On the Corner of Hopeless and Hopeful

Meal 04

0 4

Souvlaki

All day Nami focused her attention to a certain customer. A middle age lady who would do one of four things: look at her laptop, look out the window, scratch things down on a notebook, or eat. Her emotions also ranged from delighted to silent fuming rage.

The woman had been there all day since the restaurant opened and showed no signs of leaving anytime soon. Nami had been tracking her order all day: two teas, one coffee, one slice of amygdalopita, a serving of pita with gyros, refills on daktyla, Greek salad, and bourou-bourou.

She stopped typing to take a sip of her tea only to realise it was empty. She signaled Nami over for a refill making it three teas. As Nami was refilling her drink, she noticed that all day, the woman was writing a story or essay of some sorts but judging by the word count she didn't accomplish much.

"Thank you."

"Do you need anything else?" Nami asked.

"Any chance you have the ability to make me finish this manuscript?" She took a sip of her tea before scratching out something in her notebook.

"No sorry."

"It's fine. I'll probably get the motivation and inspiration to write it when it's one in the morning or something. For now I just need to avoid my publisher."

Nami gave a confused nod and returned to her job. Since no one else needed anything at the moment, she started to wipe the tables. She was cleaning the counter when Rosemary walked out with a few piece of amygdalota, Greek almond cookies, and sat down opposite to the author.

"I'm guessing you're stuck again?" Rosemary asked as she ate one of the cookies.

"How'd you know?" The author asked, taking a bite out of the cookie.

"You only come here when you're celebrating or hiding. So what's the problem this time?"

"I don't know what story to tell this time. I scrapped the past two ideas and my publisher didn't like the previous idea."

"Why don't you take a break from writing?" Rosemary suggested. She stopped eating the cookies and took out a lollipop from her pocket. "I mean you did a five book series, followed by a crime trilogy in the past decade. Both kids are out of the house and there're no grandkids to take care of. It's the perfect time to take a break. Travel the world, it's not like you don't have the money to do so."

"I'm not in the 'travel the world' mood. I'm in the 'I want to write something' mood. I just don't have something to write."

"Well," Rosemary said as she unwrapped the lollipop, "if you're not in a rush then go back to writing something fun. Weren't you always talking about writing a collection of stories to go with the World of Glass?"

The author stopped eating and seriously considered the idea. She had, ever since she finished planning the series, wanted to write stories focusing on the aftermath of the characters. Not so much that it would be a sixth book focusing solely on their relationships and jobs which would be a whole other genre.

"I'll make you some food while you start writing."

"Thanks Rose."

"Anytime."

Rosemary called Nami into the kitchen to teach her a meal of the day. Since it was a Greek theme, Rosemary decided to make some souvlaki for her favourite author.

"Okay kid, chop the peppers and grill them over high heat until they turn black."

"Black?"

"Black, when they look like they're almost ruined that's when you're going to put them into a bowl and wrap the top, letting it steam for five minutes."

Nami washed and chopped the peppers and began to blacken the peppers. When they looked like they were one second away from being too burnt to be eaten, Nami moved them into a bowl and wrapped the top with plastic wrap.

Rosemary, who was watching for the side, said, "Good job. Now we're going to make tzatziki. So grate these cucumbers into a sieve, a sifter, which is over a bowl. Throw some salt for flavour and squeeze as much water as you can out."

Nami grated the cucumber and threw the salt into it. She found squeezing the life, or in this case water, out of the mixture was rather relaxing. She pretending it was her cheating ex-boyfriend who kicked her out the day she lost her job.

Rosemary replaced the water filled bowl with a new one and added yoghurt, dried mint, red wine vinegar and a garlic mortar paste into the bowl before mixing it. She let Nami have a taste and she could only describe it as a graceful explosion.

While Rosemary was doing that, she instructed Nami to make the kebabs. After threading the marinated pork, she grilled them. Nami made sure to turn the kebab allowing for all four sides to be cooked evenly not wanting to repeat her last grilling accident.

Nami occasionally turned to see what Rosemary was doing. One moment she was deseeding the peppers and the next she was slicing mint leaves into the dill. She went from adding red wine vinegar to extra virgin oil. She as the young woman finished, Rosemary was mixing everything together and slicing lemon wedges.

"What do I say about preparation?"

"That there's no point in cooking good food if it looks ugly."

"Good so watch me." Rosemary instructed. "You're going to add the tzatziki and meat onto the flatbread. Good, there you go. Now take this," she handed the mixture she made when Nami was grilling, "and top it. Now squeeze some lemon juice and voilà."

Rosemary placed her finished souvlaki in front of Nami for her dinner while Nami went to serve hers to the author. The author, who Nami later found out was Claudia Dale a.k.a Dacri Slayter, was too busy writing to even notice Nami. However Nami did notice the focused author taking a bite of her cooking and a smile appearing shortly after.

N O T E

The souvlaki recipe used in this chapter can be accessed through the external link. What do you think the next theme or recipe will be?