Daring Dreamers Club #2

by Erin Soderberg

  “You are so talented,” Milla said. “I don’t know how you come up with all your ideas for what to do in the kitchen.”

  Piper shrugged. “Food science is really just a bunch of what-ifs. I taste or cook something, and then I think what if? Like, what if ice cream didn’t have to be cold? Or what if super-ripe fruit didn’t drip down your chin? Or what if I cooked something with more heat or less yeast or added a flavor or whatever? It’s fun to play around with ordinary stuff and see what happens.”

  She pushed the empty plate aside. “I still want to try using a smoker and an immersion circulator sometime. And, of course, I’d like to do more with infusion….” Piper trailed off, noticing the other girls’ blank looks. Laughing, she explained, “Those are a few of the tools contestants have used on past episodes. A smoker gives your creations a sort of woodsy flavor. I’ve never been a big fan of smoked flavors myself, but I guess it could be useful in the right situation, with the right combinations of stuff.” With an excited look in her eye, she went on, “And an immersion circulator is a tool used in sous vide cooking—”

  “Sue who?” Ruby asked.

  Piper laughed. “Sous vide,” she said. “It’s a French term. You cook food in a plastic pouch that’s all sealed up. And an infuser…you guys know about infusers, right?”

  Mari shook her head, eyes wide. “Uh, no.”

  Piper pushed her glasses up her nose and said, “Tea is made using infusion. And you know that yummy lemon- or cucumber-flavored water they sometimes have in the lobbies of hotels? Infusion is when you soak something in liquid to extract the flavor, then use that flavor in other things.”

  “You are going to be seriously amazing on The Future of Food,” Ruby declared.

  Piper flushed with pride. “Thanks. I hope you’re right.”

  Ruby went on, “My brother and I watched a few more episodes of the show online last night, and Henry is one hundred percent sure you’re going to win. Twins don’t always agree, but I’m totally with him on this.”

  “I just wish I knew who I’m going to be competing against,” Piper said wistfully. “I could be up against a movie star, or some supersmart child prodigy who’s been cooking since she was two, or some flashy YouTuber who has ten million followers…who knows!”

  “I feel bad for whoever’s competing against you,” Zahra said. “They have no idea what they’re going up against. You’re definitely going to be a superstar.”

  “Thank you,” Piper said, momentarily taken aback by Zahra’s kind words. She wasn’t used to being the star of anything. She could already imagine what it would feel like to hold that $10,000 check and stand under the confetti and swirling lights, with the champion’s golden spatula in her hand. Her parents would run onto the set and congratulate her, and—

  She shook her head to clear it, trying to remember that dreaming about her win was only going to get her so far. She could dream big, but if she wanted that dream to come true, she had some serious work to do! Pulling an apron out of the drawer, Piper said, “Well, anyway, I don’t have any control over the other kids I’ll be competing against, but I can try to prepare myself for the surprise challenges. I’m sure there will be a few difficult obstacles I need to overcome before I can win. Are you guys ready to test me?”

  Piper’s friends had come up with a series of difficult challenges to help her prepare for what she might have to face during her episode. The other girls exchanged excited smiles.

  “We’re totally ready. The more important question is: Are you?” Ruby asked.

  Piper tied her apron and tucked her tangled braids inside a fluffy blue-and-white knit hat. Then she rubbed her hands together and said, “Let’s get cookin’.”

  Zahra dropped a quilted bag on Piper’s kitchen counter and reached inside. With a flourish, she pulled out a small glass jar and held it up. “Your first surprise challenge,” she said with a sly smile. “Baby food!” She twisted off the lid and held the jar in front of Piper’s nose.

  Piper sniffed it. “Interesting. Sweet potatoes?”

  “Yep,” Zahra said with a nod. She pulled two more jars out of her bag. “We also have peach-banana puree and mashed green peas. I got them from my dad’s work.” She held one of the jars like it was a microphone and then said in a funny announcer voice, “For this surprise challenge, you will need to convert this baby food into a delicious dessert—and make it look appealing, too. You have thirty minutes. Good luck!”

  Milla set a timer on her watch. Then Zahra and the rest of the Daring Dreamers Club settled in on one side of the breakfast bar, watching as Piper got to work in the kitchen.

  Without using any kind of recipe, she quickly whipped up a batch of pastry dough, talking through each step as she cooked. “I’m going to make tartlets,” she explained. She stirred and kneaded and rolled, working in a flurry of flour, butter, and eggs. As soon as she’d finished rolling the dough and began cutting it into little circles, Ruby held up her hand.

  “Stop!” she cried. “Time for another surprise challenge!”

  Piper clapped. “Hit me!” she said cheerfully.

  “From now on, you can only use your left hand for cooking,” Ruby said, giggling.

  “But I’m left-handed,” Piper reminded her.

  “Then you can only use your right hand for cooking,” Ruby said. “Good luck!”

  Piper got back to work, moving much more slowly than she had before. She kept dropping ingredients, and little splats of baby food littered the countertop.

  Finley slipped into the kitchen, meowing around the mess. She was pulling a jump rope that she had attached to a skateboard. Riding atop the skateboard was the kindergarten’s class frog, staring out at the world from inside his plastic cage. “Can meow help you?” Finley offered.

  “No,” Piper said impatiently, wiping her right cheek with a flour-covered hand. “I don’t need any help. I’ve got to do this on my own. And, Fin, you better keep that frog out of my way.”

  “Ten minutes gone,” Milla said. Piper cringed, put her head down, and got back to work.

  Finley squatted in a corner of the kitchen, tapping the frog’s cage while Piper whipped the sweet potatoes together with honey, vanilla, a bit of heavy cream, and some spices. “This will be the first of three tart fillings,” she explained to her audience. Then she made a second mixture using the sweet peas, and a third with the peach-banana. She dipped the end of a spoon into each of her mixtures after every ingredient she added, testing to see if she’d successfully turned the baby foods into something delicious and rich.

  “Not sweet enough,” she announced after a mouthful of the pea filling. Making a face after tasting the peach-banana, she declared, “Gross. Too sweet. Needs a savory undertone.” She offered her friends a bit of the sweet potato filling, saying, “This one’s good, yeah?”

  Just as she had begun to ladle her fillings into the center of her tart crusts, Mariana held up her hand and yelled, “Stop! Time for your next surprise challenge.”

  Piper clapped, bouncing from one foot to the other. “I’m ready.”

  “From now on, you can only use your Bunsen burner for cooking stuff. No oven, stove, or microwave.”

  Piper grinned. “Interesting challenge,” she said, laughing. “Can I also use the tripod, so I have a flat surface to cook stuff over the flame?”

  “Uh,” Mari said, turning to the other girls for consensus. They all nodded. “Sure.”

  “I like this challenge,” Piper said. “A true test of mixing food and science. Not sure how I’m going to bake my tart crusts without the oven, so…I might need to change the plan. Good. Change is good.” She chewed her lip. After a moment, she nodded and then threw herself back into her (one-handed) work. “If I could modify the crust dough in some way that I could cook these as dumplings in a boiling water bath…,” she muttered to herself, poking at the soft white rounds of do
ugh. She opened drawers, pulled out her Bunsen burner and a heatproof mat, and then started to set up the tripod.

  “You’re not allowed to light your burner without telling Dad,” Finley helpfully pointed out. Piper glared at her sister, scowling when she saw that Finley had taken the frog out of its cage and was rubbing its rubbery back with her thumb. Finley grinned at her and said, “Purrr purrrr purrrrrrr.”

  “Yeah,” Piper snapped. “I know I need to tell Dad.” For the past few years, Piper had been allowed to use her lab (also known as the kitchen) without parental supervision, as long as someone knew what she was working on, and assuming there was a parent home. The Bunsen burner was so powerful and flammable, however, that her parents insisted they be within arm’s reach when she was lighting and using it.

  Suddenly, Piper realized that if her dad got a full-time job in an office, she wouldn’t be allowed to do experiments in her lab after school. A wave of disappointment washed over her, and she was momentarily distracted. For a second, she forgot what she’d been doing. “Focus,” she muttered out loud. “Come on, Piper.”

  “Ten minutes left,” Milla told her. “You’ve got this!”

  Piper raced around the kitchen, tasting, stirring, mixing, and pounding—still with only one hand. She didn’t want to call her dad out of his office to light the Bunsen burner until everything was ready to go—and she still had more prep to do. Even without the burner on, Piper could already feel little beads of sweat running down her temples. She flung her hat to the floor. She was almost always cold, so she wore something on her head pretty much all year round—but at the moment, the stress of finishing was making her sweat.

  “Do you want some help?” Milla offered, sensing her friend’s panic. “If you tell me what to do, I could be an extra set of hands. Four minutes left…”

  “No,” Piper muttered. If I can’t handle this practice run, she reasoned, what am I going to do on the day of filming? “I don’t want help. I can do it myself.”

  But there was so much to do, Piper realized, and so little time. Piper felt stressed in her lab, for the first time ever. Looking at the pile of ingredients, and thinking about how much was left to do…ugh! She almost felt the way she did during tests at school. Like the jumble and mess was too much for her to make sense of, and it would be impossible to figure anything out before her time was up.

  “Piper, let me help you,” Milla urged again. She stood up and came around the counter. “I can just clean some of this stuff up, so you have more room to wor—”

  Milla stopped talking as Piper, who was carrying a cookie sheet filled with tart crust dough, bumped into her. Piper screamed as little dough rounds flew into the air.

  Milla stepped backward, tripping over Finley. To avoid crushing the little girl, Milla threw her weight to the side and crashed into the kitchen island. Her elbow hit the tripod, sending it toppling into a bowl of sweet potato filling. The orange mixture fell to the floor and splattered all over the kitchen.

  Meanwhile, the frog—which had previously been safely tucked inside Finley’s closed palm—took its chance to jump to freedom. As Finley fell over, the frog squirmed out of her fist and leaped into the air. “Get it!” Finley wailed.

  All six girls raced into action, chasing after the little critter as it hopped and zoomed around the kitchen. Cooking utensils and tart filling flew in all directions. The frog zipped back and forth across the room like the ball in a pinball machine. Every time someone got close to catching it, the frog bounced off in the other direction.

  “Got it!” Ruby finally cried. She had trapped the frog under a pea-splattered bowl. She slowly lifted the bowl off the floor and then cradled the escaped pet between her palms. It was covered in Piper’s sticky pea filling.

  As soon as the frog had been rinsed off and returned safely to its cage, Finley crawled around the kitchen island to investigate. Then she crouched down on all fours and started to lap up a spill with her tongue. “Meow like it!”

  Mari giggled. “I’ve got to say: The tarts don’t look pretty, but at least you know your creation tastes good.”

  “Yeah.” Zahra nodded, trying to hold back a laugh. “The plating in this challenge definitely could have used a little work. Something to think about for next time.”

  “I’m so sorry, Piper,” Milla said softly. “I was trying to help.”

  “It’s okay,” Piper said, surveying the kitchen. She mustered up a smile to show her friend she wasn’t upset with her. “This wasn’t your fault. I shouldn’t have lost my cool.” One by one, she picked up the rounds of dough and tossed them in the trash. “But I’m pretty sure we could call this surprise challenge a total fail.”

  Mariana

  Even though I love swimming (and I’m pretty good at it), I don’t always love it. I guess that probably doesn’t make any sense. I love the way I feel after I win a race or get a personal best. I love that swimming is such an important activity to my family. I love hanging out with my friends at meets and during practice.

  But sometimes, I’m not sure if swimming is my passion, you know? Being with Piper in her kitchen is amazing, because she gets so excited and energetic. I like watching her cook and experiment with stuff, because she’s obviously very passionate about food science. It’s easy to see that she loves it. I don’t know if I have that same feeling about swimming.

  There was never any question about me joining the swim team (it’s something every Sanchez does). My parents are swimmers, my older sisters are all swimmers, so naturally I’m a swimmer, too. I didn’t ever say, hey, I really want to join swim team! When I turned five, I just started going to practices and it became my thing.

  Here’s where Ariel and I are most alike: She was raised in this royal family, and everyone had these expectations for who and what she would become because of the family she was born into. But Ariel secretly had other interests, different stuff she wanted to explore and try out before she was ready to settle down and accept the life her dad planned for her, right? That’s me, too.

  You asked us to write about a fear, and this is one of mine: I’m afraid to tell my parents that I might not want to be a swimmer anymore. Or not as much of a swimmer, anyway. Right now, I go to five or six practices a week, which doesn’t really leave a lot of time for trying other stuff. I guess I kind of want a chance to see if there’s something else I love, like theater, or maybe piano or cello, or even another sport. I want to find something that makes me as happy as Piper is when she’s cooking and creating and testing stuff. (Zahra has her art, Ruby has soccer, and Milla loves writing.)

  I don’t know what that something is, but I wish I could explore a little bit and find out. Like Ariel, I kind of want to trade my fins for something else for a while, and just see what happens.

  Someday, maybe. A girl can dream, right?

  “Quiz me.” Piper thrust a sheet of paper at Finley while the two sisters were walking to school a few days later. “Please.”

  Finley took the paper from her sister and squinted at it. “What—crrrrrk—is this? Ribbit.” She did a little frog hop, practicing her new animal moves for the week. Ever since she’d spent the weekend caring for her class pet, Finley had been obsessed with frogs. Piper, not so much.

  “My spelling word list,” Piper told her sister. “We have a test this morning, and I didn’t have time to study.”

  Finley croaked and hopped. “Crrrrrrk.”

  “That’s not one of my words,” Piper said with a smile.

  “Ribbit,” Finley said.

  “That’s not a spelling word, either,” Piper said. “This is serious, Fin. If I get more than five wrong, I have to bring the test home for mom and dad to sign.” She still hadn’t shown her parents her terrible math quiz. By some miracle, Mr. Mohan hadn’t asked about it yet—but if she had to take a bad spelling test home, too, she knew she was in for some serious trouble. />
  Piper’s usually chill parents had both been on edge lately. Her dad had said he was feeling tense because job interviews are very stressful. But Piper had accidentally overheard her mom and dad talking in the kitchen the night before (when she was supposed to be in bed), and she now knew it was bigger than that. They had talked about money, and how it would really help a lot if her dad could get more work. Unfortunately, while she was eavesdropping, she had overheard something she wished she hadn’t. Her dad was interviewing for a full-time job with one of his clients. And the company’s offices were in Chicago!

  If her dad got the job, her family would have to move. The thought of that made Piper want to throw up. She just had to hope he wasn’t seriously considering the job.

  “Why didn’t you study?” Finley asked, frog-hopping over every crack in the sidewalk.

  “That doesn’t matter,” Piper lied. The truth was, she had tried to distract herself from what she had overheard by watching old episodes of The Future of Food. She’d stayed up way too late and had forgotten all about the test. “What matters is I’m studying now.”

  “Okay,” Finley said. “I can’t read the first word on this list. How do you say C-O-N-T-I-N-E-N-T?”

  Piper rolled her eyes. “ ‘Continent,’ ” she said, grabbing the paper out of her sister’s hands. “You can’t read any of these words, can you?”

  “Nope-si-do,” Finley said proudly. “Ribbit!”

  “Forget it.”

  * * *

  —

  “How’s everyone’s week going so far?” Ms. Bancroft asked later that afternoon in advisory group.

  “Honestly?” Piper grumbled. “Mine’s been crummy.”