The Language of Baklava

Diana is so frustrated and lonely that she walks out of the house one day, followed by her sisters. They walk down the road with no particular plan but are soon tracked by Bud in his car. He entices first Monica and then Suzy back home by telling them he is preparing their favorite dishes. Diana hides in the bushes when Bud comes looking for her, feeling a mixture of dread and relief as she reveals herself after Bud calls to her.

The family invites relatives over every weekend, as there is no other entertainment. Bud cooks elaborate meals, the women drink cocktails, and the men discuss politics; Diana provides the recipe for “‘Lounging with the Ladies’ Grasshoppers” (148). Some of the children explore the surrounding countryside, and one day Diana and two cousins enter a huge cement pipe, where Diana feels a sense of freedom from her old life. Their disappearance from view causes Gram concern as she calls for them to come in for dinner. Touching something furry in the dark of the tunnel, Diana’s fear takes over and the children run out: “We are running back, into ourselves, into light, to dinner, to what is known” (151). The chapter ends with the recipe for “Magical Muhammara” (152).

Diana relates some of the many long and apocryphal stories that Bud loved to tell the family. They cover, amongst many topics, his parents’ meeting, his father’s fierce and generous personality, Bud’s wild and rebellious childhood, and his employment by the king of Jordan, where he met his dear friend Mo Kadeem, with whom he has now lost contact. The two young men worked on preparing the dish mjeddrah for the king, the recipe for which comes at the end of the chapter: “Bud’s Royal Mjeddrah” (159). These larger-than-life accounts delight and entertain Diana and her sisters, bringing them closer to their father. At the same time the stories impart moral guidance—for example, how to be a “good girl” and a responsible child. They also transmit “a full overview on [Bud’s] life plan for himself and for [his children]” (156), which includes opening a restaurant and becoming a doting grandfather to many offspring, born of his daughters and their second cousins.

Diana describes two groups of high school classmates: the immigrant children, whose names the teachers cannot pronounce and who bring fragrant exotic dishes in their lunch boxes; and the American girls, who are all on diets and obsessed with being skinny. Diana describes the father of one of her friends, Olga Basilovich, as “an elderly, gentle, diminutive man from Russia” (161). She learns from Olga how he escaped concentration camps and walked across Europe, eventually finding his way to America. Scientific and intellectual, he nonetheless suffers from terrible depression and has attempted suicide. His only joyful experience while Diana knows him is eating Bud’s lamb-stuffed cabbage rolls, which lead him into poetic rapture. He makes them himself for Diana to try, but soon after he goes into a deep depression and is hospitalized. He finally dies by suicide, jumping out of the hospital window. On the day of his funeral, a pigeon approaches Diana and looks at her. Some years later she learns that the Russian word for stuffed cabbages is “golubsti,” or “pigeon.” Diana ends the chapter with the recipe for “‘In Honor of Mr. Basilovich’ Cabbage Rolls” (167).

Bud is back to his old lively self. He is about to buy a restaurant of his own, a lifelong ambition that has never happened despite several false starts. He and Diana dine at the only other Arab restaurant, which will compete with Bud’s; they try the falafels and plan to poach the waiter, who is an engineering student. The recipe for “Very Fried Falafels” follows (171). Bud wants Diana to serve at his restaurant, and she is excited to plan her uniform. The younger girls will work in the kitchen. The family continues planning for months, with investors recruited and menus created. On the day of the planned signing, Bud and Mom are gone long into the night; eventually Bud returns and goes straight to bed. The plan has fallen through due to the previous owner’s retraction. The following recipe is for “Perfectly Tender Bamia” (176), one of the secret recipes Bud had up his sleeve for his new venture.