Hot Under Pressure (35 page)

I am not a poet. Beck’s poem, however, is a real, honest-to-goodness poem written by my dear friend, the talented poet Liz Jones-Dilworth. She wrote it for the wedding between her brother-in-law, a New York City chef, and his fiancée, a former pastry chef! So it’s weirdly appropriate for Beck and Skye, and once I heard it, I couldn’t get the line about being born face to face out of my head. It just fits them perfectly.

So with thanks to Liz and her in-laws for the use of their poem, I wanted to reproduce the whole thing here, so you can see how completely beautiful and romantic it is.

Falling in love is easy, but no one knows how it’s done. The girl and the boy are walking through the market. Calluses touch the spots on a stuffed giraffe, the carved patterns of a spoon, wool spun into yarn. The rubber tire of a stroller, the canvas loop of a leash, honeycomb gleaming in a glass jar.

Love is built one choice at a time. Move the bracket to the left, to the right. To the left. Bolts and washers and the wrong-sized wrench. Splice, twist, cap. Dimmer switch. Another trip to the store. It’s not fun until it is fun, and suddenly no noisy street is better than this noisy street. That’s when they decide to get the ice cream. Love is a choice, but who among us can resist it?

Two pairs of aching heels under the same covers, two pairs of eyes blinking at the same screen. Two throats laughing at the same joke, which makes no sense outside this room. That’s because what the joke really means is we’re together. They might sleep through every alarm, but still each morning the girl and the boy belong more fully to the other, until it seems they were born face to face.

Falling in love is a secret, but we all see it happen. The girl and the boy are down the shore, stirring lemon marmalade and wine-poached figs over a sticky stovetop. They arrive on the bus loaded with brown paper sacks, handles tied with curling ribbon. Inside is the earth and all it offers, their work and their love which has bubbled and boiled until it is on our lips—extravagant unnecessary treats, made of sugars without which we could not survive.

Hot Under Pressure
Recipes

MRS. BECK’S GRILLED PB & J

2 slices of bread

Softened butter

Peanut butter (your favorite kind—chunky, smooth, whatever)

Jelly (your favorite kind—raspberry, strawberry, grape, whatever)

This sandwich is more delicious than you could imagine from the simplicity of the ingredients!

Set a sauté pan over medium heat. While the pan is warming, spread a thin layer of softened butter on one side of each slice of bread. Cover the clean side of one slice with peanut butter, and cover the clean side of the other with the jelly of your choice. Press the peanut butter and jelly sides together, then lay the sandwich, buttered side down, in the hot skillet.

Fry the sandwich for a minute or two, until it reaches the desired level of toasty golden-brown doneness on one side, then carefully flip it over. The heat will have melted the filling a bit, so the bread may slide around. Just realign the bread slices once the sandwich is flipped.

Toast the sandwich on the other side; it will take a little less time on this side, because the pan will be even hotter now. Just keep an eye on it, and remove the sandwich from the pan when it’s toasted the way you like it.

Put the sandwich on a plate and slice it in half diagonally. Serve with a tall glass of cold milk for the perfect nostalgic lunch!

SKYE’S ROASTED ROOT VEGETABLE GRATIN

For the filling:

2 medium parsnips, peeled and chopped into ½-inch dice

2 medium carrots, peeled and chopped into ½-inch dice

1 large bulb fresh fennel, cored and chopped into ½-inch dice

1 large Yukon gold potato, peeled and chopped into ½-inch dice

1 large sweet potato, peeled and chopped into ½-inch dice

¼ cup olive oil

¼ cup water

2 tablespoons butter, plus a little extra

2 tablespoons minced shallots or scallions

1 cup white button mushrooms, thickly sliced

1 tablespoon dry white wine

salt

pepper

You could add and/or substitute peeled, diced turnips, celery root, yams, fingerling potatoes, or any other root vegetable you like. Essentially, you need about eight cups of chopped root vegetables.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

In a large bowl, toss the chopped vegetables with the oil and water, and sprinkle generously with salt and pepper.

Spread vegetables in a single layer on a rimmed baking sheet, cover loosely with aluminum foil, and slide into the hot oven. Roast for twenty minutes.

Remove foil and stir the vegetables around on the sheet. Roast, uncovered, for another twenty minutes, stirring occasionally. The vegetables are done when they’re tender and their edges are beginning to caramelize.

While the root vegetables are roasting, heat a medium sauté pan over medium-high heat. Melt two tablespoons of butter and add the shallots or scallions. Sauté for a minute or two until softened and translucent, then add the mushrooms. Stir the mushrooms around; they’ll absorb all the butter immediately so keep an eye on them and if they start to scorch, turn down the heat. But keep sautéing them until they begin to give back the moisture they absorbed, and grow tender and brown around the edges. Pour the dry white wine into the hot pan and cook it down until it’s been absorbed by the mushrooms and shallots, another five to ten minutes. Take the mushrooms off the heat and set them aside until the root vegetables are done roasting.

Grease a gratin dish or a medium-size casserole with a thin film of butter, then spread the roasted vegetables and mushrooms in the dish. Salt and pepper to taste.

Turn oven down to 350 degrees.

For the Mornay Sauce:

3 tablespoons butter, plus a little extra

3 tablespoons all-purpose flour

2 cups whole milk

4 ounces swiss cheese, such as Gruyere, grated

In a small saucepan, warm the milk over medium heat until almost boiling, being careful not to scorch it or to let it boil over.

While the milk is heating, melt the butter in a medium saucepan over medium-high heat. When the butter has stopped frothing, add the flour and stir it around with a wooden spoon for at least two minutes. It shouldn’t get brown at all, but it should stop smelling like raw flour. This is what’s called a white roux.

Pour the hot milk into the roux in a slow, steady stream, whisking like mad the whole time. Keep whisking, scraping any bits of roux off the sides of the pan, until it comes to a boil. Then whisk some more while the sauce boils for a couple of minutes. When it starts to get thick and smooth, take it off the heat and whisk in salt and pepper to taste—at this point, you’ve got a béchamel sauce. Now add about half a cup of the grated swiss cheese a little bit at a time to help it melt into the sauce evenly, and when it’s all mixed in, taste it for seasoning again! Now you’ve got your Mornay sauce.

Pour the Mornay sauce over the vegetables in the gratin dish, then sprinkle the top of the gratin with the rest of the grated cheese. Dot with the extra butter, just a couple tiny pieces here and there over the top of the gratin.

Bake in the 350 degree oven for about thirty minutes, or until the top of the gratin starts to bubble and brown.

Serves six to eight as a side dish, or four as a main course with a lightly dressed salad.

BECK’S PAELLA (SERVES 6–8)

Paella is a generous, informal dish that is perfect for parties and large family gatherings! It’s very forgiving when it comes to proportions and ingredients—basically, it’s all about making it the way you like it. There are a few steps to go through, but I promise, it will be worth it when you wow your guests with the finished dish.

Stock Preparation

½ cup dry white wine

1 tablespoon lemon juice

½ teaspoon saffron

5½ cups stock (fish or chicken)

¼ teaspoon ground coriander

1 bay leaf

Mix white wine, lemon juice and crushed saffron in a small bowl and let stand to allow the saffron to bloom.

Bring stock to a simmer in a 3 quart saucepan. Add the saffron mixture, coriander, and the bay leaf to the hot stock. Hold at simmer while preparing vegetables and seafood.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Meat Preparation

1 pound spicy sausage, such as linguiça or Spanish chorizo

¼ to ½ pound diced ham or bacon

2 tablespoons olive oil

8 boneless, skinless chicken thighs, cut into chunks

Remove the sausage casing and sauté the sausage in olive oil in a skillet until lightly browned. Break into bite-size pieces while cooking. Remove browned sausage to a platter.

Sauté ham or bacon and remove to platter with the sausage.

Add chicken pieces to the skillet, brown on all sides in the pork fat and remove to platter. Reserve the pork fat.

Seafood Preparation

2 to 4 small lobster tails (½ tail per person)

1 pound large shrimp

2 tablespoons olive oil, divided

1 tablespoon lemon juice

Salt and pepper

½ teaspoon dried thyme

½ teaspoon dried oregano

1 pound squid (tubes)

½ pound mussels

1 pound clams

Cut lobster tails in half lengthwise; you can use kitchen shears to cut through shell.

Peel and devein shrimp.

Toss shrimp and lobster tails in a bowl with 1 tablespoon of the olive oil, and the lemon juice and seasonings.

Clean and wash squid. Slice squid tubes into ½ inch rings and add to bowl with shrimp and lobster tails.

Place paella pan or large, oven-proof skillet on stovetop over medium-high heat. Add remaining tablespoon of olive oil and 2 tablespoons of reserved pork fat.

Once the oil and fat are hot but not smoking, add lobster tails and sauté for two minutes. Remove to platter.

Add shrimp and squid and sauté for two minutes. Remove to platter, then discard fat from paella pan and wipe with a clean towel.

Clean and wash mussels and clams.

Vegetable and Garnish Preparation

8 garlic cloves

1 teaspoon sea salt

3 medium tomatoes (in season) or one (14.5-ounce) can diced tomatoes, drained

1 teaspoon smoked Spanish paprika, hot or sweet

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 onion, sliced into ½-inch strips from pole to pole

1 red bell pepper, sliced

3 cups Spanish Arborio rice, or other medium-grain rice

1 cup frozen green peas, thawed

1 cup Italian flat leaf parsley, chopped

lemon wedges

Mince garlic and mash to paste with 1 teaspoon sea salt in a small bowl.

Peel tomatoes and remove seeds. Dice and place in a bowl. Stir in smoked paprika.

Heat oil in paella pan over high heat, then add onions and peppers. Stir-fry the vegetables for two minutes, until they begin to soften.

Stir garlic and salt paste into paella pan and stir-fry for one minute, until the mixture becomes fragrant.

Add tomatoes and paprika to paella pan and stir-fry for one minute.

Add uncooked rice to paella pan and stir with tomatoes, onions, and peppers to coat.

Final preparation

Measure hot stock and add stock or water as needed to make 5½ cups. Stir hot stock into rice, tomatoes, onions and pepper mixture and bring to rapid boil on stove. Stir gently and cook about six minutes until liquid thickens and rice appears on surface. You know it’s thickening when your spoon starts to make tracks exposing the bottom of the pan.

Turn off heat and add sautéed meats from the platter, then stir in shrimp, squid and peas.

Add lobster tails and push them partly into the rice. Push mussels and clams partway into rice, hinge end down, then drizzle juices accumulated on the platter over the top. Bake ten to fifteen minutes uncovered on center rack of oven until liquid is absorbed and a crust forms. Rice should be slightly too al dente.

Remove paella pan from oven, cover with aluminum foil or kitchen towel and let stand for ten minutes. Rice will continue cooking and firm up.

Sprinkle paella with parsley and decorate with lemon wedges. Serve with a simple green salad and a nice, crusty bread to soak up the juices!

St. Martin’s Paperbacks Titles by

LOUISA EDWARDS

Can’t Stand the Heat

On the Steamy Side

Just One Taste

Too Hot to Touch

Some Like It Hot

Hot Under Pressure

About the Author

LOUISA EDWARDS grew up in Virginia before moving to Manhattan to work with some of the biggest names in book publishing. She has also worked as a restaurant reviewer for a small-town newspaper, a waitress at a retirement home, and behind the counter at an organic bakery. She decided to bring her love of romance and cooking together by writing the Recipe for Love and Rising Star Chef series. She currently lives in Austin, Texas.

Red-hot raves for the novels of Louisa Edwards

TOO HOT TO TOUCH

“
Too Hot to Touch
is a satisfying, emotional and touching read.”

—
Read, React, Review

“I can see that this series is going to be another keeper on my shelves. A great start to this new foodie series, it makes me want to learn to cook … almost.”

—
Smitten with Reading

“Edwards always amazes me with her descriptions in the kitchen and food. Be sure to read this book on a full stomach, or else the hunger pains might get ya!”

—
The Book Pushers

“Jules and Max scorch the pages … very well-written characters with flaws, issues and depth.”

—
Badass Book Reviews

“I loved this book. It was funny, sexy, the love story was touching, and the characters were likeable. As a fan of contemporary romance, this is exactly what I’m looking for when I buy a book. I can’t wait to read the next installment. This one is a keeper so don’t waste more time and go get it!”