The Undomestic Goddess - Sophie Kinsella

so often to run my hand under cold water.

I’ve been going for three hours. And I haven’t yet made anything that could actually be eaten. So far I’ve discarded a collapsed chocolate souffle, two pans of burned onions, and a saucepan of congealed apricots that made me feel sick just to look at them.

I can’t work out what’s going wrong. I haven’t got time to work out what’s going wrong. There’s no scope for analysis. Every time there’s a disaster I just dump it and start again, quickly thawing food from the freezer, changing tack, trying to cobble something together.

The Geigers meanwhile are drinking sherry in the drawing room. They think

everything is going splendidly. Trish tried to come into the kitchen about half an hour ago, but I managed to head her off.

In less than an hour she and Eddie are going to be sitting down at the table expecting a gourmet meal. Shaking out their napkins with anticipation, pouring out their mineral water and wine.

A kind of frenzied hysteria has come over me. I know I cannot do this, but somehow I can’t give up either. I keep thinking a miracle will happen. I’ll pull it all together. I’ll manage it somehow—

Oh, God, the gravy’s bubbling over.

I shove the oven door shut, grab a spoon, and start stirring it. It looks like revolting lumpy brown water. Frantically I start

searching in the cupboards for something to chuck in. Flour. Cornstarch. Something like that. This’ll do. I grab a small pot and shake in vigorous amounts of the white powder, then wipe the sweat off my brow. OK. What now?

Suddenly I remember the egg whites, still whisking up in their bowl. I grab the recipe book, running my finger down the page. I changed the dessert course to pavlova after I chanced upon the line in a recipe book: Meringues are so easy to make.

So far so good. What next? Form the stiff meringue mixture into a large circle on your baking parchment.

I peer at my bowl. Stiff meringue mixture? Mine’s liquid.

It has to be right, I tell myself feverishly. It has to be. I followed the instructions. Maybe it’s thicker than it looks. Maybe once I start pouring it out, it’ll stiffen up by some weird culinary law of physics.

Slowly I start to pour it onto the tray. It doesn’t stiffen up. It spreads in a white oozing lake and starts dripping off the tray onto the floor.

Something tells me this is not going to make white chocolate pavlova for eight.

A splodge lands on my foot and I give a frustrated cry, near tears. Why didn’t it work? I followed the sodding recipe and everything. A pent-up rage is rising inside me: rage at myself, at my defective crappy egg whites, at cookery books, at cooks, at food… and most of

all at whoever wrote that meringues were so easy to make.

“They’re not!” I hear myself yelling. “They’re bloody not!” I hurl the book across the kitchen, where it smashes against the kitchen door.

“What the hell—” a male voice exclaims in surprise.

The door flies open and Nathaniel is standing there, a rucksack hefted over his shoulder; he looks like he’s on his way home. “Is everything OK?”

“It’s fine,” I say, rattled. “Everything’s fine. Thank you. Thank you so much.” I make a dismissive motion with my hand, but he doesn’t move.

“I heard you were cooking a gourmet dinner tonight,” he says slowly, surveying the mess.

“Yes. That’s right. I’m just in the… most complex stage of the… um…” I glance down at the hob and give an involuntary scream. “Fuck! The gravy!”

I don’t know what’s happened. Brown bubbles are expanding out of my gravy saucepan, all over the cooker, and down the sides on the floor. It looks like the porringer in the story of the magic pot that wouldn’t stop making porridge.

“Get it off the heat, for God’s sake!” exclaims Nathaniel, throwing his rucksack aside. He snatches up the pan and moves it to the counter. “What on earth is in that?”

“Nothing!” I say. “Just the usual ingredients…”

Nathaniel has noticed the little pot on the counter. He grabs it and takes a pinch between his fingers. “Baking soda? You put baking soda in gravy? Is that what they taught you at—” He breaks off and sniffs the air. “Hang on. Is something burning?”

I watch helplessly as he opens the bottom oven, grabs an oven glove with a practiced air, and hauls out a baking tray covered in what look like tiny black bullets.

Oh, no. My chickpeas.

“What are these supposed to be?” he says incredulously. “Rabbit droppings?”

“They’re chickpeas,” I retort. My cheeks are naming but I lift my chin, trying to regain some kind of dignity. “I drizzled them in olive oil and put them in the oven so they could… melt.”

Nathaniel stares at me. “Melt?”

“Soften,” I amend hurriedly.

Nathaniel puts down the tray and folds his arms. “Do you know anything about cooking?”

Before I can answer, there’s the most almighty BANG from the microwave.

“Oh, my God!” I shriek in terror. “Oh, my God! What was that?” Nathaniel is peering through the glass door.

“What the hell was in there?” he demands. “Something’s exploded.”

My mind races frantically. What on earth did I put in the microwave? It’s all a blur.

“The eggs!” I suddenly remember. “I was hard-boiling the eggs for the canapes.”

“In a microwave?” he expostulates.

“To save time!” I practically yell back. “I was being efficient!”

Nathaniel yanks the plug of the microwave from the wall socket and turns round to face me, his face working with disbelief. “You know bugger all about cooking! You’re not a housekeeper. I don’t know what the hell you’re up to—”

“I’m not up to anything!” I reply, in shock.

“The Geigers are good people.” He faces me square on. “I won’t have them exploited.”

Oh, God. What does he think? That I’m some kind of confidence trickster?

“Look… please.” I rub my sweaty face. “I’m not trying to rip anyone off. OK, I can’t cook. But I ended up here because of… a misunderstanding.”

“What kind of misunderstanding?”

I sink down onto a chair and massage my aching lower back. I hadn’t realized how exhausted I was. “I was running away from… something. I needed a place to stay for the night. I stopped here for some water and directions to a hotel and the Geigers assumed I was a housekeeper. And then this morning I felt