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A questioning look must have been on my face, because he explained. “For the stew, princess.” His eyes twinkled with amusement. “This is elf root. It will give our stew flavor to it.”
I dropped the knife on the counter and leaned against it. “Are you telling me that elf root is fennel?”
He chopped the fish for the stew. “I rarely hear that name for it, but yes.”
I shook my head, still trying to wrap my mind around it. “I did not know.”
“It’s a common ingredient in many Elvish dishes.”
“We use it in Midar as well,” I said, thinking of the dishes my mother used to make. Tajine, couscous, stews, chebbakia, all of them had elf root in them.
“Really?” he said, sounding surprised. “I wouldn’t have expected that.”
“Yes, but I’m not used to it being purple.”
“In the Mountains of Ilum, it grows in different colors. Blue, green, even orange,” he added the chopped fish to the pot. “But I thought you Midarians didn’t care for the taste of elf root.”
“Some do, some don’t.” I shrugged. “I quite like it.”
I chopped the fennel root into small pieces and popped one into my mouth. It tasted like regular fennel, but a hint sweeter. I chewed on it for a while, lost in thought.
“Does it taste good?”
“Just like fennel,” I nodded. “But sweeter.”
Lord Caes looked at the pot of stew, his hand resting on the chopping block. “That would mean it’s not elf root that’s the problem, but the craft of magical cookery. We need to experiment.” He sliced the elf root into tinier pieces and added it to the stew.
Bemused, I glanced at him. “Can magic enhance the flavor of a dish to such a degree?”
Magical cookery was an arcane science, one that few bothered to study. After all, why use magic when you could just add more salt? But I knew that some swore by the power of magic to make food more delicious.
Spell crafters often added special effects to their dishes that made them more visually appealing or added a certain je ne sais quoi that couldn’t be replicated without magic. It was a waste of time, in my opinion, but to each their own.
“There’s a lot of difference between cooking with magic and without it,” he explained. “It’s like the difference between day and night. The magic adds an entirely different dimension to the food.”
“So another application of magic could make the food taste better to non-Elves?” I asked, still not quite following his line of thinking. “Is that even possible?”
“It’s worth a try,” he said, his eyes determined. “The only way to know for sure is to experiment. This could change everything. The Fae claim that their cuisine is the best, but if we could make it so that everyone could enjoy our cuisine, then we would be unbeatable.”
“I love their food,” I said, my stomach growling at the mention of it. “There’s this great restaurant in Midar that I love to go to. They have this dish called laab neua...”
An affronted look crossed lord Caes’s face. “Laab neua is a dish for children! It’s too sweet.”
“It’s not too sweet,” I protested, amused as Elvish perfectionism reared its head. “It’s savory, spicy, and delicious.”
“The Fae have no sense of taste,” he said dismissively. “They can’t appreciate great cuisine. That’s why their food is so bland.”
With great difficulty, I contained my laughter. I didn’t want to offend him, but it was hard to keep a straight face. “I’m sure the Fae would beg to differ. You just have to be open-minded about it.”
“I am open-minded.” His voice rose in frustration. “I’m just not going to pretend that something is good when it’s not. The Fae need to learn how to cook properly, and then maybe their food will be edible.”
Lord Caes refused to believe that anything could be better than their cuisine. We argued back and forth about the merits of various dishes from different cultures, and it quickly became clear that we were both passionate about food. It was a shared love that bonded us, and I found myself liking him more and more.
I shook my head. “You’re really stuck in your ways, aren’t you?”
“I am not,” he said, huffing. “I’m just very particular about my food.”
“Well, I think you should try the laab neua,” I said, smiling mischievously. “It might change your mind about Fae cuisine.”
