Chapter Twenty-Four
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Aidan texted her at a quarter past three and Riley and her mother headed over to the inn. Luke was waiting for them in the lobby and ran over as soon as they walked in.
“Do we do the chocolates now?” he asked.
Riley laughed. “Not yet. We’ll do that in a little while. Right now we need to make a quiche. Which means we have to make pie dough. And I thought it might be fun to make something sweet with the leftover dough. Do you like raspberry squares?”
Luke looked confused. “I don’t know what that is.”
Riley’s mother smiled. “You are in for a treat.”
Aidan came down a moment later, carrying his briefcase. He walked over to them. “Okay, I’m off. I’ll see you in about an hour.”
“Take your time,” Riley said.
“Thank you. Luke, do whatever Riley and her mom tell you.” Aidan playfully mussed Luke’s hair.
Luke laughed and ran his hand over his hair to smooth it back into place. “Bye, Dad.”
“Okay, who wants to learn how to make a quiche?” Riley led the way into the kitchen and Luke followed. Beth went into the tiny downstairs office to get her checkbook. She returned a moment later and sat down at the kitchen table with a stack of bills to mail out. Meanwhile, Riley got all the ingredients for the quiche and set about mixing up the pie crust. She showed Luke how to wash his hands thoroughly so he could touch the food and help. She handed him a rolling pin and demonstrated how to roll the ball of dough into a big circle of pie crust. Once he was done, she laid it in a quiche pan, lined it with aluminum foil, and then handed an open bag of beans to Luke.
“Want to pour these into the pie pan?”
He looked at her curiously before doing as asked.
“We’re doing something called blind baking. We bake the crust a little so it won’t be soggy when we add the filling. And the weight of the beans helps keep the crust in place.” Riley popped it in the oven to bake.
Next, she mixed up the filling: the egg, milk, and heavy cream mixture that formed the base of the quiche. She let Luke crack the eggs after showing him how to do it so that he wouldn’t get any shells in the bowl. She was impressed by how careful he was and that he managed to crack four eggs and only one small speck of shell got away from him. He looked disappointed but she assured him he’d done great.
“I almost always get a little shell in there. But it’s easy enough to fish it right out.” She flicked the annoying bit of shell away and gave him a big wooden spoon. “Okay, now mix that up good, while I get the rest of our ingredients.”
Luke stirred energetically while Riley found the leftover cooked bacon from breakfast and the sliced onion and thawed chopped spinach.
“That looks perfect, Luke. Now we add our other ingredients.”
She chopped the bacon into small bits and squeezed any remaining water out of the spinach before adding it into the egg mixture along with the onion and bacon. She then stirred in half a log of goat cheese.
“Okay, we have to wait for the pie crust to finish cooking and then cool a little. I thought we could make our raspberry squares now.” Her pie crust recipe made two crusts but they only needed one for the quiche. She grabbed the other ball of dough and rolled it out into a square shape this time. Then she laid it across a buttered cookie sheet, sliced it in half, and got a jar of raspberry jam out of the refrigerator.
“I need your help spreading the jam. Do you think you can do that?” Riley asked.
Luke nodded and she handed him the open jar and fished around in the drawer for a knife.
“Okay, dip your knife in the jam and then spread it on the dough. Like this.” Riley got some jam on the knife, then carefully spread it over the dough. She handed him the knife and he finished the rest of the jam layer. When he was done, she plopped the other square of dough on top of the jam and got two forks out.
“And now we poke the dough all over so it will cook perfectly.” She showed Luke how to evenly poke holes across the top of the dough. Once he was done, it was time to take the pie crust out and slide the raspberry squares into the oven.
“While we let this pie crust cool a little, I think we should take a break. I could go for a hot chocolate, how about you?”
Luke nodded. “I love hot chocolate.”
“Mom?” Riley asked.
He mother laughed. “As if you need to ask. Yes, please.”
Riley quickly made three mugs of hot chocolate and added mini-marshmallows, then handed one to Luke and one to her mom. After about ten minutes, she had Luke pour the bowl of quiche mixture into the pie crust. Riley slid it into the oven and they joined her mother at the table to finish their drinks.
Riley’s mom asked Luke about school and he told them all about it—the classes and teachers he liked and the ones he didn’t—math and Mrs. Evans—because she always told him to stop talking.
“It’s never my fault! If people talk to me I talk back,” he explained.
Riley tried not to smile. Luke was chatty and had a lot of energy, and she remembered that Mrs. Evans was near retirement age and had always been one of the stricter teachers. Riley hadn’t been overly fond of her either.
When they’d finished their hot chocolate, Riley checked on the raspberry squares and they needed a few more minutes. It was almost four thirty, so she decided to get the cheese and crackers ready to go. She pulled several cheeses out of the refrigerator and after taking the raspberry squares out and setting them on the counter to cool, she and Luke sliced the cheeses and she arranged them on a platter along with crackers and a small dish of Marcona almonds that were lightly oiled and salted.
When they finished with that, the front door opened and Aidan walked in. Luke glanced his way and waved. Aidan came into the kitchen and smiled appreciatively at Riley and her mother.
“Thanks for keeping an eye on him.”
“No problem. We kept him busy,” Riley said.
“Yeah? What did you guys do?” Aidan asked.
“I learned how to make egg pie! And raspberry squares.” Aidan glanced at the pastry that was still too hot to eat. “Are they ready yet?”
“Not just yet. A few more minutes.”
“We should probably get out of your hair. Do you want to head upstairs, Luke?”
Luke put his hands on his hips and looked determined. “Not yet. I want a raspberry square and I’m going to help deliver chocolates.”
“I did say we were going to do that,” Riley agreed. “I can send him up when we’re done… or you can relax with my mom and have a raspberry square when we come back. It won’t take us more than ten minutes or so.”
Aidan smiled. “A raspberry square, huh? I guess I can’t say no to that.”
Riley opened a drawer and pulled out the bag of chocolates in their boxes. “Ready, Luke?”
He followed her to the rooms that were booked and they knocked before going in and fluffing the pillows, drawing back the comforter, and placing a box of chocolates on each pillow. Luke helped with the fluffing and placing the chocolates.
“This is so fun!”
Riley smiled as they raced to the next room and as predicted, ten minutes later they were done and headed back to the kitchen. Riley checked the quiche and it needed a little more time, but the raspberry squares were cool enough to eat. She cut out one for each of them and put them on small paper plates.
“I used to make these for the girls when they were little,” her mother said.
“Every time we made pies, we made raspberry squares or turnovers, depending on how much extra dough we had,” Riley said. “They weren’t always pretty but they still tasted delicious.”
“I’ve always liked a good raspberry square,” Aidan said.
After they finished, the quiche was ready to come out, too, and Riley set it on the counter.
“Is that on the menu tomorrow morning?” Aidan asked hopefully.
Riley grinned. “It is. It’s a new experiment. Goat cheese, onion, spinach, and bacon.”
“Well, if it tastes anywhere near as good as it smells, it’s a winner,” Aidan said.
“I guess we’ll find out tomorrow,” Riley replied. It really did look and smell good.
“Okay, now we will get out of your way. At least for a few minutes,” Aidan said.
It was a quarter to five, almost time for wine and cheese.
“Come on, buddy, say thanks to Riley and her mom for watching you.”
“Thank you! It was fun.”
“It was fun,” Riley agreed.
“I really do appreciate it,” Aidan said. “I’m going to drop my stuff off in the room and then we’ll be back down a little after five.”