The caterer WAS LOCATED IN WHAT LOOKED LIKE AN ABANDONED warehouse in the farthest reaches of northeast Philadelphia. They were greeted by one of the owners, a middle-aged man named Moishe, who bounded toward them wearing a yarmulke on top of a toupee—something that struck Mark as particularly redundant.
The inside of the building was cluttered with aluminum pans, serving bowls, and cardboard boxes, but an area had been cleared in one corner where a small table had been carefully set with three place settings. There was a magenta cloth on the table, matching magenta napkins, and plates with magenta trim, as well as glasses and cutlery. This apparently was where the Goodmans were to sample the bat mitzvah meal.
“I set the table according to the color scheme that our bat mitzvah girls tend to favor,” said Moishe, motioning to the table and addressing Stephanie, “but of course we have the books for you to look through to choose what you like if this isn’t to your taste.” He gestured to a library of black leather volumes on shelves across the room.
“The young lady should sit here.” Moishe gestured to the center of the table. “And I’ll take her order for a beverage.” He bowed
his head in pleasing subservience to Stephanie. “Your choice of Diet Coke or iced tea.”
“Diet Coke,” said Stephanie demurely.
“And the folks should sit on either side,” motioned Moishe, more perfunctorily, failing to take their beverage order.
“We’re going to give you a sampling of some of our most popular items,” he explained. “But you also have a list here.” He handed them a calligraphied sheet that seemed to go on forever. “These are other options that you can choose from. Here you see the meat menu and here the dairy. Note that some are starred to indicate a cost over and above the standard package fee. Some, with the dagger, are seasonal, and some, which require additional time to prepare, are in italics”—his hand swept across the menu quickly, indicating a veritable jungle of symbols and typescript. “Generally,” he said, as he saw Mark and Carla looking confused, “the items we’ll be serving you tonight are the ones most people choose, and they fall within the standard package price.”
He turned to Stephanie to give a personalized translation: “I’m simply showing what we have, because we want the bat mitzvah girl to be happy, and sometimes she wants to choose something out of the ordinary. But as I say, most choose from among the items you’ll get to sample today—and I’ll be frank with you about which ones are the all-out favorites with the teens.” He turned to Carla and Mark in an aside: “I’ll send on the hors d’oeuvres menu another time. The hors d’oeuvres tend to get a bit complicated, and I like to leave it to Mom and Dad to make those selections at a later date.” (Experience had shown that it was best not to overload the customer, especially with the child present, since messy scenes were likely to result.)
“So without further ado, let’s have Eduardo, our chef, bring out your first course.” Moishe retreated to a mysterious area behind the cluttered office that one assumed to be the kitchen. Almost immediately, a large Hispanic man, wearing a chef’s hat and a mildly irritated expression, emerged holding a tray with three
bowls of salad. “This is Eduardo, the best kosher chef in the Northeast.” Moishe gestured toward the chef. “And here’s your salad course,” he announced, “a very good starter, since if they want to go up and schmooze or do the hora, it won’t get cold. We’re doing a meat meal for you, since that tends to be the favorite with the kids. Our nondairy ice cream is awesome,” he turned to Stephanie, “and the cheese on the cheesesteaks—you’d think you were at Pat’s in South Philly, not that I know myself, but I’ve been told.
“Anyway, the salad has croutons, tomatoes, cucumber, walnuts, a little arugula for those who like the fancy lettuce, with a nice vinaigrette. A big favorite.” Mark and Carla sampled the salad and observed that it was good. Stephanie, who didn’t eat salad, waited patiently.
“Okay, that’s the salad,” said Moishe, “Now for the soup. It’s good to get everyone settled down with the soup. We have a nice matzo-ball soup—lightest matzo balls in the Delaware Valley—no offense to Grandma.”
The soup was brought out by the surly chef. Stephanie, who liked matzo-ball soup, agreed that it was good.
“The kids can have the matzo-ball soup too,” said Moishe. “Usually we give them mozzarella sticks as a first course—tastes just like real mozzarella—but we can substitute the matzo-ball soup if you want; we do it a lot.” Stephanie said she wanted the matzo-ball soup instead of the mozzarella sticks.
“Done,” said Moishe.
“Next, we have a palate cleanser, a nice sorbet.” Eduardo brought out three dishes of sorbet: two yellow, one red. “Raspberry or lemon, your choice.”
“Lemon,” pronounced Stephanie.
“Lemon it is.
“Then we have the main dish for the grown-ups. We’re going to bring you three choices here: the pistachio-crusted sea bass, the chicken with tomato and pesto glaze, and the filet mignon with
shiitake mushrooms and red wine. I’ll tell you frankly here that the sea bass and the filet are generally the favorites. Nothing wrong with the chicken, mind you.” Carla and Mark sampled the three dishes and agreed to go with the sea bass and the filet.
“Now we’ll bring out the kids’ choices,” said Moishe. “Here we have a cheesesteak—and you tell me if you can tell the difference from the real thing. We also have the hotdog and the hamburger, the ten-foot hoagie, the chicken nuggets, and the pasta with meat sauce—all big winners. Generally, we serve three of these, so there’s plenty to satisfy if a kid doesn’t like something.”
Stephanie was biting into the cheesesteak with the air of a serious connoisseur. “It’s pretty good,” she admitted. Mark took a bite to assure himself that Stephanie had not been snowed by an impressive sales job, and had to admit that it was indeed pretty good. Stephanie also chose the nuggets and the pasta, which, according to Moishe, were what most kids chose.
“And now for the final and most important course,” said Moishe, looking knowingly at Stephanie. “The dessert. Can we make it taste like ice cream?—that is the question. Not one of the Four Questions, I’ll grant you, but an important one.” Eduardo brought out a tray with the faux ice cream and a variety of toppings, which Stephanie carefully prepared into a sundae.
“It tastes real,” she said, to which Moishe exclaimed, “What did I tell you? For the adults, we serve a nice plate with fresh fruit and a chocolate torte.” He obviously did not intend to bring this out, having accomplished the task of selling the child on the ice cream.
“I’m sure it’s wonderful,” said Carla, relieved to see Stephanie behaving with such docility. How, she wondered, might she perfect Moishe’s mixture of flattery and bullying so as to ingratiate herself with her daughter?
“Fine,” said Mark, glad to have the thing over with. “We’ll take it.”
“And the table setting?” asked Moishe. “Would the young lady like to look through our sample books for other options?”
“I like this one,” said Stephanie, to Carla’s surprise. Her daughter had never made a decision this quickly before in her life.
“A wise choice, if I may say so,” said Moishe. “It’s our favorite setting by far. Your daughter, I can see, has a good eye.”
“That she does,” said Carla, trying to share in the goodwill that Moishe had generated. Stephanie, however, would have none of it—this was a love-fest between her and Moishe alone—and she shot an annoyed glance at her mother. Still, there was no fighting, and they shook Moishe’s hand at the door with a certain amount of relief.
“Now that was easy, wasn’t it?” said Carla as they drove home, Stephanie having fallen asleep in the backseat.
Mark grunted. Moishe’s brand of salesmanship rubbed him the wrong way, and he still wasn’t thrilled by the idea of serving food that imitated other food. But he had to admit that it had all tasted pretty good and that the whole thing had transpired more painlessly than expected. The cost, of course, was another story. He had put down a substantial down payment, and the final bill for the meal promised to be very painful indeed.