STF

Cargo Bay 3 - Nailed It

Posted Feb. 21, 2021, 11:02 p.m. by Fleet Captain Kelly Bordeaux (Commanding Officer) (Kate O'Neill)

Posted by Lieutenant Commander Ian Bordeaux (Chief Diplomatic Officer) in Cargo Bay 3 - Nailed It

Posted by Fleet Captain Kelly Bordeaux (Commanding Officer) in Cargo Bay 3 - Nailed It

Posted by Fleet Captain Kelly Bordeaux (Commanding Officer) in Cargo Bay 3 - Nailed It
Posted by… suppressed (7) by the Post Ghost! 👻
SNIP
Hours went past as Aedan’s crew finished, as the three couples sat on their chairs in front of their cooking stations as makeup began to powder them down.

“I hate you, so much… why couldn’t you grab Crewman Boyler and his wife for this?” Chris said as he looked over at Ian only to have the make-up lady push his head back to the center position.

“This is going to be fun,” Lexi laughed relaxing back. “I mean it is like an impromptu spa.” Her voice had a deeply relaxed quality to it as she closed her eyes and enjoyed the make-up artist rub the top of her neck and shoulders. “If you sat still and let the woman work, Ming might be nice enough to work out some of that tension babe like Huan is doing for me.” Lexi took a deep breath and sighed enjoying every second. With a full-time job in the science department and a family, she rarely got time to relax like this.

“This is not going to be fun… this is going to be torture.” Chris so gruffly as he tried to get settled as they kept working to get them ready for the show.

“Besides how hard can it be to make a cake and we are working for the same thing. Some random entertainment package for the ship so it is not like we are actually going to win anything. It’s zero stress so lean back and stop fighting the woman about the shine on your nose.” Lexi let out a deep sigh as a crewman passed her a long neck bottle of beer.

“Oh you better believe there is going to be stress… this is Ian love… /IAN/. That man wrestled alligators just so he could use their meat for a roast then made souffle for every girl I ever saw him date… perfectly… immaculately… and I refuse to let that cajun hillfolk beat us!”Chris said with defiance to his tone.

“That souffle is made of gator? Wait don’t answer that,” Lexi looked a tad shocked at Chris’ comment. “I thought it was chicken pot pie and it’s better that way.” Lexi wasn’t sure if she really wanted Chris to confirm or deny her statement. Many a morning she had rooted around the small refrigerator they had in their room finding a bowl of the concoction. It was full of starch which made it a great hangover remedy. The last thing she wanted was to have Ian’s miracle next morning dish turn on her when she needed it most.

“No no no… the souffle was a souffle… I said he made a <ROAST> out of gator. Don’t you remember that spicy cajun roast dinner we had for his grandma’s 80th birthday?” Chris said with a devilish grin as he looked over at Lexi. “You said it was amazing, and asked for the replicator recipe which you gave to your parents for Hanukkah this year.”

“Wait is gator kosher,” she looked at Chris alarmed biting her lip. So many things changed when she decided to marry Chris like informing her Bubbe that they would be celebrating Christmas and Hannahak and they were not going to keep Kosher. Lexi never had as a life choice but did tend to follow it when she was home in Israel. Once Chris became the standard plus one at bar mitzvahs and Passovers, everyone gave up asking if she was going to try and convert him as he made his cheeseburger.

“ETA twenty minutes!” came a shout from one of the stagehands as the hosts began to enter as they seemed to be talking amongst themselves. The hosts Chris noticed were an interesting group. The woman in the middle was the host he knew, she was a large sassy black named Nicole Smith, a woman who seemed louder than Ruth when she wanted candy. On her left was Aedan Teller, serving as special celebrity’s host this show often had, first time ever he had guested on this production. To the right, Dalton Black, the world-renowned half human half Romulan chef who was not known for having any sense of humor at all.

“I, for one thing, this is a great chance to get us all together… we need some morale boost and the others…” Ian said pointing to the Klingon couple down who didn’t seem to be saying a word, “They are really great… we vacationed with them a few times now… never on purpose… and to be fair I am not sure how they keep finding us… they just do… should I be worried they are always around?” Ian said as he looked over to Kelly.

Bordeaux, Chief Diplomat

“Only if I get blindfolded as you scream come on pumpkin you can do this as you get smashed on Klingon Blood wine,” Kelly smiled sweetly at her husband. The comment made Lexi lean forward slightly in her seat casting a glance between Chris, Ian, and Kelly. Waving a hand as if pushing the thought from everyone’s mind, Kelly gave a fast rundown of Opal, the day she and Ian got married, and their introduction to Gorka and Borka.

“Yet you forgot to tell them how you always lose to us,” Borka guffawed at Kelly moving from her seat towards the staging area.

“Like hell, we lose to you,” Kelly stood up ready to either progress the situation to another level or simply throw the first shot. “We won every single…”

“Don’t make me separate you two.” Ian said as he eyed the pairs. “I swear the things I get into… you know this is like that time on Vegin III where we had to talk out that couple from eating each other for ritual sacrifice and wanted us to do it too… sometimes you have to take the high road and not take the bait,” Ian told Kelly with a chiding tone.

“I’m five four. I can’t see the high road to take it,” she rolled her eyes at Ian.

“All contestants to their stations. We are live in five minutes,” a voice rang out sending the production crew into a flurry of activity. As always Aedan was prepared for every contingency as three stagehands large enough to be bouncers escorted Gorka and Borka towards their cooking station. Kelly shot a glance at Teller yet the sight was not what she expected. The man wasn’t randomly signing PaDD’s and talking on his comm as he gave out order. Instead, he was leaning on the small between Cera and Ruth listening intently and repeating the random words spilling from the girl’s lips as they labeled objects around the set. So much had changed since she had spent an appreciable amount of time with Ric’s former boss. It was hard today however to hold on to the resentment she felt when Aedan was saying words like “Santa”, “knowman”, “wollipop,” and “woodolph”.

Kelly stared hard at the trio as she fastened the apron around her waist. Christmas had always been about parties, booze, the occasional trip home, and playing Aunt to various friends and families children. Kelly had accepted long ago that she did not want kids but was that really her decision or a decision made based on events in her life. Ric was always gone. Kelly kept getting promotions until she finally received her own ship. Kelly wanted them one year, Ric wanted them another but never at the same time. The years of a life slipped by rapidly causing one to wake up one day with regrets they didn’t even know they would regret. Was that the subject of children for Kelly? Maybe she and Ian needed to step away from the Captain and Lt. Commander roles and have a conversation about being Mr. and Mrs. Bordeaux.

“Hello contestants,” Dalton’s deep voice boomed out on the set, “and welcome. Tonight we will make three dishes. The winner will be given the golden bakery hat and twenty-five thousand credits in gold-pressed Platinum but,” he held up a finger as he strode around to the front of the table, “the task will not be easy. The first challenge is to make Spotted Dog Bread Pudding. This is a traditional dish in honor of our host’s home country of England.”

“Oh that doesn’t sound so hard,” Lexi hip-checked Chris playfully. “We got this in the bag.”

“Just wait Lex baby… just wait,” Chris said as he whispered in her ear.

“It is a savory dish evolved from the Spanish dish called capirotada which is a dish of layered bread, onions, cheese, and meat or poultry and topped with sweet meringue,” Dalton explained the recipe. “That means I want to taste the cheese, meat of your choice, and the sweetness of the sauce to round out the flavor profile.”

“Wait…onions,” Lexi wrinkled up her nose. “I thought this was a dessert competition.”

“See I told you, shenanigans … shenanigans I say!” Chris said loudly as the stagehands began to quiet him.

“It isn’t that bad, trust me,” Ian said with a smirk as he felt more confidant than ever in this. He loved Lexi and Chris, but he was not losing to them, even with Kelly’s complete lack of skill in cooking.

“Aedan,” Kelly yelled feeling much like Chris but the man behind OMAP knew her too well and had deadened her mic. People would see the shocked expression on her face and read the words on her lips but few would catch the connection. “He muted me.” Kelly turned to Ian as her husband began to look over the utensils provided for him. “Why would he want to mute me?”

“So that it stops you from complaining,” Gorka guffawed loudly grabbing his belly. “This is not like that time on Belarta six where we found the lake we were swimming in was full of electric morays and had three minutes to get onto dry land. This is just baking and you are still belly aching.”

“With onions and chicken,” Kelly looked at Gorka raising an eyebrow. She drifte slightly realizing how often they actually showed up on vacation with the klingon couple. If Kelly was the suspicious type she would think they were some sort of spies yet that thought was even more insane than expecting to see the same couple shore leave after shore leave with a billion trillion other needles in the galactic haystack.

“You don’t use onions in your desserts,” Borka laughed out a deep chuckling sound. “Who doesn’t add sausage and onions, garlic, and zests to their after-dinner meals.”

“The dessert-eating population of the galaxy…or Russians,” Kelly quipped thinking about all the stuff Nat had made over the years.

“Your recipe is on the PaDD. You have one hour. Begin,” Dalton took his seat wearing the same austere expression he had since he had arrived at the competition.

Kelly Bordeaux

Bordeaux/Robins

The contestants immediately broke into the small groups setting temperatures and pulling out utensils. “So the recipe says to boil the sugar and water to make maple syrup,” Lexi swiped the screen to the right and then back again several times. “Okay so it doesn’t tell us the temperature to boil the sugar too. I have seen enough cooking shows that says if you cook it too long it will burn. If you don’t cook it long enough....well I am not sure what happens when you don’t cook it long enough.” Pulling her hair back into a pony tail, Lexi no longer cared about the hours in hair and makeup. It was already hot under the lights and the heat from the stove top was not making it any cooler.

“Wait… wait… aren’t we supposed to pre-cook the chicken… and what temperature does chicken not kill people?” Chris asked Lexi with an arched eyebrow, as he was uncertain of either answer.

“Salmonella is sterilized at 150 degrees while Campylobacter is at 212 so just boil the and we should be fine. Aren’t you lucky you married a biologist,” Lexi smiled as she rocked on her heels happy to contribute. Chris was getting a little intense which always happened the second he got into one of these competition with Ian. She needed to do something to put her husband’s mind in the correct frame. Raising up on her tip toes she kissed the side of his cheek hoping to pull his attention from the pot.

Gorka and Borka began to skim the ingredients and combine steps. If cooking the sugar down into a syrup was only going to be added to the onions, why not do it all at once. It would just increase the flavor of the onions in the sugar. The recipe called for the two ingredients to be added later but there was a clock running.

Kelly stood as she watched Ian stirring the syrup mixture. He had always been pretty handy in the kitchen but candy making was not his fortee. Steaks, barbecue, an anything you could flip with tongs was more his alley. Since there was not anything for her to do now, Kelly moved to the next stage of the recipe so that when Ian was finished all he had to do was prepare it. “In a separate bowl, stir together the eggs and half-and-half.” Kelly read aloud and cracked the thin white shells on the bowl rim as she read. “One. Two…three and now one and a half cups of half and half.” Kelly had always read the ingredients out loud as she added him. It was probably because that is what her grandmother did so the habit stuck. Pickin up a whisk she plunged it into the bowl and began whipping them as she read ‘Don’t beat them.’.

Abruptly she stopped and looked to the right and then the left. “Ian....Ian....uh…how do you incorporate eggs but don’t beat them.” She had hoped that with the one yolk remaining the concoction could be saved but all she was doing was chasing the yolk around the bowl with the whisk. “You have to beat them but the recipe says you can’t.” Kelly was already feeling stressed out. Chris was right. This challenge was not going to be fun or easy as his wife suggested.

“First you got to… wait crap the water,” Ian said as he put the pot off the stove as he looked back to Kelly. “Okay babe, first you gotta…” a loud ding could be heard from behind him as he looked at the oven as he opened it up. “One-second baby I am gonna add an extra twist to this the judges will love,” Ian said, as he reached behind him as he pulled a pan down as he began to grease it.

“Twist? Are you sure about this,” Kelly looked at Ian with a raised eyebrow. She had no idea what he was thinking but Ian was in the competitive zone. When he was there it was best to just let him get to the finish line the way he had planned.

“Don’t worry buttercup, big daddy’s got this.” he said as he smacked Kelly’s ass as he went back to his surprise.

Kelly let out a small yelp sound as Ian caught her off guard. “Bid Daddy,” she raised an eyebrow. “Okay don’t make me every have to say that again,” she laughed.

“Like I am gonna loose to a Robins, either of them… I would rather have Ruth beat me.” Ian mumbled under his breath as he took the bowl back.

At station one Lexi brought the chopped onions over to Chris as requested. “Okay heres,” she stopped as a retching sound erupted from her lips followed but another one.

“It’s okay, power through… we have all been there when making food Ian claims tastes good.” Chris said as he began to pat her on her back slowly as he let her get it out of her system.

“You hear that,” Borka bellowed out loudly eavesdropping on Chris and Lexi. “Your friend says your recipes suck.” The Klingon had not idea if this is what the blonde man meant but anything to slow down the Bordeaux pair or distract them would only benefit them.

“Heres the un,” a third retching sound emanated from Lexi this time making her body shake. Lexi blinked twice but the spicy scent of the fresh onions and the sickenly sweet scent of sugar had already started to work is hellish magic. “Oh god…take this…take this,” she held her hands out over the pan. The faint idea that she could vomit was becoming a strong possibility. Opening her fingers, she let the onions plop into the golden mixture Chris was stirring vigorously. The small kerplops only emphasized the struggle of Lexi trying to keep down the snacks they had eaten before the show started. Reaching to the side she grabbed the bowl with the prepared egg and milk mixture and shoved her face in it as she retched.

“Cut to camera’s two and three,” the production assistant instructed over the comms, “and offer them medics but remind them the clock is not stopping.”

Kelly Bordeaux.

“Lex… spin it spin it!” he said out loud, before remembering he was against her. Years of friendship he always wanted them to succeed, but he also wanted to win. It was a mix, as Chris had often been the one to win all prizes between them. This time though, that wasn’t going to happen.

Bordeaux, Robins

“Spin it. Spin what. The recipe says to fold,” Lexi looked at Ian desperate and confused at the Judge yelled out forty-five minutes remaining on the clock. Lexi looked back at the recipe and realized how close they were cutting it. The recipe said forty-five minutes bake time and fifteen minutes prep but right now they would have to share five minutes off the cook time just to get it out of the oven and plated.

“You have to fold it, yes but she needs to turn on the spin cycle on the mixer or it won’t work!” he said as he shook his head.

“Turn it on,” Kelly yelled gesturing to the side of the mixer. “There. There to the right,” she stabbed at the air trying to help her friend. Watching Lexi flip the switch she cringed. “The other right,” Kelly cringed seeing the batter splatter from the bowl.

===================
Forty five minutes later
===================

“Contestants you have five minutes,” Nicole’s happy voice rang out, “before we get to eat the masterpiece you that you .....NAILED IT!” Her demeanor and attitude could only be described as sweet and uplifting. No matter what had been put in front of the woman over all the shows, she always powered through with a delightful comment and humor. Nicole was Kelly’s favorite judge. The guest judge and Dalton, Kelly could take or leave but Nicole was the only one Kelly really wanted to try and impress. If not impress, just not poison.

Lexi looked to the left and then the right with wide eyes. The timer on the stove still have four minutes left to cook but there was no way they could get it out of the oven and plate it in that time. Knowing her husband didn’t care what they served as long as they served something. “Chris, it is still wobbly. It is not cooked all the way,” Lexi put a hand on the stove to stop him. “We can’t serve it to them. What if we have undercooked the chicken and they get sick? We are just going to have to pass on this round.”

“Look, take it out and…” Chris said as he looked around to find what he was missing.

“Take it out. We can’t take it out,” Lexi stared at him stunned as she dabbed her apron with a rag trying to still remove the batter splatter from before.

“I will use this!” he said as he reached down and when he returned pulled out an industrial blow torch that ignited with a powerful ‘pssssh’ that sent flames out six feet that singed the Klingon contestant’s area before he put the power down some as he looked with wide-eyed concern.

“Whoa,” Ian yelled putting a hand on Kelly’s back forcing her down in the small kitchen space as flames licked the air over head of them ending by smoldering the back of Borka who was too slow to move or duck. Gorka immediately began to beat her mate with a towel ensuring the blackened fabric did not actually catch fire . As if to make sure the sprinklers above the Klingons area began to sprinkle water directly over Borka.

“Why does it have a power level like this? Is it for cooking or fighting entrenched forces?”

“Put that thing away before you hurt someone,” Lexi crossed her arms in the mom pose ready to begin to lecture whoever was in her path.

“Look, it’ll work… think of it like s’mores… it’ll be fine.” Chris insisted, not deterred at all by the fire as the smoke alarm began to go off as fire suppressors began to turn on around the Klingons.

“Not like we are eating it,” Kelly yelled over to her friend with a small smile. “I say make themtake all the risks. Medical is on standby. You saw that earlier.” Kelly had no idea what the hell Ian had made or if theirs was even edible but at least her team was setting it on the plates and drizzling the merengue sauce over the edges. Looking over at Ian, she realized the word Team Bordeaux was actually spelled out it would read as Team I as in Team Ian. Kelly had no idea how to do half the terms listed on the recipe so Ian basically did all of it but that was the beauty of being married to someone. When they said the winning team’s name, your name matched it.

“We should not have to call medical? What have you been doing that we might need medical… medical? Really?” Ian paused feeling a little flummoxed. “You can read can’t you? I don’t read your reports to you cause you can’t right? I thought I was doing that cause you loved hearing my voice…” Ian said as he began rubbing his hand through his hair.

Kelly raised an eyebrow looking at her husband. There were many things couples did together. There were many things they did not. Cooking was turning out to be one of those no-go’s right now. Much like not being able to take a shore leave to Talos IV, the kitchen was going to have a Bordeaux General no-go Order after this. “Yes, I can read. It says two tispuhstsss of thyme,” reading the abbreviation on the recipe in an attempt to sound dumb after the reading comment. Kelly read the recipe correctly but held up the tablespoon measuring unit.

“Read this. What does this say?” he said as he held the measuring spoon in front of her.

“Tablespsoons,” she was starting to get annoyed with the game.

“Read this. What does this say?” he said as he put over the recipe in front of her.

“Two teaspah....” her voice trailed off slightly as she started to understand what she was saying and what she did was not the same thing. Looking up at Ian, Kelly’s mouth opened but no words escaped it. “I might have used the thabaustssss.” The joke of reading the abbreviation was not longer funny but it was all Kelly had to stop Ian from killing her with the smallest and dullest of kitchen tools.

“TWO tablespoons, TABLESPOONS!” he said as he felt like he might be sick. “That clearly says teaspoons, do you not understand abbreviations? How have we been together this long and you not know the difference between tablespoon and teaspoon? This is going to be awful, god awful.”

“No, it is going to be.....earthy,” she said in a hopeful tone. “You said thyme has sharp grass, wood, and floral notes right? Used in egg dishes to make it savory,” she tried to remember everything Ian had said about cooking. “Oh,” she snapped her fingers,” and you commented the biggest issue with cooking is people tend to be hesitant with flavor. You just gave it a…punch.”

Noticing Kelly and Ian were light years ahead of them Lexi made a judgment call. “She’s right. Nuke it up,” Lexi stopped blocking Chris and was making a hurried motion for him to flash cook the concoction. It looked for the most part like a bar or bread....as long as you didn’t shake the pan very much. The center was obviously still raw, but they did not have time to cook it longer.

“Maybe we just use the edges and paste it together with this meregue sauce,” Lexi held up the bowl of topping with a hopefully look on her face.

Digging into the pan he scooped out the dish into bowls as if it were ice cream. “Drizzle this,” she handed Chris the bowl of merengue as she continued to scoop out the food into bowls.

“Chefs step away from your table and lets go see who has the best dog. Spotted dog pudding that it is.” Nicole’s exuberance in possibly coming to be poisoned by raw chicken made everything leading up to this worth it for Kelly. If the woman was in Starfleet, she would have done anything to have her on the crew.

Kelly Bordeaux

Ian stopped as he stepped back, from their plate there was two items on each plate, one the joint item that Kelly and Ian made, but there was a separate which was a cookie with ornate icing and frosting. It was clear Ian was hedging his bets that if one item was perfect they would forgive the other if it mutated and ate them.

Bordeaux, Chief Diplomat

“Hello hello hello,” Nicole said in a chipper tone walking towards Lexi and Chris’ table. “What do we have here?” The ever perky hostest wore a smile and had her fork poised ready for a bite. She would never ay a bad word directly about a dish which is why most people loved her.

Kelly Bordeaux

Bump

Bordeaux, CDO


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