The recipe we had found never mentioned that
you were supposed to put the top back on the blender before switching on.
But then, it also hadn’t mentioned that you were well-advised to remove the
paper after cutting your butter or discarding the shells before dropping the
eggs in the mix. It’s these necessary details, the whys and the wherefores,
which adults are always missing out.
Not that we minded. We, my three brothers and I, were new to this cake-making business and so weren’t entirely sure what to expect. We had agreed that this was supposed to be a magic cake so we all figured that a few bangs were probably in order.
We
had agreed. That was novel in itself.
Recipes were things that we knew you had to follow without deviating. Things
of religious awe, in fact, in a disordering universe. Except we didn’t think
of this a recipe, yet, for fear of failure - this was our egg-speriment. We
were familiar with egg-speriments from the fizzing, fart-smelling world of
the garage where we endlessly played with our chemistry sets. Egg-speriments
normally resulted in some violent and enchanting change. Such as the detonation
of a test tube when the built-up carbon dioxide failed to fire off a rammed-in
cork or when Jack went purple and got rushed to the outpatients.
We
agreed that there must be some sort of egg-speriment we could work in the
kitchen. Some sort of spell we could find in the hand-written cook books that
would bring about the change. We were dissatisfied; with the odd-coloured
meals, with the hours of crying coming from the back bedroom. I guess we were
lucky that we had an electric oven because the recipe did not mention lighting
the gas either.
The
recipe was, however, very precise in places. Like our father it was full of
clipped strictures on weights and measures. Dan, as the eldest, took on the
scowling seriousness that he assumed when being the banker in Monopoly and
went to work setting up the scales. Meanwhile, Mike climbed on the kitchen
work surface and grabbed at the bags that were kept high up on the shelves.
He avalanched down the contents of the cupboard.
Jack and I were the helpers
responsible for pouring the weighed ingredients into a big pail I had found
in the pantry. We stuck to our tasks with military precision. I didn’t even
get distracted when I was asked to open the fridge. I could get lost for hours
in its formal splendour. The still-lifes of food,
the swirling mists of the cool compartment defrosting....
The
blender top wasn’t mentioned in the recipe but nor was the violent snowstorm
that lifted off the blades. But then, the recipe also didn’t mention anything
about Mother’s face as she came through the kitchen door: its bleary-eyed
blotchiness: its layered exhaustions.
“We’re making a cake for Mother’s Day”
Jack warbled out over the scream of the blender.
I
was lucky enough to see our egg-speriment work; the miraculous smile that
inched up like a sunrise.
The recipe didn’t mention about the need for a mop.