom consommé—the best that Julienne had ever made—to pool around the scallops.
Mindy, the most natural plater of the bunch, had been given the most difficult task. She took a blini, a bite-sized buckwheat pancake, and topped it with a mound of créme fraîche. On this mountain of cream, she placed black fish roe down one side like a landslide and balanced out the other side with shavings of smoked salmon. She topped the pile with a little sprig of dill, giving the dish a beautiful blend of brown, pink, black, white, and green.
“Ready.”
The waiter by the door signaled for the others in the dining area to grab the plates. Julienne went out with them to present the meal. He had a captive audience—the grand king and his council were excited to experience the rise of the next Julienne, and the Gluttons were excited to eat.
“First up, we have three amuses, each of which celebrates the fusion of earth and sea that makes Labruscan cuisine so unique. Scallops and black pudding topped with a delightful and earthy mushroom consommé. A blini that balances the heaviness of a pancake with the lightness of créme fraîche, fish roe, smoked salmon, and dill. Finally, fried coral mushroom with salmon roe for a beautiful gold-on-gold visual. Enjoy.”
A chorus of plates clattering on tables filled the restaurant as the waiters set down the food, the natural music accented by little ooo’s and ahh’s from the grand king and his men. But someone didn’t want to be part of their musical number.
“That’s it?” Prince Waldorf asked as he looked down at his food. “It’s ninety percent plate.”
Grand King Flambé leaned over the table and grumbled at his son. “It’s an amuse, not a deluge. Show some respect.”
“The only amuse-ing thing about this is that he thinks this qualifies as a meal,” Prince Waldorf complained loudly enough for everything to hear. His sycophants laughed with him.
There were over two hundred knives in Cafe Julienne. Julienne knew where they all were and where he would put each one in Prince Waldorf.
“Enough,” Grand King Flambé hissed. He took a fork to the blini, his eyes closing as he savored the taste. “Julienne. This is delightful.”
“Enjoy,” Julienne said. He turned his attention to Prince Waldorf. “There will be more coming. We’ll have crab out shortly.”
Back in the kitchen, Julienne checked on everyone’s progress. Yarrow and Nori frantically chopped oranges and strawberries. Mindy obsessed over getting the exact combination of mixed greens right on each plate. Only Archie seemed calm as he stirred away, oblivious to the others.
As Julienne mixed olive oil, white wine vinegar, salt, pepper, sugar, and vanilla extract to create a vanilla vinaigrette, he checked to make sure Archie’s confidence wasn’t a facade.
“You good?”
Archie smiled, his head bobbing back and forth with the rhythm of the stirring. “This one’s gonna be even better than the last.”
“Good.” Julienne tasted the vinaigrette and added more salt. Archie had been a question mark going into the day. It was good that Julienne could rely on him.
“Hey. I know it’s your day, but…” Archie didn’t look away from his work.
“What?” Julienne asked while looking in the cabinets for tarragon leaf. He couldn’t spare a second and was already annoyed that Archie waffled on whatever he was about to ask.
“Well, if it…if it’s not too much trouble…when you serve the torrone…”
Julienne could tell that Archie had lost the rhythm of the stirring. “Hey. Focus.” Julienne snapped his fingers at the pot.
“Sorry. If you have the chance and think it’s okay, can you tell them that a Kent made it?”
Archie stared deeply into the pot—not out of focus but out of shame. At least he had some. This was Julienne’s day. A day with a thousand years of history behind it. Not the day of a family that hadn’t been relevant for two generations. A “no” bubbled to Julienne’s lips, but he did not speak it. As upsetting as the request was, Julienne knew that his name had given him a platform that was large enough to share.
“Sure,” he said. “If it feels natural.”
“Thanks.”
“Yarrow,” Julienne barked, eager to get out of that conversation. “There’s a canvas bag in the fridge over there with crumble cheese. Grab it for me.”
Yarrow ran—being a natural sprinter was an essential skill of cooking in Cafe Julienne’s large kitchen—and fetched the bag. “Did you make this? It’s buzzing with essence.”
Julienne smiled. “I owe it to the bees. That’s nectarus vanilla in there.”
“Crab ready,” Nori shouted.
“No presentation,” Julienne responded. “Just get them on plates and get them out there. Nori, work with Yarrow to set up the eggs, but don’t start cooking. We need to serve sixteen egg plates at the same time and the texture and heat have to be perfect. Mindy, help me with the salads.”
A few hectic minutes later, Julienne and the waiters presented the salads.
“Mixed greens, Labruscan oranges and strawberries, topped with crumble and a necartus vanilla vinaigrette. The yellow flowers are nectarus vanilla orchids. The use of nectarus vanilla in this dish harkens back to First King Nectarus. There is only one species of bee known to pollinate this specific flower, and they can only be found in Lampuki, making this dish a truly unique experience.”
Prince Waldorf used his great weight to crack a crab leg halfway through Julienne’s presentation. At least something kept the manchild busy. But not busy enough.
“Julienne. I want to go back there,” Prince Waldorf said.
“Excuse me?” Julienne asked, genuinely confused.
“I want to go to the kitchen,” he said plainly. He pointed a massive finger at the swinging doors of the kitchen.
“Uh—I…”
“Behave yourself,” Grand King Flambé warned his son.
“I’m sorry,” Julienne said, emboldened by the grand king but still terrified of the prince’s potential outburst. “We don’t allow guests into the kitchen.”
“Well I’m not a guest. I’m the prince. That makes you the guest.”
Stress balled up in the center of Julienne’s head, a painful pressure forming behind his eye. “I…”
“Enough,” Grand King Flambé intervened. He nodded reassuringly at Julienne. As long as the grand king was there, the prince could be controlled.
Prince Waldorf cursed under his breath and took his mother’s plate in protest—not that she had eaten any. She couldn’t eat anything in solid form, but Uncle Julienne had been adamant that Julienne serve her like everyone else anyway.
Julienne retreated back into the kitchen. Four stovetops each contained four skillets. Julienne, Yarrow, Mindy, and Nori each took up one station and started on the eggs. Once the eggs finished, Julienne grabbed the truffle. While Archie stirred away, the rest stared in awe at the infinitely expensive ingredient, ignoring their responsibilities. Julienne didn’t mind for the moment. He was as excited as they were.
He grinned as he cut off a shockingly large chunk of truffle.
“Oh my…” Yarrow’s hands went up and down with nervousness.
“Chunks,” Julienne said with a dramatic flair. “Not shavings.” He chopped a finger-sized log of truffle into six parts.
They filled special plates with a circular dip in the middle with the lightly cooked egg and topped it with the truffle and cured pork fat. Julienne took a plate out with the waiters, buzzing with anticipation as he crossed into the dining area. They were going to love this one.
But the atmosphere seemed even more hostile than before. The Gluttons laughed at some joke that must have been offensive based on the way that the council members hunched over their table in defiant silence. Splinters of crab legs littered the tables and floor. A couple of the Gluttons had taken it upon themselves to move their chairs to another table, throwing off the balance of the room. Julienne powered through.
“I must admit, I am most excited for this dish. My Great Aunt Julienne has supplied me with a genuine white truffle, which are the chunks that you see. The white truffle can only be found in north-central Labrusca—nowhere else in the world has the right conditions for it to grow.”
He gestured to the statue of the truffle hunter that extended over a table of Gluttons. He imagined it falling and crushing the occupants below, but didn’t let such a dream affect his tone.
“Truffle hunting is a valued tradition of Labrusca. It is one of the most dangerous, competitive occupations in the world and requires a truly amazing amount of expertise. Depending on the time of year, a white truffle can be more expensive than a similarly weighted dragon scale. You’ll find that it adds an earthiness and contrasting texture to the creamy egg, which I hope you all enjoy.”
Julienne looked to Grand King Flambé for validation, but received none—the king seemed weaker than when they arrived. He coughed painfully, his eyes unfocused and his head wobbling around. His energy had gone, but no one seemed alarmed by his deterioration. It was as if his grand flame had been lowered to a mere ember by the suffocating presence of the Gluttons.
The council members ate and spoke softly to each other, careful not to get a rise out of any of the Gluttons that ran the show. One of the Gluttons reached over and grabbed another’s truffle, his hand coming away dripping with egg. The victim of the heinous crime reached over to take it back, but his chair snapped, dropping him to the floor with a thud—Cafe Julienne only had six chairs built for Gluttons, so two normal chairs had been given an impossible task.
In the commotion, Julienne retreated back into the kitchen, wishing the job was more cooking and less presenting. But such was the life of a Julienne. As he approached Mindy and Yarrow to see their progress on the meatballs, the noise from the dining area intensified, a mixture of laughter and protests bouncing into the kitchen.
The double doors swung open. Julienne turned, expecting to see a waiter.
Prince Waldorf’s massive frame filled the entire doorway.
The Glutton stepped into the kitchen and looked around with his arms held out wide. “Now this is magnificent.”
Julienne watched in horror, frozen to the spot. Something moved quickly at his side. He turned to watch Archie try to grab the counter for support and take the tray of roasted nuts down to the ground with him as he collapsed.
