The fruit is next, and I load up on oranges. Nothing like leaning into the Sunshine State’s most famous export. I’m about to turn around to search the refrigerator for supplies when I spy small green limes hidden behind a bushel of pears. A slow smile spreads across my face. I take the entire bag and rush back to my station to drop off my haul before making a return trip to grab dairy and meat. The menu is slowly unfolding in my mind, and it screams Florida panhandle.
After preheating the oven, I look over my supplies to make sure I have everything I need. I still have no idea what I’m going to do for an appetizer, but I really need to get the pie crust baking and the filling ready. I open the box of graham crackers and, out of habit, start crushing enough to make two pie crusts.
“Crap,” I say as quietly as I can.
Paulie hears me. “What’s the problem?”
I look over at his station, where he is opening can after can of tomatoes, splashing a little from each as he puts it aside. “It looks like somebody died over there.”
He grins, using his arm to swipe all the empty cans into the trash at the end of the counter. “I’m here to cook. No one said I had to keep it clean.” He points with his chin. “What mischief are you up to?”
“I wasn’t thinking and doubled the recipe.”
He pauses for a moment. “And?”
“I only need one.”
“Big deal. Make two,” he says. “You never know.”
I nod and go back to finishing the crust and pressing it into two tart pans before popping them in the oven. Normally, I don’t need a timer to know when a pie crust is done. I can tell by the smell. It’s that sweet spot just as the crust becomes golden brown but before it’s overcooked. Even thirty seconds can make the difference between good and perfection. And a graham cracker crust is even less forgiving than dough when it comes to overcooking. But today, it’s probably a good idea to pay attention to the clock. I grab the turquoise kitchen timer and twist to ten minutes.
Since I now have two pie crusts, I go ahead and whip up a double batch of filling, careful to keep an eye on the oven. I know the timer is ticking down the seconds, but it’s hard not to peek inside. Not all ovens bake the same and I haven’t had time to figure out this one’s quirks.
“Hey, Peyton,” Jessica says, standing on her tiptoes to look at my station. The camera is right behind her.
“Hey, Jessica,” I answer, trying not to be nervous. “Congratulations on winning your show.”
“You’re so sweet,” she says with a smile. “As a fellow baker, I just had to come and see what you’re up to. What’s in the oven?”
“Pie crust,” I say. “For key lime pie.”
Her eyes widen. “I think that might be my favorite pie.”
“Mine too,” I admit with a grin. “The sweetened condensed milk really highlights the tartness of the lime.”
“Agreed,” she says. “What are you working on here?”
“I’m cutting strips of steak for citrus asada fajitas with fresh pico and guac,” I say quickly, slicing through the skirt steak. I pause my cutting and glance up to flash a quick smile to the camera. With a knife in my hand and a mental to-do list running through my head, I feel more confident.
“What kind of citrus are you using?”
“Oranges, of course,” I say, zesting the peel.
“Right. You’re from Florida,” Jessica says with a gentle laugh. “Well, I can’t wait to see what you do with all this citrus.”
“Thanks, Jessica,” I say, keeping my eyes on my knife instead of the camera. Nothing says amateur like cutting off a fingertip.
When she finally leads the camera away from my station, I rush to the sink to wash my hands before moving the crust from the oven to the blast chiller.
On my way back to my station, I check out some of my competition. Inaaya is de-boning a full fish with a pair of fish tweezers. I can’t believe how quickly she pulls out the tiny bones. I’m going to have to ask her for some pointers.
Lola is stacking various sizes of foam disks until she has a cone shape that must be at least three feet tall. And on Adam’s station, I’m pretty sure he’s got every spice on the rack organized into four groups.
Everyone is rushing around to get their dishes done, and I still don’t have an appetizer. No matter how good my pie is, I can’t win this round if I’m missing an entire course.
Going back into the walk-in cooler, I survey what’s left of the supplies, and I have to give it to my castmates: there’s not much.
Seafood is a no-brainer for a Florida girl. Even where I live, the fresh catch of the day is only a couple of hours old when you get it. But all I see are a few scallops and a broken crab leg. Not enough to make a complete dish for the judges. On the top shelf, far in the back, are two containers filled with something that is slimy enough to suggest it came from the ocean. I reach for them, but my arms are too short. I duck my head and try again, this time reaching under the wire rack and using my fingers to nudge one of the containers toward the edge. Once it’s within reach, I grab it and read the label.
“Yes!” I shout, causing those around me to turn, including all three judges, who are keeping a running commentary from their elevated vantage point at their table. A. J. stands to crane his neck to see what I’m up to. “Sorry,” I say, but I don’t mean it. I make quick work of getting the other container and am rewarded with a second helping of my magical ingredient. I race back to my station and resist the urge to start chopping now. I still need to finish the marinade for the steak.
“Peyton,” Jessica says once she finishes interviewing Lola. “I noticed you were pretty excited about something in the cooler.”
I look up and my eyes zoom in on the red light. With each blink, the words in my brain disappear.
“Uh, yeah,” I stammer. “I found my inspiration for my appetizer.”
“That’s great,” she says, peeking over the countertop of my station. “Can’t wait to see what you do with it. Smells fishy.”
She laughs at her own joke, and I know I’m probably supposed to do the same, but I just freeze up.
As she pushes away from my counter and walks behind me on her way to spy on another cast member, she whispers, “Breathe and relax.”
I take a deep breath as the cameras follow Jessica, then begin to mix up a batter for my appetizer. Hakulani glances over his shoulder. “Batter?” he asks. “You’re going to serve fried food to Angelica?”
I don’t know if his words are meant to get under my skin, but they do. Angelica is known for her clean, fresh, grilled-never-fried cooking. Number one rule of feeding people is to know your audience. My face falls and then he quickly adds, “I mean, if you can catch her attention with something outside her culinary lane, that would be epic.”
He’s not doing a good job of digging himself out of his hole, but he looks so earnest that I go against my gut and decide to give him the benefit of the doubt.
“That’s what I’m hoping for,” I say, pointing at the tails of his shirt peeking out from the bottom of his chef’s jacket. “Nice shirt, by the way.”
He glances down, almost embarrassed. “My aloha shirt? Normally I wouldn’t wear one. Too touristy for me, but the wardrobe person was insistent that I wear them as part of my brand. I’m eighteen. Do I really need a brand?”
“What?” I ask in mock horror. “You don’t have a brand? I’m not sure I can be seen with you.” I smile at him and start cutting the tomatoes for the pico.
“Oh yeah?” he asks, glancing over his shoulder. “What’s your brand?”
“Lard and butter, baby,” I answer quickly. “Or butter and lard. I’m not sure which order will resonate with the focus groups.”
“I don’t think you can go wrong leading with butter,” Malik says as he turns and races to grab something in the pantry.
“He has a point,” I say.
Hakulani smiles before stepping back from his counter and looking into my station. “Key lime pie, hu
h?”
“Yeah. It’s kinda my signature back home.” I take my hand juicer and pop the limes in before squeezing all the juice into a measuring cup.
“Best key lime pie I ever had was from a food truck on Kamehameha Highway,” he says as he steps back and picks up a knife to slice something.
“What was so great about it?” I ask.
“It was dipped in chocolate.”
“Watch out. I might steal that idea,” I warn him. “You don’t want to help out the enemy, do you?”
He laughs, and then we both turn our attention back to our dishes.
A few minutes later he heads to the pantry and returns with two cans of Spam.
I wrinkle my nose. “What can you make with that?”
He pops the top. “I think you mean: What can’t I make?”
“I said what I meant.”
“Have you ever tried it?” he asks, shaking the can in my direction.
I shake my head and lift the measuring cup to see how much juice I have. “I wouldn’t even know what to do with it.”
“Well, maybe I can teach you,” he says, popping the top off the can and giving me a wink.
I pause, mid-cut. Is Hakulani just being naturally friendly, or is he flirting with me? I look down so he can’t see my face turn red. Of course, we’ve only just met, so it’s probably more likely that he is being nice. I mean, we’re on a television show and going to be working next to each other for as long as we’re here. That’s it. He’s just being neighborly. Plus, when you’re surrounded by people who love food, offering to make dinner for someone doesn’t mean they’re interested in you. Does it?
A roving camera crew parks in front of Hakulani before I have a chance to respond to him, then Jessica begins to pepper him with questions about what he is working on. Apparently, I’m not the only person surprised to see Spam being used in today’s competition.
I glance up at the giant red timer hanging over the middle of the room. Each second that ticks by feels like a thud in my head. Once the crusts are cool enough, I fill both with the pie filling and stick one in the oven and put the other one in my tiny fridge for later. I glance at the timer again, making a mental note to check it in twelve minutes. Grabbing the rest of the ingredients for the pico and guacamole, I begin chopping, my mind racing through the things I still have to do. I put the pico in the cooler before getting to work on the avocados. After a few minutes, I check the time, taking my eyes off my blade long enough to slice open the tip of my finger.
“Ow,” I cry out. Every head on the set and probably most of the ones sheltered by the dark turn to look at me. Some, like Hakulani and Paulie, are staring in concern. Dani has an amused smile on her face.
“What happened?” Paulie asks.
“Cut myself,” I say, grabbing a paper towel and wrapping it around my fingertip as I step back from my station. The medic arrives like a bloodhound on the hunt.
“Let’s get you bandaged up,” he says, steering me over to the corner with a Red Cross emblem taped to the wall.
“But my pie,” I say, trying to pull away.
“Sorry, Peyton,” the medic says. “We have to follow the blood-borne pathogen protocol. I’ll get you patched up as quickly as I can, but you can’t go back to your station until I’m done.”
“Just give me a bandage,” I argue. “It’s not that bad. It’s practically stopped bleeding already.”
The medic ignores me and sits me down on a stool. He doesn’t give me a bandage so I can get back to my pie. At any minute the timer is going to go off and if I’m not around to pull it out, the custard will burn. Not that this guy cares. He cleans the cut for several minutes, flushing it with sterile saline over and over with a plastic syringe, during which time I definitely hear my timer ring. When he is convinced I don’t need stitches, he smears salve over my finger before putting a waterproof bandage over the cut. The bleeding has slowed, but he wraps it up in gauze anyway. With each step and minute that goes by, I can smell the damage being done. By the time I get back to my station, my pie is beyond saving.
“I tried to get your pie out,” Paulie says. “But Jessica stopped me. Apparently, they’re more afraid of you accusing me of sabotage than burning the whole studio down.”
I yank open the oven and smoke pours out as the smell of burned graham crackers wafts across the room. I pull out the pan, dropping it on the stainless-steel counter. The entire kitchen is silent. Well, almost silent.
“Look,” I hear Dani say in a stage whisper, “the baker burned her pie. Guess we know who not to worry about.”
My entire body feels hot and my face sizzles with humiliation. I want to tell her off, but she’s right. I am the baker who burned her first baked dessert.
“Oh no, Peyton, what happened?” Jessica asks, more for the people viewing at home than out of real concern for me. So much for baker solidarity.
“I guess I burned my pie.”
Wanting to be rid of the smell of burned graham cracker, I grab the pan off my station counter and dump the blackened goo in the trash before quickly walking to the dirty dish area. It’s the only place the cameras don’t seem to go. Maybe it’s because the piles of dirty dishes don’t make for good optics. I flip the tart pan into a mostly empty sink and turn on the cold water. After letting it run a little bit, I splash my face and dry it off with the cuff of my jacket. After two deep breaths, I turn and walk back into the brightly lit studio and plaster a smile on my face. I won’t give anyone the satisfaction of seeing me cry. When I arrive, all remnants of the burned pie have been carried away by some unlucky crew member.
Paulie gives me a thumbs-up and whispers, “You got this,” as I walk by.
Jessica is still waiting at my station. She nudges the camera guy and he zeroes in on me. “Everything okay?” she asks.
I force myself to look up and smile, trying not to be mad at her. She was just doing her job. “Yeah. Luckily, I’ve got a backup.” I pull the second tartlet pan from the fridge and set it on the table to come to room temperature.
Jessica claps her hands together. “That’s great news. I’m so glad we’re still going to get to taste your key lime pie.”
“Absolutely,” I say, forcing myself to sound calm. I go through my mental checklist. As much as I need to get the pie in the oven, I still have two other courses to prepare. I preheat the grill burner and toss the skirt steak on before turning back to Jessica.
“Take two,” I say, smiling as big as I can. That’s what the camera wants, right? Happy teens having a good time in the kitchen. Wholesome entertainment for the whole family. When I glance at the clock, however, my smile fades. Back home it takes me the better part of an hour to finish a key lime pie from baking to plating. That’s all that’s left in the competition. It’s going to be close.
Jessica nods her head toward the stations across from us, and the camera turns away from me. “We should let Peyton get back to work,” she says and gives me a wink.
Once she’s out of earshot, Paulie gives me a head nod and a grin. “Aren’t you glad you made that second crust now?”
I shoot him a quick smile before turning back to finish the guacamole and pull my steak off the grill, trying to work around my overly bandaged finger. “I suppose you’re going to say I owe it all to you. It’s like you knew something was going to go wrong.”
“Actually, I was hoping there’d be an extra one to eat later tonight.”
I don’t say anything, and Paulie must sense that I’m not in the mood for banter because he focuses on his sauce as I take one of the containers I found in the cooler and dump the contents out on my station.
Thankfully, the rest of my cooking time is uneventful, because I don’t think my heart could handle one more disaster. As the minutes tick down, I fill a whipped cream canister with whipping cream, vanilla extract, and powdered sugar. Once the lid is on, I give it a good shake to mix the sweet concoction together before loading the nitrous oxide cartridge into the holder and make q
uick work of squeezing out a ring of perfectly sized rosettes onto my pie slices.
Finally, I turn my attention to the part of the competition that I was dreading—plating. At the diner where I work, we keep it pretty simple. Most of the time you just add a slice of orange or maybe a parsley leaf, and then send it out. But I doubt that will impress the judges, so I grab a key lime and slice five thin wedges, clipping them in the middle so I can twist them on top of the cream rosette. Just as I set the final one down, the buzzer goes off and we all throw our hands in the air like every show I’ve ever seen. If I wasn’t so stressed, it would be funny.
The first challenge is over, and I accept a group hug from both Paulie and Hakulani, who has come over from his station. Malik gives me a fist bump over the counter.
“Tough luck about the pie,” he says, and I can tell he means it.
I thought this was going to be a competition where people were prepared to stab each other in the back to win, and I’m pleasantly surprised that I might have been wrong.
“Thanks,” I say. “I had a backup, so fingers crossed.”
“That was smart,” he says, giving me two thumbs-up.
Hakulani looks over his shoulder as the PAs prep the dais for our presentations and the judges take their seats. “We’re not through yet,” he says, and all of us stop smiling.
CHAPTER
SIX
I TRY TO REMAIN CALM AS, ONE BY ONE, MY COMPETITION steps forward to present their dishes to the judges, but I am totally freaking out. Not only do I have to explain what I made and how I made it, but now everyone is telling these personal, moving stories that are winning over the judges. The problem is that I don’t have a good story.
I mean, I could talk about my fried conch fritters and how the first time I had them was during a tailgate party before homecoming. I could tell them about how we go from car to car, tasting whatever dish each family made. Of course, I’m not going to mention the part about how my family never brought a dish or had a spot for themselves—usually we didn’t even go to the game afterward. I also cannot say that, some years, that was the only thing I’d have to eat that day.
Where There's a Whisk Page 4