The Just Desserts Club Page 2
“I would have guessed it if you’d given me more time,” Cricket argued.
“No, you wouldn’t. No one ever guesses the answer.”
“Wait a minute,” Julio interrupted. “Aren’t you forgetting something? I’m supposed to get a prize from you for guessing about the zucchini. Remember?”
Cricket did remember, but it didn’t seem fair. Julio had made a lucky guess. Well, he’d get his “just desserts” all right!
“Wait outside,” she told the boys. “I’ll bring Julio his prize in one minute.”
Lucas, Marcus, Marius, and Julio waited in front of Cricket’s house. “I never won a prize before,” said Julio, eager to see what he’d get.
Cricket came out and handed Julio a paper bag. “Here’s your prize,” she told him.
Julio quickly opened the bag and let out a groan. Inside were two large green zucchini. But there were still fourteen zucchini left at the Kaufman house. Plenty for cooking with the next day.
Zucchini “Apple” Crisp
Ingredients for Pie Filling
8 cups peeled and sliced zucchini (three or four zucchini, depending on size)
2∕3 cup lemon juice
1 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon nutmeg
Topping for Pie
¾ stick of butter or margarine, at room temperature
½ cup oatmeal
½ cup flour
½ cup light brown sugar
1 ready-to-use piecrust
Cooking Directions
• Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
• Cook zucchini and lemon juice in a saucepan on top of the stove until tender—about 30 minutes. During last 10 minutes add sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg, and stir everything together.
• While zucchini is cooking, mix all the topping ingredients in a large bowl. This works best and also is most fun when done with your fingers, but be sure to wash your hands thoroughly first!
• Pour zucchini mixture into ready-to-use piecrust.
• Add topping. Bake for 30 minutes.
• Allow to cool before eating.
• Fool your friends by telling them that this is an apple pie!
Brownie Surprise Cake
(The surprise is that it is made with zucchini.)
Ingredients
1 stick butter or margarine, at room temperature
½ cup canola or corn oil
1 ¾ cups white sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 eggs
½ cup plain yogurt
½ cup cocoa powder
½ teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
2 cups flour
2 cups unpeeled grated zucchini (about two zucchini)
½ cup chocolate chips
½ cup chopped walnuts (optional)
Cooking Directions
• Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
• In a large bowl, mix butter or margarine together with oil. Add eggs and vanilla. Beat until smooth.
• Add yogurt.
• In a separate bowl, combine flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, and salt, and stir into the wet batter.
• Add zucchini, chocolate chips, and nuts (if you don’t like nuts, you can leave them out). Stir until everything is blended together.
• Pour batter into a greased and floured 9-inch-by-13-inch baking pan or a tube pan.
• Bake for an hour. Test for doneness by sticking a wooden toothpick into cake. If it comes out clean, you will know that the brownies are done. If not, allow to bake another few minutes and test again.
• Cool before removing from pan.
Zucchini Bread
This recipe makes two loaves. You can always give one to a friend or wrap one in aluminum foil and freeze for another day. To make only one loaf, use one whole egg plus one egg yolk, and use half of all of the other ingredients.
Ingredients
3 eggs
1 cup canola or corn oil
2 ½ cups white sugar
2 cups grated zucchini, unpeeled
3 teaspoons vanilla
3 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon baking powder
3 teaspoons cinnamon
½ teaspoon salt
walnuts or pecans and raisins (optional)
Cooking Directions
• Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
• Combine eggs, oil, sugar, zucchini, and vanilla in a large bowl. Beat using an electric mixer (if you have one—if not, use an eggbeater and a lot of muscle).
• Add flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, salt, and, if you want them, nuts and raisins.
• Mix well. Batter will be runny.
• Pour into two greased and floured loaf pans.
• Bake for about one hour. Use a toothpick to test for doneness.
• Cool in pan for about ten minutes. Turn pan upside down and loaf will fall out.
Zucchini Cookies
Ingredients
¾ stick butter or margarine, at room temperature
¾ cup light brown sugar
1 egg
½ teaspoon vanilla
grated rind of one orange
1½ cups grated zucchini, unpeeled
1¾ cups flour
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
1½ cups granola cereal
½ cup chocolate or butterscotch chips
Cooking Directions
• Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
• Mix butter or margarine with sugar. Add egg, vanilla, and grated orange rind. Add zucchini.
• Into this mixture add flour, baking soda, salt, granola, and chips.
• When all is mixed together, drop by spoonfuls onto an ungreased baking sheet. Leave spaces between cookies, as they will spread when they cook.
• Bake for 12 to 15 minutes.
• Allow to cool for a minute or two before removing with a spatula.
TWO
Cooking Up a Plan
Sixth grade was even better than Cricket had ever imagined. First of all, she was together once again with all her old friends—Zoe, Sara Jane, Lucas, and Julio. But the best thing about sixth grade was being part of the oldest group at the Edison-Armstrong School. This had its privileges, as well as its responsibilities—which suited Cricket just fine, because she had always felt a little more grown-up than everyone else.
So Cricket was especially excited when their sixth-grade teacher, Mrs. Cheechia, told her class that they were going to run the annual clothing drive. Cricket remembered contributing her old snow boots to the drive the previous year. Now she found herself going around the school and reminding the students to bring in warm clothing, which would be donated to the homeless shelter in town. Since Cricket loved telling people what to do, this was a job she really enjoyed. No wonder the sixth graders collected more clothing this year than ever before.
It was a bit of a letdown when the clothing drive ended. “Now we should do something else,” Cricket suggested to her teacher.
“What do you have in mind?” Mrs. Cheechia asked. For once, Cricket didn’t have an answer.
“How about a food drive?” said Julio. “It’s no good being warm if you’re feeling hungry. Let’s collect food to give away.”
“I wish someone would collect something for me to eat,” Lucas called out. “I slept so late this morning, I hardly had any breakfast.”
“It serves you right,” scolded Cricket. “You should get up on time, like I do.”
“Never mind.” Mrs. Cheechia hushed the students. “Let’s see a show of hands. How many think they’d like to take part in a food drive?”
Every hand in the class went up. Even Lucas Cott forgot his own stomach for the moment and agreed it was a good plan.
“We should bring in canned goods and things that won’t spoil,” said Zoe.
“What kind of thi
ngs?” asked Arthur.
“Think for a minute,” Mrs. Cheechia instructed. “What comes in a package and stays fresh without refrigeration?”
“Wrapped elephants,” Lucas called out, and everyone laughed.
Mrs. Cheechia sighed. “Lucas Cott, sometimes I feel like wrapping you up and putting you in a package.”
Lucas would be fresh whether wrapped or unwrapped, Cricket thought.
The students suggested types of food that would not spoil: pasta, rice, dried beans, and cookies.
“What about bread?” asked Arthur.
“No, no,” Cricket called out, forgetting to raise her hand. “Bread would get stale or even moldy after a few days.”
“You could always make toast out of stale bread,” replied Arthur, defending his suggestion.
“You could make penicillin out of moldy bread,” shouted Lucas. He smiled triumphantly when he got another laugh.
Mrs. Cheechia ignored Lucas. “Think before you bring anything in,” she reminded her students. “Ask yourself if it could sit on a shelf in the back of our classroom for a couple of weeks without going bad.”
“Could we make announcements on the public-address system?” asked Cricket. She had enjoyed doing that for the clothing drive. In fact, as she sat in her seat she suddenly got a great idea: Rhymed slogans would make the messages stick in people’s heads. She opened her notebook and started scribbling some potential announcements:
Ask your Aunt Milly for a can of chili.
Will you please bring a can of peas.
It’s not too rash to bring corned beef hash.
We’ll give a whoop if you donate a can of soup.
Mrs. Cheechia thought the announcements were a great idea. And over the next couple of weeks, Cricket was pleased to hear students repeating the rhymes she and her classmates read every morning over the PA system. The food contributions began piling up as a result.
Cricket’s mother donated a brand-new jar of strawberry jam, two cans of sardines, and a bottle of ketchup. Cricket felt sorry for the people who would get these contributions. What kind of meal would that make? Sardines with ketchup and strawberry jam!
That’s when Cricket got another idea. “If we collected money, as well as food, the needy people could go out and buy fresh things too. They could get bread and butter, or cheese or meat.”
“That’s true, Cricket,” Mrs. Cheechia agreed. “If anyone would like to donate money from their allowance or their savings, I will collect it for this cause. However, I don’t want you to ask your parents for money. This should be a student effort. Perhaps a few of you could think of ways to raise some money.”
“I know how we could get loads of money,” Julio announced.
“Loads of money?” called out Lucas. “What are we going to do? Dig for gold out in the school yard?”
“No,” said Julio. “We could collect soda cans and get the nickel deposit on each of them. I saw two cans in the street on my way to school this morning. I bet we could find a ton of cans.”
“My father drinks a can of beer with his supper sometimes,” a girl called out. “You get a nickel back on beer cans too.”
“All right, kids. Any money we can collect will be a bonus,” said Mrs. Cheechia. “I’m delighted that you have all gotten into the spirit of giving. Bring in any money that you make collecting cans, and we’ll get gift certificates to be used at the supermarket.”
Cricket thought about Julio’s plan. Doing the math in her head, she realized that she and her classmates would have to find a hundred cans in order to earn five dollars.
“There’s got to be a better way to earn money” she told Julio at lunchtime.
“Trust me,” Julio replied. “Tomorrow’s Saturday. If we go out together, we’ll find a zillion cans.”
Julio made it sound as if the streets were covered with empty cans, Cricket thought. She was certain they wouldn’t find enough to make much money. But on the other hand, if Zoe and Sara Jane were going along with Lucas and Julio, she didn’t want to be left out.
So the next morning she met up with her friends as planned. Lucas had brought along a wagon that belonged to his little brothers. “This will hold a lot of cans,” he said optimistically.
“We’ll need it to get the cans to the supermarket,” Julio commented.
“First we have to find the cans,” Cricket reminded everyone.
The five friends walked along the street with Lucas in the rear, pulling the old wagon. The wagon already contained two cans that Lucas had brought from home.
“How come I always see cans in the street when I’m not looking for them?” Sara Jane wondered aloud.
The streets were amazingly clean. Most people in the neighborhood had even raked and swept up the autumn leaves, collecting them neatly in large plastic bags.
Suddenly Lucas gave a shout. “There’s one!” he called. All five kids ran toward the lone can, which was resting against the curb. Julio picked it up and threw it into the wagon.
“Wow!” said Cricket sarcastically. “Now we’ve made fifteen cents!”
“Believe me, we’re going to make money before the day is over, ” Julio said.
“I don’t believe you,” Cricket said. “Why don’t we have a bake sale? Then we’d really make money.”
“When we had the bake sale at school last year, it was a lot of fun,” Sara Jane remembered.
“Yeah. But it takes too long to bake things,” Julio replied. “You’ll spend all day cooking, and there won’t be any time to sell the stuff.”
“I know lots of easy recipes that don’t take a long time to fix,” said Cricket. “I’ll explain them if you guys decide to drop this silly hunt-the-can plan of yours and agree to have a bake sale instead. Let’s take a vote. How many think we should have a bake sale?”
Even though she wasn’t in school, Cricket raised her hand up in the air. Zoe and Sara Jane raised their hands up too. Lucas and Julio kept their hands at their sides.
“See. My plan wins,” Cricket said triumphantly.
“So go have a bake sale,” Lucas said. “Julio and I are going to collect cans. We don’t need you.”
“We’ll earn more than you,” Zoe warned the boys.
“Says who?” Lucas wanted to know.
“We do,” said Cricket as she and Sara Jane and Zoe turned to leave the boys.
“Come to my house,” Zoe invited. “I know my mom will let us do some cooking.”
“Okay,” Cricket agreed. She was pleased to have won the girls over to her point of view. She couldn’t wait to tell them about the no-bake cookies that she knew how to make.
Cricket, Sara Jane, and Zoe, with a little assistance from Zoe’s older sister, Hailey, spent the next couple of hours cooking up some treats to sell. Cricket saw an unopened box of vanilla wafers in the cupboard and used them for a recipe she knew. Hailey taught the girls how to make another type of treat. They looked through Zoe’s mother’s cookbooks and found still another recipe that would be quick and easy to prepare.
They were so busy working in the kitchen that Zoe’s mother offered to phone and order a pizza for their lunch. It was a good thing, because all the counter space was filled with plates of cookies. The sink was overflowing with dirty bowls and utensils. There was no room or time for meal preparation.
When lunch was over, the girls carried a folding table out to the street. “Let’s set it up at the corner,” Cricket suggested. “More people pass by that way.”
It took more effort to transport everything to the corner, but it was worth it. Zoe insisted they needed to put a tablecloth on the table. And then they needed to bring out the trays with the things for sale.
“Too bad Lucas isn’t here with the wagon,” Sara Jane observed. “We could use it now.”
“I wonder how much money they’re making,” Zoe said.
“Not much,” said Cricket.
Because it was a lovely autumn day many people were outside. Some adults were working in their
yards, two teenage boys were washing a car, and several young children were out on their bikes. It didn’t take long for the table of baked goods to attract attention.
Zoe got an idea and ran back to her house. She returned carrying a half gallon of milk and some paper cups.
“Milk and two cookies are fifty cents,” she announced.
“That’s equal to ten empty cans!” Cricket said happily as she poured milk into cups for two little girls whose mother brought them—their first customers.
Before long there were many others waiting in line. The guys washing the car came over and bought thirty-five cents’ worth of cookies.
“Don’t you want to buy some milk?” asked Cricket.
“Naw,” said one of them. “We’ve got some soda to drink.” He pointed to two cans resting on the curb near the car.
“Keep an eye on the cans,” Zoe whispered to her friends. “We’ll show Lucas and Julio that we can sell cookies and collect empty cans at the same time.”
Just as the rush of customers was over, Lucas and Julio came along the street. Lucas was still pulling the wagon, but there was nothing in it.
“Did you turn in your three cans?” Cricket asked.
“We turned in a whole lot more than three,” said Julio.
“We found a man who had a garage full of cans. He said we could take them all and keep the deposit,” Lucas said proudly. “He was going to do it himself, but he never got around to it. So when he heard we were going to give the money to charity, he offered them to us. He said it would probably be worth the effort.”
“Well, was it?” asked Cricket.
“Was it what?” Julio responded.
“Worth the effort? How much did you make?”
“There sure were a lot of cans,” Lucas remarked. “We had to make three separate trips to the supermarket because there were so many of them that they couldn’t all fit in the wagon at once.”
Julio put his hand in his pocket and pulled out several dollars. He started counting. “Seven dollars and thirty-five cents,” he said.
“How many cans was that?” Sara Jane wanted to know.
“One hundred and forty seven,” said Lucas and Cricket simultaneously. They were both good at math.