People love to laugh, mock, and make others feel small and useless. Status is often seen as a zero-sum game; if someone’s got it, someone else is missing it. I think that’s why many people get off mocking others. They need it because they aren’t comfortable with being at the bottom of the social hierarchy in a given place. But it is a psyop, truly. What happens once you get out of the bakery? You have many other hierarchies that are even bigger. Also, they are more important and crucial in deciding what will be of you in the future. Plus, a social status achieved by taking from others is often hard to translate into other contexts.

While the world is not perfect, it’s also the case that there are status scenarios that are not zero-sum games. The most common is the hierarchy of skills. Unless you teach in a Humanity department at a college or work as a politician, skills are usually well-rewarded. Well, skills and the ability to market your skills. Anyways, the more you put things on the long term, the more you strive for skills that are not toxic, and the better the bet you can take.

Learn how to do something tremendously well, and it’ll be highly unlikely that you will ever starve or want more. No matter how weird your thing is, if you are good enough, there’s a big chance that, with the right marketing, you’ll make a good living.

That’s why when I look at my team doing their best and the competition – and their fans – laughing us off, I just sigh. They don’t know any better. I mean, they don’t know any better for now. A reckoning is coming the same way my father came from work to my mother, telling him I did something sneaky. They just don’t know about the ass-whooping that’s about to get served, that’s all.

Well, it’s going to be fun to see their faces when the results are out. Plus, if I’m about to stay here, I might want to clean the house a little. But that’s for later…

I look at Claudius’s grimace as he kneads the chocolate paste with some awkwardness. Laugh all you want, but this guy actually has good hands and is mimicking what I showed him with great reliability. I explained the movements to him, and he’s doing quite decently.

Just for a moment, my mind went on a tangent.

See, the real question here is the following: if we ever decide to nuke France, are we nuking Belgium as well? I would say that following a par condicio, we should.

You would pay a few thousand bucks to learn what Claudius is doing at an introductory chocolate-making course. Maître chocolatier, more like money-thieves.

Focus, Joey. Focus.

I move behind Stan and Quintus. They are doing a good job at candying the fruits. Good. Moving on to Raissa, I see her with several bowls on the table: good. If she had tried to mix all that ricotta in one bowl, it would have been hard to stir properly.

“Raissa, have you tasted it?” I ask.

“Yes, chef. I tried not to overdo it with the sugar. I am not sure this is okay. Could you check that bowl, please?”

I put my finger in the bowl she pointed at and spoon some of the creamy mix into my mouth.

“Nice. Add three more spoonsful of sugar to this. Adjust all the other bowls accordingly. You are doing a great job.”

“Thanks, Chef,” Raissa bows her head, and her face goes red.

I don’t know what’s up with her, to be honest. She has worked with me many times before. However, today she defers to me much more than usual. Whatever.

“Truffles?”

I approach the ovens and see that Truffles and Tiberius are busy with the trays that Raissa’s prepared. They are just taking out the first batch now. I look over and see a soft, slightly golden sponge cake. At first glance, and judging from the smell, the baking went perfectly.

“Wow,” I tell the blonde, “this smells incredible.”

I poke it gently with a finger, and, indeed, it’s soft. I slowly raise my head to look at Truffles; this guy’s nose is the real deal.

“I did what you told me,” he shrugs.

I love how practical and to the letter Truffles is. The guy is a bit weird, but he’s also a straight shooter.

“Wonderful job.”

“The soaps,” he declares.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

“Yes, yes. I’ll explain the soap-making process later.”

Truffles nods and puts another tray inside the oven, with the wooden-legged Elf helping him.

Amazing.

I walk over to get a pitcher of water and mix it in a bowl with lemon and sugar. We need something to wet the sponge cake; you’d usually add a liqueur in the mix, but I simply put a little chocolate powder in it. I don’t trust Elven spirits. I am not much of a drinker and don’t want to mess up the recipe. This is more like a child-safe version of the actual recipe, I suppose. I mean, it is true that the one thing my father and mother never had a problem with was my drinking. Wait, only if it was wine and beer. Or their homemade spirits. I think I drank my first beer with my father when I was thirteen? Yeah, something like that.

Anyway, there’s one step missing before we are actually ready to start the real show. I take out yet another ingredient that was not just hard to find, but I also had to get a [Farmer] to crush it properly. Almond flour and pistachio paste.

Now, before you go all ‘oooh’ pistachios, let me just say that the pistachio craze of the last ten years is nonsense. So many rich young women came to my bakery asking for a cake with pistachio cream in it because, apparently, liking pistachios has become a personality trait. Yeah, pretty much like liking The Office. Now, have I allowed these heathens to get away with all this pistachio bonanza? If they were hot and single, sure. I even offered to show them how it’s done live if they invited me to the party. But saying anything more than that would violate client confidentiality, so…

I lay down the ingredients and wait for my team to be done with their tasks.

“Claudius, stop kneading. Spread it out until it’s like this thick,” I say with my fingers close together, “and make sure it’s uniform. Once you are done, let it cool. If you have a cooling wand, use it. I’ll pay back the usage.”

As soon as everyone else is done, I call them to the table where I’ve laid down the ingredients.

“Now, since it was so hard to get this, I suppose it’s likely that no one knows what marzipan is, am I right?”

I see everyone confused at the mention of the word.

“Yeah, I figured.”

“Anyway, follow what I’m about to do closely because I’m going to cut the chocolate, and then each one of you will be making their own Cassata. What we are missing so far is a couple of things, including the decorations. But fear not! Let’s start with marzipan!”

“Marzipan was born about 800 years ago during a famine,” I explain as I grab some of the almond flour and start with it. “People didn’t have flour, but they did have a bunch of almonds instead. A guy thought, ‘well, why not crush the almonds to a powder and replace normal flour with almond flour.’

“Now, Marzipan is a pastry paste whose main ingredients are, as just mentioned, almonds, powdered or liquid sugar, and sometimes honey. You mix these three ingredients and then shape the dough with your hands like clay into any shape you want.

“Marzipan is a very versatile food,” I continue. “It can be used to make shapes and decorations, add flavor and texture to pastries, or it can be consumed on its own as a treat. It is easy to mix, and it holds its shape when cooled quickly. It is also very malleable, meaning you can mold and shape it easily.

“Before you all start making the marzipan, I need to explain the Sicilian process,” I say. “This is an important step to ensure that the marzipan will be even fluffier than usual. We’ll whisk some egg whites – around three egg whites for every half a pound of marzipan.”

I start mixing all the ingredients together as I keep explaining.

“The green paste is just crushed pistachios. It was hard to make it this smooth, though. Now, everyone, grab some of the ingredients.”

Now, everyone is ready to start making the marzipan.

“You could shape the dough into whatever you wanted, be it roses or rabbits. But first, we will use a bowl to create the shape of the Cassata, working upside down. We will cut our thin sponge cake into rounds to fit the inside of the bowl, and we’ll alternate the cake with a block of marzipan. Make sure that both elements are around the same thickness. Now, whisk the eggs, please, and then add the almond flour, sugar, and pistachio paste.”

Everyone quickly gets to work, producing a smooth green paste. I give them a few more tips throughout, but mostly let everyone have fun with it. Once they’ve played around enough, I take a bowl and put it in the center.

“Now, I’ll cut our marzipan into a trapezius shape; like this,” I say while moving a knife over the marzipan quickly. “Ideally, you want a bowl that is eleven to twelve inches in diameter.”

I move over to a shallow bowl – more like a big plate, really – and start putting the cut marzipan and sponge cake around the sides. Then, I cut a circular shape out of the sponge cake and press it firmly to the bottom.

“That’s the base,” I point. “Now, I want to gently wet it with some sugared water. I don’t want it wet-wet. Add just a little so that the cake is not too dry. By the way, if you ever mess up the preparation of the sponge cake and overcook it, you can always wet it a lot and let it rest for a day to dry, making the cake moister. It’s not ideal, but it’s better than throwing it away.”

“Claudius,” I say as I finish wetting the base. “Get me the chocolate.”

I have already explained to the enchanter what chocolate is, and as he comes back to the table with a piece of the big sheet he made, I start cutting it into small chips with practiced ease. Also, I cut some bigger pieces and tell my team to have a taste.

“It’s not Leonidas, but it’s something.”

Leonidas, by the way, is a centenarian chocolate company in Belgium—one of the most famous in the entire world.

“Pigfeed?” Raissa stares at the small chocolate tablet and frowns.

“Just taste it.”

Everyone takes a bite and, almost in synch, their eyes go wide.

“This… this…” Raissa looks like she’s about to have a stroke.

“Oh, yeah, baby,” I give her my custom wink.

From the other side of the bakery, you can hear the women laughing hard at us.

“World’s Tree! They are eating Pigfeed!”

I keep a satisfied smile as my team keeps eating the chocolate.

“Child, this is… How did you know of this? Humans don’t grow Pigfeed,” Stan frowns as he snags another piece of chocolate and plops it into his mouth.

“I’m a Baker, Stanimal; that’s how I know. A baker with capital B.”