The Last Super Chef

by Chris Negron

  Suddenly, the door opens and Mel hurries through the dorm on his way to the handler’s room in back. “Better get moving!” he calls out to us over his shoulder.

  We all jump again.

  “More cowbell!” Pepper shouts, pointing at him accusingly.

  Mel’s in too much of a hurry to be amused. “I’m serious. They’re already waiting for you guys.”

  Minutes later, Mel leads us down the stairs toward a giant security guard dressed all in black except for the “STAFF” written in big white letters on the front of his shirt. The guard’s standing silent next to producer Kari, his tree-trunk arms folded across his chest.

  “Perfect! Perfect! Perfect!” Kari squeals as she appraises us, the newly jacketed chefs coming down toward her. She isn’t wearing her headset, and a glance into the arena shows no cameras are waiting for us, either.

  “We’re not on TV today?” Pepper asks. We’d wanted to come down as a group but had to wait for her to make sure her every curl in the puff of her ponytail was tucked away successfully. As much hair as she has, it took a while.

  “No TV,” Kari confirms. “But let’s have a little practice anyway.”

  She lines us up and shows us how to wait for our cue to enter the arena. We learn how to walk in a straight line, matching each other’s footfalls. Or, at least, try to learn. At first we’re all left feet. We mess up three times in a row—Joey flat-tiring my sneaker, Bo getting confused and stopping so suddenly Kiko nearly runs him over, Pepper halting in front of her sink instead of the burners so the faucet blocks her face—before we finally start getting it right.

  We complete the final run-through to find Chefs Wormwood and Graca standing on the stage as we reenter the arena. We land back at our stations, same spots, three of us in the first row, Joey and Bo behind in the second. There’s a black box right in front of each of us that wasn’t there before. The lids are all closed. The Super Chef is nowhere in sight.

  “Mise en place,” Chef Wormwood announces when we settle into position. “I’ve talked to Chef Taylor, and he agrees this group needs a little remedial work on that particular topic.” She rolls her eyes. “In my opinion a lot of remedial work.”

  Wormwood seems to notice Chef Graca looking a little surprised, but she ignores it, only raising her voice even louder. “You will find at your stations the same ingredients you worked with last night. We better see some improvement today,” she warns us before pacing toward one side of the stage, where three steps allow her to descend to our level. “We stay here until we get this right. Trust me, I’ve got all day.”

  I open the box in front of me. There they are—the artichokes and onions, the shrimp and the clams. The instruction to start is given. Time begins to tick away. I get to work.

  With no Pettynose video playing this time, I’m more focused on each step. Dicing onions, peeling and deveining shrimp, prepping artichokes. I work with my head down, not even checking the clock once. When I get to the clams, I think about how ridiculous it is to be asking us to shuck them. Most kids wouldn’t know where to start, let alone finish in time.

  Every so often one of the two sous chefs comes around to help us. Graca shows me I’m not holding my knife quite right. Wormwood explains how to tell when I’ve exerted just the right amount of pressure to pry a clam open. By the time the hour ends, I’ve actually completed everything. Surveying my station, I’m even pretty happy with my results.

  I glance around at the others. Everyone is wearing the same look of satisfaction. The buzzer rings out on the clock in the front of the room, and that’s when, for the first time, I notice the Super Chef standing behind it on the balcony, leaning forward with both his hands on the railing in front of him. Was he there the entire time?

  “Again,” he says in a deep, commanding voice.

  Chef Graca sighs, but he doesn’t look back to question his boss. “Again,” the no-longer-jolly Portuguese chef repeats. Five black-shirts stream out of the pantry, each carrying a box identical to the ones we’d started from. They swap out old for new, wiping down our stations, clearing away all signs of the first round.

  When I open the new box, it’s like déjà vu. The artichokes. The onions. The shrimp. The clams. All exactly the same.

  We spend another half hour trying to be perfect, this time aware of the Super Chef pacing around the balcony above, watching us. I try to concentrate, but now that I know he’s there, I can’t ignore the echoes of his footfalls. Even just listening to them, trying to avoid distracting myself by looking up, I can tell he has a weird walk. Eventually I can’t resist watching it for a few seconds. He keeps sort of twisting his left leg outward, like it’s trying to dance but the rest of his body isn’t interested. Or like he’s trying to step over something that isn’t there. Wormwood passes my station, tapping her index finger on my cutting board. I refocus.

  We finish another round. There’s a beat of silence as we all look skyward at the Super Chef behind the clock once more, hands in his pockets. Almost like he might be relaxing, but he definitely isn’t. Not if that intense gaze of his is any sign, anyway. His left leg bounces in place as he surveys our stations from afar.

  I hold my breath, waiting for his verdict. Staring into his deep-in-thought face.

  That’s when it hits me. The Super Chef. That’s him. Really him. Right here, in the same room with us. With me. And here I am, obsessing over his every movement and expression, the same thing I’ve been doing through the TV all these years. It’s like I can’t stop myself from wondering what he might be thinking. About our work, all of us, but especially about mine. About me.

  But as his eyes flit about our stations, his expression turns from intense to flat. It reveals nothing, and Lucas Taylor doesn’t even look my way before repeating his command. “Again.”

  I recheck my precise cuts, the same ones he didn’t bother to inspect. How could he tell the quality of our work from way up there? What, is he too good to come down to our level?

  I try to shoot a glare at him, but the Super Chef only starts his pacing again, in the opposite direction this time. Same twisty, clunky left step. Same inability for me not to notice.

  And here they come. Five more boxes. Same exact ingredients.

  Two hours later, when we’re finally released upstairs after several more rounds, my hands are cold and shaking. My fingers feel locked into the position Graca taught me to hold my knife in, and I never want to see another onion or shrimp or clam or artichoke again.

  The rest of me shakes alongside my hands. Not with cold, but more anger. It hasn’t been enough for the Super Chef to ignore me my whole life? He’s going to fly me all the way to New York just so that he can prove he’s able to continue ignoring me even when I’m right in front of him?

  The five of us crash onto the leather sectional. We don’t talk, not to complain, not even to celebrate that our first “open/training” day is over. We’re too tired. Even though it’s only midafternoon and I haven’t eaten lunch yet, I fall asleep almost immediately.

  20

  Inside the arena, the crowd stamps their feet onto the overhead balcony in a chaotic, riotous beat. The noise slams into my whole body like thunder.

  Kari crouches in front of us, glancing at her clipboard and mouthing out reminders. “Watch the person in front of you!” and “Smile!” and “Shoulders back!” Her headset looks at home again, nestled in her yellow curls.

  We’re waiting in the hallway outside the arena, in a single-file line. Wearing our Super Chef jackets, which must’ve been gathered up sometime after we all finally crawled toward bed. They’d been washed and pressed, then returned to us in sparkling new condition this morning.

  Pepper is first in line. She nods at every one of Kari’s instructions, then takes a deep breath. After her it’s Kiko, then me, then Joey, and finally Bo.

  Kari raises one hand, five fingers, then starts counting them down, just like we practiced the day before. 5-4-3-2-1 . . .

  Move, legs, move, I t
ell my lower half when Kiko starts to follow Pepper through the double entry doors and into the deafening arena. The crowd comes into full view. It feels like it’s doubled in size compared with the last episode. Or maybe what’s doubled is their sheer cheering volume—those stamping feet are joined by a ton of piercing whistles and even the occasional high-pitched scream.

  This is it. The second episode of The Last Super Chef. We’ve had one day of rest since we arrived and were thrust into the mise en place challenge. If you want to call what we did in the last twenty-four hours “rest.” I open and close my fist, making sure my hand has returned to normal. My right thumb cracks, I wince, and, even above the racket surrounding me, “Again!” echoes in my ears.

  The Super Chef waits for us alone on the stage. The critical stare from yesterday is gone, replaced by his flashy, on-camera smile.

  “Welcome back to The Last Super Chef,” he announces proudly, and the cheering starts to die down. I glance around for his sous chefs, but my eyes can’t find them.

  “Let’s get right to it. Warm-up is over. Today, the competition starts for real, with Challenge #1! Please don’t forget that the winner of tonight’s competition will receive two tickets front and center for all the events at NBA All-Star Weekend in Los Angeles, coming up this February!”

  The crowd gasps. I resist checking on Joey. I’m sure his expression is full of the same excitement and confidence that’s been there since yesterday. He’s been laser-focused on these tickets for hours. “NBA All-Star Weekend! Just me and my dad!” he kept spontaneously shouting in the dorms, as if he’d won them already.

  “Let’s remind ourselves of the scores from the warm-up episode, our mise en place challenge!” The Super Chef gestures toward the blank scoreboard. It flashes to life, displaying the same scores as last time, our names in order. Kiko first, with 50 points. Me, last, with 34.

  “Tonight is also our first themed competition. So please remember, Chefs, to keep those thinking caps on while you compete.” He taps his index finger on his temple.

  “But before we can start, I think we’re missing some key folks, aren’t we?” The Super Chef puts one hand over his eyes like a seaman searching the horizon for lost boats. “Where are my sous chefs? Chef Claire? Chef Gabriel?”

  To our left is a table I’m noticing for the first time. Something’s on it, but I can’t tell what because it’s covered in black tablecloths. And anyway, my attention is pulled away when two booths light up, each no bigger than our tiny pantry closet back home. Chefs Wormwood and Graca appear inside them. Bulky, noise-canceling headphones cover their ears, and they’re blindfolded, too.

  “Well, there they are.” Chef Taylor cups his hands over his mouth to project his voice. “Hey, Chefs! What are you guys doing over there?”

  Their expressions don’t shift a millimeter, not even when the Super Chef waves both hands over his head like he’s stranded on a desert island, hoping to flag down a passing rescue plane. It’s clear the sous chefs can’t see or hear their boss at all.

  “Sensory deprivation booths,” the Super Chef announces with a knowing grin. “Four of them.” Two more identical but empty booths light up. “Inside these, our contestants won’t be able to hear a thing going on in Super Chef Arena. More on why we need such precautions later; suffice to say they’re extremely important for tonight’s challenge. Now, somebody get me my sous chefs back up here! I’m lost without them.”

  Wormwood and Graca are helped out of the booths. Once they’re out in the arena again, they carefully remove their blindfolds and headphones. Chef Wormwood’s rosy cheeks, clearly irritated by the tight equipment, match the annoyance evident in her straight-lined mouth.

  Both chefs shake themselves back to their full senses. The booth lights flash off, dropping that side of the arena back into shadows. If you didn’t already know the mysterious capsules were there, you’d have a hard time locating them.

  The sous chefs join Chef Taylor on the stage. He addresses us and the cameras and the audience above at the same time, alternating eye contact between all three as he speaks. “Two nights ago, our mise en place challenge involved some ingredients that can prove especially difficult to prep, but can be equally daunting to actually cook with.”

  Two of the black-shirts fold back the first tablecloth. “Artichokes!” the Super Chef cries when several bowls of prepped artichoke hearts, surrounded by dozens more, huge and untouched by knives, are revealed.

  “Onions!” he says next, and suddenly we see mounds of them, perfectly diced, again surrounded by tons of matching, beautiful, whole Vidalias.

  Graca and Wormwood join in, yelling out “Clams!” and “Shrimp!” one after the other, more piles of the same components we worked with yesterday coming into view.

  Terrific, I think, looking at ingredients I’d vowed only yesterday never to touch again.

  “That’s right, Chefs,” the Super Chef says, “your challenge today is to cook a dish using all of these ingredients, along with five more”—Wormwood and Graca each hold up five fingers—“that you select from the pantry.”

  “You’ll each have one shopping minute,” Graca adds. “Choose your ingredients carefully, then close your lid and head back to your station.”

  Kiko is first. She grips the edge of the counter in front of her. Her eyes fix on a single point in the distance, the entrance to the pantry. Her right foot is inches behind her left and stands up on a toe.

  The Super Chef points back at the clock, waits for a new minute to start, then swings his finger through the air at the scoring leader. “And . . . go!”

  Kiko races toward Pepper, slipping between her and the second row of stations, where Bo, standing on his stepping stool, looks on with a worried expression. A cameraman is hot on her heels as she nears the pantry, snatching up one of the shopping boxes just outside. The lid flaps open and closed as she yanks it from the rack. She darts to the right and disappears. The wall separating the pantry from the arena is frosted glass, so all we see is her shadow as she zips around in there.

  On the stage, the Super Chef relaxes. All of the red camera lights in the room with us have winked out. The live television audience must only be watching Kiko now, through that single camera in the pantry with her.

  I squint at her shadow, trying to guess what she might be selecting. Then I realize what a mistake that is. I have to focus on myself, my own dish. What should I make with these ingredients, and what else do I need to get from the pantry to pull it off?

  Kiko emerges huffing. When she hits her spot, she heaves her closed box up onto her station. Another deep breath.

  The Super Chef doesn’t waste more than a few seconds, just long enough to track the second hand as it reaches the following half minute. He sends Joey into the pantry next.

  One by one my competition streams behind the frosted glass. The camera follows their feet. My eyes track their shadows. And one by one they charge out, filled boxes in hand. Boxes that they lift up to rest upon each of their stations, lids closed. They shake out their legs.

  I can’t help but wonder if some of them have picked the same ingredients I will. But that’s impossible to say, because I still don’t know what I need. I’ve run through about a hundred recipes in my head in the last four minutes and settled on absolutely nothing.

  “Chef Curtis!” the Super Chef shouts, and I look up to find his long, slightly shaking finger pointed straight at me. “Go!”

  I cross the front of the stage. I don’t bother looking up at the chefs as I sprint past them.

  I guess my speed must surprise the lumberjack-y cameraman, who’s even completing his look today with a flannel shirt. We do a little dance outside the pantry before he takes a huge step back, allowing me to slide past him.

  It’s my first time ever inside the Super Chef pantry. It looks the same in person as it always has on TV, from the pilot episode of season one. Brightly lit, everything beyond fresh, tons of options.

  I freeze up. What am I maki
ng? What do I need?

  I’m still not sure. I start to head left, then change my mind. The cameraman efforts to stay close, almost running into me a few times. I guess he wants to zero in on my face sweat again. By the time this is all over, I’m going to have the most well-known face sweat on the planet. Maybe I’ll bottle it and sell it on a website, like Pepper does with her spices. Fear by Curtis. A scent everybody will want. Or probably more like absolutely nobody.

  The essentials, get the essentials. If you have them, you can always find something to make. I head for the refrigerator case and throw it open. Grab a jug of milk. Snatch a carton of eggs. Protein, I need a protein.

  I race for the butcher’s block. Pork chops and pork loin and pig’s feet, chicken legs and thighs and breast. And beef. There are ribeyes, New York strip, filets . . .

  Filets.

  When did I last cook such an awesome cut of meat? The rare times we eat steak at home, it’s never a filet. Mom can barely afford the flank steak most times. Decision made, I wrap the best filet I see in some butcher paper and tuck it into my box.

  I round out my picks in a huge hurry with a chunk of parmesan cheese and a bunch of asparagus. I race back into the arena.

  “Congratulations,” the Super Chef says when I hit my station. My breath returns to something close to normal again. “All of you. Now. Let’s see what you chose.”

  The three chefs descend those same short steps and march toward us, reaching Pepper first. The Super Chef flips her box lid up and takes out her ingredients one at a time, setting them on her station. As he does, he describes them for the audience.

  “Lobster. Excellent choice. Cabbage. Interesting. Brioche. Very good. Celery and dried apricots. Nice.” He looks down at Pepper, who seems a little nervous. “If I had to guess . . . stuffed lobster?”

  Pepper nods hard, smiling, proud of her selections. “You know, I might’ve enjoyed that,” the Super Chef says, glancing over his shoulder at his sous chefs. Their grins seem especially devious.