Cooking for Picasso Read Free

chocolate for the quick breakfast she shared with her parents, then to serve the morning customers their
brioche
and coffee. After that, she got the stocks simmering gently on the stove before she went outside to pare her vegetables; now it was time to assemble all the salads for the lunch service.
    Yet apparently her mother had much more unusual plans for Ondine today.
    “Just make one perfect salad, fit for our new
Patron,
” Madame Belange commanded. “And write down every ingredient we’ve used in today’s lunch for our records.” With her hip she pushed a cupboard drawer shut. “This man will be a regular customer, so we don’t want to give him the same lunches again and again. Make notes,
tout de suite
—and put that convent schooling of yours to some real use!”
    Ondine reached up to a shelf for one of the blank notebooks they used for such occasions—bound in butter-soft maroon leather, they’d been a gift from a stationer who ate his lunch at the café three times a week. She turned to the first page, which had a printed box framed by an illustration of bunched grapes on a twirling vine. Inside the box was a line designated for filling in a
Nom
. She imagined that this new
Patron
must be some rich banker or lawyer.
    She paused. “What’s his name?” she asked curiously.
    Her mother waved a ladle indifferently. “Who knows? He’s got money, that’s all that matters!”
    So Ondine simply wrote a large
P
for
Patron.
Then she turned to the next page and wrote
2 April 1936
at the top before she recorded today’s meal, checking on which ingredients were used and how they were cooked. Her mother kept such records only for distinguished customers, and special events like catered meals or wedding banquets. Later she would add comments about the
Patron
’s personal preferences and how the recipe might be better tailored to him.
    Madame Belange looked up from the stove and said resolutely, “All right now. Put away the notebook and let’s pack up this meal!”
    “Pack it?” Ondine echoed in surprise.
    Her mother wore an especially sober expression. “This man has rented one of the villas at the top of the hill. Here’s the address,” she said, digging in her pocket for a scrap of paper and handing it to her. “You will use your bicycle to bring him his lunch every weekday.”
    “What am I, a donkey?” Ondine demanded indignantly. “Since when do we deliver lunch to people’s houses? Who is this man, that he can’t come to the café to eat his lunch like everybody else?”
    Madame Belange said, “He’s someone
très célèbre
from Paris. He speaks French, but I’m told he’s a Spaniard. The nuns taught you Spanish at the convent, yes?”
    “A little,” Ondine answered warily.
    “Well, it might finally come in handy.” Her mother glanced around decisively. “Get me that nice striped pitcher for the wine.”
    “But that’s your favorite!” Ondine objected. Besides, the tall, hand-painted pink-and-blue pitcher had been promised to her for her wedding trousseau—if she ever made it to the altar. Her unsentimental mother shrugged. Ondine muttered, “I hope this fancy Spaniard appreciates it.”
    She had to move swiftly now; the meal was coming together quickly. They packed the lunch into an insulated metal hamper, wrapping each dish tightly in red-and-white cloths. Then Ondine went into the basement to an oaken barrel of house wine, from which she siphoned off enough white wine to fill a bladder made of pigskin which she brought upstairs. Madame Belange ordered one of the waiters to carry the hamper outside and securely clip it to the metal basket on Ondine’s bicycle.
    “
Alors!
Listen carefully.” Her mother fixed her with a stern look. “You are to enter the
Patron
’s house from the side door, which he will leave unlocked for you. Go straight into the kitchen. Heat up the food and lay it out for him. Then leave, right away. Do not wait for him to come downstairs to