Cammie and Jean-Paul

[x-cynosure.livejournal.com]

Jean-Paul gets out of the school for a little while by taking Cammie grocery shopping.



The parking lot at FoodPlus was littered with shopping carts, rubbish, and one Quebecois trying very hard not to let his opinion of the grocery store show on his face. This wasn't the kind of place he'd normally think of when it came to restocking the larder -- overripe fruit, most of it irradiated or heavily treated with pesticides, canned goods in dubious condition, and questionable expiration dates on the refrigerated goods. Fortunately, they weren't shopping for his palate, but for Cammie's. The more spoiled and chemical-laden the food, the better it would taste to her.

Jean-Paul glanced over at the sound of the car door finally slamming behind him. "Decided not to be upset with me after all, or simply going to mug me for the car keys?" he asked innocently.

“Well, you didn’t get us killed, so wrestling you away from the wheel would’ve been too much work,” Cammie said, stepping out of the car and stretching. It had been years since she had been to a grocery store with the intent to actually pay for something to eat. She adjusted one of the leather bracelets on her right hand so it wasn’t hanging down so low and started towards the door. “I’ll pocket the keys somewhere in the store and you’ll never even know. Safer that way.”

"Mark me later. For now, I need your input." Jean-Paul headed for the store's entrance, snagging a cart on the way in. "What did you decide on?"

“I don’t know, really. There was this chicken pasta stuff my mom used to make that I remember, kind of,” Cammie said, walking by the cart, holding her arms up behind her head. “It was really good. I felt kind of ripped off when I could taste it anymore.”

"That is a place to start. What was it like? A pasta-with-sauce dish? A casserole?" A pause. "One of those label recipes where you use mushroom soup as the base for everything?"

“No. Mom was allergic to mushrooms, so we never used that as a base for anything. Unless Dad was cooking and managed to ditz out,” which had happened once as she recalled. “I think it was a pasta, but it was one you cooked in the oven maybe? The chicken had cheese and stuff on it too.”

The cart listed slightly to the right as they stopped in the dry goods aisle and looked over the selection of pasta noodles. "Like a lasagna?"

“Yeah. Like that, I guess,” Cammie said. “And with the white sauce and not the red, though I’ve had it both ways,” she said. “Heh. I wonder if it will taste the same,” she said, looking down at the noodles. There were a lot of different kinds of noodles. She didn’t know how complicated all this stuff was.

"Probably not on the first try." Jean-Paul offered the girl an encouraging smile. "But we can keep trying until we strike the right combination, I think. It is not as if it will go to waste, no matter what we end up with. It may be that we improve upon the recipe so far as your system is concerned."

“Well, that’s fair. First we’ll need some sort of noodles. And then chicken and that’s about all I remember because I never did anything with the cooking other than eat it,” Cammie said.

"This was not an every-night dish, then?" Jean-Paul considered their options, then finally decided to go with basic egg noodles. "What sort of cheese are we looking for? Cheddar? Mozzarella?"

“Nah. Special occasions, like birthdays and stuff,” Cammie said. “I don’t think it was cheddar… but it might have been a few different kinds. It was fancy in its own way. Well, as far as Mom’s cooking went it was.”

"We could try one of the pre-packaged blends," Jean-Paul suggested. "Cooking does not need to be fancy to be special. The first dish I recall anyone ever making specifically for me was cheese-fries with gravy. Not exactly haute cuisine, but it made an impression."

“Yeah… that could work. And that sounds gross. Which means I should try it at some time,” Cammie said thinking about it. “Never heard of having cheese fries and gravy.”

"Poutine. A matter of national pride, I will have you know." They turned toward the refrigerated bays of pre-packaged meat. "How do you want to try preparing this one? I can either let the ingredients go bad on their own and then combine them, or we can try making the dish and letting it age. Cooking it after the ingredients have gone bad might kill off enough bacteria to ruin the flavor."

“I don’t know… um… bake it first and then let it go bad. That doesn’t work we can always try it the other way,” Cammie said. “This is way more involved than what I normally do.” Which was cover everything with Tabasco sauce or just make overly ripe sandwiches.

"There used to be something of a science to this sort of thing, you know, back before refrigerators -- deciding just how rotted food had to be to reach that balance between potent flavor and becoming dangerous to consume, and then how to prepare it without compromising either.You might have enjoyed the cooking in ancient Rome. Rather than pitch out meat that was spoiling, they cooked with the strongest spices they could find to cover the taste."

“Really?” Cammie asked with a laugh, “That does sound good. People put so much effort into food. I mean, I get it. I can eat anything, but I like it best when I can taste it.”

"Having one of life's vital processes become a chore is definitely something to be avoided. If there's extra pleasure to be coaxed out of it, so much the better." Marked-down chicken breasts, their expiration date marked as yesterday, went into the cart and they moved on. "Your mother did not cook very often?"

“You mean like from scratch? No. She did the house-wife thing, but most of the meals were boxed stuff. When she did pull the stops it was because of something going on,” Cammie said, walking along with the cart. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing too wrong with hamburger helper. I just liked when we actually had stuff that was a bit better than that.”

"Did you ever have any interest in learning?" A slight smile. "I do not see you as the sort to sign up for home economics, but I have been known to assume before."

“Well, not really. But now it’d be nice to know something BESIDES sandwiches, you know?” Cammie said, thinking about it. “I mean, most things are pretty easy to make. Box food is and stuff.”

"You are in an odd place for cooking. Everything has to be aged for you to taste it, so there is little instant gratification to knowing how to do it." Jean-Paul considered. "Pick up some of the box meals that you used to like, then we will visit the cleaning supplies and look for ingredient substitutions. Between your memories and your current tastes, we can probably come up with some interesting instant meals for you."

“That sounds okay, I mean, maybe I can replace water with bleach or something,” Cammie mused.