Chapter 11
CHAPTER
ELEVEN
Kyle wanted to punch the air after pronouncing mi amor correctly.
First, he’d had a fabulous call with Chef Fourier and now he’d gotten praised by his Spanish teacher for mastering rolling his R’s in Spanish.
The nuance had proven his hardest challenge after years of speaking French, a language that favored softer, rounder sounds. Being able to call Madison my love in Spanish with a good accent had been one of his goals. His online Spanish teacher smiled as she gave him the next phrase.
Someone pounded on the door. “Kyle!”
He recognized Brooke’s urgent voice. Shooting out of the chair, he leaned into the screen. “Excuse me. I need to see what’s wrong. Let’s reschedule.”
His tutor only nodded before clicking off. He rushed to the door, which he’d made a practice of locking ever since Dean had barged in during one of his lessons. Flinging it open, he scanned her shocked face. “What happened? Is it Nanine?”
She shoved her phone in his face. “The William Silver review dropped twenty minutes ago, and it’s so hot my phone started ringing with A-listers calling to see if I could use my influence to get them a table.
I even had a crown prince’s secretary call me!
I tried to call you again and again, but your phone went to voicemail.
You didn’t respond to my texts. What are you doing? Why is your door locked?”
His mind was already spinning. “I was in a Spanish lesson with my tutor. Shit! So the article was that great, huh?”
Brooke clicked on her screen. “This makes Le Monde’s review look like child’s play. Listen to this.”
Nanine’s is the Paris restaurant no one can currently get into quickly, with reservations of nine months out making it one of the most coveted restaurants currently in the world.
I’m about to make that situation even worse for prospective diners.
Being fortunate enough to have a dear friend in Paris who’d wisely secured a table before Nanine’s reopened after a major remodeling and installation of a new chef de cuisine hailing from Miami’s renowned La Fleur, Chef Madison Garcia, I arrived with unusual excitement.
I have never had a meal with bread pairings before, and with Paris being a city renowned for bread, the combination was intriguing, especially in a world where gluten issues have redefined fine dining.
The avant-garde addition of specialty breads alongside French classics didn’t merely tantalize the senses. What Nanine’s maverick menu has done is redefine French cooking, the kind of culinary supernova that makes me want to secure my next reservation.
Restaurants hailing their own experimentation with culinary boundaries have become so banal I steer clear. Yet Nanine’s quietly serves you with the kind of gourmet honesty I have rarely encountered in my thirty years as a food critic.
Chef Nanine Laurent cooked with the kind of heart and passion that delighted diners for decades until her recent heart attack. This critic has always wondered why Nanine’s did not receive more august praise from the culinary gods. I can only hope that travesty is firmly in the past.
This new menu reaches that touted excellent standard of French cooking previously only secured by greats like Paul Bocuse, Alain Ducasse, and Joel Robuchon, the latter of which is the perfect comparison.
Chef Robuchon made art of mashed potatoes. Nanine’s makes art of bread, as a powerful and universal call to the one food humans have enjoyed across the world since time began.
Paired perfectly with soul-nourishing French dishes, interspersed with plates that revolutionize in their boldness of flavor and simplicity, Nanine’s brilliance is a standout on the restaurant scene—one that will redefine an entire generation of restaurants that will try and fail to copy its imagination and soul.
Kyle couldn’t close his mouth. He’d received plenty of positive reviews before, but this one was culinary gold.
“Then he goes on to talk more about the meal, which you can read later.” Brooke pushed her phone into his chest. “Kyle! We need a plan. I cannot turn down crown princes, Oscar winners, and the hottest singer on the planet and her fiancé.”
“Them too?” He chuckled shakily. “Holy shit. This is huge. I mean, we knew…but… I need to get to the restaurant. Does Madison know?”
“I called Nanine to tell her to go down to the kitchen since Madison doesn’t touch her phone during work, but I imagine the calls started coming into the restaurant. Dean told me the online reservation system has so many hits, Nanine’s suddenly jumped from a nine-month wait to fifteen months.”
He walked back to his desk, shrugged into his coat, and picked up his phone. “We need to grab a bottle of champagne.”
Brooke shook her head as she straightened her navy pantsuit jacket. “You let Madison decide on that. She and the staff still have to prep for tonight. You and I need to figure out how to handle the calls and the media because we’re now under siege in the best way.”
She was right. When he checked his phone, he had messages from major news media outlets, from print to television.
“We’re going to need a publicist,” he told Brooke after sifting through the first twenty.
“I have a few people in mind,” she responded quickly after tapping something into her phone, working quietly in front of his desk. “So does Axel.”
“Good.” He could already imagine wrapping Madison up in his arms. “I’m so happy, I don’t know what to say. But I want to get over to Nanine’s—even if Mad throws us out.”
“I love hearing you call her that.” When he came around the desk, Brooke threw her arms around him. He hugged her tightly.
“I love seeing you two together,” she continued. “And I’ll never be happier to get her get lost I’m cooking look. Oh, Kyle! Remember when we were worried about whether Nanine’s would ever reopen? Look at us now!”
He could hear the tears in her voice. “Yeah. Glad we’ve kicked those dark days to the curb. God, I need to call our contractor. We’re going to have to move faster on the private rooms upstairs. Because you’re right. We can’t turn down a crown prince, can we?”
“Axel says we can set up some screens and freestanding lighting and furnishings upstairs to make the space usable sooner while the contractors deal with the more complicated installation.”
Way to go, Axel. “Great idea.”
“He also mentioned that we can’t turn a prince down without making an international incident. He told me a story about one that happened in Monaco, and we so do not want that drama.”
He rubbed the area between his brows. “Right. Royals come with big drama.”
“So do A-listers.” She took a couple deep breaths.
“I’ll run point with you until we hire a publicist. We also might need a concierge type.
I’ll have to ask some of my own A-lister contacts how this kind of thing is handled.
Who they call. How the reservation is made.
They don’t go online and fill out a form with their phone number. ”
This situation went beyond all his former experience as a restaurateur, and like he’d reminded Madison, he’d owned fourteen successful restaurants. “I can make some calls as well for best practices. Now let’s go.”
A harried Sawyer was coming in with a poleaxed Thea as they were leaving the house.
“What do you need us to do?” Sawyer asked.
“Dean texted us the news. He says the restaurant is getting a beating on the reservation side. He’s trying to keep the system from going down because of the number of hits. ”
Kyle hugged both of them before taking them by the shoulders. “Everyone take a breath. This review is exactly what we were hoping for. Thea, your breads—”
“I know!” She started half crying as a heartbreaking smile stretched across her face.
“Jean Luc said the same thing. But it’s so much to take in.
Dean said my online bread selection has sold out for six months now.
It’s only about a third of what we’ll make every day, but I can hardly believe it. My bakery hasn’t even opened yet.”
“We’re going to figure it out. But this is fucking awesome, guys! We celebrate this hard. Let’s go to the restaurant.”
“Are you sure?” Sawyer grimaced. “Madison hates interruptions during prep. That’s why we came here.”
He laughed heartily. “Let her kick us out.”
When he came through the back door of the restaurant, he was glad he’d followed his instincts. Nanine’s chandelier gave a nonchalant jingle, clearly taking its lead from her chef. While the staff continued their work, he noted a few people stole glances their way.
Madison gave their arrival party a cutting glance, but her golden eyes were sparkling. “You too? I hope you’re here to tell me that you’re taking care of the circus out there because we have dinner service to prep for and tonight’s dinner to execute.”
The hard edge of her voice had him grinning. “I thought you’d appreciate knowing we’re taking care of everything.”
Their other friends nodded as well.
“See that you do!” Madison crossed her arms over her black apron, a dark goddess of no nonsense who made his heart drum faster in his chest. “We’ve had to unplug the phone. Some very aggressive diners were being rude to my staff about reservations, and I won’t have that.”
Her protective mode didn’t surprise him. He realized he would need to protect her a little, too, from this avalanche of interest. “So that means you probably don’t want to fly to New York and go on one of the morning shows. With your famous culinary parrot sidekick.”
Her eyes widened briefly before she gave an audible huff. “I’m a chef, not a culinary poodle. Same goes for Pierre.”
Quiet chuckles erupted from her staff as they continued prep. He shoved his hands in his pockets, rocking back on his heels.
He wished he could kiss her.
He wished they could take a break and eat ice cream off each other’s bodies.
He wished he could mouth I love you and tell her how happy he was for her.
Letting the silence gather, he made sure she read his mind before he said professionally, “Noted. We’ll leave you, then.”
She flicked a hand in the air. “Good. Because people are going to be coming tonight thinking they’ve died on a Friday and gone to heaven to eat, thanks to that review. Their expectations are going to be impossible to meet.”
They shared a final quiet look, their friends beaming around them.
Then she gave a slight smile, making this moment one of the best of his life.