The cook is named after Hercules. Over his life, he has had many titles, some honorable, others racist. Recently, he has lived under an alias, in New York. Now, he is thinking about his life, as a cook, and wishes to share his recipes, the ones that made him a chef for the president, with magic laden in them. He admits to guilt with regard to magic, and how he used that magic. He proceeds to tell his story, one of lying.

The cook can’t remember when he was born. As a child, he is enslaved on the Mount Vernon plantation. He never meets his parents, though he assumes they must be black like him. Instead, he is raised by a missus who shows him everything he needs to know in the kitchen. By eighteen, he cooks all day with the missus: they prepare breakfast, bake johnnycakes, prepare lunch and dinner for George Washington, and run through chores for maintenance and the next day’s preparation. Every day is the same, but eventually, the cook discovers his powers.

In 1773, the head chef is sick, on the day of George Washington’s dinner party. Such occasion does not allow anyone, especially not enslaved people, to make mistakes. The head chef gives the cook and the missus instructions on what to do, which they must do perfectly. However, Martha Washington sets them up to fail by giving them a deer with rotting meat that’s impossible to work. After butchering it, the cook realizes that none of the cuts are workable, as they have already gone bad.

With some ingenuity, the cook and the missus make a beef stew, which is sour at first, after which they add lemon to mask it and allow the taste to settle for the day. After that, they make mashed potatoes to accompany the beef stew. By the dinner party’s time, Martha Washington eats the beef stew and then asks the cook to bring out the missus. Fearing that they’ll be reprimanded, the cook takes the fall for the dish, saying that he cooked it. Surprisingly, George Washington says that it’s incredible.

Soon enough, the cook realizes that not only is he a good chef, but his creations have the power of manifestation. Whatever he feels, he can put into his food, and whoever eats it will feel the effects of it. He can change recipes on a whim, and as he later finds out with his wife, years later, he can even make others cook well. From then on, George Washington and his guests only want dishes from the cook. One day, Charles Byrd, a remorseless slaveowner, is invited as a guest. Seeing the cook’s talents, he offers to buy him. With disgust, the cook manifests a death wish into Charles Byrd’s food, causing him to slump over and die. Weeks later, the cook overhears the Washingtons talking about what happened, how no one can explain the cause of Charles Byrd’s death. As a test, the cook prepares tonics, also imbued with death wishes, and feeds them to moles outside. The day after, they are dead.

The cook becomes more and more popular. He caters during the Revolutionary War and kills several people involved in slavery. To avoid suspicion, he arranges for their deaths to happen well after leaving Mount Vernon. Soon enough, George Washington becomes president, with many titles to his name. The missus dies, making the cook officially the head cook of Mount Vernon. George Washington always wants to eat his food. After he becomes president, George Washington has the cook go back and forth from Virginia and Philadelphia to cook for him, which the cook accepts. Still, the cook kills various people involved in slavery.

Six years later, the cook continues his routine of oscillating from Virginia and Philadelphia per George Washington’s request. One dinner, with Johnathan Cooke as a guest, the cook overhears George Washington say that he rotates his enslaved staff every six months to prevent them from gaining freedom in Philadelphia, and that he specifically does so with the cook. From then on, the cook realizes the true nature of George Washington, how he’s just like the rest. For now, he doesn’t kill him, though he ponders it, as he cooks for him, has dinner with him, and travels back and forth with him. He waits until his sixth month in Pennsylvania.

On the hundred and seventy-eighth day, George Washington tells the cook that they’re going back to Virginia. Together, they return to Mount Vernon, separately, and the cook believes he must die there, at his true home. Despite his status, he is still treated as an enslaved person and seen as less-than by the white people there. When he’s talking to another enslaved person at the stables, a white man tells him to go back to the kitchen. There, he grips a bottle of tonic hard and thinks about all the enslaved people which George Washington owns.

The next year, the cook leaves Mount Vernon for good. He hides under his current alias, in New York. Years later, George Washington dies from illness on Mount Vernon. Meanwhile, the cook hears, from his fiend, about the nature of magic in this world. His friend has only one wing but says there are many people with two. One night, the cook awakes to see his friend at his window, to tell him the news that all of George Washington’s enslaved people are free. For his journey, the cook prepares a leftover pheasant dish for him, and a macaroni pie after he wishes not to eat a winged creature. The friend knows that many deaths have been related to the Washingtons, after their dinners. He tells the cook to write about his story, as George Washington’s cook, which he agrees and decides to do.

The cook admits that he did not in fact kill George Washington. The bottle of tonic, which he intended to kill George Washington with, was shattered before it could be consumed, after which the cook leaves. Since then, he has not made a single magical dish. After having admitted it all, the cook feels better. He feels like he can cook with magic again and bring about a feast. He thinks, now, about all which he will cook.