Private The Great Luncheon

[Aris Noble]

"They are."

Was his only confirmation as she stood beside her to watch as she poured in the paprika. And poured it in. Without measuring. He practically vibrated with an unspoken need to ensure everything was measured properly, but he hit his tongue and said nothing on it. She knew what she was doing, right? .. Right? He was truly trying not to be hovering or doubtful.

"The right kind of seasoning can bring out the natural flavor better. I don't like over seasoning things." He paused, then for the first time looked actually nervous. ".. Not that I think you are. You're not, right? Of course you're not." He let out a nervous chuckle.

Mahsa

 

[Mahsa]

She was oblivious to the silent worries that whirled within the taller padawan’s mind, mistaking his posture and the energy that almost emanated from him as simple nervousness about how fixable this stew could possibly be.

"Likewise, over seasoning can be just as bad—or maybe worse?—than underseasoning." A considerable amount of the paprika had gone into the stew, enough to give the broth a slightly orange tinge. She had been just as liberal with the dried garlic and onion powders, while the ginger had been the only one properly measured out. One tablespoon, no more and no less.

"Hopefully not," A slight chuckle coated her words as she glanced back to Aris, the same soft smile that usually rested on her lips visible. "At least my nose says it should be fine, but we won’t know until we taste it again."

A nod was given towards the paddle that rested within the stew, trusting Aris to mix the contents carefully but thoroughly, as her attention turned to a few bottles of dried herbs. Like the ginger these were also measured out, one tablespoon each, and before long the fragrance coming from the pot shifted to a pleasant aroma.

Two spoons were carefully dipped in, each gathering a generous amount of the broth, before she held one out for Aris to take. "Ready?"

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Aris Noble ​

 

[Aris Noble]

Her.. Nose?

Aris blinked. The slow, realization dawning sort of blink as he looked to the stew. All this time he'd been so focused on proper measurements to make food taste good that he'd overlooked one thing he was actually good at. Or, well, enhanced to be good at. Scent. He leaned over the pot, idly sniffing for a brief moment after she'd added all the spices within. It smelt.. Good. Right, even.

He could've measured it out with scent alone, couldn't he have?

He smiled a little as he took up one of the spoons, nodding his head in appreciation. He didn't explain what this epiphany was, but as he took the spoonful he realized that, yes, he could measure by scent.

"It's good. Not just better than it was, but actually good."

Mahsa

 

[Mahsa]

Her comment seemed to spark something within Aris, the padawan’s face slowly shifting as a new thought took shape within his head. She had no clue how good his sense of smell might be, but if even humans could afford to cook in such a manner then surely he could too?

"It doesn’t work for everything," A hard-learned lesson when Mahsa had tried to make some baked sweets once without a recipe. It’d been an absolute disaster and she’d learned science—such as chemistry—could have its uses in the kitchen. "But your nose and ears can be very helpful when cooking."

All of their senses could help, though some took longer to develop than others for such things. Perhaps that’s why some of the best chefs were older in age?

A happy humm escaped the Kazelrrian as she also tried the stew, delighted to find that the dry bitterness it held onto at the start had now faded away. "Crisis averted then, the younglings will go to bed today with their bellies full~ "

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Aris Noble ​

 

[Aris Noble]

Not everything, but a lot of things. He was already thinking back to the festival with Zaiya Ceti and the foods he smelled there, he could make a lot of dishes work. Hearing too, though? The sizzle of food, would that actually give him some edge on actually cooking? He was going to have to work with it, then. Get better, make better food. Maybe even some of the kebabs?

"Good. .. I'm glad they won't be hungry. Or stuck eating something bad."

Mahsa

 

[Mahsa]

Her head nodded in agreement as Aris spoke, a satisfied smile on her lips as she turned off the flame and carefully placed the lid over the pot to keep its contents warm. "Mhmm, everyone deserves something yummy to eat~"

Food should be something that warms up the soul and comforts you after a long day, and she was glad the younglings here would never experience those unpalatable gruels she’d been forced to survive out of not so long ago.

"If you need help again don’t hesitate to ask," Carefully the Kazelrrian began tidying the area now that they had finished, picking up the various bottles of spices and returning them to their proper place. "I’m not the best at cooking, far from it I’m sure, but I’ll happily lend a hand if you need it."

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Aris Noble ​

 

[Aris Noble]

"Teach me."

Aris glanced about the room before hurriedly going about the cleaning with her. The last thing he'd allow was for her to be the only one cleaning. If anything, he should be the one cleaning by himself. She'd saved lunch, after all. But at the same time as he picked up one of the pans to dunk in the sink for a scrubbing. Which he half focused on. "I want to be a better cook. I think Zaiya would really like something I made for her."

Mahsa

 

[Mahsa]

"Wha—whoa!!!" The last spice bottle slipped from her fingers as the unexpected request reached her ears, the panic that quickly overtook her finally subsiding as she caught the object before it smacked onto the floor.

A relieved sigh escaped her lips before the bottle was placed back on the rack, before the Kazelerian tilted her head slightly as she looked back to Aris.

Zaiya…? She was the last person that should probably be teaching someone else about cooking, any of the older and more experienced kitchen members here would do a better job than Mahsa probably could, but the reason behind it gave the girl some pause.

How could she deny him when his motivation for learning wasn’t that different from her own?

"A-Alright," She could only hope Aris wouldn’t regret this later. "I’m not the best at explaining stuff and whatnot… but I’ll try my best."

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Aris Noble ​

 

[Aris Noble]

Aris paused his washing, glancing towards Mahsa for only a brief moment as she fumbled the last spice container. He didn't want to stare, after all, when someone had a mistake. Why she'd dropped the bottle though had him more confused on exactly happened there. "Even just watching you is enough for me to learn. You've already taught me a lot just with this soup, so.. I think you're perfect to help show me." Aris smiled faintly as he focused up on finishing the pot he had been cleaning, then moved on to clean even more.

"If.. That's not too much to ask, I mean. You can say no."

Mahsa

 

[Mahsa]

With Aris taking charge of the dirty utensils and whatnot Mahsa directed her attention towards the counter and nearby areas around the stove. A damp cloth was picked up as the Kazelrrian carefully got to cleaning, doing her best to get as many of the spots around the burner where the massive stew pot now rested.

"T-Thanks…" She’d wanted to argue that she was far from perfect, accepting praise wasn’t something Mahsa was used to… but she had promised her master to try.　Burden.　She gritted her teeth as she buried the echoes of unpleasant memories into the back of her mind, ignoring the light sting around the corner of her eyes as Mahsa finished polishing off a rather stubborn stain on the metal.

"Eh? A-Ah no—" She was brought out of her thoughts when Aris spoke up again, and it took a second before his words made sense in her head. "—it’s not too much at all, I promise."

The dirtied cloth was wringed out before being placed into a nearby basket with others, due to be collected and washed later. A clean one was picked up as she joined him by the sink, using it to dry off the pot he’d just finished washing. "I’d be happy to share what I’ve learned… I just worry it might not be that much in the end?"

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Aris Noble ​

 

[Aris Noble]

"You saved this soup. Even just one more dish is more than I could hope for."

The more he learned, the better, in his mind. He wanted to learn as much as he could, from as many different people as he could. Maybe he should actually talk to Valery Noble about teaching him more things. Dad was good at a lot of things, but there was no denying that mom was just better at others. He hummed at the thought, now focused on the utensils as he cleaned then all. Perfect, as per usual. It wasn't even a need, he could just see how dirty things could stay even after a normal cleaning. "I guess.. What else do you know?"

Mahsa

 

[Mahsa]

”You saved this soup.” His wording put into perspective the magnitude of what had been achieved—had a youngling been unfortunate enough to taste the original stew they would’ve undoubtedly agreed with Aris—and the Kazelrrian slowly nodded back as her mind wrapped around that fact.

This wasn’t just a small dish or one of her little experiments where, if things hadn’t worked out, the only one to suffer the consequences would’ve been Mahsa (and perhaps her master too)... and she had done it on her own, with the knowledge she’d picked up from others and her own past mistakes. It might not seem like much for most, but for the young Kazelrrian it was a big cornerstone as she continued to learn and grow.

"What else…?" Her brows furrowed in thought as her mind tried to figure out an answer for such an open ended question, a couple of hmms and aahs echoing from Mahsa to fill up the silence.

"I learned a curry stew from him… it’s actually not too different from what we did today." If anything it had heavily influenced her train of thought as she’d figured out how to fix the contents within the massive pot. "Oh, he also taught me a batter they use when frying things—it’s so light and fluffy and crunchy too!"

Her attention turned towards the books she’d picked up as well, though she was less confident about the recipes there. It was easier to pick up recipes and techniques when she could actually see someone else doing it first… something that the Kazelrrian hadn’t quite realized until now. "I tried making a cake too… but it didn’t come out quite right."

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Aris Noble ​

 

[Aris Noble]

"Batter and fry?"

Deep frying. High in calories. Fat. And yet so, so good. When he was really sure it wouldn't hurt his diet Aris would get himself something deep fried as a treat, though those days were few and between. If he could have his own recipe so he could cook it himself, though? Maybe he could find a way to cook it so it wasn't so loaded with general unhealthiness.

Distracted by his thoughts there was a crack of metal. Aris blinked before he glanced to the knife he was cleaning. So distracted he'd ended up snapping the blade in half. He was unharmed, as per usual. Usual to him anyway. He let out a sigh as he plucked up the broken blade to dispose of properly, and continued on like nothing weird had happened.

"What was wrong with the cake? Did you mix up salt and sugar? .. I did that once."

Mahsa

 

[Mahsa]

"Mhmm! I swear, you could fry anything in that batter and it’d come out delicious~" Calories? Mahsa certainly didn’t know her, but thankfully the Kazelrrian’s palate was varied enough to keep her on a balanced diet.

The familiar snap of metal caused her to jump back instinctively, the pupil of her eyes narrowed into thin slits even as a soft hiss escaped her lips. It was Aris’ calm disposition that served to ground the girl back into reality, the light thrumming in her ears ignored as she watched him sigh before carefully disposing of the knife he’d been cleaning moments ago.

"N-No, thankfully it wasn’t that—though I’ve heard it happens a lot." An eyebrow carefully arched in silent questioning, though she kept herself from vocally asking it when Aris continued as if nothing had happened. "It looked like the perfect picture of a cake when I pulled it out of the oven too, but before I knew it it had become all flat and sad…?"

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Aris Noble ​

 

[Aris Noble]

It happened a lot? Aris visibly looked a little relieved at that, so at least he wasn't too silly on mixing it all up. Though he did tilt his head at the mention of the cake deflating. Was that a normal thing? He didn't know too much about baking at all. Maybe he should ask his dad more? Kahlil was quite good with the more bakery and sweets side of the kitchen. "Maybe it was the heat? As things get warmer, they tend to expand. It's the inverse as things get cold, so.. Maybe it didn't so much deflate as just go back to the size it should be?"

Mahsa

 

[Mahsa]

"I dunno… maybe?" What Aris said made sense in her head, but if that had been the case wouldn’t most cakes she’d seen deflate similarly? "It just looked wrong though…"

Her hands followed along as she spoke, an attempt to help Aris visualize what she’d seen at the time. First was the shape, an average sized circular cake. "As if someone had stolen all the spongy goodness from its middle." Her hand rested atop the imaginary top of it and made a downward curving motion, implicating the odd concave shape her cake had ended with.

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Aris Noble ​

 

[Aris Noble]

Aris nodded slowly. With his hands now dry from the cleaning he pulled out a datapad to start actually stoogling this problem. There had to be a reason for it, right? But what was it exactly? He hummed as he glanced through, but after a moment he figured he might of had something that stood out.

"It might've been underbaked. From what I can find that's usually why."

Mahsa

 

[Mahsa]

"Underbaked…?" His words caused her to pause as Mahsa searched for the buried memories of her failed attempt, brows furrowed as the Kazelrrian recalled as many details as her mind would allow in such short notice. "It’d looked fine though."

At least that’s what Mahsa had thought at the time, but now Aris had her second guessing that assessment. "It did feel dense in the middle when I cut into it…" The edges had been cloudy and fluffy, a delight really, but that hadn’t carried all the way to the center.

"Huh… maybe it really was underbaked." Impossible to tell now without the actual cake on-hand, but what Ari’s proposed made perfect sense when the Kazelrrian thought back on it. "Thanks Aris, I’ll keep that in mind for the next attempt.."

With one mystery potentially solved her mind was free to move onto the next thing that had been occupying space within her thoughts, glancing towards the bin where the broken knife had been safely discarded into.

"Is that… does that happen often for you?" After all he’d been entirely unphased when the blade had snapped like a twig.

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Aris Noble ​

 

[Aris Noble]

"Don't thank me, I don't really know how that all works. I just stoogled it." Aris shrugged indifferently as he clicked off his datapad to instead focus on the room again. Just to check and see if there was anything else to clean. He paused, though, glancing to Mahsa, then to where she'd glanced towards. Ah. "Yes, if I'm not careful. I need to make sure I keep control so I don't do that sort of thing. Most things aren't made for how strong I am."

Mahsa

 

[Mahsa]

A quiet humm left her, the Kazelrrian nodded in understanding as she listened. "I see." She’d known Aris was strong from the Endor field trip, but now Mahsa couldn’t help but wonder just how strong... could he rival Ayhan in strength and power?

A familiar chime rang through the air as they finished tidying up their section of the kitchen, signaling it was time to man the stations before hungry mouths began to flood the refectory for their next meal. A quiet chuckle escaped the girl as she began to collect the utensils and mesh nets required for those on duty, before she looked at Aris.

"Would you mind carrying it over to the station then?" A nod was given towards the massive and lidded pot, conscious that she’d never be able to get it where it needed to be on her own. "I’ll get all the stuff we both need in return."

Perhaps not a fair trade-off… but hopefully the Epicanthix wouldn’t mind?

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Aris Noble ​