Cooling on the Counter

An apron is tied tightly around my waist, but drooping at the front; previous knots have been tied too tightly for me to untangle. The benchtop is spotless and shiny, and the smell of Cherry Blossom & Green Tea Cleaning Spray fills the air. An army of stainless steel bowls and appliances are lined up along the counter, ready to be filled with all manner of ingredients, edible or otherwise. I tie my hair back with a unicorn scrunchie, given to me by my gorgeous five-year-old niece, and stare down at the recipe book with a fierce determination.

  I am ready.

  I open the book gingerly, the pages are yellowed and flaky, like leaves of many autumns past. Some pages are dusted with flour, and occasionally a smear of indeterminate substance makes the recipes hard to read. I flick through the various directions, skimming across my grandmother’s spidery handwriting as she dictates how much butter one should use for tart casings, or which saucepan is best for the making of marshmallows. 

  Finally, I reach the page for the recipe I want; her famous chocolate-chip cookies, the shining centrepiece at all the family gatherings. My mouth begins to water at the thought of their cloud-like consistency, and suddenly I cannot wait to begin. I read the first sentence below the title; ‘My cookies are special for one reason and one reason only…' It feels like my heart is performing a gymnastics routine in anticipation. I take a deep breath and read the next part: 'They are special because I do not have a recipe. This way no one can steal my recipe, and they change a little every time.’ My stomach drops, and I can feel tears welling up in my eyes.

  I had done everything right, I had the proper equipment and outfit. I had cleared my whole afternoon just so I could bake these cookies. I had been gifted the recipe book when my grandmother had passed away and therefore given the enormous task of replicating her incredible cookies for my niece’s 5th birthday in just four hours. But it was more than that.

I missed my grandmother more than anything in the world. She was my whole life, I had only ever baked with her, her sure hands guiding me, showing me what to do. When she died, I felt a horrible emptiness that seemed like it would never go away. I thought that if I could make these cookies, maybe she would come back. Some small part of her would be with me again. I wanted to make these just so I could feel close to my grandmother again, and what did I have to show for it? Absolutely nothing. 

  I begin to pack up all the cooking materials, closing the cupboard doors much harder than necessary. Mixing bowl away, SLAM! Wooden spoons back there, SLAM! Milk and eggs back in the fridge, SLAM! I grab the recipe book too roughly and one of the fragile pages floats out and settles in a puddle of water splashed across the tiled floor of my kitchen. I brag at it in desperation, but it disintegrates in my fingers. 

  Defeated, sad, and angry, I slide onto the floor and begin to cry. Deep, racking sobs shake my body as I curl up in a ball, trying to shut the world out. As I wallow in my self-pity, a saying that my grandmother loved to say comes back to me.

  Giving up is perfectly natural. Giving up is part of life. You may give up on a relationship, a dream, or sewing a button onto a jumper. But although giving up is certainly the easiest option, it isn’t always the best. And I think you’d be surprised about what you can do if you just try that little bit harder. 

  I sit up and wipe the tears from my eyes. I retie my ponytail, taking a few deep breaths to steady myself before coming up with a new resolve. It doesn’t matter if I don’t have a recipe. I think. I will make these cookies. I will bring them to Cassie’s birthday party. And they will taste amazing. Recipe or not!

  Two cups of self-raising flour are dumped into a mixing bowl. One cup of milk, three eggs, and one and a half teaspoons of vanilla extract follow. I gain speed, and as I do, I get wilder and wilder with the ingredients. Chocolate chips, a pinch of salt, a dash of paprika. A lid full of baking powder is added alongside a splash of maple syrup and some shaved nutmeg. 

  I whisk with the speed and strength of a madwoman until the dough is relatively smooth, and I can no longer see and of the ingredients under the froth that I have created. Then I roll them into ball shapes and shove them in the oven. 400° is about right, isn’t it?

  Only when the smell of burnt cookies overpowers the Cherry Blossom & Green Tea Cleaning Spray do I pull the trays out of the oven, burning my hands at first and then remembering to use oven gloves. Some of the cookies’ edges are slightly charred, and others are still gooey in the middle, but it doesn’t matter. I made them. I really did.

  I grab the largest one off the tray and juggle it in my hands to cool it down. When it’s cold enough that it won’t burn my mouth, but the chocolate is still melted and dripping, I take a large bite. The flavour is… interesting, and something brittle (presumably an eggshell) crunches between my teeth. But as I eat, tears well up in my eyes and spill down my cheeks. They taste exactly like my grandmother’s, and as the warm cookie slides down my throat, I feel her there, enveloping me in her arms and telling me what an amazing job I did.  

  I can feel her spirit, as warm as the cookies still cooling on the counter.