That Summer by Jennifer Weiner (read more books .txt) 📕

sugar snap peas. That was for dinner. For pantry staples, she’d gotten flour, white and brown sugar, kosher salt and Maldon salt, pepper, chili, and paprika; for the refrigerator: milk, eggs, and half-and-half, and, for a housewarming gift, a copy of Ruth Reichl’s My Kitchen Year and two quarts of her own homemade chicken stock.

“You’re going to do great,” Daisy said as she washed her hands. “Anyone who wants to learn how to do this is a person I’m happy to teach.”

“Do you ever end up with people who don’t want to learn?” Diana asked.

“Only all the time. There are the college kids whose parents gift them my services. They don’t always see the point of cooking when they can order any food ever invented on their phones and get it in twenty minutes, and they’re more than happy to share that opinion.” She could still remember her last such assignment, a girl who’d brandished her phone in Daisy’s face, saying, Like, hello? Grubhub? DoorDash? Uber Eats? Why do I even need to learn this? “College kids are bad. Widowers who’ve never cooked and are angry that their wives had the nerve to die on them are bad.” Daisy told Diana the story of the older gentleman who’d quit on her, mid-lesson, shouting, “She was supposed to be here to take care of me! That was our deal!” before leaning over the counter to clutch the food processor as he’d cried.

Diana shook her head. “I can’t even imagine what my mom would’ve done to my dad if he’d ever said something like that.”

“Hah. Maybe someday you’ll meet my father-in-law. He acts like it’s a woman’s job to handle anything related to the kitchen, up to and including getting him a glass of water.” Even after their cooking lessons, even after she’d become his daughter-in-law, Vernon Shoemaker would summon Daisy to the kitchen from the den or the bedroom and wave his empty coffee cup, not even bothering to verbalize the request, let alone slap a “please” on the end of it. “I’m sure Hal can help you,” Daisy had learned to say.

“What about your husband?” Diana asked. “Does he think it’s your job to get his coffee?”

Daisy closed her lips on her first answer, a reflexive, “Absolutely not.” Hal would never say that it was her job to take care of him—at least, not out loud—but she couldn’t ignore the way that their lives broke down along gendered lines, with Hal as the provider and Daisy in charge of child and home. He went out to conquer the world while she made a nest for him to land in, and she liked it that way. At least, most of the time. “Hal isn’t much of a cook,” she said, answering carefully. “But he’s good on clean-up.” When he doesn’t disappear. “Let’s see what you’ve got for pots and pans.”

In addition to the knives and the mixer, there was a deep roasting pan with a removable rack; pots from extra-large to extra-small, cutting boards and graters, a garlic press and a lemon reamer and even a cast-iron pan—unseasoned, but better than nothing. Daisy set out what they’d need for the chicken: a stick of butter and the herbs, lemons and garlic, onions and carrots.

“This is a no-fail, can’t-miss recipe. Unless you forget it’s in the oven, it’s almost impossible to ruin.”

“There’s a first time for everything,” Diana muttered, but she rolled up her sleeves and followed Daisy’s instructions. Daisy had her preheat the oven, remove the chicken from its plastic, rinse it, and pat it dry. “Dry skin is crispy skin,” Daisy said, encouraging Diana to blot the chicken skin until there was no moisture remaining. “Some recipes have you leave the chicken in the refrigerator, uncovered, for the moisture to evaporate from the skin. Some chefs even use a blow-dryer on the skin.”

Diana looked at her skeptically. “You’re kidding, right?”

“Hand to God,” said Daisy. “It probably looks ridiculous, but I’m sure it works.”

Daisy showed Diana how to rock the flat side of her knife against a garlic clove to loosen its skin. She had her season the bird with lots of kosher salt and fresh-ground pepper, and mix chopped herbs and garlic into the softened butter, then loosen the chicken’s skin and work the butter underneath. Some people got squeamish at touching gizzards or raw meat, and Daisy was relieved when her student managed it unflinchingly, poking carefully, almost apologetically underneath the chicken’s skin. “You’re a natural,” Daisy said, and Diana scoffed, looking pleased.

Diana asked Daisy how far away she lived, and about nearby grocery stores, and told her that she’d already found two bookstores and the La Colombe coffee shop on Nineteenth Street.

“How’s your daughter?” she asked, after Daisy had her stuff a lemon and some onions into the bird’s cavity, and showed her how to truss the bird’s legs with twine.

“Oh, Lord,” Daisy sighed. She gave Diana the brief version of the mice-in-the-freezer fight. “It’s not that I was actually worried the mice were going to contaminate our food. It’s more of the principle of the thing.”

Diana nodded. “She invaded your space.”

“With dead rodents!”

“I get it,” said Diana. She was smiling, which made her look younger. “I had a boyfriend once who was a fisherman. He’d leave his worms in my fridge, in a mayonnaise jar with holes punched in the top. I remember once when I went to get the orange juice they were all there, wriggling around. That was traumatizing.”

Daisy was wiping off the mushrooms, gathering Parmesan cheese and white wine. “Was this a serious boyfriend?”

Diana frowned. “He was,” she said, but she didn’t seem inclined to offer details. “You told me your husband went to boarding school with your brother. Did you meet him then? When you were a little girl?”

“Hal says he remembers meeting me when I was six. I don’t remember this at all.” Daisy couldn’t recall many specifics of the occasions when her brothers had brought friends home from boarding school or