Mimi is a card.
My long-suffering mother, to be sure, but expert and in her element in a kitchen. She runs a tight ship, as they say.
In a culinary sense, she’s surely forgotten more than I’ll ever know, so I rarely try her. Mimi always cooked and only in recent years has she let me pitch in. I’m a dabbling apprentice at best, but she tolerates what I prepare, and I haven’t caught her spitting anything out yet.
We laugh often and rib each other, but sometimes I feel like George Constanza to his mom, Estelle. Mimi’s voice isn’t quite as nasally, but living with your ma is living with your ma. You still try to be a dutiful son, but — sometimes by proximity alone — you are inevitably reminded of the ways you come up short or miss the mark in the present, the past, and, of course, the rapidly approaching future.
That’s why the new French toast recipe I recently learned was so enjoyable.
It was a smash hit. It was my own Festivus.
And Mimi was thrilled and adoring (of the meal — not me).
Did I say it was French toast?
It was French toast, and the new recipe I learned did have a new twist, but the coup de grace was the homemade syrup.
I have this friend, see, and, well, let’s call her “Dejah” — she prefers her anonymity. So, Dejah tells me she’s gonna make us some French toast, a “mean French toast,” and I pass this along to Mimi, maybe embellishing.
Photo by E.R. Bills
“Dejah says it will be the best French toast we’ve ever had,” I tell Mimi, and that maternal unit of mine gives me a Quint-on-the-Orca look like I’m a clueless landlubber hayseed who doesn’t know a sheepshank knot from a flowerpot. Like I’ve never even been in a boat.
“What’s so special about it?” Mimi says. “In my experience, French toast is kinda hard to screw up.”
The gauntlet (a stovetop mitt) is dropped, and I parry.
“It’s the syrup,” I say. “It’s made from scratch.”
“What?” Mimi scoffs. “Is it sugar and water?”
“I don’t think so,” I reply, unsure and slinking off like a canned Costanza.
On Festivus Toast Day, the pressure is on. Dejah is visiting, and Mimi is polite but still salty. She converses with the rest of the party while Dejah and I get to work. Or Dejah works while I watch. It becomes a culinary moment that will live in the annals of Bills breakfasts for time immemorial.
First of all, Dejah uses French bread, which was at least new to me. Not baguette but medium loaf. Second, the Festivus Toast batter is made with more milk than eggs, whole milk, each side of the thick-sliced French bread whetted gently and immediately placed in a heated pan with a little melted butter. And more milk than egg, because Dejah prefers the eggs on the side, scrambled.
Mimi cocks an eyebrow at this, and I sense a sideways harrumph from her direction in my peripheral vision, but I ignore it, assisting Dejah where I can.
For the syrup, Dejah puts a saucepan on medium heat, throws in two sticks of real butter, and lets them melt. When they begin to cook, she drops in three to four heaping spoonfuls of brown sugar and lets them simmer. Then, she takes some pecan halves and crushes them up. When the brown sugar and butter begin to gel, Dejah mixes in the pecans, a capful of vanilla, and a half a cup or so of water. Then she stirs. And that’s it.
The butter, brown sugar, pecans, and water cook and warm to a light consistency, the eggs practically scramble themselves (on another burner), and Dejah cooks the French toast while she’s getting the Festivus syrup just right. I slice up a banana or two just to have on the side.
The milk-toast is not milquetoast.
The syrup is not “sugar water.”
We dine simply but luxuriously, with a new secret recipe. Mimi is authentically and admittedly stupefied, thrilled, amazed. Dejah is modestly pleased and maybe even a little surprised that we’re so surprised, but she takes it all in stride.
Now I wow Mimi with Festivus French Toast and Dejah’s secret syrup a couple times a month. (My twist: adding a sprinkle of cinnamon to the toast as it cooks.) And if there’s any syrup left over, Mimi puts it in the fridge and warms it up to use on toasted Belgian waffles.
Mimi sometimes even grudgingly concedes that I may be earning my keep.
Photo by E.R. Bills
