Love, Roses and the Best Sauce Ever

“I think careful cooking is love, don’t you? The loveliest thing you can cook for someone who’s close to you is about as nice a Valentine as you can give.” —Julia Child

Valentine’s Day may not rank on my list of “Top 10” favorite celebrations, but I do enjoy any excuse to let Rebekah know how much I love her.

She gifted me with an amazing series of books (they have a great story to go with them, so I’ll reserve that for another post). Then what I came up with was a really great card with some words – Rebekah loves words, a beautiful bouquet of flowers and – best of all – her choice of a new recipe for dinner.

This is the second time in five days I have turned the cooking up a notch and, once again, it went really well.

So well that, to quote Rebekah, “This is the best sauce I have ever tasted. You should make a big batch and freeze it.”

I second her opinion. This was well beyond delicious, it was spectacular.

But listen to the ingredients. How could I go wrong? Salmon. Olive Oil. Minced garlic. Butter. More butter. Cherry tomatoes. Fresh baby spinach. Heavy cream. Parmasen. Fresh parsley. Fresh basil. Lemon juice.

I am not going to talk you through the process. Just imagine the salmon smothered in the sauce. And if you make it, don’t even think about substituting out the heavy cream or the butter. Or, as Rebekah said, “You had me at heavy cream, butter, and lemon.”

One of the first things I remember Rebekah ever saying to me was, “feed me!” It was the evening my friend Kirk and I ran into her outside the library. Here’s the excerpt:

1976: It is evening, sometime in the fall. The time is around 9:00 and I am walking back across campus with my friend Kirk, heading past the library and on toward the fountain. The door opens and a slender figure breezes down the steps with an armful of books. She pauses to say hi to Kirk, who she knows.

“Derek, this is Rebekah Alexander. Rebekah, meet Derek Maul,” Kirk says.

She has thick, wavy, shoulder-length brown hair, an exquisitely beautiful face, and a slightly mischievous smile that is accentuated by dancing eyes that shine with something extra, some level of life I recognize but seldom see.

She looks at me and shoves her pile of books into my hands. “Feed me,” she says. It is a statement, not a question. So we walk back to our house together, where I find a piece of pumpkin pie and make her a cup of tea….