When we got back to the dining room, Mika was sitting with someone I hadn’t seen before — a woman about her age, with slightly wavy black hair, wearing a white apron. Kitchen worker?
Both had dishes in front of them, and were eating in careful bites with thoughtful expressions. Mika spotted us.
“Ah, perfect timing.”
“What’s up?”
She brought the other woman over.
“This is Aer. She runs the café Parento in town—”
“Oh — I was just there yesterday. Nice atmosphere.”
I’ll skip mentioning the soaked-table incident. Aer probably hadn’t been on the floor, so she wouldn’t have seen it. If she had, this would be awkward.
“She’s thinking about adding a new menu item and wants opinions. Thought a foreigner might know some interesting dishes.”
“If you could suggest a dish, I’d appreciate it.”
Aer bowed slightly. Linze and I looked at each other and nodded.
“If we can be useful.”
”…Mm.”
If we could.
“What kind of dish are you thinking?”
“Hmm… ideally something easy to eat. Something dessert-like, and something women would gravitate to, even better.”
“Something women would like… hmm. Crepes, ice cream — those are about all I can come up with…”
Embarrassingly thin set of options. I don’t really cook.
“Ice — like the frozen stuff?”
“No, not that — ice cream.”
“Ice cream?”
Wait. They were all staring at me blankly. Doesn’t this world have ice cream…?
“What kind of dish is it?”
“Sweet, cold, white… you don’t know vanilla ice cream?”
“Never heard of it.”
Apparently they really hadn’t. Right — no refrigeration, of course not.
“Do you know how to make it?”
“Uh — no, I just know you make it with milk somehow…”
I trailed off. Don’t really know.
…Wait. I didn’t know how to make it — but I could look it up.
“Hold on a sec. We might be able to do this. Linze, help me out?”
”…Mm, sure.”
I led Linze to my room. I pulled out the phone and searched “ice cream recipe.” Yes, got it, got it.
”…What is that?”
Linze peered at me operating the phone.
“Uh — a convenient magic device. Only I can use it. Don’t dig too deep.”
She looked dubious but didn’t press. Good kid.
“Okay, write down what I read off.”
“Got it.”
“Three eggs, 200ml of fresh cream, 60 to 80 grams of sugar… any words you don’t know there?”
I rattled the ingredients off and asked.
“What are milliliters and grams?”
Right.
“Milliliters are a measure of volume from my country. Grams are weight. We’ll have to eyeball it on this side… Oh — also, can you do ice magic?”
“Yes — it’s Water-element.”
Perfect. No problem then. I had her write down the rest of the recipe.
Aer worked from Linze’s transcription. A complete amateur trying it would’ve been worse. I helped with the whipping — getting it to peaks took some elbow grease.
Finally, with the mixture in a sealed container, Linze cast a spell to surround it with ice. We waited, smashed the ice off at the right moment, and pulled out the container. Set. Looking good.
I tasted a spoonful. Slightly different in detail, but recognizably vanilla ice cream.
I plated some and passed it to Aer. One bite and her eyes went wide; then she smiled.
“It’s delicious.”
Looks like it landed. Relief.
“What is this!? It’s cold and sweet!”
“It’s so good…!”
Mika and Linze loved it too. Personally I thought it was just okay — but you can’t expect a major ice-cream chain’s quality from this setup.
The remaining question was whether the café had someone who could do ice magic, but apparently Aer’s sister (who worked with her) could. We’re covered.
“This should appeal to female customers — it’ll work great on a new menu.”
“Yes! Thank you so much! I’ll feature the vanilla ice cream!”
(Technically without vanilla extract, it’s not really vanilla ice cream, but — fine.)
Aer left at speed, eager to make it herself from scratch. Greeting cut short.
Later, when Elze got back from the guild and heard the story, she was furious to have missed the ice cream — so Mika made another batch. Which meant I got drafted into whipping duty again, and I came away wishing earnestly for a hand mixer. My arms are dying…