To have one's meat pie and eat it too [practice, self mod]

[Amelia Lynsdaughter]

Last brightening of Junctior, Era 13 PF
OOC: Recipes courtesy of Godecookery.com.

She so wasn't doing this for him.

Such were her thoughts as she tied her hair with the strip of cloth that had belonged to Father and reread the pages she had copied from the recipe book at the library. It was about time she decided to broaden her repertoire a little anyways. Chicken soup, meatballs and candied almonds was all good and dandy, but there came a time in every girl's life when that just didn't cut it. So, with her white apron over a light, sleeveless dress - Nei had used the kitchen not long before and the place was still hot - and the ingredients laid out before her, Amelia went about her culinary experimentation. Ivan would make an ideal test subject. No gentleman could simply refuse an offering of food from the girl he had a date with, and no man could mask his true opinions from the scrutinizing gaze of a woman.

So, they sold a lot of meat pies at the market, and the half-elf figured that any cook worth their tall white hat needed to know how to bake a simple meat pie. Nothing too fancy or complicated, merely an application of techniques she already knew. Besides, meat pies could be heated again the following brightening, which was exactly what Amelia was going to do. Some beef and pork meat was already on the table, and the chicken, she had killed it herself. As practice, and apologizing first, as she always did. Then there was some broth, a leftover from rosyun. She had asked Nei if she could use it, and there had been no problem with it.

The first step involved chopping the meat and making it simmer in the oven with the broth and some white wine. This should take about one candlemark, give or take.

She went over the recipe one more time and began preparing the shell. She poured some flour on the cooking board, a circular pile with a small crater in the middle. She added a little butter, a table spoon of salt and a few egg yolks, and then added a little amount of water every once in a while. She spent a few minutes working the resulting dough. This wasn't bread, and as such no yeast would be included to make it rise. Still, it needed to rest a while, perhaps a quarter of a candlemark. She split it into two equal parts, one for the shells and one for the lids, with enough dough to make four pies.

After letting it rest, Amelia worked the dough with her hands a little more, gently but firmly massaging it into shape. She had procured herself a few circular molds for holding the pies, and now placed a thin layer of dough on the bottom and sides of the molds, pushing carefully and making sure the cover was evenly thick throughout the shell, not so thick that it would obscure the meat within but but not so thin that it would risk breaking in the baking. The lids would be applied later.

At this point it was a matter of waiting for the meat to finish simmering, and the girl wondered if she could work on something else in parallel while that stage of preparation came to an end. Oh yes, that she could. Candied almonds. She had run out of those, and that would not do. That would never, ever do.

[Amelia Lynsdaughter]

Amelia took a bowl full of unblanched almonds and gathered the rest of the ingredients. Nei always made sure that they were always available in the kitchens, given the girl's fondness for that particular taste. She took a few eggs, some sugar, ground vanilla beans and salt. She put some sugar in a bowl, then she readied another, smaller bowl. Cracking the eggs open one by one, she separated the yolk from the albumen, needing the whites for this recipe, though she did not throw the red away. Wasting food was a sin.

The next step involved beating the whites without overdoing it. After a short while, she added the vanilla and salt. As she had been instructed by Nei, she stirred the substance a little and then added the almonds, stirring some more. Once properly coated, she removed the almonds and put them in the sugar bowl for the next stage. She had previously prepared a slightly buttered tray, upon which she lay the resulting almonds, one by one, arranged neatly like rank and file soldiers marching to battle.

By the time she was done, the meat had finished simmering. The apprentice cook opened the small square door and slid the pot towards her with thick-gloved hands. She laid it on the cooking board and applied the chopped meat on the shell of pastry she had prepared, so that it would become its filling. She pressed the meat so it became more or less evenly spread inside the pastry, and finally placed the lid on top of it all, repeating the process for the other three pies. Meat pie stage two, complete. Now it was all about baking it in the oven, which it could share with the almonds. It was a nice oven, supporting up to three levels of trays. The Ablutos could easily afford that.

She carefully arranged everything in the oven and closed its door once more, wiping the sweat off her forehead afterwards. Now, was there anything else she could cook for a certain Sorcerer? Or perhaps something to drink instead?

[Amelia Lynsdaughter]

Amelia wasn't quite done with almonds yet. Yes, she liked them that much.

The problem with being an apprentice to a witch was that her teacher kept goats around. Which was not really a problem per se, as goats were pretty cute beside the smell. The real problem came with the milk. Milk that was collected daily and expected to be consumed daily or made into cheese. Now, Amy could not be counted among the fans of goat's milk, as she found it hard to digest. The recipe book had been helpful, though, and now she could prepare a surrogate of milk. Almond milk. Milk that would not spoil, incidentally, and that could be used just like regular milk, including as an energetic, sweet drink.

The recipe was pretty easy to perform. She found a series of small bottles that had previously contained spirit water, ideal for carrying around. Then she procured some more almonds and proceeded to grind them. Mortar and pestle were almost ubiquitous in the average Allerian kitchen, and a few minutes of manual labor took care of the grinding, reducing the almonds into fine powder.

As the next step, she heated some water on the stoves until it started boiling, and then poured some in a bowl. She added the ground almonds and steeped them for maybe five minutes, stirring the mixture with a spoon every once in a while and enjoying the scent of almonds filling the air. Finally, the girl took another bowl and a sieve, which she placed upon the bowl. Then it was a matter of pouring the substance into the second bowl, sieving it in the process to separate the coarse byproducts of the grinding.

There, almond milk. She repeated the process and obtained two small bottles of it. One for direct consumption, and a much thicker one for her final recipe that she would complete after pracenda. The half-elf knew this was an overload of sugars and fats - and in fact she was going to have just a salad tonight - but what else could one be eating on a date? Even if the unpredictable Mage turned the mood into a sour one with his antics, this would make sure there would be some sweetness to be had no matter what.

[Amelia Lynsdaughter]

The reason Amelia could not get down to business with the recipe right away was one of carelessness. Being still inexperienced, she had forgot to check the kitchen for ingredients, making sure each was available. As it turned out, even such a well-kept kitchen as that of House Abluto had its limits, and the young cook regretted not having made this check before her cooking session that brightening. A lesson she would keep in mind for the future.

So, she made herself look presentable again, slipped into a dress and hurried out of the mansion with a shopping list on her mind. It would be too late in the darkening to work on the recipe before pracenda, but she had all the time in the world afterwards, unless Shiandi came up with some strange errand for her to carry out. Those had become increasingly rare, though, and were now few and far between. Amelia was not sure what to make of this, but it probably meant that her assignments would get more and more important in time.

She came back with everything she needed, had a quick meal, and waited for Nei to pass her the keys of the kitchen, so to speak. Unfortunately, using the place at this time meant the room was quite hot, but Amelia had become accustomed to the heat. Being that she was going to bake a fruit cake, it would get even hotter before the end.

And Ivan had better pray the date was worth all this trouble, or be ready to use those teleportation spells of his. While sword-bearing-but-non-violent most of the time, the girl could be pretty sharp with words when she wanted to, and her confidence level had grown quite a bit ever since she'd taken to walking around with a weapon and knowing how to use it.

So, cold slices - a fruit cake. Ideal for picnics or other cubotri taken in the outdoors. The girl readied her thick almond milk and gathered the other ingredients for the recipe. There were apples, pears, dates, prunes, currants, several spices, sugar, salt and even some sandalwood she had bought in the Private Trade Circle for the purpose of adding color. All in all, this was one of Amelia's most complex recipes yet.

The first thing she did was prepare yet another pie shell, not unlike those that had served as containers for the meat pies. This was a bigger cake, though, and demanded more of each ingredient. She kneaded the dough and let it rest for a while. Meanwhile, she set herself to preparing the filling. She took the thick almond milk, poured it in a bowl and added some sugar and other spices, such as cloves, ginger, cinnamon, mace and white pepper. Oil and sandalwood were added next, forming a lively red substance that maintained the thickness of the almond milk but could still be stirred without a problem.

In another bowl, Amelia put all the fruits. She had peeled and cored the apples and pears, then dicing them with the economical motions Nei had taught her. The dates were chopped as well, whereas the prunes were sliced, and all went into the bowl. At this point the girl added the mixture made from almond milk and the other ingredients. She blended the two components with a spoon, satisfied with the enticing smell that came from the substance.

At this point she retrieved the dough and carefully applied it to the bottom and sides of a bigger mold used for such cakes. She then picked up the mixture and helping herself with a spoon she placed it in the shell as its filling, adding the lid as usual. The girl was tired but rather proud of the way things were looking, and now she put on her thick kitchen gloves and inserted the fruit pie in the over for it to bake. The process would last about three quarters of a candlemark, and Amelia regularly checked on its progress to make sure it didn't burn or overbake.

When it looked like it had finished baking, the half-elf smiled and pulled the cake out of the oven, leaving it in a corner of the kitchen to cool down. The meat pies had already been wrapped in clean kitchen cloth, and this cake would go down the same road eventually. They would be wrapped up with their dishes to form a bundle that Amelia would bring to her date.

All done! No, not really. Nei tapped the apprentice on her shoulder. "You need ter clean up this mess, child." "Of... of course, Nei, I'm doing that right now." Truth told, Amelia had totally forgot that she would have to clean up her workplace afterwards, and while every single muscle in her body seemed to be aching in unison, she had to spend the better part of the next candlemark mopping and washing and scrubbing, her shoulders literally screaming for a massage.

And after this, a certain young man from the Towers had better give her a spectacular brightening in Arakmat.

[Grim]

Approved.
+1 exp Cooking.

-Grim