Was woken up this morning by my oven clicking endlessly and when I called my landlord to ask him for help, before I could say anything about the oven he launched into a speech about how the basement is flooded which is why there will be no hot water until Monday. Which is of course how I learned I have no hot water, because I was calling about my oven (which in end he came over to look at, unplugged, and told me he'll have a guy come by and look at it Monday, which is frustrating because I was planning to bake a pie for a party today? I guess I'll just show up with the homemade pie filling I have all ready to go in the fridge????).

@cantillat asked: ❝ Your cooking is surprisingly adequate. I haven't eaten something so good in quite a while. ❞ Van Helsing had to admit. Despite her perchance to get on his nerves at times, Sonia wasn't disagreeable like Impey and her cooking was indeed enjoyable so credit where it was due.

Unprompted IC asks - Accepting from mutuals!

Sitting on one side of the table in the Servants Hall, Sonia stared at Mr. Van Helsing, flabbergasted. Her expression matched her current appearance: an apron and matching cap had been arranged over her pale blue day dress and elegant, braided updo. Now, specks of sauce, flour, and who knew what else adorned both the apron and cap, as well as the sleeves of her dress and her face. Across her, her bodyguard and the closest thing she had to a friend in London (who wasn't in her direct employ), regarded her in-between bites of the dinner she'd prepared and...complimented her efforts.

It hadn't been a situation she'd expected, that any of them had expected really. The Marquis Renfield and his sister had been called away to the country for an important series of meetings at their estate up north, but did not wish to bore their royal guest with the lack of entertainment. Thus, they'd insisted she stay in their London townhouse with Delly and Van for company. Sonia, however, had looked at it simply as an opportunity: to not be chaperoned from dinner to party to ball every evening, and to give the kitchen staff the night off in an attempt to cook her own meal for once. And for Mr. Van Helsing, who had some level of interest show through his usual look of displeasure. Still, she'd enlisted her lady's maid's help in acquiring the necessary ingredients from the market, and using an old and battered cookery book, she'd gotten to work on what was supposed to be a beef and mutton soup popular with Queen Victoria herself and a pigeon pie.

Neither, to her dismay, had turned out edible in the least: the beef had somehow become too tough, the lamb not cooked enough, and the vegetables still crunchy in her lumpy excuse for soup. And the pie consisted of dough that simply wouldn't stick together, with solid lumps of unmixed flour and greasy melted butter, to cover the wine-soaked pigeon meat, the meat itself still raw in places (though to her credit, she'd been smart enough to ask for the bones removed before purchasing the poultry). A single spoonful of each dish had been enough for Sonia's eyes to widen, her face going pale with nausea at the unappetizing, if not illness-inducing, taste as she pushed her own bowl and plate closer to the center of the table. "I apologize for this, maybe there's still some leftover sandwiches from lunch somewhere," She'd suggested, referring to the picnic lunch the Marquis's cook had arranged for her the day prior, when she'd suggested a picnic in the park to be an excellent idea and had given both the vampire king and his guard little choice but to accompany her. It at least would make for a better meal than the last of the bottle of wine she'd used for cooking, paired with as many shortbread biscuits as she could stomach from the glass jar in her bedroom.

Except, he didn't seem to want sandwiches. He wasn't revolted by the muck that barely passed for food: instead, Sonia watched, mouth agape in the most unladylike fashion...as Abraham van Helsing ate his fill of both dishes. "Th-thank you?" She stammered, cheeks turning from a sickly green to flushed red, unsure of what the polite protocol was. She knew it was awful and he wasn't the type to spare her feelings no matter the situation, thus Sonia could only assume his words were sincere. "My stomach doesn't seem to agree with it, however...the heavy English cooking. I'm afraid if I attempt to eat another bite, I may be violently ill. Therefore, perhaps you might enjoy my portion while I check on the Apple Charlotte for dessert?"

The apple charlotte that had been prepared with slightly stale bread, apples that had been mashed with cores, skin and all, and had utilized salt instead of sugar, but apple charlotte nevertheless. She'd needed to make the cream sauce to drizzle atop it, and thus hadn't bothered putting the milk back in the icebox for the past two hours for that purpose.