The Worst Case Scenario Cookery Club Read online

  ‘Any nice blokes there?’ Corinne asked.

  ‘There are two. They’re both nice. One’s the teacher, Alex. But he’s at least ten years younger than me, and the other bloke, John, probably fought in World War Two.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Corinne. ‘Still, age is just a number.’

  ‘In which direction? Older or younger?’

  ‘Either. And the new cooking skills will come in useful when you do start dating again. The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach.’

  ‘Yeah. If only I’d known that Ian’s stomach was crying out for sprouted mung bean salad and not steak and kidney pie.’

  ‘What are you making tonight?’ Corinne asked.

  ‘A simple white sauce and fish pie according to Alex.’

  ‘Oooh. One of my favourites. What time shall I be over?’ Vince joked.

  ‘I’m hoping that Saskia will eat her share of it this time.’

  ‘I thought she’d turned vegetarian.’

  ‘Not completely. She says she won’t eat anything with a nose or a beak.’

  ‘Don’t fish have noses?’ Vince asked.

  ‘Crikey, I feel like I should know this,’ said Liz. ‘I’m going to have to google it.’

  But there was no time before the class. When Liz arrived – with her apron this time, the one with the torso of the Venus de Milo printed on the front – her fellow students were already in their places. Exactly the same places as they had taken up the previous week. Liz had often thought it strange that people refused to move around. Still, she wasn’t about to upset the status quo. She took her spot in the middle.

  Alex was talking Bella through the final steps of making the curry – the stuff she’d missed when she had to dash from the class to the police station. She was nodding enthusiastically as he explained how it ought to be served.

  ‘Hey! How did the curry go down with your family?’ Alex asked Liz. ‘Were they impressed?’

  ‘Yes,’ Liz said. ‘I think they were.’

  It wasn’t entirely a lie. Ted had loved it.

  ‘Well, I’m sure everyone is going to like today’s recipe. There aren’t many people who don’t like a good fish pie.’

  ‘My nearly ex-husband doesn’t,’ said Liz.

  ‘Then it’s a good job you’re no longer cooking for him,’ said Bella.

  John agreed. ‘Sounds like he doesn’t know what’s good for him.’

  Liz decided she liked her classmates even more than she thought.

  ‘A white sauce is very simple,’ said Alex. ‘It’s the basic building block for all sorts of recipes from the everyday to the exotic. All it takes is a little patience. The recipe we’re going to use today can be the foundation of a cheese sauce, a parsley sauce or a béchamel.’

  ‘I never thought I’d make a béchamel,’ said John.

  ‘I’m not sure I ever will,’ said Liz.

  ‘You’ll all get it right,’ said Alex. ‘First, you’re going to watch me. It isn’t hard at all.’

  Alex did have the knack of making things look uncomplicated. It was a big part of his appeal.

  ‘There are just three ingredients, plus a little salt and pepper. I’m going to start by melting twenty-five grams of butter.’

  So far, so easy, thought Liz. Though she couldn’t help remembering the last time she’d tried to melt butter, left it to itself while she checked Facebook, and ended up with a ruined pan and all the smoke alarms going off.

  ‘When that’s melted, we stir in the same amount of flour.’

  Bella and John watched avidly but Liz’s mind was racing again. She wondered if she would ever make a dish her daughter would actually eat. Butter and flour was vegetarian at least. Could she stick white sauce on courgettini? If she cooked courgettini, would Saskia just think she was trying to copy Brittney? Was she losing Saskia to Brittney altogether? Liz couldn’t compete with the free clothes.

  ‘I’m going to let the flour cook for a couple of minutes.’

  Bella and John asked intelligent questions about the degree of heat and the type of flour. When Alex talked about grams, Liz thought about Ted. Had he lost a single gram that week or was she in for another lecture at the Waggy Weight Loss weigh-in on Saturday?

  ‘After a couple of minutes, we take the pan off the heat …’

  Liz gave herself a little lecture for having failed to walk Ted as often as she’d intended to. Well, bloody Brittney had put a stop to that. Liz hadn’t dared walk on any of Newbay’s beaches on Sunday in case she bumped into her ex, her child and his oh-so-glamorous lover on a photo shoot again. She was still fuming about that. How dare Brittney use her family – right down to the dog – to promote her flippin’ interests? Maybe she should ask Bella about the legalities of it. Saskia was still only fifteen. Surely it was up to Liz whether her daughter’s image could be used in advertising? And if it was used for advertising purposes, Saskia should be properly compensated.

  ‘Did everybody get that?’ Alex asked.

  Get what? Liz assured him that she had got it whatever it was. White sauce. Three ingredients. Really how difficult could it possibly be?

  Alex showed his students the smooth white sauce he had created.

  ‘Et voila,’ he threw in some French. ‘No lumps. Time for you three to try it.’

  With the demonstration over, Bella, John and Liz took up their positions again. Without hesitation, Bella and John began to melt their butter, which Alex had already helpfully weighed out. Liz followed suit. Melt butter. She at least remembered that bit, though …

  ‘Heat’s a little high,’ Alex told her when he came to check her progress. ‘Don’t want it to burn before you know what’s going on.’

  Liz turned the heat back down.

  ‘I think you’re ready to add the flour,’ Alex told Bella moments later. Liz decided she must be at the same point. They’d started at the same time. She dumped her twenty-five grams of flour in.

  Meanwhile, Bella sifted her flour into the pan. As did John.

  ‘If you sift it, you’ll get a head start on the lumps,’ Alex reminded them.

  Rats, thought Liz. She had lumps already. But she was pretty sure she could beat them out. She used the edge of her wooden spoon to smash them just as Alex said, ‘The trick with any white sauce is to be gentle.’

  Liz slowed her beating right down.

  ‘Now add the milk.’

  Liz tipped in the whole pint in one go.

  Alex, Bella and John all looked horrified.

  ‘Liz! This bit is supposed to be gradual.’

  Liz couldn’t remember Alex having told them that at all. When did he say gradual?

  ‘Sorry, sorry, sorry.’ Liz stepped back from the pan.

  ‘It’s OK,’ said Alex, quickly stepping in. ‘We may be able to rescue it. If not, we can always start again. Just make sure you’ve got a couple of pints of milk handy whenever you do this at home.’

  Alex took Liz’s pan from the heat and tried to salvage her white sauce, while Liz pinched the top of her nose.

  ‘It’s been a long week,’ she said.

  ‘I understand,’ said Alex.

  ‘Sometimes I think I’ll never get the hang of this,’ Liz continued. ‘This cooking thing. Isn’t it like gardening, where you’ve either got green fingers or you haven’t? My grandmother was always going on about having the right kind of hands for making pastry. I’ve only got the right kind of hands for making a dogs’ breakfast.’

  ‘I don’t believe in that,’ said Alex. ‘It’s an excuse not to take it seriously. Anyone can learn to cook. You just have to be prepared to be patient. All right, Chopper?’

  He handed back the wooden spoon and gave her a reassuring smile. Liz shrugged shyly. Alex really was quite gorgeous. And kind. And not half so patronising as he might have been, given the circumstances. Why was he so lovely to her? She was still the only member of the class he’d given a nickname. Did that mean something?

  ‘And there we have it,’ said Alex, return
ing to the front of the class. ‘You’ve all made a white sauce. Now wasn’t that easy?’

  ‘Surprisingly,’ John said. ‘I’m beginning to wonder why I’ve held you chefs in awe over the years.’

  ‘We’re held in awe?’ said Alex. ‘That’s news to me.’

  He smiled at Bella. She nodded.

  ‘Well, I absolutely hold you in awe,’ said Liz. ‘Thanks, chef. I couldn’t have done it without you.’

  That much was definitely true.

  ‘Don’t relax yet,’ said Alex next. ‘You’re going to make another one. And this time we’re going to add parsley to use in our fish pie. Parsley and cod is a classic combination.’

  ‘We used to get it in packets,’ said Liz.

  ‘Oh yes,’ said John. ‘I still would if I could find them.’

  ‘Have you tried Iceland?’ Liz asked.

  ‘Students, please,’ Alex interrupted. ‘Once you have made your own parsley sauce and whipped it up into a proper fish pie, you’ll never go for boil in the bag again. In any case,’ he told them. ‘The classical term is sous-vide.’

  ‘Sounds much better when you put it like that,’ Liz agreed.

  ‘Fish pie is one of my favourite recipes. My grandmother used to make one every Friday. She was old school and it was always fish on Friday in her house.’

  ‘We used to go down the chippy on a Friday,’ John said. ‘Every Friday, me and Sonia …’ His voice tailed off.

  ‘Food takes us back, doesn’t it?’ said Alex. ‘The smell and the taste. One whiff of a good fish pie and I’m underneath the table in my grandmother’s kitchen, reading comics and secretly eating the sweets I was meant to save for after dinner. Hoping it would be peas with the pie and not broad beans.’

  ‘I like broad beans,’ said John.

  ‘I can show you how to make a sort of hummus using them,’ said Alex.

  ‘I’m not sure why you’d want to mess with a perfectly decent veg,’ John replied. Yep. John was roast dinners through and through.

  Alex quickly prepared a fillet of cod. ‘You won’t have to do this,’ he told his nervous students as they watched him with frowning expressions. ‘I’ve already prepared your fish for you but it’s useful for you to see how it’s done. Now, what’s the food that takes you back? Bella, tell us a food memory from your childhood while I finish this off.’

  ‘Cotechino,’ she said. ‘That’s a pork sausage from Italy, which is where my family come from. We used to have it with lentils on New Year’s Eve to bring luck for the year ahead. Dad made an excellent version, though I didn’t really like lentils much when I was small. I only ate them because my Nonna said that every lentil I ate would translate into a shiny new penny in the year to come. On New Year’s morning, she’d give me the big bag of change she’d been saving up all year – swearing there was a penny for every lentil I’d eaten – and I’d go with Dad down to the pier and waste it all on those shove penny machines.’

  ‘That sounds like a lovely tradition,’ said John. ‘We always had duck on New Year’s Eve, me and Sonia. She could make red cabbage like nobody else. She’d add slivers of apple and sultanas and raisins and some spice or herb I can’t remember.’

  ‘Coriander?’ Alex suggested.

  ‘I’d have to smell it.’

  ‘I’ll bring some in next week. Anyone got any other food memories they want to share?’

  ‘Aubergine parmigiana,’ said Bella with a sigh. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever tasted such a heavenly dish as the one my dad used to make. He would slice the aubergine so finely, it just melted in your mouth. Actually, I think aubergine parmigiana would be my choice for my last meal on death row.’

  ‘I can’t imagine you ending up on death row,’ said John.

  ‘You must have friends who could get you off,’ said Alex.

  Bella laughed. ‘I hope so …’ She paused and her smile faded. ‘My dad’s melanzane parmigiana is one of the things I miss the most.’

  John quickly picked up the thread. ‘If I was choosing my last meal, it would be beef wellington.’

  Bingo, thought Alex.

  ‘It’s got everything, really. I love a bit of pastry and a good bit of beef. You can’t beat it. Sonia used to make beef wellington if we were having a dinner party. It was a proper show-stopper. No one ever turned down an invitation to our house. A beef wellington with a good red wine. That takes me back. I’d give anything to be able to eat Sonia’s beef wellington again.’

  ‘What about you, Liz? What taste takes you back through the years?’ Alex asked.

  Liz shrugged. She really didn’t know. She’d done all the ready-meal preparing during her marriage with Ian. As for her childhood, if incompetence could be passed down the generations, then Liz had inherited her lack of prowess in the kitchen from her parents and her grandparents before them. What she remembered about the food she’d eaten as a child was that it all tasted the same. No matter what it was. Liz’s own dearly departed mother liked to boil her veg until they were all the same colour. No matter how green, yellow or orange something started out, it always ended up grey and tasting of over-salted water.

  Liz struggled to answer Alex’s question.

  ‘There must be something,’ he said. ‘Even if it’s only your favourite sweets.’

  ‘Actually, there is one thing,’ said Liz. ‘On my birthday, Mum used to make these things we called traffic lights.’

  ‘What are those?’ Bella asked.

  ‘Just sponge fingers with a layer of icing. And in the icing, three Smarties. One red, one orange and one green.’

  ‘That sounds like fun,’ said Alex.

  ‘One of those could probably take me back. Not that I could possibly recommend them in my role as a dental hygienist.’

  But for now they were making Alex’s grandmother’s fish pie. Alex did a wicked impression of her as he put the dish together. John, Bella and Liz all laughed but Liz found she was a feeling a little reflective too. She envied her fellow classmates and their culinary memories. It also worried her that she didn’t really have any. If someone had asked Saskia right then what smells and flavours reminded her of home, what would she have responded?

  Burnt toast? The smell of melting plastic from a ready-meal container that’s been in the oven too long? The frightening bright green food colouring of a shop-bought Hungry Caterpillar Birthday Cake?

  Well, at least Liz was making an effort to change that. She put her own version of Alex’s fish pie into the oven alongside John’s and Bella’s. A delicious smell was soon wafting out. It was the smell of comfort and effort. Maybe this could be the thing Saskia remembered when she was finally fully grown and moved away from home?

  ‘An excellent attempt,’ said Alex as Liz brought her pie to the front table for inspection.

  Liz was grateful. ‘I think I’m getting the hang of this.’

  ‘I told you you would, Chopper,’ he said, adding her nickname again. ‘You’ve got the hands for it after all.’

  Was he flirting with her? Liz found herself hoping he was.

  Chapter Seventeen

  John was very pleased with his fish pie. It was the one thing Sonia never made. Though John was a big fan of fish of all kinds, Sonia claimed it stank out the kitchen with a smell that would linger for days, so he only ever had it when they were out at a gastro pub or at someone else’s house.

  Of course, Sonia wasn’t around to complain any more. The thought gave John a little stab of sadness. Grief was a funny thing. Had you asked John a year before how he would have reacted to the loss of his wife, he would have guessed that it would finish him. He’d have taken to his bed and never got up again, he was sure.

  In the event, it was all quite different. Yes, he’d done his share of sobbing, but nearly ten months on there were days when he didn’t cry at all. He felt as though his emotions were muffled. Then suddenly the tiniest little thing would trigger him and feel like a twisting dagger to the heart.

  The thought that Sonia wasn’t
around to complain about the fish pie turned out to be one of those tiny things. With a heaviness to his step, John let himself into the house. He put the fish pie, carefully wrapped in silver foil, into the fridge for another time.

  He felt better the following morning. It was one of those beautiful autumn days, when there isn’t a cloud in the sky and the air is crisp and fresh, with none of the heaviness of late summer. Good weather always made John feel more optimistic.

  He decided to make the most of it and started his day with a walk along the beach. Though he was in his seventies, he was proud that he was still pretty fit and he intended to stay that way for as long as possible. In many ways, he had Sonia to thank for that. She was always very keen on staying active. For a while, she’d insisted they attended a ballroom dancing club in Newbay Town Hall but John, who was one of the few men there who actually knew what he was doing, found being in demand to dance every dance was overwhelming. He only wanted to dance with his wife anyway.

  John walked to the main Newbay beach, the one with the pier. The onset of autumn was marked by the reappearance of the dogs and their owners, enjoying the freedom of the sand until they were booted off again the following spring. John had been thinking about dogs lately. He’d always wanted one. They didn’t have one because Sonia was allergic. It wouldn’t have been fair. That didn’t matter now, of course.

  The last time John was at the NEWTS, Trevor Fernlea had asked him, on the quiet, whether he wasn’t slightly enjoying doing everything he wanted without having to ask permission from the missus. John took the question in the spirit in which it was intended, knowing that Trevor’s wife, Cynthia, while she had been one of Sonia’s friends, was best described as a termagant. Trevor could be forgiven for wondering what life might be like without her. For John, the answer was ‘no’. Being able to get a dog if he felt like it, or cook fish pie at home, did not make up for what he’d lost. Not even close.

  He watched a couple, perhaps in their fifties (bright young things!) embracing as they looked out to sea just as he and Sonia used to do.

  ‘Make the most of it,’ he told them silently. ‘Life really is too short. You always think you’ve got time and then suddenly you haven’t. Make sure you’ve said everything you want to say to each other. Never mind not letting the sun go down on a disagreement, don’t let a single minute go by in angry silence. Not a second.’