“I’m not certain what you’re asking,” I told her. Which was certainly the truth.
“Inside the biscuits.”
“I don’t. . .” I began, but then, upon actually looking at what I had been doing, I understood the question. The “biscuits” to which the child had been referring were not fresh from a bakery. Rather, they came in a tube designed to be stored in a refrigerator. One simply pops open the tube by pulling a strip down the side of the container. Inside, there are eight white disks of dough which, if placed in the oven for the requisite time, emerge as biscuits. I eat such products frequently. So frequently, in fact, that I go into auto-pilot mode as I cook for myself, never paying attention to the process.
“You want to put something inside the biscuits *before* they are baked?” I asked her.
“Yes, please.”
“Why would you want to do that, Zoe?”
“Just to make it different. Maybe. . . even better. Just to. . . I don’t know. . . see what happens. Do you think it would work?”
“I must say I don’t know. The biscuits are a specific design. If they are separated to insert something, that might alter the result. And whatever was inserted would be subjected to the same degree of heat for the same duration.”
“But can’t we *see*?”
“If you like.”
“Goody!” the child exclaimed, clapping her hands. She immediately began to forage through the entire supply of foodstuffs, holding up various options much as an artist might examine a dab of color before applying it to canvas. She finally settled on an entire palette: Celery, onion, radish, parsley, and other herbs.
“Are you going to put all that in the biscuits?” I asked her.
“No, silly. Each biscuit gets a different one.”
“Very intelligent,” I complimented her. “That increases significantly the prospects of success for at least a portion of the experiment.”
“And they might *all* be good too.”
The child was still during the baking process, but stole occasional glances at the oven. When the timer sounded, she reached it before I did. She turned the oven off, opened the door, and took out the metal tray with the biscuits, being careful to wrap her hand in a towel first. I never use a pot holder for such tasks and the child had apparently observed my propensity for utilizing whatever was at hand.
“They *look* real good,” she said, holding out the tray.
I was constrained to agree. The appearance of the finished product did not vary visually from what I had grown accustomed to over the years.
“Which one do you want?” she asked.
“Do you remember which is which?”
“Yes,” she said proudly. “Just tell me which one you want, and I’ll pick it out.”
“Oh, the. . . parsley.”
“Here!” she said, reaching unerringly for the correct biscuit. She watched as I took a tentative bite. It tasted as it usually did but, perhaps, there was just a hint of parsley. . .?
“It’s quite good,” I told her.
“See?”
“Yes, I do. Now perhaps you would like to sample one yourself?”
“I’m going to try the onion,” she declared.
We then reversed roles, me watching her with some interest. “Ummm! It’s really, really good!” she sang out.
The radish biscuits—she had, for some reason, made two of those—were, we both agreed, the least successful of the batch. “Now you have your own recipe, Zoe,” I told her.
“My own?”
“Certainly. You are the originator, so it is certainly your own.”
“You mean it’s a secret?”
“Not necessarily. I only mean you hold the key. If you share your recipe with anyone else, they could certainly pass it along. But if you keep it to yourself, only you will know.”
“You know too.”
“I promise I shall never tell another living soul.”
“Swear?”
“Yes, child. I swear.”
“What should I call it?”
“Well, what about ‘Zoe’s Secret Recipe’?”
“No, I don’t like that. It’s not really a secret, it’s more like a. . . they *look* the same, right? As the regular ones?”
