No, Christmas was a terrible holiday. Usually I tried to avoid it. But here it was staring me in the face.
“I have an array of chocolate holiday sugar cookies with royal icing,” Fiona said.
“What do you think, Owen?” Chloe asked me brightly.
I picked up the cookie gingerly and broke off the smallest piece I possibly could.
“It's sweet,” I said. “And tastes like chocolate.”
Chloe rolled her eyes and patted me on the head. She broke the cookie in half and showed the camera.
“See how the cookie looks layered? You can tell Fiona didn't overwork the dough.” Chloe took a bite. “It's light and flavorful and has a nice bite. This is a very nice cookie! Also, making a chocolate sugar cookie is more difficult than a plain sugar cookie, because you have to balance out the chocolate and subtract that amount in dry ingredients. People think baking is just some sort of girly thing to do while you sip wine, but baking is a science. The ratios, temperatures, and processes have to be exact, or you won't get excellent results.”
“I agree with everything,” Anu said. “Fiona, you're lucky to have the dessert queen looking over your cookies.”
“They're beautiful cookies,” Chloe continued. “Look at the intricate icing work. This winter lace pattern is perfect. It's like art. Did you see that, Owen? She put snowflakes on it.” She stuck a cookie in my face.
I grunted, earning more eye-rolling from Chloe.
Holly was up next.
“I heard you almost blew up the kitchen,” Chloe joked as Holly set the platters of cookies before us.
“What?” I growled. “Are you seriously trying to burn down my tower after you subjected my dog to a Christmas costume?”
Holly's eyes narrowed. “He looks cute in that costume. Every other normal person feels a sense of warmth at the sight of a puppy in a costume. But of course not Owen Frost.”
I glowered at her.
“Don't worry about the accident. It all worked out,” Holly said to Chloe. “And I was able to make all these cookies.”
The sugar cookies were piled with fluffy white frosting. I poked one suspiciously.
Chloe picked up a star and took a bite. “These are delicious, if a bit rustic. They sort of dissolve in your mouth. They're really addicting! Try it, Owen,” Chloe coaxed.
I picked up a frosted candy cane. I appreciated that it wasn't pretentious. It was a cookie. It didn’t need to have a detailed depiction of theMona Lisaon it. I took a bite of the cookie, bracing myself for the sledgehammer of sugar to my teeth. But it didn't happen.
The worddissolvemade it sound as if the cookie had no substance. That was not the case. This cookie was like eating a cloud. It tasted—happy. It wasn't too sweet, either. It was perfectly balanced.
“These just feel very homemade,” Nick said, inspecting the cookies critically.
I couldn’t really concentrate, as I was having a religious experience. The slightly savory buttercream frosting, the crunchy sugar crystals, the cookie dough that wasn’t overly sweet. I stuffed the rest of the candy cane into my mouth.
“If you compare these to the cookies we just saw,” Anu said, “those were professional cookies. These are… I don't know if I would even put these on Instagram.”
“Sometimes rustic cookies are good,” Chloe said. “These are tasty and addictive. You feel like you could eat one after the other then look around and say, 'Hey, who ate all my cookies?'”
Maybe they weren't Instagram-worthy, but that was why I liked them. They were honest. My mom would never have served cookies like these at her holiday party. I was about to take another cookie but scowled. I didn't want to think about my mom right now.
“You don't like it?” Holly asked. She was annoyed at the comments.
“Those three are the chefs,” I said gruffly. “If they say they're bad, then they're bad. They don't look like Fiona's cookies. I guess you could have used one of those bag thingies.” All the while, my thoughts were spinning. How would I sneak out the rest of these cookies?
“You mean an icing piper,” Holly said through gritted teeth. “Why are you even judging the baking contest if you don't even know what anything is called?” Her voice became shrill, and her cheeks flushed. “And why are you even judging something calledThe Great Christmas Bake-Offif you don't even like Christmas?”
“Thank you, Holly,” Anastasia interrupted.
Holly stalked off to the greenroom, and I had to contend with a parade of cookies. Nick and Anu weren't as harsh with the other contestants. None of them made simple cookies like Holly’s; they all had fussy, fancy cookies.
