James Norton

At the expense of my credibility, I’m going to put a little more fiction up on the site. This is my (far from formalized and completed) first chapter:

“Cooking is the oldest of all arts: Adam was born hungry, and every new child, almost before he is actually in the world, utters cries which only his wet nurse’s breast can quiet.”
– Brillat-Savarin, “The Physiology of Taste”

“It was he who taught me the pleasures of the table, instilling in me the idea that a meal isn’t just food on a plate or wine in a glass, but a moment of culture and conversation, of leisure and learning — of, in a word, conviviality.”

– John Irving writing about his father-in-law in The Art of Eating No. 78

The steak came back. Now, evidently, it had been overcooked. And there was also a chop. It, too, was not satisfactory. “For fuck’s sake. Find out their names. They’re not coming back.” Mario paused. “What are they drinking?” “A Solaia 1997.” A bottle was $475.
“Forget it,” Mario said and ordered another round of entrees.

– Bill Buford, “Heat”

At three in the morning, Paul Wednesday dined alone. He sat at the head of a 24-foot long table hewn from a single solid piece of hardwood, lightly sanded, burnished, but otherwise raw. Its surface was slightly warped, and it was clean and empty other than a single pewter plate heavily laden with red meat, sliced thin, nearly raw. He chewed his steak thoughtfully, in the dark. Streetlights shone through the restaurant’s stained glass windows, throwing colored shadows onto the various animal skulls fastened upon the walls.

A string of mild Slavic expletives drifted out of the kitchen and got lost amongst the dining room’s strong timber rafters. Another voice, speaking with a heavy Mexican accent said something largely incomprehensible that involved the phrases “never again,” “dry-aged” and — most distinctly — “suck my dick.”

Wednesday was turning things over in his mind. There was a stream marked “financial assets” which included the constantly updated bottom lines of the two different restaurant groups in which he had controlling interests. There was a stream marked “real estate” which included a themed chain of seven upscale farm-to-table soup and sandwich joints, three gastropubs, two neo-French chef-driven outposts, a quirky but insanely profitable breakfast joint and Blood, the timber, stone and bone-encrusted steakhouse in which he was currently dining. And there was a stream labeled “people,” sorted out into those who were burning out, those who were peaking, those who too good to keep, those who were too good to let go, and those who needed somehow to be weeded out of the operation without overturning too many tables in the process.

Wednesday crawled around in his own head like a spider in a web. Interpersonal connections made the “people” part of his brain look like a tightly woven, wildly misshapen silk sweater. Poke here, and these people move to the competition. Pluck there, and two journalists will write about it the next day, one favorably, one in sarcastic and scornful terms. Sell this and fire her, and the whole operation breaks apart like an iceberg. Promote her, and roughly the same thing happens, only more slowly and destructively.

Wednesday thoughtfully stabbed a small piece of meat with his knife, taking care to avoid dripping even a spot of juice onto his newly purchased tie. On the tie was printed a roadmap of the city, taken from when the city was just the colonial holding of a second-rate and decomposing empire.

Affecting an air of comic resignation, his wife had told him the tie was in bad taste. He knew that. He’d earned the right to enjoy his things, though: maps, skulls, knives, good whisky. He smiled and sucked down a sip of Highland Park 18 Year Old Scotch, tasting the toffee and peat, exhaling an invisible gout of smoke and alcohol. In the kitchen, a cheerful argument in heavily-accented English raged along, and Wednesday smiled quietly to himself. He’d figured out his next move.

He flipped his long blond bangs back from the left side of his face, and absentmindedly let his finger trace its way around the empty socket.

I’ve started work on a novel about a chef, and last night I hit the 15,000-word mark. On one hand, arbitrary word counts don’t mean  a thing in terms of putting together a book people want to read. On the other hand, it feels good to have taken an idea from initial conception to at least partial execution. (I would guess that the final manuscript will be 60,000-100,000 words, but who knows?)

In the spirit of actually getting somewhere, I thought I’d post a little tiny bit of the work in progress.

–

Robert T. Johnson was summoned to a final interview on a Monday morning at one of Jim Thursday’s more successful gastropubs. The Hammermill, which served breakfast Tuesday through Sunday, was mostly quiet. Stores were being restocked, bathrooms were being cleaned, but for all intents and purposes, the restaurant was effectively napping.

Johnson’s impression of Thursday was that the food magnate must be some kind of giant. On initial observation, he seemed to be 6 foot 10 inches tall and broad as a Volvo, although more careful observation revealed that he was probably around 5 foot eight. At nine in the morning, Thursday was unshaven, his blue necktie already loosened to the point of abstraction. His hair and beard — bright red, flame red — burst forth from his lumpen face like a car bombing. His eyebrows jutted like cliffs. His eyes widened as Johnson walked through the door.

“YOU are the man!” said Thursday, leaping to his feet and rushing toward Johnson. He shook Johnson’s hand enthusiastically, involving his left hand in the process in order to add emphasis. “You are the man, the MAN! Welcome to New Amsterdam, welcome to The Hammermill, welcome to your new life. This is a THRILL.” By the time he’d finished the sentence, he’d plunked back into his wrought-iron and plexiglass chair, which quietly complained about his weight and violent gestures through a sorrowful chair language consisting solely of miserable peeps and squeaks.

“Good morning,” said Johnson. He took a seat at the table, looking, with interest, at the single sheet of paper that was spread across it. It was his contract, a deal to hire him as executive chef at Kami. Even reading it upside down, Johnson was able to note that the numbers looked right.

“Before we ink this thing, there’s one thing I’d like you to do for me.” Thursday grinned broadly and benignly through his facial thicket.

“What’s that?” asked Johnson.

“Make me breakfast. I’m fucking hungry.” Thursday patted his enormous stomach, currently concealed beneath an untucked tailored white dress shirt.

Johnson blinked at the request. He shrugged his shoulders slightly. “OK. Sweet or savory?”

Thursday stared at him for a minute, running his right hand vigorously through the red underbrush of his face. “Both,” he grunted.

“High end? Low end?”

“Just make it stuff I haven’t seen a thousand times before,” said Thursday. “Please,” he added, delighted that he’d remembered the word and used it in a socially appropriate context.

“OK, then.” Johnson strolled into the kitchen like he owned the place.

The kitchen was open, so Thursday was able to follow Johnson’s progress, which he did with considerable interest. Johnson scanned the pots and pans, picking out an All Clad skillet and a few bowls. He located a knife, sharpened it, assembled a handful of small dishes and prep bowls.

“Clean,” he said to Thursday.

“Goddamn right,” said Thursday. “Dirty kitchen won’t do.”

“Won’t,” said Johnson, strolling off to inspect the walk-in.

Johnson began to assemble ingredients. “You’ll spoil the surprise,” he said to Thursday. Thursday nodded — he could accept that. He turned around to read the cooking magazine that he nominally edited, and was, within moments, swearing under his breath and composing an email bristling with complaints. “Can’t… fucking… split infinitive…” he muttered. Meanwhile, in the kitchen, there was chopping and clanking, and — soon enough — sizzling and good smells. Coffee arrived at the table, unbidden.

“No cream? No sugar?” asked Thursday.

“Doesn’t need it,” said Johnson. “You’ve got good beans and a stout machine here — much respect to the Clover.” He jabbed his thumb toward the modestly sized plastic and stainless steel box.

“Fucking thing cost us $11,000 and I can get a better cup at McDonald’s,” said Thursday, bitterly. He sipped at his coffee. “Hmm, nice.”

Johnson missed the compliment. He was back in the kithcen, spooning white,  ethereal batter into the All Clad. Another pan was going, too. And a saucier. Soon, Johnson was carrying a platter out to the dining room. It was laden with six chive-garnished brown discs of pan-fried potatoes, and six improbably fluffy little pancakes.

Thursday eyed the contents of his plate with an expression of intrigued suspicion. “What do we got here?” he asked, poking at one of the pancakes with a fork.

“Cinnamon Cloudcakes,” said Johnson.

“Egg whites folded into the batter?”

“And sour cream. Also, bubble and squeak,” he said, referring to the savory discs.

“British?”

“English, yes. Pan fried potatoes, boiled cabbage…”

By now, Thursday had stuffed an entire pattie of bubble and squeak into his mouth, and was chewing heartily, talking as he did so. “…peas, onions… lardon? Curry powder? Fuck me, I like this. Doing it curried was a nice twist.”

“I do what I can, yeah,” said Johnson, letting a tight grin momentarily sprint across his face.  “Fresh sour cream right in the metal bowl there. And I’ve made a maple and cloudberry syrup for the cloudcakes.”

“Hell, I didn’t know we had cloudberries.”

“There’s lakkalikööri — cloudberry liquor — back there too,” said Johnson. “You seem to have a Finn loose in the kitchen.”

“Kai Mannerheim, yeah, great guy, hell yeah,” said Thursday, packing a syrup-smeared cloudcake into his gullet and washing it down with good black coffee. “His great-grandpa was some big shot in the army. Shit, you’re hired, man.”

“Listen, I know we talked about money…”

“$15,000 a month, up front, no problem, we get you an apartment, no problem” said Thursday. At this point in the meal, he’d lost interest in Johnson and seized a second fork. He began playing around with the theory and practice of packing one of each variety of round breakfast item into his mouth.

“Yeah, money is great. Three other things.”

Thursday paused, fork in each hand, cloudcake on left fork, bubble and squeak on the right. Thursday wasn’t typically dictated to. Generally, he had his choice of being bored or raging, but, now, in his own dining room, he felt strangely at a loss.

“First thing is my books,” said Johnson. “I need them all shipped out from Chicago. I don’t start work until they’ve all arrived in good condition.”

“That’s all? No problem…”

“No, I mean, I’m serious about that. The books need to be here before I start. I’ve gone through this before.”

“I know, I looked at your resume. You should be glad I’m giving you another chance — you’ve been at 15 fucking places in 10 years!”

“Eighteen,” said Johnson, back in the kitchen, tidying up pots and pans. “That brings me to point number two. I work for you for nine months, tops. I get the place in shape. I make the menu and the staff function. We get good reviews and customers like it. Money comes in. Then I’m gone.”

“But…”

“But nothing, I’m not interested in Kami, or New Amsterdam, or your company or whatever. That’s not what I’m here for.”

“Then what the fuck…”

“Not important. If you don’t like my resume or my reputation or my cooking, tell me, and I’m on the first –”

“Fuck fuck fuck fuck shut up fuck just get on with it,” growled Thursday, who was sputtering like an overloaded Ukrainian cargo plane struggling to get airborne.

“Third thing,” and Johnson said this calmly, raising his grey eyebrows slightly but otherwise fixing Thursday with a rock steady stare, “You don’t ever, ever, ever tell me how to cook.”

“But…”

“No. We can and will consult about the menu. You can give me feedback. You control the pursestrings, so you hire and fire as much or as little as you want.”

“But –”

“I’ve worked with… I worked with a guy who killed his girlfriend with an industrial immersion blender and kept her, at one point, in the meat locker,” said Johnson. Thursday’s eyes bugged out a little. “She was a math teacher, a nice girl, from Appleton, Wisconsin. I turned him in as soon as I could make it stick. For 14 shifts I worked with that Bavarian son-of-a-bitch knowing what he’d done, and I kept it professional. So I don’t care what kind of sociopaths, mongoloids or relatives you want to employ in my kitchen. I’ll make it work.” Johnson paused. “Just don’t tell me how to cook. Ever.”

“How the hell do you kill someon–”

“Better not to know. Do we have a deal?”

“Yeah,” said Thursday, talking through a pile of warm potatoes and cabbage. “We got a deal, welcome aboard.”

“See you once my books get here,” said Johnson, walking out the door.