[The Midnight Gem]Even a human could...[Weekend Challenge]

by **Crylon Stonecraft** on March 31st, 2019, 7:16 pm

19 Spring 519

Rising early that Spring morning, Crylon took a few moments as he lay in bed to ponder his days activities. At the moment he had nothing particularly pressing. No specific plan of something to work on, to improve, make, or learn. Today was but a quiet day which he needed to fill.

After a few moments Crylon had considered and tossed aside several things, when he felt a small rumble in his gut. He was hungry. It was then he realized, that was something to do! Not to eat, he did that every day, but to learn how to cook. To make food from disparate things, or to by some method or other transform them from one state into one ready for eating. He had not tried his hand at it before, but how hard could it be?

He was an Isur. Humans by the droves did it, or else how would he have been eating all this time? How would they have been eating all this time? They would be out in a field eating grass like a goat, or else they knew how to cook. And anything a human could do, an Isur could certainly learn.

And besides, Crylon reminded himself, he was a builder. He could understand the inner workings of a building, what did what, how to support it, how to lay it down. How to make it strong. If he could build an entire structure, surely then a simple meal would be no trouble at all? If he could use all those disparate tools used in industry and craft, hammers and saws and planes and the like, then he could work some simple cooking tools.

Rising from bed Crylon made haste to the cooking room, beginning to root around for starters as a means of familiarizing himself with his environment. The same as he would before starting work in a new smithy, he marked out in his mind where everything was. Where the tools lay. The hearth for cooking on. A pile of pans and things for cooking on or in. A somewhat dull knife of unknown providence that had seen better days.

And nearby was a pantry, a place holding various bits of food stuffs. Plants. Some meat. Eggs from the chickens. The plants seemed pretty simple, all they required he thought was some application of heat. The same as heating up metal in a forge. Ah, a forge!

Turning Crylon headed to the hearth to kindle a fire. Bits of something fine shredded, perhaps plant. He placed some of that down, and took out some flint and steel to start it with sparks. Once, twice, three times, a smolder, a flame. Quick, before it goes out feed it! Some small bits of wood to give it sustenance. Let it lick over the wood. That starts as well. Feed it some bigger bits of wood. A proper fire going. Once he had the flames properly tended Crylon headed to look for something to cook.

Moving into the pantry Crylon grabbed a small box of something, some green stalk like plant. Grabbing one from the box Crylon headed over to the fire, and holding it in his left arm dropped it in. Occasionally he would poke it about with his fingers on that hand, letting the heat properly lick over it, much as he would a piece of metal he had dropped into a forge and was heating up.

Everything seemed to be going fine for a short while, until suddenly the green plant- which had blackened by then- caught aflame. Rushing forward Crylon grabbed up the plant with his left hand, and turning found a bucket of water to the side and promptly dropped it in.

Perhaps, Crylon mused, this would not be so simple as he had thought...

WC: 635

by **Crylon Stonecraft** on March 31st, 2019, 7:51 pm

Once the fire had been extinguished, Crylon noticed some tinkling from nearby. It took him a few moments to realize it was the Gem's chimes. Or more to the point, the Gem intermittently setting off all of its chimes for a few moments, stopping, then doing it again. For some odd reason it reminded Crylon of someone laughing, though he was not sure why. Of course, if a building was too laugh, how would that sound? Particularly one that could only “speak” in such a limited fashion.

After Crylon took the plant from the water the sound stopped, except one final single chime for a single moment.

No one else was around, and no one was interacting with the chimes, so it had to be the Gem, but what she might be trying to tell him Crylon was unsure. They had no other means of speech, and so he was left to wonder.

Pulling at the blackened plant which was slowly dripping now that it was out of the water, Crylon tried to ponder what he had done wrong. He could see the crinkle of the plant, but beneath that thin layer... Beneath that was something yellow, he could see from a spot where the flame had burned through. Pulling at this he realized the bit of green had been the outer layer, and underneath was... Corn.

He had not recognized it before within its covering, had not he supposed seen a whole uncooked or unprepared corn cob, but once its outer layer was gone he knew it by sight. That had been the problem, he realized, he had forgotten to take off the shell!

It took a bit longer because bits were scorched and burned, but soon enough he got the entire outer layer of the corn stalk off leaving only the yellow corn cob beneath. Minus, he admitted, some black bits where the fire had burned through with the stalk.

It was like, he tried to apply his prior understanding and logic, he had been heating it while it was still in the box it was carried in. Adding some more wood to the hearth Crylon waited a few moments for it to catch, before adding the corn back in. Now he was applying the heat directly to the corn, rather than its coating.

This seemed to work, as he could see by looking the corn was starting to darken. That was, surely - he thought, a sign of it cooking. Of progress.

It was when Crylon was looking about for something to put the corn on when he was done cooking it, that he realized there was the smell of smoke again. Of flame. Turning back he found the corn aflame again. Once more using his left arm he pulled the corn from the hearth's flames, and dropped it into the water bucket. More chimes.

Yes, Crylon realized, The Gem was laughing at him.

He just was not sure what he was doing wrong. It was then though that his eyes turned to the stack of metal nearby. Pans. Pots. Things. Perhaps those were to be used?

WC: 520

by **Crylon Stonecraft** on March 31st, 2019, 8:23 pm

Turning to the pots Crylon picked one up, considering it.

First, he had tried adding in the plant whole. That had not been it, as the coating or husk had caught aflame. Likewise when he had removed the husk, the innards had caught aflame. Or at least burnt. But it had to be possible, since he knew he had seen people cook before. So it was possible, just that he was missing something...

The application of heat then, without direct fire? The pan was metal, but stern enough he did not think it would melt in the small flame from the hearth which was not too hot of a fire. But it would transmit the heat, he realized. If he put the food on the pan, it would cook by being heated. Just not directly, as he would with metal. It appeared cooking food to turn it into a state ready to be eaten was rather more different than he had realized as heating metal to make it malleable enough to shape it was with metal.

Tossing aside the burnt corn that was still dripping into a bin for refuse, Crylon went and fetched another piece of corn. Pulling he took off its husk, its outer coating, revealing the yellow corn beneath.

Then he placed the denuded corn into a metal pan, which he placed over the hearth. Heat made metal hot, and if hot enough it became malleable. With food it was less about becoming malleable, and more about... Something. Something though he was not quite clear on. He had seen food, knew it was usually served hot, but he realized then he had not seen it made and so was not completely clear on the process.

He had simply assumed his other knowledge would carry over, and that if humans had figured it out well enough to not starve then he as an Isur should have no issues figuring it out.

That was quickly proving false, and he was left to ponder his own inadequacies. He might be able to build a house with little more than his bare hands, but making a meal was another thing entirely. As different as working metal was from working wood, if not more so. Both of the former were about yielding materials, materials which simply needed to be shaped. With food though, the shape was not the problem.

It was, Crylon felt, like he was missing some critical bit of knowledge after which things would slot into place.

As the pan heated up, the corn within began to sizzle where it met the pan.

As he thought about it though, perhaps cooking was more different than that? With a building, you could use different materials, hold them together in different ways, but in the end you were doing the same thing just to a different design. A different shape. It all came out the same though, whether of stacked stones, logs of wood, bricks, planks, whatever it was made of.

There was more sizzle, and as he turned the corn he saw some of the corn on the outside of the plant had began to blacken or brown.

Perhaps a pan was not the intended tool for this?

Perhaps he should just go to a restaurant and pay for some prepared food...

WC: 551

by **Crylon Stonecraft** on March 31st, 2019, 8:49 pm

When he continued to blacken the corn, Crylon thought perhaps it had cooked enough.

Moving the pan off the flame, Crylon waited a few chimes to let it cool, before carefully prodding the corn with his normal right hand. It did not burn him, though it was still warm.

Carefully picking it up, he tried to take a bit, but found that the non-blackened bits were not cooked properly, still more or less raw somehow. And the blackened bits were charred, shriveled, and burnt. Like eating a bit of coal from a forge. This he spit out, along with the first piece of corn he had burned.

Perhaps corn was not the place to start? Something smaller maybe, would be easier to cook?

Returning to the pantry holding the food, Crylon moved about trying to find something that looked simpler. Something he could cook with less trouble. Something that did not have so many parts.

After a chime he found something, a box of mushrooms. Smaller, each fist sized or smaller than that, they would he reasoned be easier than corn?

Grabbing a half handful of the mushrooms, he dropped these back in the first pan stalk and head, which he saw had some black residue in the bottom. He would need to clean it out afterwards.

Bringing it back to the fire he began to heat them up. This time however he tried to move them about, reasoning that perhaps the reason some of the corn had burned was because all the heat was on one part of the food and was not moved around or distributed evenly.

He tried moving them about with a flick of his wrist, making them hop in the air and turn over. This worked a few times, until he missed and dropped the lot out of the pan and into the hearth below.

Moving hurriedly he tried to pull them out and put them back in the pan with his left hand, but by the time he retrieved the fragile mushrooms they were burned. Ruined, just as the corn had been.

Letting out a sigh Crylon moved to the increasingly full waste bucket, and dumped out the burned carcass of the mushrooms.

Note to self, make sure the food stays in whats cooking it.

Glad he had decided to only cook a small bit, and so had not pulled out many mushrooms which would have gone to waste, literally, he grabbed another half handful. Until he got things down, if he did, he would make sure to cook in small bits.

This time as he added them to the pan and put it over the hearth, he moved them more carefully. Setting the pan down he would quickly turn them over with his fingers on his left hand, before grabbing the pan back up and letting them cook further.

This seemed to work, as after a few chimes they were still cooking and had not fallen out of the pan to burn in the hearth, and were not on fire.

Progress, of a sort.

WC: 511

by **Crylon Stonecraft** on March 31st, 2019, 9:06 pm

After moving the mushrooms about a few more times, and applying steady heat from the pan, Crylon noticed the mushrooms had began to darken. A Positive sign, and while he was not sure what exactly they should look like when done he thought this was as good of a time as any.

Moving the pan aside he once more let them cool for a few minutes, before trying them out. A quick tap with his right hand fingers to make sure they were not still too hot. Picking one up Crylon slowly brought it to his mouth, and carefully took a bite. And chewed. And chewed. And chewed.

It was bad.

Somehow he had cooked them so as to make them gummy, or overly chewy such that they did not taste right. Beyond not being possible to chew, they also did not taste correct as a cooked mushroom should.

Odd, he thought, since to begin with they had been quite soft being a mushroom. Some feature however of the heat treatment had by some means he did not understand transformed them into the tough, chewy, ill tasting thing before him.

But still edible, he thought. And so, with some gritting of his teeth and twisting of the face, he popped another mushroom into his mouth and chewed at it until he could swallow. Considering how chewy they were, it took quite some time to make his way though the entire half of a handful he had cooked.

Looking at a piece of wood, he could reason out how to work it into a shape he desired. The same for metal, even if he had not done it before or had not made that shape before. It seemed to in a manner seem simple and straightforward, as if traveling a straight line and he could see which way it was going and so which way to take.

Cooking however seemed to instead be a circle, unclear where one started or ended or how to get where one wanted on the circle from another identical point on the circle.

Moving about the kitchen Crylon set aside the used pan to wash out later, pondering where he had gone wrong. Should he have used a pot? Filled it with water, and boiled the things inside that water? That perhaps would apply a more even heat, but how did one know which to use? So many tools, and rather than all coming to the same end result each method of cooking seemed rather different from each other. Like an entirely different dish.

Letting out a sigh, Crylon pondered the food, and resolved himself to for some time either have to let others cook for him, or to partake of quite bad food.

Of course, there were other people about the Gem who knew how to cook, and there were places in the city which served prepared food. So it was not impossible to get by without cooking. Just not as easy. But unlike various types of building and crafting, this did not seem to come natural to the Isur.

WC: 515