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None of the others was completely sure how they had gotten steamrolled into this by Mark. Maybe it was his puppy dog eyes. Maybe it was that smile. Maybe it was all the blackmail material he’d compiled against them over the past 22 years.
But in any case, they were all somewhere that seemed more foreign to them than even the Olympic Stadium stage in front of billions. They were in a test kitchen in the middle of Salt Lake City, listening to a perky blonde woman droning on and on about all the possible ways you could fill a cupcake.
Even if Mark had done this before, he was still raptly attentive, occasionally asking things like how thick a jam filling would have to be to keep the cake from collapsing, and whether a cheese filling would serve better than simple whipped cream. None of the others had bothered to think of these things. In the experience of three of them, thinking of cupcakes never went beyond how fast they could eat them, and for the other cupcakes were yet another food to avoid at all costs.
Despite all that, Jason actually did like the thought of trying this. He had grand designs on designing an organic cupcake, and had even made a special trip to Whole Foods to pick up liquid stevia to make sure he could keep all the refined sugar out of the mix.
“No sugar in the cake and the icing?” Rob asked when he saw Jason’s ingredients laid out. “Gluten free cake? Do you not know what the purpose of cupcakes is supposed to be? Indulgence!”
“This is indulgence, mate,” Jason replied. “It’s going to have fresh fruit in it. What’s better than that? And your body appreciates having something it can actually digest properly. Do you know what refined ingredients do to your blood sugar?”
On the other hand, Rob was all about the red velvet cupcakes. He was so much into it that more of the batter was going into his mouth than into the cups. Gary was running into similar issues with his dark chocolate batter nearby.
Howard actually was taking the whole thing much more seriously than anyone thought possible. Apparently he had gotten very much into the Great British Bake Off during their hiatus. He was carefully monitoring the consistency of his angel food batter, muttering about getting the lofting correct by not overbeating it, and he was so serious that he didn’t even catch the double entendres. Mark looked over at him and felt strangely competitive.
“Howard, are you going to have filling for those?” he asked.
“I’m making a fresh raspberry compote to put in them,” Howard grinned. “It should add some moistness to the consistency. But I have to make sure they’re baked exactly right. They can’t be raw inside.”
Finally, all of them finished their mixing and measuring out of the batter, although in Rob and Gary’s case they had to mix up additional batter after eating a little too much. Jason looked very concerned about his mix, muttering something about the bitterness of too much stevia.
The blonde teacher chatted with Jason for a few minutes about it and was left blushing, giggling and saying she’d be back in a few minutes after checking on something in the office.
“Jay, she’s married,” Gary commented when she left the room. “And Mormon. Please don’t get us run out of the state of Utah.”
“But I thought multiple marriages was allowed?” Jason grinned.
“That would be for men,” Howard said. “And I’m not certain I want to share.”
“Oh HO!” Rob and Mark shouted as Jason blushed and looked for revenge. He found it in a bowl of leftover flour, of which he grabbed a handful of and managed to rub thickly into Howard’s curly mop.
The war was on. Howard grabbed a big spoonful of the raspberry filling he’d created and slung it onto Jason’s chin. He then whipped around and smacked a dollup onto Rob’s chest as he guffawed. Rob retaliated by smearing cream cheese on Howard’s beard, and for good measure, onto Gary’s also.
By the time that the teacher came back, she found four of the guys still throwing a mixture of toppings, fillings and leftover batter onto each other. She also found Mark over in the corner, jealously protecting his own icing and fillings and sulking.
“I’m so sorry,” he said. “They just don’t take baking seriously.”
In the end, the teacher received a heartfelt apology from the boys (and a kiss on the cheek from Jason, which pretty much dissolved any leftover annoyance forever,) the four ended up scrubbing the kitchen cleaner than it had ever been before, thanks to Jason’s expertise, and fillings and toppings were remade whilst the cakes cooled. They finally surveyed their finished product.
Jason poked his cupcakes, then picked one up and threw it at the wall. It bounced off and landed on the floor perfectly intact, icing included.
“Well, so much for becoming an organic baker,” he groaned. “Another thing off of the possible post-band career list. Maybe local microfarming will still happen, though.”
Rob and Gary’s cupcakes were very messily decorated but were pretty much the tastiest things ever created. Even Jason had to agree with that. Mark’s cupcakes were gorgeous, and even the teacher couldn’t figure out how he had successfully made each one with a matching rainbow spectrum in the cake and the icing. Nor did she have any idea where he had found marzipan unicorns in the middle of Utah to top each one off.
But the winner, surprisingly, was Howard. His angel food cupcakes, filled with raspberries and topped with fresh whipped cream, were little cakes of heaven.
“These are perfectly delightful,” the teacher enthused whilst Mark looked on grumpily. “You are going to make some woman very happy someday, I can see.”
“Well, it might be that the person that I plan to make happy doesn’t appreciate fine baking,” he grinned. “I think they’re more into kale smoothies than cakes.”
“Such a waste,” she said, walking off.
Smiling at Mark’s continued sulking, Howard began packing up his cupcakes with the assistance of Jason, who had thrown all of his away after asking if they could be used as paving stones.
“Maybe that person would actually appreciate a little baking,” Jason commented. “Especially at the right time. I personally have a weakness for scones in the morning.”
Howard shot him an impish look under his eyelashes.
“With clotted cream and orange marmalade?” he asked.
“And organic butter,” Jason said.
“Of course,” Howard said, wiping away some stray flour off Jason’s cheek as they both grinned.