Iron Chef 2: Dessert Boogaloo

Raspberry snapped into action, retrieving the next set of ingredients behind them. The main attraction was the long yellow fruit sitting on top of the basket, and Alkonost raised one of them to the crowd.

"Banana," she declared.

"Banana!" the audience cheered in response, swept up in the theatrics of this bizarre culinary display. Cheron had to look around in amazement, he would have to take notes on how to put an audience under a spell like this for his own performances. With surprisingly fluid movements for creatures without thumbs, Raspberry and Kaiwi worked together to remove the peel from each of the bananas and handed the pile of to Alkonost. From there, she would throw one at a time into the air and cleave it into even halves with her claws. No matter the speed or height of the throw, she would always nail the slice, leaving the crowd's jaws on the floor. Behind the Theri delivering devastating blows to the peeled bananas, Cheron could still see the other cooks mixing something in a bowl behind her. Once she had sliced enough to feed a small army, Alkonost looked back towards them and they hurried forward with the bowl, revealing a lump white mixture that smelled strongly of eggs and powder, like the two hadn't been combined entirely. Alkonost covered the banana halves in this mixture before throwing them onto the grill, creating a sea of sizzling bananas that began to crisp around the outside. Once she had finished, the first bananas had browned nicely and she began to dispatch them into the crowd, simply throwing them into the waiting mob. Once the initial fear of boiling hot nanner had been dispelled, the air filled with the sound of chewing as various members of the crowd savoured the crispy outside and the creamy inner filling of the simple dessert. Cheron looked side to side, trying to see if any had landed near him when he felt a sharp claw tap his shoulder. Alkonost gave him a measured look, weighted with ceremony as she handed him his own slice of banana tempura. He shut his eyes to savour it, huffing past the hot temperature that hit his tongue to catch the distinctive banana flavour as it melted in his mouth.

When he opened his eyes again, Alkonost had her claws crossed, and her two line cooks had disappeared. Cheron followed the murmuring crowd as they shuffled and stood on their tip toes to locate the raptor and Para. They eventually emerged just off to the side, standing in front of a new display case with a new selection of plants. This one seemed to be entirely filled with preserved examples of grains and rice, including colourful watercolour paintings of where some of them used to be grown on flooded tiered terraces. Each sampling had a small label underneath, only discernable to the most fastidious of human-specialised scholars. It made for quite the backdrop as Raspberry hauled out a large stone bowl, dumping its contents out onto a mat on the floor and letting the gelatinous pile of rice sit there, wobbling slightly and steaming. 

"Mochigome rice," Raspberry announced, pointing to a small sample of rice to the left of the display case. It was almost indistinguishable from the other samples of rice plants but she said it with such confidence no one in the crowd doubted her identification. "Steamed overnight for the optimum form, now we shape it into dough." She did as she said, using her front legs to massage the gelatinous rice, still warm under her touch, rolling it back and forth until it formed a vague singular lump. She looked up and saw her assistant waiting in the shadows, his pale eyes gleaming. She gave the subtlest nod she could manage, being a creature with a crest so large, and Kaiwi leapt forward with a war cry. He was holding a wooden mallet with a long handle, about half the length of his body, and at the apex of his jump he brought the mallet down onto the doughy pile. The crowd gasped and some even shrieked at the sudden appearance but they were all glued to the way the dough stuck to the underside of the mallet, stretching out a few feet before snapping back to the pile it came from. Raspberry rolled the dough again like nothing had happened and once it was in a neat ball again, just a few moments of rolling, Kaiwi hammered it once more. They alternated like this, the silent and patient working of the dough contrasted with the loud and showy hammering of it afterwards. 

Alkonost had been hard at work while her line cooks were pounding the dough. She had put water, red beans and sugar into a pot and it was simmering away nicely as she waited for the dough to be finished. Kaiwi spun on his heel, delivering a blow from the mallet into the pot, sending water splashing over the grill and making the crowd gasp in shock. Alkonost merely nodded, far from the splash zone as the raptor turned the boiled beans into paste. She raised a hand to stop him and he bowed lowly, his nose nearly touching the ground as he backed away. Raspberry stepped forward with the finished dough, offering it to the Theri with an unmistakable air of reverence. Alkonost inspected the pale blob and gestured to the grill. The Para dropped the dough onto the griddle but before they even had a chance to begin hissing against the hot surface, the head chef drew her claws again and cut it into smaller chunks. Raspberry rolled these too, quickly so they formed miniature versions of the large dough blob they once were. The audience watched in anticipation as the dough began to brown and Alkonost drained the excess water from the bean paste, dumping it into a bucket that she kicked under the grill out of her way. There seemed to be nothing else for the chefs to do as they began to perform some kind of shimmying dance, raising their forelimbs like they were pulling the dough upwards. The atmosphere they had built from the first part of the performance carried them through, making the crowd bob in unison with their strange ritual dance. There was no music, no sound except for the sizzling of the dough and the murmuring of the crowd but Cheron could swear there was some inaudible beat they were all moving to. He could swear even the hanging skeletons in the adjacent hall of the museum were slightly swaying to it too. He glanced over his shoulder to double check and saw the crowd now extended to fill almost the entirety of the botanical wing. He could barely see the displays of preserved flowers through the eager audience, the shorter ones on their tiptoes and the larger ones craning their necks to see over. He tore his gaze away from the shelves packed with younger dinosaurs instead of their usual exhibition of seeds and focused again on the purple chef.

Alkonost swept the dough balls with the flat of her fingers instead of her claws, flipping them over to cook through the other side, admiring the firm texture of the successfully grilled sides that now faced upwards. The anticipation was reaching fever pitch now as Kaiwi and Raspberry ran to set out plates, one for each bun of dough and the crowd were waiting for the final plating. Alkonost leaned closer and closer to the surface of the grill, watching the dough rise and puff outward with each passing moment. Like a switch had been flipped, she let out a cry and swiped all of them onto their plates. She grabbed the bowl of red paste and portioned it out equally between the blobs of mochi. She held the plates aloft, far above the vast majority of the crowd's heads. Hands began to reach towards her, begging to be allowed the first taste.

"Small bites," was all she said as she lowered the first plate in front of Cheron. The ringmaster bowed his head slightly at her, honoured to be given the first taste. He heeded her instructions, only taking a small bite from the bun and taking a small amount of the red bean paste with it. He was instantly glad he did, the bite seemed to expand in his mouth, filling it with the soft and pillowy texture of the mochi. It was plain in flavour but the red bean paste more than made up for it, swinging across his tastebuds with a sharp sweetness that made his mouth water. The combination of the two: the soft and chewy mochi and the paste, teetering on the edge of being too sweet, had him returning for another bite the second he swallowed the first one. This seemed to be the only review the head chef needed as she began to hand out the other plates with the same warning, glowering with such force that the excitement for the food was tempered with the correct amount of caution. Their job finished, the trio of chefs bowed to the crowd and turned off their teppanyaki grill to thunderous applause and cheers.