Crackpot Cookery - Round 03

'Welcome back, folks,' Maya said. 'It occurred to us during the break that we've really lived up to the name of the show so far. There's been cookery, and it's certainly been crackpot. We started with dessert, after all. So that must mean that the third and final round should be the appetizer, right? My script says that should make sense, anyway.

'Either way, everything is still up for grabs in this round. Even Jade, currently in last place, can tie the scores up with a win here.'

The view moved over to the three contestants, who had been dressed in colour-coordinated waitress outfits. Each of them had on a tight white blouse, with only half the buttons fastened. Plain t-shirt bras were plainly visible beneath, each matching colours with their previous clothing -- Amelia's red, Jade's white, Holly's black. Below that, they had obscenely short skirts, hold-up stockings that hardly came close to covering all of the skin left bare by the skirts. Instead of suitable pumps or sensible shoes, they had plain but exquisitely polished black heels. Aesthetically, each contestant was a messy mish-mash of male fantasy and on-theme costume design. Practically, they were a trio of walking disasters, but that was entirely by design.

'This time, we're letting the girls choose their own meals -- from a pre-prepared list -- but they will have to serve them once they have done all the prep work. They will each be judged on speed of service, quality of food, and quantity of food. Yes, that's right, we severely doubt the entire course will be making its way to our tables. What a pity. So, ladies, what have you gone for?'

Holly, currently in the lead, was first in front of the camera. 'I'm keeping things simple with soup of the day and a buttered bread roll.'

'Probably a wise choice,' Maya said. 'If I were you, I'd keep things simple, too. What about you, Amelia?'

'I'm hoping that by being a little more daring I can wrangle up some points for quality, so I've chosen devilled eggs.'

'Given where some of this food is likely to end up, I'd say you should at least get some points for bravery,' Maya joked. 'And finally, Jade?'

'I think Holly has the right idea so I'm going really simple: nachos.'

'Well, don't expect much for quality, but I appreciate you going for something you can easily put together. Now, I'm sure you knew we wouldn't let you all of this easily for the final round. There's a catch. If you'll make your way to your kitchenettes again, you'll find the serving trays we're providing.'

As the women made their way to their workspaces, the shot cut to show the trays on the work surfaces. Each space is already occupied by a member of the production crew, anonymously dressed in order to prevent them drawing too much attention. The reason they are there becomes apparent when they lift the trays to show to the audience, and to the cameras. For the most part, the trays are like a regular TV tray, but fixed to either side is a chain about three feet long. Extending from that main chain are to smaller ones, both of which end in a clamp. Their purpose is obvious immediately.

'Fortunately for you, our helpful assistants will help you put those on,' Maya said. 'Even more fortunately, they won't be going on until you've finished preparing the food. At that point, our very eager assistants will fasten the trays in place, load them up, and it will be up to you to deliver the meals with as little spillage as you can manage. I think that's about it now. No more catches. No more rubs. Well, apart from the rub of rubber against your poor nipples, I guess. Ready? Go.'

And as suddenly as that, the contestants were flung into the finalé. All of the contestants took a moment to realise that they had begun, but it was Amelia who was first to really get started -- and first to realise she had been lied to. There was at least one more sting in this round's tail, as she soon learned that she had been given no cutlery. None of them had. She would be doing all her stirring and any mashing, whisking and so on by hand.

This wasn't a massive problem for Jade, at least, who had multiple steps in her preparation that just required dumping one thing onto another. She started by filling a dish with nachos from a large packet. The sum total of mess for this part was a few crumbs and a thin coating of the flavouring dust on her hands.

For Holly, it was a disaster. Granted, she could break vegetables down by hand, and it wasn't even particularly messy -- her hands got wet from the moisture, which was about it -- but it made the whole thing look very unappealing. Uneven lumps of carrot were thrown into a large saucepan alongside hand-snapped leaks. She did manage to peel an onion, but gave up on trying to break it after a few attempts. It was like trying to snap a phone book, except it was also round and smooth. Without a knife, she didn't even bother with the potatoes. There was no way she could break that down, and cooking it whole would just make the whole thing take far too long.

Amelia's job landed somewhere in the middle of the other two, in terms of difficulty. Certainly it would be messier than Holly's, given the fact that she had to handle -- literally handle -- mayonnaise, egg yolks and mustard. Logistically, though, it wasn't too bad. Nothing in the process was particularly difficult, nor did it rely heavily on kitchen equipment. Blending everything together by hand was going to be untidy and the finished product was going to be significantly worse for lack of a proper blender, but it would still be edible. It would still be devilled eggs, just not very good ones. Theoretically, she was onto a winner compared to Holly, whose soup was looking more and more likely to end up being solid vegetables in hot water.

Indeed, Holly didn't have much to do now that her veg was in and the water was bubbling away at a steady simmer. Unfortunately for her, this lack of responsibility was matched by a lack of agency. There really was nothing she could do to improve matters. It was a matter of waiting and praying that enough of the ingredients would break down quickly enough to make something vaguely soup-like. She couldn't even safely stir them.

Similarly, Jade had little to do except wait for her cheese to melt. She had gotten her fingers a little damp by picking jalapenos out of their jar and she knew she would have to scoop sour cream out of the jar by hand at the end of the process, but she too was largely just waiting.

Amelia continued to be the busiest of the bunch. Once her eggs had boiled she had to pour the boiling water into the sink with extreme caution, doing her best not to crack the eggs in the process. Next, she nimbly plucked the eggs from the sink and plopped them into an ice bath. While they were cooling, she got to work on the filling. She scooped mayonnaise out of its jar in satisfyingly sloppy handfuls, dumped it into a mixing bowl and used a couple of fingers to add the mustard, grateful that it wasn't her own ingredients she was cross-contaminating. Cringing and giggling in equal measure, she used both hands to mix them together, constantly forcing the slop to squelch through the gaps between her fingers. Finally, she pulled the eggs open and carefully added their firm yolks to the mix. A few minutes of sloppy mixing later, and she figured the filling was as good as it was likely to get. She filled six egg-halves with the still quite lumpy mixture and, after dusting them each with paprika, she reluctantly asked an assistant to attach her tray for her.

Time was up by this point, anyway. Jade's nachos, while uninspiring, had come out fairly well. She had managed to get a pretty even coating of melted cheese -- not really a sauce, but sensible in the circumstances. Jalapenos were dotted around the place, and while the sour cream had indeed led to slimy fingers on one hand, she had remained relatively tidy.

Holly was cleaner still, but her soup was easily the worst-looking of the three meals. As expected, there simply hadn't been enough time for the ingredients to become anything more than partly-cooked veg in a pan of hot water. She poured it into a bowl, sighed, and awaited her tray.

The assistants worked simultaneously, first hanging the trays' chains around the necks of the contestants. This part was easy for all involved. Next they had to attach the nipple clamps, one at a time. The clamps were big enough that they could be attached over t-shirts and still stay in place, but they would still be painful. The contestants yelped and flinched in almost perfect unison, once for the first clamp and again for the second. They each bit down on their bottom lip once their meals were placed on the trays. Holly, again, had the worst time, with her still-solid vegetables weighing considerably more than nachos or eggs. She winced in pain as the added weight tugged uncomfortably on her nipples. Worse still, all three women now had to walk over to the judge's table, every step causing the trays to shift around and pull uncomfortably at their breasts.

It was the most agonising ten feet that any of the women had ever walked, probably. What they didn't realise was that they would have to wait their the whole time. Maya was the only judge, and she didn't have any kind of table. This only dawned on the contestants when the host picked up one of Amelia's eggs directly from the plate on the tray. Naturally, this caused the tray to swing a little, which caused Amelia to gasp in pain and almost spill the remaining eggs.

'Ah, ah. Careful,' Maya warned. 'You'll be cleaning up any spillages with your clothing. Not bad, though,' she added, swallowing the last of the egg. 'The texture isn't great, but it tastes like a devilled egg to me. Well done.'

Maya patted Amelia on the shoulder. To viewers, it looked like a congratulatory gesture, but to Amelia it was another thing that caused her tray to move about, thus tugging on her already -sore nipples.

Moving down the line, leaving Amelia and her gritted teeth alone for now, Maya tore a few nachos away from the dish they had been served in. Jade was somewhat prepared for the jolt of pain it would cause, but still grunted softly.

'Pretty good,' Maya told her. 'Nothing special, but you weren't going for anything special. I'd have liked a few more toppings, but what's here works well enough.'

Jade forced a smile and was spared the pat that Amelia got, much to her relief.

'Well, I think I already know how this is going to be,' Maya said, tutting as she lifted a soup spoon from Holly's tray. Even this small change in the tray's weight elicited a slight gasp from its carrier. It only got worse as Maya used her spoon to move some of the vegetables out of the way so she could scoop up some hot, slightly off-coloured water. She tasted it, swallowed it, and looked at Holly with an expression like a disappointed teacher. 'It's just vaguely earthy-tasting water,' she said. 'Awful.'

Holly looked suitably chastened, but in truth she already knew that hers was the worst. Anybody could have seen that. She wasn't given a rewarding pat either, but nor was Holly left totally alone like Jade. Instead, Maya used her spoon to maliciously poke the tray, causing it to swing back and forth for the few seconds it took the momentum to run out. It didn't take long, but it did cause Holly to yelp in pain, following that up with a constant low-pitched groan that lasted several seconds longer than the actual swinging.

'The winner is Amelia,' Maya announced plainly a moment later. 'Jade is second -- just needed to be a little braver, I think. Holly is last, obviously. That means that Amelia is the overall winner, congratulations!'

During the announcement, all three women had finally been relieved of their trays. All three of them grunted in pain as the blood came flooding back to their throbbing nipples, and Holly was so distracted by her discomfort that she didn't even register the result at first. Her face went from agonised grimace to disappointment over the course of a couple of seconds.

'Of course, you know what that means,' Maya continued. 'Your prize is exposure, of course -- for you and your competitors. For them, though, it's a little more literal. You get to humiliate them live on national TV. As with any good meal, it involves multiple courses, too. As an appetiser, you get to remove their clothing -- well, most of it -- however you see fit. For the main course, we're bringing back all the food they chose, made, or ruined over the course of the show and you can do with that as you please. Finally, my favourite, the just desserts.