White Truffles in Winter Read Online Free PDF

fear he must be ineffectual at both tasks.”
    Escoffier made the girl laugh. Delphine suddenly felt uneasy and slow witted. The old anger rose in her, sharp and acidic, as if each of his indiscretions, each mistake, each inept investment, each moment of ill-placed trust, was new and fresh.
    She tried to push through the dullness to form the words, a sentence, anything that made sense, but all she could think was, All these tomatoes— and was panicked by them. She knew she should have had the cannery simply send cases of tomato puree for the household—it was the Escoffier Ltd brand specialty, after all. They would have done so happily. More than likely they would have also included, as a kind gesture, the Escoffier Pickles, the Escoffier Sauce Melba, the Escoffier Diablo Sauce and maybe even some of the tinned meats. Even though the factory was no longer theirs—it had failed as everything else Escoffier invested in had failed—the new owners were kind enough and somewhat generous.
    Her thoughts ran together, making her exhausted.
    It was inevitable .
    Even before the world changed, before the Germans rose again, everyone seemed to make money off Escoffier except for Escoffier—the hotels, his collaborators—and then that Philéas Gilbert suddenly claims to be the authorof Le Guide Culinaire and co-writes Larousse Gastronomique with recipes stolen from Le Guide.
    Betrayal after betrayal but no money.
    Escoffier and Sabine chopped and peeled . Delphine couldn’t stop thinking about the money.
    Even the help Escoffier had given Mr. Maggi and his cubed soup paid nothing to them . And now the world cans tomatoes! No one even considered processing tomatoes in cans until Escoffier convinced a fruit cannery to produce two thousand cans for The Savoy. For years he begged them and then— Voilà!— the next year they produced sixty thousand. Now in Italy and America millions and millions of cans of tomatoes are sold.
    Thought upon thought rolled tighter and tighter inside her head. Morphine always made her feel this way, like a whining engine burning itself out.
    And where is the money?
    The art collection: sold. The good silver: sold.
    â€œI don’t understand,” she shouted, although no one was speaking to her. The sound of her own voice surprised her. It was too loud, too shrill.
    Escoffier put down his knife.
    â€œMadame Escoffier,” he said. In his white apron, he was again the man she loved. The gentle man who only spoke in whispers.
    â€œI am sorry,” she said.
    â€œI am not.”
    He leaned over and kissed her. His lips tasted of tomatoes, sharp and floral.
    The moment, filled with the heat of a reckless summer, brought her back to the gardens they had grown together in Paris in a private courtyard behind Le Petit Moulin Rouge. Sweet Roma tomatoes, grassy licorice tarragon, thin purple eggplants and small crisp beans thrived in a series of old wine barrels that sat in the tiny square. There were also violets and roses that the confiseur would make into jellies or sugar to grace the top of the petits-fours glacés , which were baked every evening while the coal of the brick ovens cooled down for the night.
    â€œNo one grows vegetables in the city of Paris,” she said, laughing, when Escoffier first showed her his hidden garden, “except for Escoffier.”
    He picked a ripe tomato, bit into it and then held it to her lips. “ Pomme d’amour , perhaps this was fruit of Eden.”
    The tomato was so ripe and lush, so filled with heat it brought tears to her eyes and he kissed her.
    â€œYou are becoming very good at being a chef’s wife.”
    â€œI love you,” she said and finally meant it.
    Pommes d’amour. The kitchen was now overflowing with them.
    â€œI love you,” she said again.
    Escoffier nodded. “Should I get the nurse?”
    â€œIt was just a moment.”
    â€œGood. We are nearly finished.”
    He