Sensing Debs’s gaze on them, Nero tossed the last of his charred onions into a bowl and chucked them in the blast chiller. “We’re done for prep, unless we get a manic Monday. Go get a clean apron and wash your hands. You’re staying with me.”
Lenny did as he was told. While he was gone, Nero set about cooking breakfast for the team, an Urban Soul tradition, born of the Borough Market sausage sandwiches Cass was famous for, and the company ethos that no one worked a shift hungry.
Nero threw two dozen sausages on the grill. He was dishing up when Lenny returned. Nero thrust a stuffed bap at him. “Get that down yer. Service starts in twenty minutes.”
“No, thanks.”
“No?” Nero glanced around. The rest of the team had made typically short work of the free food. “On a diet, are you?”
“Very funny. Vegetarian, remember? I’m not putting pig bollocks in my mouth for breakfast, and I don’t eat bread.”
Lenny’s tone was mild, but the niggling guilt Nero had carried all morning returned full force. “Didn’t think you were serious about that shit.”
“Why not? Not a crime, is it?”
“Erm . . . no?” Though it would be a cold day in hell before someone took Nero’s homemade chorizo away from him. “Hang on.”
Nero opened the upright fridge by the grill, searching for a gluten-free breakfast no creature had died for, but in a fridge loaded with steaks and chops, it was slim pickings. He grabbed a slab of halloumi cheese. “Go and ask Debs for a couple of field mushrooms.”
Lenny sloped down to the starters section and returned with a handful of portobello mushrooms. Nero threw them on the vegetarian end of the grill, along with some sliced halloumi. “You eat green shit?”
Lenny scowled. “Not broccoli.”
“Rocket?”
“I s’pose.”
Nero grabbed a plate and pulled all the elements together for a breakfast of fat field mushrooms, grilled cheese, and rocket. He softened the blow of the bitter leaves with roasted garlic butter, and handed it over. “That’s my best offer. Nosh it or toss it, I don’t care. Be ready for service in ten.”
“I don’t know what that means.” Lenny lifted his breakfast to his mouth and took a sinfully big bite. “I mean,” he continued around chewing, “I know what noshing and tossing is, but I don’t know how to be ready for service.”
Noshing and tossing. Nero’s brain caught up and heat bloomed in his gut. He snatched his fags from the side. “Don’t be a dick. Just be ready.”
He strode away, leaving Lenny to his breakfast, and went outside, sparking a smoke. Nearby, a few waitresses were doing the same, but Nero ignored them and stomped to an upturned beer crate in the corner of the yard. Debs and Spanks appeared at the back door, lighting up their own cigarettes, but they knew better than to approach him.
Nero closed his eyes, craving a stiff drink, or a spliff—anything to take the edge off what was fast turning out to be the most bizarrely tense Monday he could remember. Blood pumping, skin tingling, and his teeth worrying his bottom lip, he could barely focus now that he had the time to try. Stress came with the job, but angsting over a fake trainee chef who’d likely be gone by the end of the week? That was a new one, and he’d run out of time to brood on it. He smoked his cigarette down to the butt and tossed it away. It was time to cook.
Back inside, he hit the ground running. Monday was the slowest day of the week, but even a quiet Urban Soul restaurant brought its own brand of mayhem, and the ticket screen logged orders as fast as Nero barked instructions at Lenny. “Two duck, three lamb, and a seabass. Get the plates, I’ll tell you what to put on them.”
Lenny fetched the plates. Nero laid lamb steaks, sautéed potatoes, and grilled asparagus on three of them. “Pour over the jus and put them on the pass.”
“Jus?”
“Gravy. It’s here.”
Lenny took the jug and carefully poured the sauce over the meat. “Done?”
“Done. Remember how you did it. You’ll be plating the next ones on your own.”
“What?”
Lenny looked alarmed, but Nero didn’t much care. On his watch, chefs learned on the job. “Don’t give me them eyes, mate. Concentrate, and put the food on the plates.”
Echoing the way Cass had taught him, Nero kept his instructions minimal, a tactic that worked well until the first orders of the hake special came in. The dish was Spanish soul food at its best, and one Nero refused to tart up for Pippa’s affluent clientele. No towers of garnish or drizzles of crap, just a sprinkle of parsley and it was done.
And then Lenny got hold of it.
Nero glared at the bowls of chorizo-spiced fish stew Lenny had set on the pass. “What the hell is that?”
