Ghosts, MOs, and a Baking Show: A Flannigan Sisters Mystery by Amanda Reid

Author:Amanda Reid [Reid, Amanda]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-07-01T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 10

“And three, two, one. Bakers, stop baking!” Amy called out with forced enthusiasm.

Mina gazed down at her pie with her heart pounding, hoping she’d done all she could to get to the next round. They’d called for a take on a classic apple pie with cheese. Simple.

But these reality people loved their twists. Today’s? Since Lovie won the last round, she got to assign the type of cheese to her fellow contestants. She’d taken the easiest for herself, the cheddar cheese. She allotted Mina cream cheese. Thank goodness she hadn’t given her some of the flavors Mina didn’t recognize, like Manchego or Emmental. Lovie had an evil little glint in her eye when she selected blue cheese for Francesca. Mina would gladly take what Lovie assigned her. If there was anything worse than coconut to Mina’s palate, it would be blue cheese.

Initially, she’d stalled, trying to figure out what to do. Then she remembered the snickerdoodle cream cheese pie her neighbor, Ms. Pinkerton, brought over after Mina’s granma died. And that’s what she had in front of her now. A short-crust a-la-snickerdoodle, with a lightly sweet cream cheese layer, an apple layer, then a snickerdoodle crumble on top. Part pie, part cheesecake, hopefully all delicious and not outside the judges’ ideas of what a pie should be. She studied the round confection. Hopefully she hadn’t made the pie too sweet. Nothing she could do about that now. She fanned herself with her hat.

“And cut.” Les’s voice echoed through the set. “Bakers, go ahead and grab some lunch in the green room. We’ll call you back for one-on-ones starting in a half hour.”

Mina put her hat on the stainless counter and rolled her shoulders, trying to alleviate the stress which had settled there. As she passed the next baking station, she glanced at Lovie’s pie. With Shelly’s ouster, the crew shrunk the set and now Mina and Lovie were neighbors. The other woman’s effort was a paragon of perfection, all glossy, flaky top crust, with the slightest bit of gooey apple goodness peeking from a perfect lattice pattern.

Any feeling of having done a good job fled. Mina’s pie looked like a five-year old made the dessert, not a professional baker. Then again, she wasn’t a professional baker. She came up with the flavor ideas, baked a couple to get it right, then they were replicated by her restaurant’s staff. Why did she think she could stand up to people who did this for a living?

Through the curtains, Mina trailed the contestant group, her hopes of earning the money firmly in the trashcan.

Shoot. She’d forgotten her hat. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed the judge’s green room area where the police had the crime scene tape. It had been there when Mina arrived this morning, but the bright yellow strip had since been removed. If they’d taken the tape down, anyone could enter, right? If she went back for her hat now…

Why did she care? After today, she’d probably be going home anyway, so keeping Camryn off her back would be moot.

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