Work Text:
An attempt was made
"Are you sure you know what you're doing, Elias?"
"Not really, but how hard can it be? It's just a cake, Ruth."
The men of the Ainsworth household were in the kitchen, looking at a recipe Elias had written on parchment and ink. Chise's twenty-first birthday was in three days, and Elias decided he was going to surprise his wife with a birthday cake.
"I still say we should wait for the Silver Lady to come back from her visit with the Spriggan to help you with this. This recipe looks complicated." Ruth said.
"Nonsense, Ruth. All we have to do is follow the directions. I do the same with spells all the time." Elias said agreeably.
"Fine. What all do we need, Elias? Will this cake be done before Chise wakes up from her nap? It's going to be hard to hide a cake from Chise until her birthday. You know how much she likes sweets and puddings."
"I'm well aware Ruth. This recipe seems to be the closest one to that slice of cake Chise had in London a few weeks ago, and hasn't stopped talking about since."
Ruth took the parchment off of the kitchen table, and went to the cabinets to start getting the ingredients ready. Elias took off his white gloves and put them in his pocket, unbuttoned his cuffs, and rolled up his sleeves.
"Hey Elias? This recipe calls for self-rising flour. Silky has three different jars of flour, and I don't know which flour is which. They all look the same."
"I'm sure any of those flours will work Ruth. I'm sure there is no difference; I bet Silky was just distributing the flour into the three jars."
"If you say so."
"Trust me. What else do we need to gather? Let's get all the items and tools needed before we begin."
"This says we need two eggs, so I will go out back and get them from the chicken coop. It also calls for two hundred grams of dark chocolate, chopped into two centimeter pieces, if you want to start chopping up the chocolate, Elias? I'll be right back." Ruth said, getting their egg basket from the counter.
Elias took down his large black marble mortar and pestle from the very top of the refrigerator. Using his hands, he broke up the dark chocolate tablets that Silky kept in the freezer. When the chocolate was all broken into serving squares, Elias took the pestle in hand, and starting to break up the chocolate, crushing it into a coarse powder.
"Elias, wouldn't it have been easier to just chop up the chocolate with a knife, like the recipe says?" Ruth asked, surprised that the banging of the pestle in the mortar didn't wake his Master.
Elias bowed his head.
"Silky doesn't let me use her knives anymore." He said sullenly, giving no further explanation.
"Oh. Moving on, the next item is instant coffee, dissolved in three hundred and fifty mil of water. Do we even have coffee?" Ruth asked, as he opened and closed the pantry doors.
"No, we do not. If the recipe calls for flavored boiling water, one of my herbal blends of tea should work." Elias said, and prepared a cup of tea using black tea, rose hips, and dried orange peel. "I'll let that steep as we keep going." Elias said.
"What's next?"
"Two hundred and fifty grams of unsalted butter, again, cut into two centimeter cubes, like the chocolate." Ruth said, and grabbed the butter dish Silky kept on the kitchen counter for their morning toast. Ruth took out the largest mixing bowl from beside the sink. The home made butter that Silky made yesterday looked to be about the right amount, and it was at room temperature, so no cutting into cubes was needed, Ruth thought, so into the bottom of the mixing bowl it went.
"I think we should add the chocolate to this butter, along with the mug of tea." Elias said, and carried to mortar to Ruth's bowl, dumping the ground up chocolate into the butter.
Ruth added the hot tea, removing the tea strainer ball that was in the mug. He starting stirring slowly.
"Now we add two hundred and fifty grams of sugar." Ruth said. Elias scooped the sugar from the large jar Silky kept into a smaller tea cup.
"Is that two hundred and fifty grams, Elias? Shouldn't you use a proper measuring cup?" Ruth asked with uncertainty.
"Relax, Ruth. I've seen the Silver Lady make hundreds of cakes. This is the tea cup she uses when she measures sugar." Elias said, as he topped off the teacup with one last spoon of sugar. He then poured it into the mixing bowl, while Ruth stirred the mixture with a large wooden spoon.
"Alright. Now we add two eggs, lightly beaten." Ruth cracked each egg into the center of the bowl, using his wooden spoon to beat them lightly. He stirred until the mixture was smooth.
"Next, two spoons of vanilla." Ruth read off the list.
Elias used the spoon he measured sugar with to add two spoons of their homemade vanilla extract to the batter.
Ruth continued to stir. "Now, we add the two hundred and forty grams of self-rising flour. Why does this call for more sugar than flour? This doesn't make sense!"
Elias stood beside Ruth, now scooping the flour into the teacup that measured the sugar. "I'm not sure, Ruth. Let's just trust the recipe." He said calmly, pouring the flour on top of the egg mixture in the mixing bowl.
"Fine. Next is thirty grams of cocoa powder." Ruth said, while slowly stirring. Elias checked the pantry and cupboards, but there was no cocoa powder to be found.
"We don't seem to have any. Does that small amount really make a difference?" Elias asked.
"How should I know? You're the one who's supposedly watched the Silver One make hundreds of cakes!" Ruth said hotly.
"Easy, Ruth. Lower your voice; We don't want to wake Chise."
"Says the one who pounded chocolate to dust, instead of using a knife, like a normal person! If anyone woke up Chise, it would be you!" Ruth whispered loudly, while glancing toward the stairs.
The men stared up toward the staircase, to see if they woke Chise up. After a few moments, and no sign of the lady of the house, they both breathed a sigh of relief.
"So no to the cocoa powder. What should we use instead again?" Ruth asked, still stirring the batter.
"I think we should just add more flour. I think you have a good point; there should be more flour than sugar in a cake recipe." Elias stated, and refilled the teacup halfway with flour from the first jar.
Ruth stirred the batter until all the ingredients were incorporated, and the rich looking batter was smooth.
"I have the cake pan ready here." Elias said, and handed Ruth a round pan that was lightly coated in butter, and dusted with flour.
Ruth carefully poured the runny batter into the pan, scraping the bowl as he went. When all the batter was i the pan, he lightly tapped the pan on the counter, to pop any air bubbles that might have formed. "I've seen Silky make a few cakes myself." Ruth said proudly.
"There. Now is the oven ready?" Elias asked, cake pan in hand.
"I thought you turned on the oven before we even started!" Ruth said with growing impatience.
"I did not." Elias said simply.
Ruth groaned, and turned on the oven to one hundred and seventy degrees. He sat at the table and helped himself to several biscuits while the oven was heating.
×××
After a while, the kitchen was filled with the sweet smell of chocolate as the cake was baking. After the one hour timer went off, Ruth quickly shut it off, and removed the cake from the oven, and placed the hot pan on a cooling rack on top of the stove.
Elias quietly walked into the kitchen.
"So how does it look, Ruth?"
"Well, the batter really didn't spread out and rise, like the Silver One's cakes do. I thought cakes are supposed to be light and fluffy, but this one is not."
Elias stood behind Ruth, and looked at the cake himself. The cake in question did not spread, and it looked like a solid dark ragged-edged brown flying disk. It looked very, very dry, with deep cracks along the top of the surface. If the cake were as it were to be (light and fluffy and moist), it should have been easy to slice the cake across into three, smaller layers, which were to be filled with the chocolate ganache filling that Elias was getting ready to prepare. There was no way the cake could be sliced into layers after it cooled-there just wasn't enough cake.
"Well, this is disappointing. I wonder why the cake ended up like this." Elias mused to himself.
"We followed the recipe completely." Ruth told him.
"That we did." Elias confirmed.
"It smells lovely in here! Did Silver come back early? Is it brownies?" Chise asked from the doorway of the kitchen. While the men of the house were contemplating this disaster of a cake, they both failed to hear Chise wake up and come downstairs and into the kitchen.
Elias and Ruth turned to face the lady of the house, their backs in front of their attempt of a cake.
"Ah, Chise, you're awake. Did you have a nice nap?" Elias asked pleasantly.
"Yes I did. Thank you, Elias. When will the brownies you made be ready to eat? I think we still have ice cream-"
"Chise. I don't think this cake is any good." Ruth started to say.
"Oh, it's cake? Even better! I could sure go for some cake right-"
"Chise."
"Some warm cake with ice cream would be a great way to wake up!"
"Chise."
"I'll make a pot of tea!"
"Chise!" Ruth said loudly, bringing her to focus on her familiar.
"Yes, Ruth?"
"We've been trying to tell you- this cake came out all wrong, and we don't know why."
"Oh." Chise said sadly, her bottom lip forming a pout, which always left Elias weak in the knees.
The men of the household were sad that their attempt of making a birthday cake for Chise failed, and hung their heads in shame.
"But what happened? Can I see the cake?" Chise asked, as she walked towards the cooling cake on top of the stove burner. Elias and Ruth stepped aside, so Chise can look at their culinary disaster for the first time.
Chise took a long look at the so-called cake, and tried to keep a giggle to herself. She looked up and saw Elias and Ruth looking for her reaction, and she started to laugh. She looked down at the saddest baked good she ever seen, and she couldn't contain her laughter anymore. The men looked at her as she caught the giggles, laughing until her sides hurt, and tears were in her joyful green eyes.
"It looks really bad, doesn't it, Chise?" Ruth said solemnly, which made Chise laugh even harder.
"We really did try our best, Chise. We wanted to surprise you with a chocolate cake for your birthday, like the cake you had in London." Elias explained.
After Chise caught her breath, she said, "I know you did, my love. I appreciate the effort going in to making a cake for me. I was just laughing, because the cake came out so wrong. It reminded me of my first attempts at magic."
"Thank you, Chise." Elias said, his red eyes turning into half-moons.
"Can I see the recipe you were using?" Chise asked, and Ruth handed her the parchment.
Chise looked at the kitchen counter, where the dry ingredients for the cake were left.
"Which flour did you happen to use?" Chise asked.
"The flour in the red jar. It was the largest jar, so I chose that one. The other two jars hold leftover flour." Elias told his bride.
"I see. And what leavening did you use?"
"Leavening?"
"Yes, like baking powder or bicarbonate. That is what makes the cakes rise, like yeast does with bread. I've watched the Silver Lady make a lot of cakes. They have all used bicarbonate so far. I don't think I know what self-rising flour even is. We don't have any of it anyway." Chise explained.
"We don't?" Ruth asked.
"No. We have cake flour in the yellow jar, all-purpose flour in the blue jar, and bread flour in the red jar. The bread flour has the highest amount of gluten; that's why it's used for breads and noodles. That's why the cake looks the way it does. It makes sense now."
"No matter. I think I learned a valuable lesson today, Teacher.
"You're welcome, my student." Chise said with a bow.
FIN