Title: Yule baking
Category: LotR, Humour
Rating: G
Beta: Not beta-read, because I don't have a beta. But I'm looking for one.
A/N: Of course, there's no Christmas in Middle Earth. Christmas is a commercialized Christian celebration. So I (and many other FF writers) made Yule as the winter solstice celebration of the German pagans (a long time ago) the Middle Earth equivalent for Christmas.
I'm not usually a Christmas fan and so I never intended to write a Christmas FanFiction, but the best thing to do with a plot bunny is catch it and lock it up in a story. And when the plot bunny is about Elladan, Elrohir, Elrond and a lot of cookie dough, writing a Christmas FF is the only solution.
Please review!
Merry Christmas to everybody!!!!!!
MysticShadowcat
Elvish: Ada – daddy, penneth – young one
Yule baking
The Yule preparations were always stressful. But this year, they held an extra shock for Elrond. His wife, who was in Lothlórien with her parents, sent a letter saying that she would be home in time for the Yule celebration, but not for the yearly cookie baking with their children and so Elrond would have to take care of it. But he knew as much about baking as a Orc knew about soap and perfume. And Elladan and Elrohir were everything but nice and orderly. But if he refused he would have to face the wrath of Elflings missing their Yule baking and his wife saying he neglected his duties as a father.
And so it came that some days later the Lord of Imladris was on his way to the kitchen to prepare the baking. He was everything but in a good temper. He loved his sons dearly, but he would rather spend the whole day with his mother-in-law talking about weaving than with his two rascals baking.
Bad luck for Glorfindel that he happened to cross his lord's path in exactly that moment and even tried to cheer him up. He found himself grabbed by the arm and dragged to the kitchen.
"But... Elrond... what?", was all he managed to say before the half-elf handed him a pile of bowls, a sack of flour and a book and he had to concentrate on not dropping anything.
"You will help me bake with my children."
"Bake? Oh, great! I used to do that with my mum when I was an Elfling."
Elrond gave him The Look, but Glorfindel didn't see anything but the bowls and the sack in front of his face and was left impassive.
He put down his load on the big table in the middle of the kitchen and, while Elrond went to collect his sons, Glorfindel got the last ingredients.
Some minutes later, two wet Elflings and a grumpy Elrond entered the kitchen. Glorfindel had finished the preparations by then and so they could start making the dough. Elrond immediately snatched the book, scared that it might get dirty. He sat down and ordered Glorfindel to get a bowl and mix the ingredients together.
"Four eggs. Elladan, bring Glorfindel four eggs."
Elladan did as he was told.
"Ada," he asked when the blond Elf put the contents of the first egg into a bowl.
"Why are eggs egg-shaped?"
Elrond was puzzled and so Glorfindel answered first:
"Then it's easier for the chicken to lay the egg."
"But wouldn't it be much easier if the egg was shaped like... like..."
Elrond, who knew exactly what Elladan meant, groaned. Where did the boy get those ideas from? But luckily Glorfindel had a fitting answer this time, too:
"If it was shaped like that, penneth, then the chick growing up in there would have to be bean-shaped."
"Ugh.", stated Elladan grimacing.
Like most children he liked chicken, but hated beans and so a bean-shaped chicken held no interest for him.
Quarter of an hour later, the dough was finished. Glorfindel, who's arms were aching more than after an hour of sparring, leaned back, closed his eyes for a moment and sighed. This short moment of relaxation was disturbed by Elrohir asking if one could eat the dough like that. Glorfindel immediately sat up straight and opened his eyes, just to find the boy sitting on the table and bending over the bowl with the dough.
"No, you can't. You'll get a stomach ache and sick if you do that. What are you doing on the table? Your ada will get a heart attack if he sees you like that."
And he'll tell me off for not looking after them. , he added in thoughts.
He hurried to lift him from the table before Elrond, who had been called out by Erestor, re-entered the room. Unfortunately he had forgotten that his arms were dirty halfway up to the elbow from kneading the dough. He thought of trying to clean the boy's clothes, but then decided that they would get dirty enough while making the cookies so this bit made no difference.
When Elrond still hadn't returned five minutes later, Glorfindel decided that it was easier to bake with twins alone than to wait and keep them from breaking plates and making this kitchen a mess. So he took the dough and flattened it. Elrohir had already gotten himself a cookie cutter and now stood on a chair waiting for Glorfindel to give him the dough. Elladan stood on a chair next to his brother, but he had no cookie cutter. Glorfindel wondered if he should ask why, but then decided that the Elfling probably knew what he was doing.
"Fin, how long do you want to flatten the dough?", asked Elrohir.
"Don't you think that's enough?"
Glorfindel looked down and noticed that the Elfling was right. He had been so deep in thoughts that he hadn't noticed that the dough was already thin enough. He handed the dough to the boy and sat down again to watch them. It was interesting. Elrohir cut the cookies and handed them to Elladan, who put them on the baking tray. Those that went bust he would 'cure' with some dough.
When Elrond eventually re-entered the kitchen, they had almost finished cutting and Glorfindel, who was now helping Elrohir cut the cookies, ordered him to make some hot chocolate for the Elflings and mulled wine for them. Elrond gave him The Eyebrow and a look that said: "How dare you ordering me around?", but turned to do as ordered anyway.
Some minutes later they sat at the kitchen table drinking hot chocolate and mulled wine and watched the cookies in the oven.
"Ada, when are they finished?", Elladan asked.
"I don't know."
The Lord of Imladris gave Glorfindel a helpless look.
"When they are gold-brown."
"And when are they gold-brown?"
"When they are crispy."
"And when are they crispy?"
"When they are finished."
"And...", Elladan stopped, finally noticing that he was being fooled.
"Fin!!!", he complained and leaned towards him to hit him.
Unfortunately the gap between their chairs was bigger than he thought and so he became unbalanced and would have fallen of the chair if Glorfindel hadn't caught him in time, knocking over his mug of mulled wine in the process. The hot liquid spilled all over the blond Elf's tunic and trousers, making him cry out in pain and leaving red stains. He put Elladan back on his chair and hurried out of the kitchen in order to change and try to wash out the stains while still wet. Elrond watched him leave and then went to clean up the mess.
When Glorfindel returned to the kitchen wearing a wine red tunic and trousers in the same colour, Elrond had already taken the cookies out of the oven.
"What do we do now?", he asked.
"The icing, of course, ada!!!!", the twins said.
"But can we also have some chocolate and raisins on them?"
Elrond looked at Glorfindel seeking for help. Fin nodded.
"If we find some, you can."
The Elflings cheered and ran off to find it. While the two were searching, Elrond and Glorfindel sat down to prepare the icing , enjoying the moment of silence. It didn't last long. Soon the twins were back, Elladan holding a small sack, most likely filled with raisins, and Elrohir proudly presenting some chocolate.
"Fine.", said Glorfindel.
"Give me the chocolate, Elrohir, and I'll melt it."
The boy did as ordered and he and his brother sat down at the table and started to ice the cookies. While they were busy, Glorfindel put the chocolate into a bowl and melted it over the fire. When it was liquid, he handed it to Elrohir again, who immediately left the icing to Elladan and 'painted' his cookies with chocolate and put some raisins on each.
Glorfindel and Elrond watched them silently until Erestor entered to kitchen and asked them to come out. It seemed to be urgent, so they sighed and followed him outside, silently praying that everything was still going to stand when they came back. But the twins seemed to be too busy to mess the kitchen up.
When the two adults re-entered the kitchen, nothing was broken and everything seemed to be the way they had left it. Except for the three bowls with icing, chocolate and raisins. They were much emptier than before. Too empty for the amount of finished cookies.
"Elladan, Elrohir, have you been nibbling?", Elrond asked sternly.
The twins looked at them innocently and shook their heads. However, not even a nearly blind troll would have believed them, as their faces were completely smudgy with chocolate and icing and Elladan was still chewing a mouthful of raisins.
"Finish the cookies, you two, and then you may eat the spare icing and chocolate.", Glorfindel said, trying to hide a smile.
"However I don't believe there will be any left-overs."
Quarter an hour later the twins were licking the bowls clean. Somehow they had managed to decorate all the cookies and still have some left-overs.
Another quarter an hour later the kitchen was tidy again and the Elflings had left to play some more. Their father and Glorfindel sat down to have another cup of mulled wine.
"That was fun.", Fin said.
"Let's do it again next year."
The look Elrond gave him could have killed an Uruk-Hai.
The End