Lots and Lots of Latkes

Posted on Fri Dec 24th, 2021 @ 6:46pm by Chief Engineer Michael Burnstein & Evahnae Kohl

Mission: Mission 14: Holoworld
Location: Ship's Galley
Timeline: MD04
Tags: December Challenge One
3944 words - 7.9 OF Standard Post Measure

Burnie poked his head into the galley, hoping to find it deserted. The cook, in his opinion, tended to be a little ...high strung. Sure, the flames from his attempt at Bombe Alaska flambe had spread across half a prep table, but it was stainless steel. It had hardly even scorched! Okay, there was a burn mark on the ceiling, but what kitchen didn't have at least one?

Seeing no sign of the cook, he ventured further in, heading for the stove top, when he spotted the new bar owner. Between ship maintenance, Nollel's sudden illness and then the holoship wreck, he hadn't gotten much chance to get to know her, at least not outside of her D&D character and not everyone played characters that were similar to who they really were. For instance, he wasn't anywhere near as ready to kill things with an axe as Thorbran, and (even if some people might disagree) he wasn't nearly as much of pyro. Hopefully Eva wasn't the kind to assume the worst when she saw him with hot oil. "Hi!" Burnie called, with a small wave. "Don't mind me, I'm just going to fry up some latkes."

For a split second, Eva looked like a child who'd been caught with their hand in the proverbial cookie jar. She hadn't been on board Rosie long enough to know if sneaking into the galley after the staff had left was a normal part of the crew's entertainment rotation but the frozen look of uncertainty on her features betrayed her surprise for all of the few seconds it took to smother it with a grin. As a fellow crewmember, Eva knew very little about her fellow stealth chef but they had bonded over enough fireballs for there to be an odd sense of camaraderie, even if he was suddenly way taller than she remembered.

Looking down at the carton of eggs she was carrying, Eva considered his confession and then added one of her own. "I'm experimenting on eggs. Theoretically, I should be able to make them somewhat edible." It was ostensibly true, though it very much did not address the fact that she was practising her scrambled eggs game because she couldn't sleep. "Latkes sound a lot more interesting though."

"They are," Burnie agreed. "And there's egg in the recipe, so technically you'd still be experimenting with eggs," he added brightly, replicating potatoes, onions and a big pitcher of oil.

An index finger, cocked and then aimed in approval, applauded his logic. "That is a brilliant observation." Reaching out the carton with both hands, Eva presented him with it as one might a gift. "In that case, please accept this offering, along with a request to please be involved in whatever mayhem you're about to unleash." Her hazel eyes gleamed, evidence enough that there was more or less very little difference between her character's support and her own appreciation for a fellow risk-taker.

A slow grin spread on Burnie's face as he realized she was going to be just fine with this (well, as long as no one's hair caught fire, but that hadn't happened in years). "Excellent," he said, taking the proffered eggs. "We just need to shred the potatoes and onions, mix with some salt, cinnamon and a couple eggs, and then the fun part: heat a big pan of oil and fry them up."

"Why does this just sound like the most terrible idea?" Eva's rhetorical question was delivered with the explicit glee of someone who had built an entire lifestyle out of bad choices and dodged consequences. Having invited herself along without much consideration for permission, the brunette grabbed a potato and tossed it up; slightly higher than intended, slightly more...diagonal. She took off after it, arm outstretched. "So how do you shred a potato?", she grunted, catching her wayward bounty but having to balance like a seesaw on one of the central preparation benches to manage it.

"Hey, latkes are always a good idea," Burnie objected with a sly smile, followed immediately by a swallowed chuckle at the potato and balance recovery. "Smashing them on the ground might kinda work, but a grater or food processor is more traditional," he laughed, pulling what looked like a bowl lined with a fan of sharp blades out and setting it on the counter. "Liha'd love this part," he remarked with a shake of his head and he rough sliced potatoes into the bowl. "That is, if she weren't such a chicken about being around when I cook with live flame."

"Be hard to cook with a dead one," Eva quipped, returning to peer at the contraption. After a moment's consideration, she reached out and very intently placed her potato into the appliance's bowl. "Now what?" She declined to look at him, concentrating instead on the now-relinquished potato, which seemed the only way to avoid betraying the absolute mischief in her eyes. She wasn't so unfamiliar with the kitchen that her ignorance was genuine but he didn't know that and failed attempts at staying asleep required copious amounts of humour to aid recovery. It was a scientific fact.

"Yes, yes it would," Burnie agreed cheerfully. "I mean, technically, you could cook them on an electric stove top, but Bubbie always fried these over flame so this is one of the few things where I'm gonna sing..." he struck a pose, one foot lightly stomping while the opposite hand swept up, wrist turning and an index finger pointed to the ceiling, as the next word came out in a long note, "..Tradition!" It looked dramatic for all of half a beat before a manic grin appeared, spoiling the effect. "As to what's next, we throw in onions," he explained, demonstrating by tossing quartered onions in, then sealed the top and pressed a button that sent the blades whirling, "..and then we let her rip."

"Oh, this thing would definitely eventually lose me a finger." Entirely circumspect about her tendency to invite culinary calamity, Eva seemed almost cheerful at the prospect of bodily harm in the name of new experiences. Turning around, she took several attempts to hoist herself up to sit on the bench, content to watch. "So what is the significance of latkes late at night, other than involving some pretty decent comfort food?"

Burnie waited for her to get situated as he stopped the chopper and opened it, scooping the shredded potatoes and oinons into a bowl. "In this case the significance is a comfort food, I guess. I took Nollel to a holoprogram version of New York - my hometown. It was set for holidays and New Year's Eve, which is always exciting, plus romantic," he smiled a little recalling it, "but we stuck to the main attractions, only heading on the Brooklyn bridge to see the Statue of Liberty. I considered going the rest of the way, showing her the part where I actually grew up, except... it wouldn't really be home, not without my family there..."

Not one typically for sharing much in the way of personal feelings, Burnie shook off the wistful thought. "Anyway, seeing even a recreation of New York during holiday season made me think of family parties - and the food! Latkes always featured since the holiday we celebrated involved oil that burned for eight days when it should have only lasted in one, so the tradition is to have oil-based foods, especially food fried in oil," he explained with a renewed grin. "Normally you light candles too, but the actual holiday is months away and I'm not exactly religious anyway. BUT you can have latkes anytime, so I decided to take a shot at making some."

If Eva had been called upon to speak honestly, she would have had to admit she hadn't thought much about home since making the decision to leave. As her sixth week aboard loomed, there really hadn't been a lot of time or energy to consider anything other than the thrill of secured freedom and then the immediate adrenaline of their impromptu adventure. Having a blended family from two entirely different cultures had peppered the calendar year with a multitude of festivals and observances and, whilst she couldn't relate specifically to this one, the patchwork woman had empathy enough for his evident nostalgia. It softened her exuberance for a moment into a more reflective smile.

"Betazoids are no different when it comes to filling their festivals with food, the difference being I wouldn't know where to start with half of my father's recipes. I like New York though," Eva added, her smile adding warmth to her eyes. "I own warehouse space there, not that I've actually visited for over a year. Maybe longer."

"I think most cultures use holidays as an excuse for a feast. About 90% of mine boil down to 'They tried to kill us. we survived. Let's eat!'," Burnie laughed as he added flour, salt and a touch of cinnamon to the bowl. "I love New York - center of the universe might be tourist slogan, but it fits for me. It's been years since I was home though. I went home for a bit after being discharged, but... everyone fussing over you gets old after a bit and after you've worked on starship engines the engineering jobs I could get there sort of paled in comparison."

"Discharged?" Years of hospitality service had taught Eva to curb her natural curiosity, but it didn't always leave her successful outside settings that served as a reminder. Tilting her head to consider him in interest, Eva's features shifted from mild to surprise to the slow spread of twinkling mirth. "Let me guess, too many rules about the appropriate use of explosives as a means to solve problems?" There was a moment's hesitation as the words left her mouth, that retrospective consideration for whether or not it was an appropriate moment for humour, but impulsiveness in her personal life had not always benefited from her professional lessons. Masking a wince at her own flippancy, Eva added, "Starfleet or something else?"

"Starfleet. It did involve an explosion ...just not one I set..." Burnie trailed off at the memory, or more properly fragments of memory. It was still little more than flashes, a jumble of moments disjointed in time... Realizing he had been silent perhaps a beat or two too long, he quickly looked back up, flashing a brief grin. "Honestly, I loved Starfleet. They were pretty happy to let me use my 'explosive' interests to solve problems. You'd be amazed at the things they let me blow up." Sadly, the last target hadn't been hit and the whole thing was so classified it was probably a mercy the temporal fragment that had done a number on his brain. Otherwise, someone might have considered him too much of a security risk to just let go. "Anyway," he said, eager to move off the topic. "Time to crack some eggs. Two should do."

Eva admittedly didn't have the best impression of Starfleet, though there had been some progress in her opinion since childhood. Having expectations so explicitly focused to a narrow laserbeam of options had meant she'd never really seen a career with the 'Fleet that didn't involve sacrifice and compromises she wasn't willing to make. It wasn't that odd to find ex-service folks amongst Rosie's crew but it was a little unexpected to find one that had fond memories. Eva had kind of just assumed being part of this crew involved a lot of burned bridges.

Probably the whole village, in his case.

She moved with the change in topic, however, easily distracted at the best of times but also astute enough to notice his intent. Obligingly, Eva leaned over to pluck an egg from the carton and attempted, because it was always wise to extend oneself beyond current talents, to crack it using one hand. Plucking the two slivers of shell from the mess before repeating the task, Eva ignored the faint trail of egg white she drizzled across the counter, having used its edge to form the crack, and asked, "Does the crew ever actually celebrate anything together?" Her scrambled-together ideas for the social events board in the lounge were always looking for new friends. "Birthdays? Festivals?"

"Hmm... not that I've been invited to," Burnie replied with a wry half-grin, whether jokingly implying he might have been left off guest lists because he was a less-than-socially-adept engineer or one liable to set party favors on fire, or both, was left to his cooking partner to decide. "I think some of the crew with shared holidays do get together to celebrate. Not that there's no interchange - I know Liha was kinda creeped out after learning about the 'Elf on the Shelf' idea last year."

"Elf...on a... How would that even work?" Eva, admittedly, had a rather limited knowledge of certain Terran folklore, though she had an extensive-enough movie collection to have pieced together some semblance of a mental image of what an elf looked like. Joining their adventuring roleplay had provided further context, though slightly contradictory, but nothing she'd experienced had ever involved miniature elves perched on shelving units. "Sounds like a line of collectibles," she added with a grin. "Can I also get a dwarf on a wharf? What about a dragon on a wagon?"

"Dragon in a wagon! - that's what I'd want," Burnie laughed, making a mental note that that could be a great menorah design. Maybe a present for his niece if his sister would trust him when it came to a fire-related present. "But the elf is a Christmas thing, so I only know about it because Christmas is kind of pervasive on earth. And because I had friends in grade school whose parents went all out with it," he chuckled, recalling stories of elaborate elf diarama discovered on various mornings. ...hmm... Maybe he could make a little fabric dragon-in-a-wagon with eight tiny sequenced LED lights in the wings for his sister to hide each morning of Chanukah...? "The basic idea is that the elf watches you and reports back to Santa Claus, who's this mythical old guy who brings presents for the holiday if you've been good. So as you might imagine from my Romulan friend's point of view, it sounded like a child's introduction to being watched by the Tal'Shiar."

Eva had grown up on Earth and still couldn't fathom how weird its customs got at times. "We never did Christmas," she pondered, "Though our wider circle of friends always do something called Thankmas, which sounds about as banal as it is. Same decorations, same scramble to find the perfect gift, just less of the historical significance. I always thought they'd made it up until I found old Thankmas cards from my grandparents." Having played her part and dispatched the eggs, Eva pulled her legs beneath her to sit cross-legged on the bench and considered the available options. "We used to encounter this same problem designing the events' calendar back in the day. Knowing what festivities to focus on without inciting interstellar war from some unintentional oversight."

"In pre-school, they just asked parents to fill out a list of holidays celebrated and went with 'we celebrate everyone's happy holidays'. Of course, that only worked for classes under 25 or so. If they tried to do that in grade school we'd have never had a non-holiday day," Burnie laughed. "Probably why it was all only official Federation holidays from then on. I can see how it would be tougher to figure out for a lounge. You'd have to avoid anything really religious or celebrating one group's victory or independence vs another. Now, me, I just stick with the ones that are fun - give me fireworks, fire or..." he filled a pan with oil and lit the wide burner under it with a grin," ...hot oil!"

"You know, you laugh, but food festivals with an open theme tend to go over well." A connoisseur of all things edible, Eva may have been speaking as much from personal experience than any observable facts but the smells coming from the pan were inspiring. "I already know Hiram can cook well enough to feed the entire crew and these," she peered into the pan, "are about to make it onto my list of midnight snacks. Maybe a potluck would drag some bottom lips off the ground."

"Can't go too wrong celebrating love of food," Burnie replied cheerfully, spooning a dollop of potato mixture into the bubbling oil, then hopping back slightly when it spit as the water in the mix hit the hot oil. Okay, should've remembered that bit... he thought, flattening the potato mix to pancake dimensions. He'd only tried making them once before - and gotten busted by the Academy's over-sensitive dorm smoke detector before getting very far - but he'd watched his grandmother make them any number of times, so he felt confident he could do it. "These always cheer me up, so if you want to serve them on the regular, I'll be there for it," he enthused, dropping another spoonful mix into the pan with a little more finesse this time.

"Of course they cheer you up," Eva exclaimed, having scooting back several feet when the first smattering of hot oil had landed several inches from her shins. "They explode as you cook them!" It wasn't a complaint, it wasn't even an accusation, just an observation from an amused mind that was comfortable enough with the notion that life needed a little risk to be worth it.

"Half the fun for sure," Burnie replied with a teasing wink as he flipped the ones in the pan - with a spatula, he wasn't quite crazy enough to try tossing hot oil and latkes in the air to flip them like regular pancakes. "Want to try making some yourself? I could heat another pan of oil."

"Uh."

Self-reflection had its merits, probably. Eva's current track record on board was practically impeccable, having managed her scrambled egg tutorial with Hiram without any incident worth mentioning. Previous issues, surely not fit for consideration given that they'd happened elsewhere and therefore 'didn't count', hadn't dampened her enthusiasm for persistence either. Wriggling forward, she uncrossed her legs, stretched downwards and still had to drop the last few inches to land on the ground, and rounded to the other side of the oven.

"Grease me up."

"All right!" Burnie lit another burner with a gleam in his eye, happy to cook with a fellow pyro ..er, lover of fine traditional open flame cooking. Taking only a moment to appreciate the blue flame, he landed a wide frying pan on it and filled it with a thick pool of oil. "There you go. Once it starts to bubble, drop some latke mix in."

Over-adventurous. It was a great word to explain a lot of Eva's choices in life. In this case, it applied to the amount of mixture she scooped up and dumped into her pan once the oil had heated as much as her patience would allow. The dollop slowly sagged, spreading out until it resembled a healthy-sized pancake and the brunette tilted her head critically to appraise the possibility of being able to flip it without incident. Still, this seemed to make more sense to her since it surely sped up the process cooking more at once instead of multiple smaller ones. She patted the wet side with the back of the spatula. "So what do you serve these with?"

"That one? A shovel," Burnie joked with a good-natured laugh. "But normally sour cream or applesauce, or if you're a real purist, only salt. Personally, I'm an applesauce guy, though salt alone is okay too."

"Do we have applesauce?" It was a lazy question since Eva made no effort to survey his stash of ingredients, too focused on the very satisfying squish made by hitting the uncooked mixture. At the edges, thin strands of potato turned a crispy brown and then, very gradually, a far crispier darker brown.

Burnie shrugged, flipping a couple of his pancakes. "That I'll replicate. And sour cream if you want to try both." Glancing over at her latke with if not a practiced eye, at least one that had seen a fair number of them fried before, he pursed his lips. "You might want to flip that soon. Crispy burnt edges can be good, but you probably don't want to take it too far."

Flipping was easier said than done. It was a good thing that, if questioned, Eva would have vowed and declared she intended for the vast latke to end up in two pieces because it's exactly how things panned out. The mid-flip collapse resulted in a spray of hot oil, most of which landed as a smattering of molten droplets across the backboard. Reflexes honed from years of prior experience had catapulted Eva several feet away from the oven, wielding the spatula like a shield, before she risked the several tentative steps forward to make sure her creation had stopped fussing.

Perfection.

Burnie shook a hand splattered with hot droplets, but grinned - what was cooking with oil without a few little burns? "Impressive." Not to be out done, he decided to try flipping two at once - it should be feasible - and after brief mental calculation edged the spatula in so that it was halfway under each of two side-by-side latkes. A quick upward yank sent both flipping over. One perfectly hit the side of the pan and slid back into position as expected. The other, however, hit a bit too close to the rim and before he could get the spatula around to tip it back in, teetered outward, right into the flame!

A flash of flame shot up from the burning latke, aided by the oil accelerant carried over with it, and rapidly followed the trail of oil into the pan. Fwoom! The whole pan went up like a miniature bonfire.

Dancing back from the blazing pan, Burnie first beat at it with a dish towel, but when that (in hindsight, predictably) also caught fire, he dropped it, stomped it out, then ran to the replicator for a big box of baking soda to smoother the flames.

Every time. How did he even do it?

Wide eyes stared, not so much out of shock or panic, but pure unadulterated admiration. It was rare for Eva to meet anyone as prone to calamity in the kitchen as herself, and ever rarer for her to be the last person standing in a race of who-sets-things-on-fire-first. She had stood, off to the side with her half-cooked latke still sizzling away in the pan despite it being removed from the heat, and frozen in place to watch him react. It seemed, all things considered, far better than trying to help.

"Having fun?"

She grinned at him.

After dousing the fire, Burnie dusted baking soda and ash off his clothes. He spared a sorrowful glance for ruined latkes, but in response to Eva's jesting query, he flashed a grin. "Definitely. That was awesome!" Pulling out another frying pan, he lifted the bottle of oil. "Want to keep trying? We still have a bowl of mix - can't let it go to waste."

Two thumbs-up was excessive.

"Let's go."