Julia’s throat tightened a little. “I never managed to do that. Bread was made the first thing every morning. I never came belowstairs before sunrise.”
“They make bread that early?” Brina questioned as much with her expression as her words.
Julia put her hands on her hips and studied the ingredients before her. Suddenly she felt the gravity of what they were about to attempt and the reason for it—so that Brina would know she could do the work should she decide to join the sisters. This task had seemed so much easier when she was just thinking about doing it. Now that it was time to do the deed, she wasn’t as sure.
Inhaling deeply, Julia swallowed down her hesitation. “Well, it can’t be that difficult, can it? Cooks do it every day. I know it doesn’t take a lot of yeast or salt to make bread rise, so let’s see how much flour this bowl will hold and we’ll go from there. I’ll put everything in and you stir it all together.”
Julia took the top of the tin to pour. The flour fell to the bowl with a heavy splat and poofed flour all over her and Brina.
“What did you do?” Brina asked coughing and waving the white cloudy mist away.
“I don’t know.” Julia started laughing. “It’s all over your face.”
“It’s on yours, too,” Brina added with a snicker of amusement. “And in your hair.”
Julia brushed her hand across her hair.
“Now it’s worse.” Brina smiled.
Julia laughed softly. “So now I’m covered in soot, flour, and ash. I’ll clean up later.” She looked down at the bowl. “I don’t think that’s enough flour to fill a pan. I’ll add more.”
They both looked down at the bowl as she tilted the canister again. A double handful of it plopped on top of the first pour and it dusted them again.
“Are you doing that on purpose?” Brina questioned in disbelief.
“Of course not,” Julia defended herself, and put the canister down with a clatter. “Do you think I want flour all over my face and hair? Look, it’s even on our sleeves.”
“All right,” Brina answered in a calmer voice. “As you said, we’ll wash up later. Let’s get this made so it can rise.”
After discussing at length the amount of milk, yeast, and salt they should use, they began.
It didn’t take long before the mixture in the bowl became a white sticky paste that was clinging to the sides of the bowl and the spoon in wet clumps.
“This is getting too difficult to stir and it won’t hold together,” Julia offered. “I think we need to stop the milk and add more flour.”
“I’ll pour this time,” Brina said confidently, “and you stir.”
“Yes, of course,” Julia agreed with a roll of her shoulders. “You need to know how to do it all. It will be good practice for you.”
They changed places and Brina lifted the canister. She gently shook out the tiniest amount. Julia stirred. The effort was repeated until Julia said, “I think we have enough. Let’s spoon it onto the table and then you can knead it.”
“Me?” Brina asked, looking down at the wet sticky flour.
“Of course, you. We’re doing this for you. Put your strength into it.”
They scraped the mixture onto the table. Brina squeezed her hands into fists and the dough squirted through her fingers. Seconds later the dough started sticking to the table and then to her hands in knobby clumps. Julia added more flour but the consistency didn’t get better.
“What happened to it? I can’t get it off.” Brina tried to wipe the dough from her fingers and ended up, sending more of if flying.
“There’s only one thing to do.” Julia walked over and grabbed a pan off the wall. “It doesn’t matter how it looks or feels. It’s how it tastes that matters. Let’s get it into the pan so it can rise.”
“And say good riddance,” Brina whispered under her breath.
After the dough was in a pan sitting on a table near the fire, and their hands were washed clean, it was time to cut the vegetables. They decided to clean up the flour from the table and floor after the vegetables were in the kettle.
Surely making soup had to be easier than making bread. There would be no measuring or sticky stuff to worry about.
Julia saw steam coming up from the kettle on the cook rack. “The water’s hot.”
“It’s getting hot in the kitchen, too,” Brina grumbled, wiping her forehead. “I think you made the fire too big.”
“I knew we had to have enough heat to cook the food,” Julia argued. “There was nothing to be done about that.” It surprised her how testy one could get while cooking.
By the time they finished chopping the cabbage, two potatoes, three onions, and several mushrooms, they had three large bowls of vegetables and one medium-size kettle of water boiling.
“Why does cabbage become so much more once it’s been cut up?” Brina asked as she looked at the mountain of food. “What are we going to do with all this?”
Julia had no idea but agreed it defied logic that something that looked relatively small could turn into a mammoth mound. But then, who would have thought baking bread could be such a chore, or that two little cabbages could look like they would feed Wellington’s army once they were chopped?
“Should we fill another kettle?”
“It will take too long for the water to heat.” Julia was ready to finish this and get out of the kitchen. “Let’s fill this one to the top with as many vegetables as we can get in it. We can take the rest of it over to the school and they can cook it tomorrow.”
“That’s a better idea.” Brina gave Julia a grateful smile.
Julia looked over at the bread and gasped. It had risen out of the bowl and had fallen over the sides of the pan and onto the table.
Brina looked at Julia and together they said, “Too much yeast!”
Julia took in a deep breath, determined not to let making bread get the best of her. “We’ll fill more pans and bake it.”
Finally, the bread was in the oven and the vegetables in the kettle. “The school will have enough bread for a week,” Julia said, washing her hands in a tub of water.
“Soup, too,” Brina added, dabbing a towel to her forehead. “I suppose we should clean up, but I would really rather sit down and have a cup of tea first.”
Julia surveyed the table, sticky with drying flour and dough, and littered with bits of cabbage, potato, and onion peelings and greenery from the celery. She thought she might never want to eat again. Especially if she had to do the cooking. It was too much work, and she simply didn’t want to eat that badly. And she had as much experience cleaning as she had cooking—which was none.
“I need something stronger than tea,” Julia said, brushing a fallen strand of hair behind her ear. “I need to be fortified before I attempt cleaning that table. Port is a fortified wine. There’s an open bottle of it in the drawing room.”
“Excellent idea,” Brina agreed.
After a few minutes, a few laughs, and a few dry bits of humor about how they looked, Julia and Brina were well on their way to finishing their second glass of port. Tiny glasses emptied quickly.
When their chatter about the enlightening experience faded away, Garrett crossed Julia’s mind and she started feeling somber.