fandomhigh | How to Survive Your Own Cooking [Class 2]

"Today," Lulu began, after the class had come into the home ec room, "as it says on your syllabus, we're going to be studying breakfast foods. As it's still fairly early in the class, we'll focus on more basic foods -- if you'd like more advanced recipes, or even some extra instruction, feel free to see me after class and we can discuss it.

"One of the most basic breakfast foods is cold cereal -- generally, in this world at least, you buy it boxed, and simply add milk, potentially some form of sweetener, occasionally sliced fruit such as berries or bananas, or even eat it as is, straight from the box. Unfortunately for you all, you're not getting away with that today. If you'd like, you can attempt to make your own, but that's not required for today's class.

"One of the staples of breakfast -- although, indeed, it is a great food for any time, including snacks -- is the scrambled egg." Lulu demonstrated proper whisking behaviour, then took her students through the process of cooking the eggs so that they'd be able to recognise when their own were finished.

"Breakfast wouldn't be complete without bacon and toast," Lulu continued. "I will add that I added the toast 'recipe' today," and you could hear the airquotes, "because it amused me greatly -- but do try to follow it as best you can. It is helpful, for all that it seems to be frivolous.

"Your assignment today is to make a complete breakfast -- cereal, eggs, bacon, and toast. If you prefer not to make the homemade cereal, you may used boxed cereal, but everything else requires preparation.

"All of the recipes you need are at your stations. Pair up -- in different pairs than last week -- and cook away! Everything you need is available either in your stations, except for ingredients if you wish to make the cereal, or if you wish to make a variation on the scrambled eggs; for those, you can find the ~~moddable~~ ingredients here at the front of the class."

Lulu smiled. "As a drink, I recommend apple or orange juice, as they will help round out the meal. Coffee and hot chocolate, however, are also provided. You can find the drinks at the front of the room as well." She paused. "Feel free to drink them during the class as well."

[OCD ~~will be up in a few~~ is up! I'm hungry now.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Maybe one of the knobs?" He said thoughtfully while fiddling with one. "I'm not sure which one though."

Some knobs were twisted (all the way up to 'your toast will catch on fire') and some other things were fiddled with before Cassandra found the lever to load the toast. "Aha!" she exclaimed triumphantly.

"And now we wait." He leaned against the counter, keeping one eye on the toast. "Wonder what those other knobs were for though. Maybe decoration?"

"They probably do... something... maybe." Cassandra had no idea, so she twisted a few experimentally this way and that, though they all ended up back on the 'we thought you wanted charcoal' setting when she was done.

"I guess we'll find out," he said dubiously, watching her fiddle, "in a minute or so."

"How are you supposed to tell how toasted it is if you can't see the bread?" Cassandra asked as she eyed the machine.

"By smell?" He wondered, leaning over to peek at the toaster. "Or does it just come up all by itself?"

"That would be really useful," Cassandra agreed distractedly as the first wisps of smoke rose from the machine.

He leaned back. "I'm not sure it's supposed to be doing that."

Cassandra's eyes snapped back to the toaster, widening at the smoke. "How do we make it stop?" she asked as she fiddled with the nobs again.

Lulu frowned as she watched the smoking toaster. "Pull the plug from the wall," she said, even as she stepped forward around her desk. "Immediately."

Before Lulu had finished speaking Cassandra had snatched the plug from its socket. Since the bread hadn't actually caught fire yet the smoke stopped, though the smell of burnt bread was pretty obvious.

Cassandra turned to Makoto, "I don't think it's supposed to do that."

He looked sheepish. "Me neither. Though I'm not quite sure what went wrong. Do you think maybe we should've gone with cereal instead?"

Lulu frowned as she looked at the toaster; she was much calmer now that the crisis had passed. "Ah," she said, "here's your problem -- you have it on the highest setting. The setting, I might add, that appears on toasters for some reason that I am completely unable to fathom." Deftly, she removed the burnt slices from the toaster, and then placed two more pieces of bread in. "You can plug it back in now," she said. She then proceeded to explain the various settings on -- and function of -- the toaster, without any hint of condescension. Even, perhaps, with a bit of a smile. "Do you think you can take it from here, then?"

"Oh, so it does automatically push the bread out as long as it doesn't catch on fire first," Cassandra exclaimed. That was impressive technology right there.

Lulu nodded. "It should, yes, but you need to put the settings a bit lower for it to do that." She smiled, quirking on eyebrow. "I'll leave you two to it, then? If you have any further questions, feel free to ask." And she moved back to the front of the room.

Makoto nodded, it sounded pretty simple when she explained it step by step like that. "Want to try again?" He asked Cassandra with a smile. "I think we'll do better this time around."

"Definitely," Cassandra nodded as she reached for more bread.

This time? They managed it a lot better. It wasn't as nice, perhaps, as toast normally looked but it wasn't burnt either and that was a huge improvement.

Perhaps, it was because they'd managed that they got the bright idea to go and play with a stove (http://community.livejournal.com/fandomhigh/1655346.html?thread=101096754#t101096754).

How to Survive Your Own Cooking [Class 2]

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