Carla’s dark brown hair is braided, and there are strands of silver glinting in the camera light.I realize the slight lines around her eyes aren’t an indication of age but of her disposition.The radiant smile she bestows on us makes the fine lines seem like paths her happiness travels as she looks to each of us.
“The most important thing,” she says, “is to have fun!We know this is stressful and a lot is riding on this for each team.For my team too.But regardless of the outcome, try to enjoy yourself, bake what you love, and be proud you made it this far.Ready?”
She nods and does a shooing motion, and we rush to stand in front of our stations.Then she gestures to the security staff to open the large doors for the audience.The station Andie and I share is the last one, going left to right.I’m glad we’re at the end of the line.That means there will only be one team to distract us instead of two.
“We got this,” Andie says, holding her fist up.I bump mine with hers, and we do the explodey fingers.
The doors open and spectators stream in.We wave to Ollie and Colby, who we knew would be here, but I’m surprised by how many other folks show up.Shelby and Daphne are here, along with a few of the Devil Birds players.Mac and Miranda with Stone Waller.Jack from the bakery is here too.
Of course both Shelby and Daphne are snapping pictures with their phones.Before she married Finn, my sister was a popular social media influencer.She still has a decent following, but the focus of her posts is more about regular life stuff—marriage and impending motherhood—more than brand deals and sponsorships.She posts about things at the wildlife refuge where Finn works too.Before the last few months of her pregnancy, she ran tours that fostered a love of the natural world in a lot of her followers.I expect she’ll add baking competitions to her channel next.Daphne will probably use this contest for the team’s social media.Whatever gets the word out about Snarky Sweet is fine by me.
Carla welcomes the audience and tells them the rules—no calling out to us, no heckling, and signs will be held up when they’re allowed to clap or react to judges’ comments.I think that’s going to be challenging for Daphne—she has no filter.Carla gives all of us a quick rundown of the day, with the first round and elimination this morning, an hour break for lunch, and then the second round and elimination this afternoon.Tomorrow, the final three teams will compete for the championship.The audience and crew can sample any extras we have after judging.
Dakota Dallas introduces the judges as they walk in through a side door.First is Paulie DeLorenzo, a bakery owner from North Jersey who used to have a show on one of the cable networks featuring the cakes made in his family-owned bakery.Now his cakes are in vending machines and supermarkets around the country.The second judge is Biff Silverman, another celebrity baker and reality show participant.I like him more than Paulie.He always seems more mellow and relatable.The third judge is celebrity wedding planner Felicia Carter-Emmons.With her New York socialite aura and penetrating gaze, she’s the one that intimidates me the most.The two guys know cake, but Felicia is the one with the power to recommend us to new clients or tank our business completely before we’ve barely gotten started.
The judges take their seats, and Dakota stands to the side of their table, facing us.Okay, he’s really facing the camera, but it’s going to appear he’s talking to us once everything is edited.
“Welcome, bakers.Do you have what it takes to be a Pastry Pro Champion?”
We all cheer and yell out “Yeah!”and “Sure can!”and even a “You betcha!”I don’t think they’re from around here, but then again, neither are Andie and I.
“The theme for this competition is spring wedding.In our three rounds of competition, you’re going to take us from the bridal shower, to the wedding, and finally to the reception.For this first round, we want floral-themed bridal shower treats.These can be cookies, cupcakes, tarts, whatever.But they must have a floral theme.”
We knew this was going to be the first round, and our plan is to have decorated sugar cookies.That’s why I was practicing the hydrangeas.
“Now for the twist.Not only should your creations be floral-themed, they must also incorporate a floral flavor.We have a variety of choices in our pantry, so help yourselves.You have one hour.On your mark, get set, go!”
“Lavender,” Andie and I mouth to each other before she rushes to the pantry set up at the back of the cooking set.We have basic ingredients for our sugar cookie dough, like sugar, butter, eggs, and flour at our station already, so I start measuring our ingredients.Andie comes back with a small jar of dried culinary-grade lavender and a couple of lemons.I wasn’t expecting the lemons.I’m not sure what she has in mind.
She puts one lemon by her round cookie cutter and the hydrangea cookie cutter next to the lavender.“Frosting.”
That’s when the lightbulb goes off.We’re going to do our regular vanilla no-chill sugar cookie and bring the floral flavor in through the frosting.We’ll do lemon for the daisy and lavender for the hydrangeas and the forget-me-not cookies .
“Yes!”I say, raising my hand for a high five.
While I get busy measuring and mixing our dough, Andie sets the oven temperature, preps our baking sheets, and starts getting things together for our frostings.A lot of bakers use royal icing on their sugar cookies.We do that too for cookies that are very detailed with images or writing or those that need to be packaged.But for something like this, where they’re being presented on a tray or a table and eaten right away, we love the dimensionality and creativity working with buttercream allows us.With the flowers we’re doing, especially the hydrangea, you can’t get the same effect with royal icing.
Dakota Dallas is checking in with each team to see what they’re making.I don’t know what the other teams have planned.We may be the only cookie bakers.I’m okay with that.We were allowed to bring some premixed, prebaked items from home, so we have our regular sugar cookie dough chilled and ready to go, but we want to show off our no-chill version.It’s still delicious and easy to work with, and it goes from mixer to cookie cutter right away.Since we’re combating hot studio lights, we have a trick up our sleeve and set the mixing bowl in a tub of ice to keep the butter at the cooler temperature we need.We’re rolling out the dough when Dakota gets to our station.
“Hello, Hockey Honeys.We know you’re used to the ice rink, how are you handling the heat of the kitchen?”he asks with a smarmy smile like he’s clever.I can see the earpiece—he must be getting fed lines from production.
“We like it hot.”I give a saucy wink and glance at Ollie, where he sits in the third row.He blushes bright red above his beard.
“I bet you do!”He gives us an exaggerated wink that I’m glad the guys can’t see because there would be some growling going on.“So, what are you making today?Cookies?Doesn’t your dough need to chill before rolling it out and using cookie cutters?”
“Usually it does, Dakota, but we’ve developed a no-chill vanilla sugar cookie dough that, under normal circumstances, can go right from the mixer to the rolling pin without being chilled first.Today, we’re resting our baking sheets on chill pads to keep the dough cool under the lights, and the mixing bowl is resting in a bowl of ice.”
“Isn’t it better to use a traditionally chilled dough?”he asks.He’s obviously being fed these questions.
“The dough we typically use is chilled,” Andie says, “but there are times when we get last-minute rush orders.Today, we’re baking under hot studio lights with a ticking clock.”She shrugs.“You gotta adapt.That’s what Snarky Sweet does, we adapt.”
I love that she worked in our actual business name.
Dakota smiles at her like he wants to take a giant sip, and I hear a single “yip” from the crowd.Ollie murmurs, “Bless you,” to Colby, but that wasn’t a sneeze.I know they’ll edit it out post-production.Andie is frozen, so I take over.
“And I’m the snarky one,” I say matter-of-factly.
“Oh, so you bite,” he says.
