Total pages in book: 111
Estimated words: 102523 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 513(@200wpm)___ 410(@250wpm)___ 342(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 102523 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 513(@200wpm)___ 410(@250wpm)___ 342(@300wpm)
It makes sense, and I’m even more impressed as Hazel looks up at a big whiteboard on the wall. It’s covered in a mess of scribbled notes in a rainbow of colors that looks about as decipherable as the walls of an Egyptian pyramid. But she clearly understands it.
“Okay, what’s first?” I ask, and Hazel points. “The flour?”
“Yeah, the one marked ‘all purpose,’” she says. “Use the baker’s scale there, and get me two pounds of it.”
I find a large plastic tub and do as she says, putting in two pounds of white flour. “Now what?”
Hazel, who’s in the fridge, looks over her shoulder. “Do the same thing with fourteen ounces of sugar, but put that in the bowl when you’re done. It’s a wet.”
“A wet?” I ask. “But it’s sugar. Dry.”
Hazel flashes me an amused look. “It dissolves so quickly with liquids, sugar’s considered a wet ingredient for our purposes.”
I peer into the bin of apparently “wet” sugar that looks completely dry to me. “If you say so.”
“I do,” Hazel says, bringing her own ingredients over. Dropping what looks like an obscene amount of butter into the big metal bowl on the mixer, she starts the mixer up at a slow speed. “C’mon, Helga. I know it’s early, but you can do it, girl,” she purrs to the mixer in a sweet, cajoling voice. To me, she simply orders, “Get me a fresh gallon of milk.”
I grab her the milk, and as she pours it in without measuring, she asks, “What do you do now that you’ve run away from home and are apparently the black sheep of the Ford family?”
“Is that the rumor? Hard to believe I’m the black sheep.” She gives me a wry look, and I shrug. “I’m a woodworker, own my own shop making heirloom furniture and period-appropriate reproduction millwork.”
“Blah blah . . . wood . . . blah blah . . . furniture. That’s about all I understood,” she teases, cracking eggs into the bowl.
I laugh, charmed by her “no big deal” attitude. But I want her to know me, as much as I want to know her, so I explain. “When people are renovating historical homes and need trim moldings, you can’t just go down to Home Depot and pick it up. The pieces are special, unique, and though we could machine-mill them with the technology we have now, creating them by hand, carving them the same way they were centuries ago, is . . . important.” I realize Hazel has stopped what she’s doing, listening to me attentively, and I fear I’ve revealed more than I intended. “The heirloom furniture is my cake and pie, though,” I joke, pointing at the bowl she’s holding. “Custom pieces using turn-of-the-century methods to make furniture your great-great-grandkids will sell at an estate sale one day.”
Hazel laughs, letting me lighten things. “So you have a bunch of big tools and machines?”
“I do, but most of my work is done with my hands,” I reply suggestively.
“You must be good with them then,” Hazel says. I hold my hands up, letting her see for herself. She smiles her approval before jumping subjects. “Where do you live now?”
“Newport. I’ve got a little house that’s smaller than my shop, which was the garage at one point. It’s enough for me.” She slows down the mixer before adding the dry ingredients, and I ask a question of my own. “Who’s the better baker, you or your mom?”
“Mom, no doubt. She’s a better baker than most of those idiots on TV,” Hazel says immediately, “but I’m learning what I can.”
“I bet,” I say appreciatively, not only of her but of her various skills. Her confidence in the kitchen is almost as sexy as her cockiness at the pool table.
She turns the mixer back up. “Okay, give that a minute to mix, and we’ll get the bacon and candied pecans going.”
“Bacon and pecans?” I groan, my mouth watering. “Damn, that’s like seduction in a cupcake for me.”
Hazel’s eyes sparkle. “Good to know your stomach is the way to your . . .” I wait for her to finish the phrase as expected, but I should’ve known better because she leans my way to say, “Dick. I picked out that combination. A little salty, a little sweet. Pure sinful decadence.”
I shift on my feet, feeling some sins of my own coming up, and though the move is subtle, Hazel misses nothing. With a coy smile, she scoops cupcake batter into the paper baking cups of a large tray. She pops the tray into the oven, asking, “Why did you leave Cold Springs?”
“It’s a long story.” I don’t add that it’s one I don’t particularly want to get into. I figure Winston will want an explanation, and I probably owe him and Wren one, but it’s not a topic I like to dig out and showcase.