(http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lecvs2vhxl1qbyk5qo1_500.jpg)<br/><strong>Armando Zavieta Torres<br/>The kitchen of the Henshaw Manor<br/>Making a feast most excellent</strong><br/><br/>"Finest beef cuts....the freshest, cleanest fruit....vegetables picked from the Garden of Eden! Ay,<em>dios mio</em>, the good Lady Henshaw demands it all! And for how many people?"<br/><br/>Armando held his hands up, his eyes dancing from digit to digit. "Nueve...diez....a lot."<br/><br/>Armando had a simple enough life as the cook for the Henshaw household. They were a big enough family, but with the duties afforded to those of their station, the culinary workload was manageable. Then, the parties started. They were very fun parties, indeed, but the work to get it started was work that could be tackled only by Armando Zavieta Torres,<em>cocinero magnífico</em>! Or, so he told himself. Of course, in truth there were other people that helped with the cooking, while Armando did the "heavy" work that the lady cooks could not be bothered to do.<br/><br/>And it was "heavy" work that he was doing, as he busied himself with a cleaver and a thick slab of raw beef, hacking at it like a Viking possessed. The good Lady Henshaw demanded cuts of various sizes: from finger food for the guests to take off of the "special platters", to the more traditionally sized cuts for eating with a fork and knife. And it was not just beef that they craved; there was fowl to be cut, be it chicken or turkey or quail or otherwise. Beyond<em>that</em>, there were exotic meats to be prepared; he had heard talk of the Henshaws importing what they called<em>"elafont"</em>meat from British India. The "elafont", Armando learned, was basically a horse that was the height of three men and had ears the size of a desk. What a creature!<br/><br/>The Henshaws' purview of all things exotic didn't stop at the foods. They also had a gas oven; turn a knob, and fire was instantly made. ("That's it?" he had asked when the Henshaws brought it in. "Yes, that's it! Now get to cooking!" they had responded.) At that moment, Armando arranged all the finger-meats he had cut to that moment onto a platter, turned the knob on and cautiously slid it into the oven. After doing that, he shuffled over to the veritable mountain of fruit on one of the tables and sighed.<br/><br/>"The freshest, cleanest fruit." he said,  beginning to wash the fruit using water delivered to the kitchen through plumbing; another wondrous invention that he had never heard of back in his old country.