The Pot Thief Who Studied Escoffier (2 page)

“You get any of this in writing?”

Susannah is the straightforward type. Once she spots a weakness, she closes in for the kill. I knew she was just trying to protect me, but she seemed to be enjoying it. She’s a couple of inches taller than me, a couple of decades younger and a fun friend to have.

I bought some time by signaling to Angie for another round of margaritas. We were at our favorite table at Dos Hermanas Tortilleria enjoying our daily cocktail hour. Which sometimes runs more than an hour if Susannah doesn’t have a class or a date. Her dating issues are often a topic of our discussions and were again that evening because a new guy was working at La Placita where she waits tables during the lunch shift.

“What’s his name?” I asked.

“Rafael Pacheco, but everyone calls him ‘Ice’. He’s the new garde manger at the restaurant.”

The holiday season was approaching, and I knew La Placita always has a crèche in the lobby. I assumed mahn zhey, as it sounded to me, was French for manger.

“I didn’t realize they hired someone to guard the manger,” I said.

“The garde manger doesn’t guard anything, Hubert. He’s in charge of preparing cold food.”

“Isn’t restaurant food supposed to be served hot?” I asked, making no acknowledgement of my ignorance of French.

“Salads, aspics, pâté and all sorts of things are served cold. That’s why they call him Ice.”

‘Ice’ sounded like a name for a pimp. I didn’t think her dating someone known as ‘Ice’ was a good idea.

“Where does the term garde manger come from?” I asked.

“I think it originally meant the person who oversees the pantry.”

“See,” I said triumphantly, “he does guard something.”

She rolled her eyes and sipped her margarita.

3

I spent a sleepless night trying to calculate how long it would take me to design, throw and glaze a hundred chargers.

Somewhere in my subconscious I knew I was really calculating how long I would have to be in Santa Fe. Not that Santa Fe is a bad place to be. Despite its too precious plaza and too many super-rich Californians, it has many of the things I like about my native state – great food, piñon-scented air, traditional adobe architecture and pueblo pottery.

This may tell you more than I want you to know about me, but I suspect the reason I dislike travel is the loss of control. In my residence behind my shop, no jarring surprises await.

The sheets are five-hundred thread count Egyptian long staple cotton. I know what’s in my larder and what I will have for breakfast. As you already know, no strangers use my bathroom.

Being away from home places you at the mercy of others. Who knows about the sheets in hotels? About the food they serve. About the people who clean the toilets.

I awoke hungry, happy that I could do my own breakfast. Secure in the knowledge that a new bottle of Gruet Blanc de Noir was in the fridge. I scrambled some eggs with diced jalapeños, tomatoes, and cilantro. I dumped the mixture in a bowl, threw three corn tortillas in the hot pan and pushed them around with my fingers until they were heated through. Then I placed them on a plate, spooned the egg mixture and some pico de gallo on the tortillas and folded them over. Breakfast tacos and champagne. Heaven.

The doorbell rang just as I lifted the first taco to my lips. I was tempted to ignore it but went to my workshop and peered through the peephole. Then I went to the front door and opened it for Martin Seepu.

“I hope you didn’t come to sell me one of your uncle’s pots. I don’t have enough money to buy one.”

He sniffed the air. “I came for breakfast,” he announced and walked back to my kitchen table. He sat down in front of the tacos and looked up at me. “These look great. What are you having?”

He sipped coffee while I cooked up a second batch of tacos. When I finally sat down to eat, he said, “Now mine are cold.”

I switched plates with him. They were not cold, and they were great with the Gruet which was. Martin stuck to coffee.

I told him about Santiago Molinero. “He wanted to pay your uncle twenty-five thousand to make chargers.”

“He won’t do plates.”

“How do you know a charger is a plate?”

“You probably figured it was a horse. He hire you instead?”

“How’d you guess?”

“None of the Indians you represent would do it.”

“Yeah. And like I told you, I need the money.”

“How you know he’s gonna pay you?”

“That’s what Susannah asked me. Why is everyone worried about my pay?”

“Twenty-five thousand is a lot of wampum.”

“Two hundred and fifty isn’t that much for a handmade plate. Unfortunately, he insists I do the work in Santa Fe.”

“How long you gonna be there?”

“I spent all night trying to figure that out. I have no idea.”

“Want me to take the dog to my place while you gone?”

“How about you stay here? You could take care of Geronimo and watch the store, too.”

“Indians don’t run trading posts.”

I was paired up with Martin when I was a college student and he was a grade school drop-out. The program, run by The University of New Mexico Indigenous Peoples Center, was supposed to give UNM students a chance for public service and the Indigenous Peoples a chance to Learn from the White Man. I’m sure that’s not the way the Center phrased it, but that’s the way it seemed to both me and Martin. Once we agreed on that, we hit it off. He taught me that his people don’t think of themselves as indigenous or as Native Americans. Neither term even makes sense in their worldview. I taught him mathematics for no other reason than it was what I was majoring in at the time. Despite having dropped out of school in the seventh grade, he learned everything I knew about math in a single year.

Martin raises horses and I throw pots, so math is of no practical use to either one of us, but I think it shaped the way we think and gave us a bond. Martin was a taciturn kid. Explaining proofs to me helped him be at ease verbally, something not expected of children in his culture.

“I’ll take the dog. You should get Tristan to watch the shop,” he suggested. “You pay him anyway. Make him work for it.”

4

Needing to walk off the tacos and champagne, I followed Central to High Street and turned south three blocks to Coal. I passed under Interstate 25 and arrived at Tristan’s apartment in the jumble of rental houses and apartments just south of the University of New Mexico campus.

Tristan is the grandson of my great aunt Beatrice. I don’t know what kinship relation that creates, but I call him my nephew and he calls me Uncle Hubert. He also calls me when he needs money, which explains Martin’s snide remark.

Tristan was asleep, the antemeridian being unknown to him. I had acquired a brace of breakfast burritos along the way at Duran Central Pharmacy for use as an alarm clock. I stuck them under his nose after letting myself in with my key, and they worked.

“Duran’s?” he asked groggily. The kid has his uncle’s nose for food.

While Tristan was in the bathroom throwing cold water on his face, I hit the brew button on his coffeemaker.

I told him about Santiago Molinero while he ate, and he responded like everyone else.

“You better get your money in advance.”

“That’s what Susanna and Martin both said. Do I make Molinero sound that untrustworthy?”

“Molinero may be fine for all I know, but most restaurants fail within the first year.”

“O.K., I’ll tell him I need the money up front.” I thought about it for a minute and said, “I might be relieved if he says no. I could use the money, but I don’t feel comfortable with this project.”

He had a mouthful of burrito, so he raised his eyebrows by way of asking for an explanation.

“I don’t want to relocate to Santa Fe, even short term. I don’t know about making pots in a restaurant that’s under construction. But my worst fear is I won’t be able to come up with a design. I copy things. I’m not a creative artist.”

“So just chose a great design from your inventory and copy it.”

“It’s an Austrian restaurant. I don’t think they have Anasazi symbols in Vienna.”

“Do a goat herder in lederhosen,” he suggested.

“You’re a big help.”

He started in on the second burrito with such gusto that I began to think I should have brought three. He has a layer of baby fat, but he’s not really overweight. His dark hair hangs in short ringlets, and what the girls call his bedroom eyes are midnight blue.

“If I take the job, I’ll need someone to tend the store.”

He swallowed the last bite of burrito. “I can do that.”

“What about your classes?”

He gave me one his big easy smiles. “Even if I close for a couple of hours a day for classes, Uncle Hubert, I’ll still be open more than you are.”

He was right, of course. But with my customer demand, what difference does it make how often I’m open? Plus, I might be making big bucks in Santa Fe provided I got paid before the place went bankrupt.

5

Thinking about Santa Fe reminded me of Frank Aquirre teaching us about the 1607 founding of Jamestown. Two ironies came to mind.

First, 1607 was also the year Santa Fe was founded. But that didn’t make the history books at Albuquerque High School. I guess they were all published back East. Jamestown was described as the first European settlement in the new world. From which I deduced in the steel trap mind I had in those days that either Spain was not considered part of Europe or Santa Fe was not considered part of the new world.

The second irony was that I had started dating Aguirre’s daughter that summer.

The hotel now known as La Fonda was also founded in 1607. The rambling stuccoed building on the southeast side of the Plaza is not the original structure, but it looks like it could be with its ornately-carved wood vigas and hand-made floor tiles. La Fonda (Spanish for ‘Inn’) has been the meeting place for conquistadores, Indians, priests, cowboys, artists, peddlers and politicians for over four centuries.

As I stood by the registration desk scanning the couches and chairs in the lobby, all those groups and more were represented. The menagerie of eccentrics, posers, tourists, hawkers, Indians, Hispanics, turquoise-bedecked blondes, pony-tailed men, bikers, and local Sufis was so oddly diverse that it might have been a caucus at the Democratic National Convention.

The guy I was looking for fit right in. But then who wouldn’t in a crowd like that? He wore a white tunic with a stiff collar and harlequin pants with a drawstring. As I neared him, I could read the embroidery on the tunic – ‘Schnitzel’ in bold red letters with “Chef Kuchen’ in black script just below.

Kuchen stood up as I approached and towered over my five foot six inches. He had broad shoulders, a square jaw, and a crushing handshake.

“Gunter Kuchen,” he announced, and I thought I heard the click of heels.

“Hubert Schuze,” I muttered as I winced from his grip.

“Ah, Schuze. It is German, yes?”

“It is German, no,” I answered.

“Yes, of course. You are too short.” He waved a long arm around the room. “Everyone in New Mexico is short. Because of the diet, yes?”

“Perhaps,” I said, not wanting to argue the point.

“We will have coffee,” he said as he strode off towards the French Café that opens onto the lobby.

The coffee and pastries in the French Café are delicious, and it was late enough in the morning that there was actually a table available. I selected a palmier and Herr Kuchen took a brioche.

“The pastries here are good,” I opined.

“The ones at Schnitzel will be better. I have a pâtissier, Machlin Masoot, who knows well the Viennoiseries.”

I had no idea what that meant. I wasn’t even sure what language it was in. Perhaps the Austrian equivalent of Spanglish.

“Why did you seek this meeting,” he asked?

“I want to discuss a proposal made to me by Mr. Molinero.”

 He stuck out his already prominent jaw and said, “In that case, I do not think I can be of assistance to you. Molinero knows nothing of food.”

“But he’s starting a restaurant.”

“No!” he contradicted me sharply. “He starts only the business. I start the restaurant.”

“Hmm. Well, the question I have is not a food question, but I’ll ask you anyway.”

“As you please.”

“Molinero wants me to design and create chargers. But my specialty is Native American. I have no idea what design would be appropriate for an Austrian restaurant.”

He leaned back in his chair and the sun glinted off his smooth blond hair. “I cannot imagine why Molinero would select you for this task. Santa Fe drowns in local culture. I came to introduce Österreichische Küche.”

“I beg your pardon.”

“Austrian cuisine,” he translated.

“Then you are just the man to suggest a proper design,” I said.

“Of course,” he agreed. “You must use Lederhosen.”

6

Susannah drained the last sip from her first margarita. “He actually suggested lederhosen?”

“So did Tristan.”

“Yeah, but Tristan was kidding. So what did you say to Kuchen? Surely you’re not seriously considering lederhosen.”

I’d arrived back in Albuquerque just in time for the cocktail hour. I was nursing my margarita because the only thing I’d eaten all day was the palmier, and the tequila seemed to be coursing directly into my bloodstream.

Susannah idly twirled her empty glass. “Although,” she said slowly, “cartoonish lederhosen might work for a casual Austrian restaurant.”

“They want me to make chargers, remember?”

“Oh, right. I guess Schnitzel won’t have a drive-thru window or golden Alps arches.”

“No. Herr Kuchen has come to introduce Österreichische Küche.”

“Who’s he, the chef?”

“No. Kuchen is the chef.”

“Yeah, but maybe this Ostrich guy is the Chef de cuisine.”

“That’s different from just a chef?”

“There’s a hierarchy, Hubie. The top guy is the Chef de cuisine. Then there’s a sous chef, a chef de partie and all sorts of other positions.”

“Well, Kuchen is definitely the top guy. I’m sure he wouldn’t have it any other way.”