Off the Menu Read Online Free

the guy have his due. The words
culinary genius
come to mind immediately and without irony.
    “So, late spring then?” I’m mentally adjusting my own schedule, since whatever Patrick does inevitably impacts my life not insignificantly.
    He takes the last morsel of toast and wipes the plate clean, popping it in his mouth and rolling his eyes back in satisfaction. “Yup.”
    “I’ll go through the calendar with you tomorrow and we can make the necessary changes.” Crap. I have eight thousandthings to do tomorrow, or rather, today, and this was not one of them.
    “Sounds good. You just tell me where to be and when and what to do when I get there!”
    I wish. “How about you be at
your
house in ten minutes, and go to sleep …”
    He laughs. That is not good. That means he is choosing to believe that I am joking so that he can stay longer. There is not going to be enough caffeine on the planet to suffer through tomorrow. Er, today.
    “So guess what started today?” He smirks at me, pushing his empty plate aside and moving my computer in front of him.
    “I can’t begin to imagine.”
    “EDestiny Fall Freebie Week!”
    Oh. No.
    “Patrick …”
    “Let’s see what fabulous specimens of human maleness the old Destinometer has scraped up for our princess, shall we?” He chuckles as his fingers fly over the keys, logging into the dating site with my e-mail and password, settling in to see what new profiles the magical soul-mate algorithm has dredged up for me. It should be the last thing I would ever let him do, or even tell him about, but my ill-fated brief stint as an online dater somehow became part of our business practice. And it is my own damn fault.
    Dumpling nuzzles under Patrick’s chin, another betrayal, and I clear Patrick’s plate and flatware, and go to wash dishes, while my bosshole in the other room yells out that there’s a very nice-looking seventy-two-year-old bus driver from Hammond, Indiana, who might just be perfect for me.

2

    I should go to bed, but the computer is taunting me.
    RJ. 49. 6’0”. Lives in Chicago. No kids and doesn’t want any. Internet media consultant. Likes wine, cooking, travel, art, music, reading, his job, his family, and his life. About twenty-five words that say nothing, and yet, all hit me where I live. No profile picture. No hobbies or favorite films or inspirational quotes. Really, the bare minimum of information you can put online and have your profile accepted by EDestiny. But something about it has haunted me all day, ever since I spotted it during Patrick’s assault on my account last night.
    It is nearly eleven p.m., and I have just gotten home after a brutal day of meetings, six hours of recipe testing, and a long after-work therapy session with the latest casualty of Hurricane Patrick, a new show prep cook just out of culinary school who was on the receiving end of the famous “Fifteen Minutes on Knife Skills” rant. Patrick asked for carrots in batonnet and celery root in allumette, or large sticks and small sticks, and got everything in fine julienne, or very small shreds. Easily remedied, and a classic newbie error, but Patrick is nothing if not precise, and since this was a test run for an upcoming shoot of a stir-fry episode of
Academy
, where size and shape of ingredients is paramount, he just lost it.
    “Are you FUCKING KIDDING ME?” Patrick swept herstation prep onto the floor in one wide swipe of his arm, sending little bits of carrot and celery root shreds flying in the air like confetti, and equipment clattering to the floor. “Exactly what mail-order culinary school did you graduate from? Incompetent Twat U? This is unfuckingacceptable. You might not have noticed, but I have a few things on my schedule. One of them is NOT supposed to be looking over your sad little schlumpy shoulder to make sure you know how to CUT SHIT UP. There are only two options here. Either, one: you actually don’t know the difference between batonnet, allumette,