Page 152 of Pistols and Plush Toys

Sitting up in bed, he swiped over to his email. There was an email there from Gerard, with the subject line: translations.

He clicked the email open, practically holding his breath. Meredith had reached out a few days ago to say that her contact in Russia had been able to locate an ancient, handwritten cookbook in Nikolai’s father’s attic. It had been fragile and falling apart, but he’d been able to carefully photograph the intact pages and send them to Meredith.

No one had been any the wiser, Meredith said, so there wouldn’t be an issue with Nikolai’s father.

Meredith had sent Elliot the pictures, and Elliot had thought that they looked like recipes, but they were in handwritten Russian. So Elliot had tentatively reached out to Gerard, to ask him if he wouldn’t mind translating.

Gerard had been more than happy to help. And now it looked like he might have done it.

Elliot opened the attached document and grinned wide to read them. Ten translated pages of Nikolai’s grandmother’s recipes. He’dgottenthem. Thanks to Meredith and Gerard, Elliot now had a way to give Nikolai a true taste of home.

He scrambled out of the bed, hurrying to the bathroom to get ready for the day.

As he read through a recipe while brushing his teeth, Elliot realized there was more work to do before he could actually use the recipes. The units of measure in the recipes were majority metric, but occasionally there would be an instruction like ‘brush with a layer of cottage cheese paste,’ or ‘as much flour asthe dough will take,’ or ‘1 stick of oleo.’ It would require some research to figure out what those instructionsmeant.

Which also probably meant some testing.

Since the recipes were so old, Elliot would need to double check what was translated. He trusted Gerard of course, but the USSR likely had some specific food manufacturing that might not have equivalencies today.

A brief sidebar Internet search provided the ‘1 stick of oleo’ was definitely margarine. Soviet Union margarine. Should Elliot go with margarine for the recipe, or switch to butter? How would that affect the taste, the consistency?

He’d need to spend some time looking things up and cross-referencing with other translated recipes from that time period.

Elliot glanced up from his phone and realized that he’d managed to finish getting ready, get dressed, and wander into the kitchen on autopilot.

Well, okay. He smiled, feeling light and bubbly and excited. First he’d make breakfast. Then he’d get to work.

***

Two days later, after some kitchen testing and much research, Elliot had a grocery order delivered and everything prepared to make one of Nikolai’s grandmother’s recipes.

Chanakhi for dinner and kuchen for dessert.

At breakfast, barely able to tamp down his excitement, Elliot requested Nikolai to stay out of the kitchen since he was working in his home office.

“Is surprise?” Nikolai asked with interest.

“Maybe,” Elliot said, unable to help his smile.

Nikolai smiled back at him. “Is good thing to look forward to, special surprise from best chef.”

“And I’ll bring you lunch,” Elliot said, handing Nikolai another of the banana nut muffins he’d made for breakfast. “So don’t worry about going hungry.”

“This is never my worry,” Nikolai said, sounding all over fond. “Have fun time cooking.”

“Thank you,” Elliot said, looking up at him. “I hope work goes easily.”

Once Nikolai had left with his coffee and muffins, Elliot turned and got to work. Preparation for dinner and dessert took him most of the morning, and he paused only to make lunch for Nikolai and himself, bringing Nikolai’s to his office on a tray.

In the afternoon, while the lamb stewed, Elliot passed the time working on more of the Russian recipes, planning future meals, and doing puzzles.

Toward the end of the lamb’s stew time, Elliot went and set the table. He did so with more effort than usual, finding candles, proper cloth napkins, and a nicer set of silverware tucked away in the kitchen pantry.

He wanted tonight to be special. Nikolai deserved something nice.

When the lamb was done, Elliot turned off the heat and went back to his room to change. He’d been in the kitchen all day and his shirt was rumpled and there was a flour stain on his pants where he’d pressed up against the counter.

He had about twenty minutes before Nikolai normally finished work, so Elliot hopped in the shower to rinse himself off and then grabbed a new set of clothing. He dressed slightly nicer than what he normally wore around the house.

---