The Dos and Donuts of Love by Adiba Jaigirdar

Author:Adiba Jaigirdar
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends

TWENTY

Bake It Till You Make It

By the time everything’s cleaned up, Galvin is back in his seat, looking grumpy as ever.

As we all head back to our kitchen stations, Niamh squeezes my hand. When I meet her gaze, she just gives me a smile. And I’m not sure if it’s because she’s worried she’s about to get into trouble or not.

I slip into my kitchen station, still feeling pretty happy about my bakhorkhani. And knowing that I didn’t throw food at anyone. I catch Chris watching me, but she glances away almost as soon I catch her eyes.

I ignore the flip-flop of my stomach, the escalated beat of my heart, and turn toward the judges. One by one, they call each of us up.

It’s … not pretty.

Chris steps forward with her half-burnt pineapple buns. She’s tried to cover up the burnt sides with crushed strawberries and even sprinkled some sliced strawberries on the side of her plate, so they almost look like rose petals. Despite the presentation, Galvin glares at Chris the entire time he chews the bread, like it’s the worst experience of his life and he can’t believe she is making him eat it.

Even from where I stand, I can tell Chris is terrified. I can’t see her face, but the way she stands in front of the judges is not her usual cool and confident self. She could be eliminated. She could go home. And not because of anything she did or didn’t do.

“I see you had a few problems,” Padma says kindly once she’s finished chewing. Her face betrays no emotion though.

“I was too long taking them out of the oven,” Chris says so low that if it weren’t for the mic taped to her, I probably wouldn’t hear her at all.

“Well, despite that. It’s got good flavor,” Máire says with a smile.

“Good texture too, the parts that haven’t burnt,” Padma adds with a nod.

“Serving burnt food is really something you should think twice about” is all Galvin says. No feedback at all. Chris just nods and stares at the ground the entire walk back to her station. All of us watch her, knowing that her chances of being eliminated are high.

The next few judging rounds don’t go much better. With the amount of time the food fight took up, everyone’s dishes suffered, and nobody comes away with glowing compliments. Not even Niamh and Séan. The judges’ disappointment in them is palpable.

“Even with the advantage that you were given, you didn’t manage to deliver today,” Galvin says to Séan. For once, Séan doesn’t hold his head high with that annoying pride of his. Instead, he actually looks kind of disappointed too. Maybe it was Séan who started the food fight. It has to be.

“Shireen,” Galvin says, clearly still in an awful mood after everything.

I grab hold of my plate of bakhorkhani and stumble forward.

“So, what do we have here?” Padma asks.

“Um, it’s a dish from the region of Bangladesh my family is from,” I offer. “It’s called bakhorkhani.

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