Catering to Nobody

INTRODUCTION Catering a wake was not my idea of fun, Goldy the caterer reflects as she shapes dill-speckled bread dough into pillow-shaped rolls. Thus Goldy announces herself at the outset of Catering to Nobody. She has no inkling as to how the events at that wake will close down her business and force her to investigate a murder. Nor did I have any inkling that Goldy would become a member of my family, a person who speaks her mind, writes me letters, and embarks on culinary and sleuthing expeditions that I find both scary and amazing. Some years ago, I pulled over onto the shoulder of one of our narrow mountain roads. About twenty yards away, a pickup looked as if it had vaulted into the enormous roadside meadow, and then stalled. Its front wheels were precariously perched over a creekbank. Wanting to see if the driver needed help, I approached. “Is anyone in there?” I called. “Do you need help?” When I was six feet away, a mane of frizzy blond hair came into view. The head with the hair was stuck at an impossible horizontal angle. My body chilled; I could not find my voice. I raced back to my car and hit the accelerator hard. (This was before the widespread use of cell phones.) At home four minutes later, I phoned the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Department (a fabulous, dedicated group of law enforcement officers). I explained what I’d seen, then begged them to call me back once they knew what had happened. The young woman driver was okay, a cop told me later. She’d spun the truck’s wheels and lost control. She was on some kind of medication (!), and she’d blacked out. I was relieved the woman was not dead or injured. Still, I chastised myself. Goldy, I thought, would have done much better. Goldy’s background emerged from my years of volunteer work. Back then, I was continually startled by the number of middle- and upper-class women—women who labored beside me in volunteering—who were physically abused by their husbands. (In the years before the arrest and trial of O.J. Simpson, this demographic aspect of domestic abuse was not well known.) The idea for Goldy came out of what I call the “emotional refrigerator.” The emotional refrigerator provides ingredients for books, and foremost among these was this caterer who survives abuse, dumps her cruel husband, and thrives. When life handed Goldy the lemon of Doctor John Richard Korman, she determined to make not only lemonade, but also lemon meringue pie, lemon bars, lemon pound cake, lemon sorbet.… To the surprise of the small town of Aspen Meadow, Goldy abandoned the role of rich doctor’s wife, and put her considerable energies into starting the town’s first catering business. Goldy also does her best to raise her much-loved son, Arch, who begins the saga here at age eleven. (As I work on the eleventh Goldy book, Arch is fifteen and just beginning to come out of his emotional and physical timidity.) In Catering to Nobody, Goldy has not yet gone back to the church, nor has she figured out where her social life might be heading. But she knows what she’s good at—cooking—and she’s determined to make her new catering business a success. She doesn’t yet know she’ll be good at sleuthing … but she figures that out! The first response to the manuscript was mixed. Scores of editors rejected it. Virginia Rich had written three culinary mysteries in the early eighties, but she had been dead for several years. Who would buy a culinary mystery in 1989? When my wonderful agent, Sandra Dijkstra, pointed out to editors that no one—not a single author—had ever had a caterer (who offered recipes!) as a main character, the response was equally negative. Even more damning, the fact that Goldy had survived spousal abuse was seen as “too dark.” The recipes were viewed as “intrusive.” I felt strongly that both were necessary to explain who Goldy was, so the excellent Hope Dellon of St. Martin’s Press, who bought the book, allowed them to stay. Catering to Nobody, published in 1990 along with hundreds of other new hardcover mysteries, received a 4500-copy first print run. A press release was the only publicity, and so my agent urged me to do my own publicity. I balked, telling her, “Episcopalians don’t do publicity.” But she convinced me. I printed up a card for Dungeon Bars, one of the recipes in the book, and sent it to bookstores. I went on the road with three other members of Sisters In Crime, and we did our presentations at a dozen bookstores. To each store, I took platters of Dungeon Bars. If readers liked the cookie, I figured, they might buy the book. Twelve years after it was first published, Catering to Nobody has sold over a million copies, in this country and overseas. I was ecstatic when Bantam Books bought the rights to reprint the book in this new paperback edition. With Bantam, I am blessed to have not only the brilliant Kate Miciak as an editor, but also an entire team of diligent artists, publicists, salespeople, and businesspeople working to ensure that each Goldy book is more successful than the last. For this, too, I am thankful. Why do people feel connected to Goldy? Despite Catering to Nobody’s original publication as a “women’s book,” the marvelous mail I’ve received about it is equally split between men and women. These readers identify with Goldy, they are pulling for Arch, they despise the Jerk, or they just love cooking … or reading about it! And so on to the other characters and recipes. Regarding the Jerk: Doctor John Richard Korman strode into my mind with all his arrogance, money, good looks, and apparent invulnerability intact. He is not based on any one man. He is every egotistical clergyman, nasty boss, spiteful boyfriend, arrogant doctor, cruel professor, malevolent friend, wicked husband, etc., that any one of us could ever have—all rolled into a tall, blond, glib, athletic, powerful, much-admired man—the übermensch we love to hate. (Just please don’t send me any more mail asking me to kill him. My agent won’t let me. After hearing this, one Colorado librarian suggested, “Well, could you maim him?”) Regarding Arch: My husband and I have three sons, all of whom have provided “Arch material” over the years. Still, not one of our sons wears glasses; they wouldn’t be caught dead in Arch-style clothes; they find his various science, art, and literary projects bizarre. Arch is just Arch. Regarding Tom: Women frequently ask me, “Where did you get him?” No matter what my response, the follow-up question is: “Do you know any single men who are like Tom?” No, sorry, I don’t. Like Arch, Tom is a composite. He is a good, kind, knowledgeable man—in those ways, he is very similiar to my husband (who is not the Jerk … please don’t ask him anymore, it upsets him). Tom also possesses a single-minded dedication to law enforcement, like the wonderfully helpful Sergeant Richard Millsapps of the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Department. Most importantly, though, Tom—with his charisma, his caring, his love of cooking, and his great affection for Goldy—just knocked on the door of my mind when I was structuring the first crime scene in Catering to Nobody. When I opened the door to Tom, he strode in and took charge. Marla, Goldy’s best friend and the other ex-wife of the Jerk, did not knock on my mental entryway. She blasted through it, her ample brown hair twinkling with precious-gem barrettes, her equally ample body swathed in expensive seasonal clothes, her voice exuberant as she delivered gossip, opinions, and advice. She flopped onto an instantly imagined kitchen chair, snagged a handful of cookies, and informed me she was rich as blazes. Moreover, she announced, she was here to stay. The only other ongoing series character, Julian Teller, is introduced in the book that followed Catering to Nobody, Dying For Chocolate. Unlike Goldy, Marla, Tom, and Arch, I had no idea Julian Teller would be such a strong presence in the life of Goldy’s extended family. But when I sent Julian off to college, I received such a barrage of complaining letters, I brought him back. Julian, like the others, is here to stay. Regarding the recipes: People often ask me where I “get” them. The answer is, from tasting, experimenting, trials, and many, many errors. Most of the recipes are ones I’ve worked on, reworked, and experimented with since my husband and I were married in 1969. At that time, I had to start from scratch, since I had no idea of how to cook or even how to learn to cook. I put our first steak into the oven at 350°—for an hour. That was what you did with everything else, I figured, so why not? And bless my husband—he proclaimed the resultant leather delicious. (I do much better now.) With the other recipes in Goldy’s books, I sometimes will taste a dish at a restaurant, or some delicacy made by my phenomenally talented catering mentor, John William Schenk, and then try repeatedly to replicate it. This works until the family cries, “Enough!” (They finally announced, when I’d served them weeks of variations on “Julian’s Cheese Manicotti”—from Dying for Chocolate—“No more manicotti! Ever!”) My sisters, Lucy Mott Faison and Sally Mott Freeman, and my brother, Bill Mott, Jr., have given me wonderful ideas and done much low-altitude testing and tasting, for which I am deeply grateful. Lucy has produced an endless stream of Goldy’s cookies, cakes, and muffins, and given all of them to her neighbors, her friends, and her son Will’s teachers at the Gilman School in Baltimore. In Bethesda, Maryland, Sally—herself a superb cook; some day I hope to learn to make her incredible chutney—and her sons Christopher and Bobby have been my unflagging publicists. (Some Episcopalians are good at publicity, after all!) And Billy, a tireless vice-president at Goldman Sachs, has not only given me numerous insights into the business world, he is also a fabulous cook who helps his wife, Cathie, cook for their children Torry, Gracie, Billy, and Olivia. It was Billy who came up with the terrific idea to grill “Snow-boarder’s Pork Tenderloin” (from Tough Cookie). (It’s great, try it!) Needless to say, I am deeply grateful to my siblings, their spouses, and all their wonderful children. Since (again, unexpectedly) the recipes emerged as one of readers’ favorite aspects of the Goldy books, four new ones appear here. I have extensively revamped the honey-spice cookie, renamed it Honey-I’m-Home Ginger Snaps, and placed the recipes in a new format. I hope you enjoy them all, and will fix them for someone you love. Good reading, and bon appétit! Diane Mott Davidson, October 2001 COLD BUFFET FOR FORTY Poached salmon ♦ Mayonnaise mixed with wild Maine blueberries ♦ Asparagus vinaigrette with minced tomatoes ♦ Wild rice salad ♦ Herb rolls and honey muffins ♦ Strawberry shortcake buffet ♦ Vouvray, lemonade, coffee and tea