Page 7 of The Tea Witch’s Secret

She chuckled. "Yes, it was, but not a very good one. Let me think, fermented foods. Like pickled things?"

"Yes, but salt-pickled."

"We should do. They might not taste the same as what you're used to, but we have preserved vegetables like cabbage, green beans, cauliflower, carrots, but I won't serve that," she responded, still looking at me, still smiling.

I didn't know what was so amusing about the situation.

"Taste doesn't matter. Fermented foods are really good for the gut, so Eva and Max should have it regularly," I instructed, making mental notes to follow up with them if they liked it or if we had to share recipes with Pepper so she could recreate the fermented vegetables we were used to. While I did want to make sure we ate them because they were good for us, I also did want my cousins to enjoy what they were eating too. It was important or it would be easy to slip into not eating the things that would help us.

"And what about you?" Pepper asked with the same seriousness as asking about my cousins' preferences.

I stared at her, trying to decipher her question but failing. "What about me?"

Pepper folded her hands under her chin and leaned forward with a small smile that seemed encouraging, but I didn't really understand what for. "What kind of foods do you like?"

"Oh, you don't need to worry about me. I have particular preferences, and it's too much effort to try to cater to them, so I'll just eat what the twins have," I said.

"No," Pepper said firmly.

"No?" I asked, feeling really lost in the conversation. I was supposed to be talking about what the twins wanted to eat, and I'd done that. Was something getting lost in translation? I was reasonably sure I'd understood everything that Pepper said, and it wasn't as if no was a confusing word.

She shook her head, making some more wisps of hair come loose. "I'm here to cook for you as Purple Oak's guests, and I take great pride in my cooking. I can't do that if I don't know what you like. So, please tell me some of your preferences too." She got a serious look on her face that made me think she was telling the truth. This has to be some strange custom from the area, because no one had ever asked me that before. Not our cook at the last town, and definitely not the cook who we grew up with. It was always all about what Eva and Max liked, which was how it had always been.

I was used to it.

I pushed down the bitter feeling. It wasn't either of my cousins' faults. They'd just been born with a twin and weather magic, whereas I'd been born alone as a tea witch, an anomaly even within our own family.

"Well?" Pepper prompted as she wrote my name down in her book.

I cleared my throat. "I like mushrooms," I replied, thinking about the kind that I had in my breakfast. Mushrooms varied from place to place, and I'd tried many different types in my porridge. I always liked them.

"What else?"

"Eggs. Eggs are always good."

"And do you have a favourite preparation of eggs?" she asked.

A memory sparked of the cook two towns back who did used to ask about my preferences, but only because she thought it was funny to serve it wrong to me anyway.

It didn't feel like that was happening here. I couldn't pinpoint why. Maybe because of the intense way Pepper was looking at me, or maybe because she'd already been respectful and thoughtful when I made my breakfasts.

"Poached is my favourite, then soft-boiled, I don't like hard-boiled. Scrambled is the worst. I don't like when they're scrambled. Omelettes are good, rolled is better. Fluffier," I said, wondering if I was oversharing, but it didn't seem so because she was actually writing it all down. "And tea eggs. Though I don't imagine they will be an option."

"What's a tea egg?" she asked curiously.

"Oh, erm, it is a boiled egg that is then cracked and boiled again in tea," I responded. "Which I suppose is a hard-boiled egg, but it's different."

"I get it," she responded. "I don't like mashed potato, but I like it on top of cottage pie when it's covered in cheese."

"I don't know what cottage pie is," I admitted.

"Minced beef in gravy topped with potato," she said. "I can make it for dinner tomorrow if you want to try it?"

"I think Eva would like it," I said. "Especially with cheese."

Pepper laughed. "I can use goat cheese," she assured me. "But I wasn't offering to make it for Eva, I was offering to make it for you."

"What if I don't like it?"