“Something was wrong with the pan,” I bit out. I couldn't remember which cookie sheet was the one Amber had given me. But she was working at the next station over with a smug look on her face.
“What did you do?” I yelled at her.
“I didn't do anything!” she protested.
“You took one of my cookie sheets, and now my cookies are ruined. I know you did something. I want to review the footage,” I demanded.
“All I did was use the sheet and wash it. Maybe some water got in the air pocket. I don't know,” Amber said in feigned innocence. “We can'tknow. You can't blame me for your issues, Holly.”
I tried to stay calm. I didn’t need to go viral for screaming at a fellow contestant, even if I did want to shove her face-first into a bowl of icing.
None of the cookies in the oven were salvageable. I threw them all away, trying not to swear. I had made extra dough, but I couldn't afford to mess up anything else. We had to make four identical plates, one for each judge and then one that Romance Creative would use to take photos and videos of our dish. That meant a lot of cookies.
Checking the clock, I rolled out and cut more cookies, carefully monitoring the oven while they baked. I repeated the process several more times then let the perfect sugar cookies cool. I could not frost them when they were at all warm because they would break.
“Can you watch my station, please?” I asked Fiona. “I need some chocolate and a double boiler.”
“Sure!” she said. Then she lowered her voice to a whisper. “I saw Amber dunk that cookie sheet under water. I bet she tried to fill up the air pocket on purpose.”
“Of course she did,” I said.
While the cookies cooled, I made a glossy chocolate ganache, mixing the heavy cream and rich, dark, unsweetened chocolate together. It was a special imported Dutch cocoa that made an almost black chocolate. It also turned pretty hard when it cooled, which was good, because I didn't want it to smear on the cookies.
Thankfully, they were cool. I mixed up a huge bowl of buttercream frosting using good European butter, confectioners' sugar, heavy cream, imported vanilla extract, and sea salt. I usually added a bit more salt than other people. As in life, a little salt made one appreciate the sweet things even more!
I tasted a big dollop of the frosting.
“Delicious! I could seriously eat buttercream frosting just by itself,” I announced.
Fiona giggled from where she was mixing up royal icing. “I know, right?”
I started with the cookie sandwiches. I spread one of the fruit glazes I’d made onto the solid bottom cookies then carefully lined up the top ones and pressed, making sure not to crack anything. On some of the shells, I had sprinkled large rock sugar granules before putting them in the oven. Those sandwiches were ready to go, and I set them aside. The second set received a drizzle of ganache.
The clock was ticking down. I carefully frosted the remaining cookies with a layer of buttercream. It shouldn't be smooth, because I wanted it to be a bit rustic to catch the sugar. I arranged them on the platters with a few minutes to spare.
“Hands up!” Anastasia called as the buzzer sounded.
I looked over at Fiona's dish. She had beautifully decorated chocolate cookies that resembled tiny works of art. I looked back at my cookies. Maybe they weren't good enough?
16
Owen
“How's Rudolph?” Chloe asked after the contestants were all furiously making huge batches of cookie dough. I was not looking forward to having to eat ten rounds of dessert. I had doubled my run that morning to make up for it.
“Unfortunately, he's very attached to the name.”
Chloe giggled. “Huskies are smart dogs!”
“He's a handful. I should go check on him actually.”
*
I had leftthe puppy with Walker that morning, and my COO had insisted on bringing the dog to the office.
He better not have peed on my carpet.
A gaggle of my employees was playing with the dog when I strode into Walker's office.
