Nyota Uhura poured a measure of thyme into the herb grinder and quickly ground it into a small glass bowl before rinsing and drying the apparatus and repeating process with dried parsley.
Spock stood beside her at the kitchen counter in his quarters and watched attentively as she did the same with basil, rosemary, then, finally, dill weed. He took mental notes of how she stirred the herb mixture with a wooden dowel before dumping it all into the first pot of lentils.
He raised an eyebrow when she reached for the thyme again, this time pinching out a bit with her thumb and index finger and dropped it into her other palm. She rubbed the plant vigorously between her two small hands and let the resulting powder drop into another glass bowl. Then she did the same with the parsley, basil and rosemary. All this she did without really looking at what her hands were doing.
He interrupted her as she reached for the dill weed.
"Cadet," he said, "I am curious as to why you so carefully measured, ground and combined the herbs required of your recipe when preparing the first portion, but with this you choose your ingredients without looking, let alone measuring. Also, when preparing the first portion, you used an herb grinder, but with this one you use your hands to serve an apparently identical purpose. Why?"
The young cadet looked up at him for the first time since she'd commenced with the cooking lesson.
"The first portion is for you, sir," she explained. "This one is for me."
As if her words were enough of an explanation, once again she reached for the waiting dill weed.
Had Spock been a human, he would have frowned at her less than enlightening account. As he was a Vulcan-raised hybrid, he instead simply swiped the bottle of dried herbs from the counter and held it out of her reach.
"Cadet, I surmise that you have used the grinding apparatus in acknowledgement of the Vulcan taboo against touching one's food with one's hands. That does not, however, tell me why you measured carefully while preparing my meal, but did not do the same when preparing your own. Furthermore, would it not have been more expedient to simply prepare a double portion while measuring out the ingredients intended for my consumption, rather than putting together two separate, though similar, meals?"
Uhura flicked a glance at the bottle he still held aloft. She appeared lost in thought for a moment, and then puffed out a little breath. Spock was unsure whether her sigh was one of frustration or of resignation, but felt confident that a more thorough explanation would be forthcoming.
Then she smiled.
"No," she said firmly, and reached up to pluck the bottle from his hand. She shook out a bit of the dill weed into her palm and began rubbing her palms together as she continued to explain. "When preparing food for my own… consumption, I use whatever ingredients feel right in whatever amounts also feel right. The recipe serves only as a guide. However, I understand that with your affinity for scientific study, you would more likely appreciate a more concrete method of preparation. Moreover, as your Vulcan upbringing precludes you from finding enjoyment from food you know to have been handled, I thought it wiser to use the grinder for your herbs."
She held her hands over the second glass bowl and allowed the crushed dill to drift onto the other herbs. Still employing her fingers, she mixed the combined ingredients together, and then carried the bowl over to where a second pot of uncooked lentils waited on the stove. With six quick pinches, using all of the digits of her right hand, she emptied the bowl and sprinkled the herbs into the water. She turned on the heat beneath both pots.
As it appeared that she was finished with this more detailed, but ultimately still unsatisfactory accounting of the reasoning behind her actions, Spock opened his mouth to enquire further, but she "beat him to the punch" as humans were wont to say at times.
"My mother and father always prepared our meals in this way," she said, indicating the pot that held her portion of the lentils. "Their parents also used this method."
She leaned against the counter once more, and, again, her thoughts seemed to turn inward.
"Baba says that everything tastes better for having been touched by the cook. He says their love of food comes out in the final result," she confessed, smiling a little sheepishly. "Mama says that he is full of nonsense – that the reason for using our hands is to allow us to develop an instinctive idea of what works for us. She says that such is nearly impossible to develop using measuring spoons and measuring cups."
Spock that it was odd that Cadet Uhura's father, a noted xenopsychiatrist, known for his careful scientific study of his subjects would posit such a fanciful reason for the Uhura family's preferred cooking style. He found it even odder, that her mother, equally well known in the field of Terran linguists and xenolinguistics, as well as for her commitment for preserving ancient Terran literature as one of her many side projects, would dismiss her husband's view for one that bordered on embracing the more biological concept of utilizing muscle memory. Suspecting that bringing up either conclusion, however, might be viewed as an offense to Terran sensibilities, the half-Vulcan voice neither of his opinions.
She grinned at him before turning and picking up a wooden spoon in each hand. Stirring both pots simultaneously, she turned to look at him over her shoulder.
Had he been fully human, he thought, he might have suspected she had read his thoughts. As things were, he knew she could not have done so.
"My grandparents have all said, at one time or another, that they are both right," she told him. She turned her attention back to the pots before continuing. "They say that a cook who does not love food, will leave behind a bitter taste on anything she touches. They also say a cook who does cannot feel the weight of a satisfying measure of spice in his hand will never adequately satisfy his hunger."
Spock considered her words before replying.
He understood that human emotions were often accompanied by changes in body chemistry. It was not unreasonable to believe that what the cadet's grandparents believed to be the bitterness of a cook who did not enjoy preparing food – and Spock firmly believed that was the idea that they were trying to convey, rather than a lack of enjoyment of food in and of itself – could be ascribed to stress hormones emitted when performing a task that one found unpleasant. He postulated that opposite might likely be equally true.
As for their ideas surrounding the weight of food, well that harkened back to his original hypothesis employing muscle memory, so he didn't waste further thought on that.
"The truth is probably more mundane," she told him as she shook a healthy amount of cumin into his pot and another into her left palm. She used the fingertips of her right hand to brush this into her own pot. "I'd guess it has something to do with the oils of the cook's hands, influenced by the individual's body chemistry, combing with the ingredients, that effects a variability in flavor."
Once again, Spock had the fleeting, and uncomfortable, impression that she had read his thoughts.
He was silent over the next fifteen minutes as she stirred the pots, placed flat breads in the oven to heat, and steamed a selection of dark, leafy greens and a vegetable she told him was called okra.
He complied without comment when she bid him to set his table for two, and got out several the serving dishes she said they would need. When the meal was ready to be served, he helped her carry the various dishes of food to table.
Sitting across from her, he watched as she grabbed a piece of flatbread and spooned a portion of the lentils onto it. He used the tongs she'd suggested he use to select his own bread and added lentils from his own dish. After seeing her pinch off the bit of her bread holding the lentils and squeeze it together before popping it into her mouth, he used knife to slice his own bit from the rest, and, spearing it with his fork, brought the food to his own lips.
The flavor, he found, was… most pleasing.
He did not, however, he reflected as he chewed thoughtfully, enjoy his meal with the same relish he observed in the cadet sitting across from him. It shouldn't matter, he told himself – it was most important that he received proper nourishment from the meal. A pleasing flavor was only secondary. Besides, he truly did enjoy the taste of the food Uhura had prepared for him.
And yet.
Yet, watching her scoop her lentils onto her bread in between bites of her vegetable – for which, he noticed, she used a fork – he realized the pleasure she was taking in her own meal far exceeded his own.
Spock placed his utensils beside his plate.
"Sir?" Uhura questioned, her forehead wrinkling in a tiny frown. "You don't like it?"
Spock stared at her plate for a moment before meeting her eyes.
"The food is most pleasing, cadet," he assured her. He leaned back so that he could watch both her face and her place as he continued. "It appears, however, that you are experiencing a great deal more… pleasure from your meal than I am from mine. It has made me wonder… ."
She waited a few beats after he trailed of, not wanting to interrupt if he intended to continue the thought. When seemed as if he might not, she spoke.
"Yes?" she prompted.
His face still impassive, Spock shifted just the tiniest bit in his seat. It was, Uhura thought, almost as if he were uncomfortable with the direction the conversation was about to take.
"I was thinking about human mating rituals," he said, at last. The tips of his ears were faintly greener than they had been moments before. "Is it not a common practice for lovers to feed one another from their hands? Is this practice not considered… romantic in nature? Perhaps it is a form of bonding among humans. Could it be that by tasting a the oils from their lovers' hands, a humans might feel more closely connected?"
Uhura felt her own blush rising, and hoped that her brown skin would shield the worst of it from her companion.
"Well, y-yes," she started, eyes on her plate. "Though I suppose it is considered to be more, um, sensuous than romantic."
Spock's right eyebrow slipped towards his hairline.
"Sensuous?"
"Uh, yes," she told him, blushing in earnest, now. She realized there was no hiding her discomfort from him, so she forged on without further hesitation. "I think it's something that is considered more of a prelude to sexual intimacy than a strictly romantic gesture."
Spock's eyebrow dropped back into place as he considered her words. He picked up his spoon and added another bit of lentils to the bread on his plate. Placing the spoon back in the dish, he neatly sliced off the portion of bread with his knife, speared it with his fork and eased it into his mouth.
After he'd chewed carefully and swallowed, he resumed the conversation.
"Am I correct in understanding that you liken feeding one's lover to a form of foreplay?" he asked her.
Uhura ducked her head towards her plate once more.
"I think so," she confessed quietly.
Spock, now fully in scientist mode, felt no embarrassment, and no need to modulate his voice.
"You think so, cadet?" he asked in normal tones. "Why is it that you suggest a theory that you only believe to be true? As you have almost always been careful in your studies of behavior as it applies in the study of cultural linguistics, I can only believe that if you lack personal experience in a practice, you must have reason to believe that you are correct in your analysis of it, or you would not have contradicted my own theory."
Uhura knew she needed a moment before she could answer. She swallowed and grabbed a spoonful of lentils from her dish. She tore off a piece of flat bread and smoothed the concoction onto it.
Before she could raise the morsel to her lips, Spock's hand shot across the table and grabbed her wrist. His hold was gentle, but firm enough to prevent her from eating. She looked up.
"Are you going to answer my question, cadet?" he asked, his eyes boring into hers.
Suddenly, Uhura felt rather silly for her reaction to his line of questioning. This was Spock, for goodness' sake! Her whole reason for being in his quarters this evening was so that they could each increase their understanding of the various cultures each was familiar with. Hadn't she just a week ago shared plomeek soup with him as they discussed the Vulcan education system over breakfast?
"Actually, sir, you are correct in your assumption that I lack personal experience with the practice," she admitted with a small grin. "However, my siblings and I spent enough time spying on our parents during their weekly 'date nights' to form a reasonable hypothesis about where the practice might lead. Years of watching vids, reading literature and observing my classmates here at the Academy have only served to confirm the theories I first developed as a child."
Spock raised his eyebrow again, but did not release her wrist.
"And why is it that you have not experienced these acts for yourself?" he asked her, not entirely certain he wanted to hear her answer.
At this, her smile was wide and unmarred by any discomfort.
"Actually, sir," she said with a giggle, "I've always been a little picky about who touches my food. I'm not sure I would find it… stimulating to be fed that way. It's all too likely that I might find it revolting, coming from the wrong hands."
"And how will you deduce that the correct hand has come along?" This, he was certain he did want to know.
"I guess," she told him, "it will just feel… right."
Spock didn't think before he acted. One second he was listening to the cadet's illogical, emotional answer to what he had thought was a very logical question. The next, he was acting illogically himself.
"Fascinating," he said, after swallowing the food he'd just taken from her hand. He leaned in and softly licked away a crumb of bread he'd left clinging to her thumb on his first try. "It would seem that when the hand in question does feel right, the favor is enhanced most favorably."
A/N: I originally envisioned this as a very different fic, occuring in the TOS universe. I might write it that way, still, but don't expect to see it here. Just needed to get this out of the way before continuing on with Compass, Ladies' and TCS. Considering its origins, this story is unrelated to those.
This is unbetaed, so go easy on me. I really needed to get this out of my head so that I could continue on with the stories y'all actually want to read.
Usual disclaimer: I don't own the characters or the setting, but I wish I did.