5 Like Mud

CHAPTER FIVE LIKE MUD Condensation (noun). A gas turns into a liquid when the conditions are just right. It's like a bunch of molecules at a party, sliding into one another mosh-pit style. Then an electric wand messes with them, and now the molecules are closer together and dancing in unison. WITH WIDE EYES, Liam studied the bag of semisweet chocolate on the counter. And the sugar, eggs, vanilla, flour, cocoa powder, and salt. "What are you making?" "Brownies," said Birdie. "Hey, I want to make brownies!" cried Liam. I put my fingers to my lips. "Shhh, keep your voice down." Liam squinted. "Is it a 'prise?" "A surprise," I corrected. "For Mom. She's been working really hard and needs a little treat." "I could hear you shouting earlier," said Liam. "You were loud."

第五章像泥凝结（名词）。 当条件合适时，气体会变成液体。 就像派对上的一堆分子，像跳舞一样互相滑入。 然后用电棒搅乱它们，现在分子靠得更近了，一起跳舞。 利亚姆睁大眼睛，端详着柜台上那袋半甜的巧克力。 还有糖，鸡蛋，香草，面粉，可可粉和盐。 “你在做什么？”“布朗尼，”小鸟说。 “嘿，我想做布朗尼！”利亚姆叫道。 我把手指放在嘴唇上。 “嘘，小声点。” 利亚姆眯起了双眼。“这是一个惊喜吗？”“一个惊喜。”我纠正道。 ”妈妈。她一直在努力工作，需要一点小小的款待。” “我刚才听到你在喊。”利亚姆说。 “你太吵了。”

"We shouldn't have been," said Birdie, setting out metal measuring cups. "I want to make brownies!" Liam grabbed the bag of chocolate pieces. "You're too little to cook by yourself," I said. Liam was in kindergarten. Mom didn't let me cook by myself until the summer after third grade. "At school, I'm a paper passer." Liam proudly thumped his chest. "And a line leader." "Well, now you can be the official taster," I said. "That's the best part of brownie making." "You get to lick the bowl," explained Birdie. "But I want to cook!" Liam waved the bag of chocolate. It dropped out of his curled fist, thwacking against the island counter. "Hey, what's going on in here?" asked Dad, walking in from the basement. That was where he has his woodworking area and spent several hours during the weekends. He glanced at the ingredients on the counter and then at Liam. "Why don't we let your sister and Birdie take care of baking? Buddy, I need you to go with me to the grocery store. We're clear out of milk. And you can't eat brownies without milk, now can you?" Dad scooped up the car keys from the rack. "Plus, I need a shopping associate. And just maybe you can help pick out some chips."

“我们不该来的。”小鸟说着，拿出金属量杯。 “我想做巧克力蛋糕！”利亚姆抓起那袋巧克力。 “你太小了，不能自己做饭，”我说。 利亚姆在幼儿园。直到三年级的那个夏天，妈妈才让我自己做饭。 “在学校，我是一名及格学生。” 利亚姆自豪地捶打着胸膛。 “还有一个组长。”“好吧，现在你可以成为正式的品尝师了，”我说。 “这是布朗尼蛋糕制作中最棒的部分。” “你可以舔碗，”小鸟解释说。 “但我想做饭！”利亚姆挥舞着那袋巧克力。 它从他卷曲的拳头里掉了出来，重重地撞在岛上的柜台上。 “嘿，这是怎么回事？”爸爸从地下室走进来问道。 他在那里有自己的木工区，周末会在那里待上几个小时。 他看了看柜台上的配料，又看了看利亚姆。 “我们为什么不让你妹妹和伯蒂来做烘焙呢？” 伙计，我需要你和我一起去杂货店。 我们没有牛奶了。你不能吃没有牛奶的布朗尼蛋糕，对吧？”爸爸从架子上拿起车钥匙。 “另外，我需要一个购物助理。 也许你可以帮我挑选一些薯片。”

"The kind that gets my hands orangey?" Liam stared at his palm. "Or the kind with green flecks?" "Orange or green. Dealer's choice." "Yes!" As Liam charged to the door, he knocked into our dog's water bowl. A small puddle spread out on our new kitchen floor. "I'm on it!" I grabbed a rag and wiped the wood floor. "Thanks, Kate," said Dad. "But next time let your brother do it himself." "Sure!" I tossed the rag to Liam. "Go for it!" "You already did the good part," moaned Liam. "It's hardly wet now." Only my brother would think that wiping up a spill was fun. Once after Liam complained that I got to unload the dishwasher, Dad had said that I made everything look cool since I was five years older. I grabbed a glass of water and spilled it. "There you go! A huge puddle!" Dad rolled his eyes but didn't say anything. He was awesome like that. As Liam wiped, Dad put his hand on my shoulder. "There's something I want to ask you, girls." He drew in his eyebrows in a serious discussion face. "I want you to think about this long and hard before answering." Birdie and I looked at each other. When it came to very important questions, my dad, a

“那种让我双手发紫的？”利亚姆盯着自己的手掌。 “还是带绿色斑点的那种？”“橙色或绿色。 经销商的选择。”“是的!”利亚姆冲到门口时，撞到了我家狗的水碗。 我们新厨房的地板上有一个小水坑。 “我这就去！”我抓起一块抹布擦了擦木地板。 “谢谢，凯特，”爸爸说。“但下次让你哥哥自己动手吧。” “当然!”我把抹布扔给利亚姆。 “去吧！”“你已经完成了最精彩的部分，”利亚姆呻吟道。 “现在几乎不湿了。”只有我哥哥会觉得清理漏油很有趣。 有一次，利亚姆抱怨说我得把洗碗机里的东西卸下来，爸爸说，从我比他大五岁开始，我就把所有东西都弄得很酷。 我抓起一杯水，把它洒了。 “这就对了！一个大水坑！”爸爸翻了个白眼，什么也没说。 他是那样的了不起。利亚姆擦着，爸爸把手放在我的肩膀上。 “姑娘们，我有件事想问你们。” 他皱起眉毛，一副严肃的表情。 “我希望你在回答这个问题之前仔细考虑一下。” 伯蒂和我面面相觑。 当遇到非常重要的问题时，我爸爸，一个

therapist, who asked people the right question to help them figure out their problems, was an expert. "Cakey or fudgy brownies?" asked Dad. I laughed, relieved that Dad was just being a goofball. "For brownies, I'm team fudgy." "Me too," said Birdie. Dad told us that was wonderful news and asked if we needed any brownie-making advice from Mom. In our house, Dad's the cook, but Mom's the dessert maker. I've helped her make brownies but never made them myself. Still, I told him that I had it covered. "Baking is sort of like a science experiment," said Dad, winking at us. "Where you still have to clean up after yourself." "It's only an experiment if we test something out," I said. "And not just anything, but a hypothesis." "I have a hypothesis," said Dad. "That your brownies are going to be delicious." Dad got a big thumbs-up from Birdie and me. Although after he and Liam left, I wished I had asked if Dad knew where to find Mom's brownie recipe. It took Birdie and me forever to find what

治疗师，谁问人们正确的问题，帮助他们找出他们的问题，是一个专家。 “蛋糕还是软糖布朗尼？”爸爸问。 我笑了，松了一口气，因为爸爸只是个傻瓜。 “对于布朗尼，我是软糖团队。” “我也是，”小鸟说。爸爸告诉我们这是个好消息，并问我们是否需要妈妈给我们做巧克力蛋糕的建议。 在我们家，爸爸是厨师，妈妈是甜点师。 我帮她做过布朗尼，但我自己从来没做过。 尽管如此，我还是告诉他我能搞定。 “烘焙有点像科学实验，”爸爸对我们眨着眼睛说。 “你还得自己收拾残局。” “这只是一个实验，如果我们测试出来的东西，”我说。 “不只是什么，而是一种假设。” “我有一个假设，”爸爸说。 “你的布朗尼蛋糕会很好吃。” 我和伯蒂对爸爸竖起了大拇指。 虽然在他和利亚姆离开后，我真希望我问过爸爸是否知道妈妈的布朗尼食谱在哪里。 我和伯蒂花了很长时间才找到

looked like the perfect fudgy recipe on her phone (saved by the bowl of rice that absorbed all the pond water). Suddenly, Birdie's phone's battery icon turned red. "Oh no! It's running out of power." Birdie frowned. "Snap! I forgot my charger." Unfortunately, my parents' chargers didn't work with her phone. And I didn't have a smartphone. Just an old flip one only to be used in an emergency. "Maybe we should look up the recipe on the computer and print it out," said Birdie. "Nah." I tapped my head. "It's all up here." I just need to get the ratios right. "Cooking is chemistry!" I boiled water in a pot like I'd seen Mom do, set a metal bowl on top of it, then stirred up the chocolate and butter into creamy deliciousness. When we set the smooth melted chocolate onto the counter, it immediately turned into what looked like pebbly mud. I yowled in frustration. "What is wrong with it?" shrieked Birdie. "I don't know!" Okay. Don't panic, I told myself. You can fix this. Examining the bottom of the pan, I noticed beads of water—condensation!

看起来就像她手机上的完美食谱（被一碗米饭吸收了所有的池塘水所保存）。 突然，小鸟手机的电池图标变成了红色。 “哦,不!它快没电了。” 小鸟皱起了眉头。“拍!我忘了带充电器。” 不幸的是，我父母的充电器不能用她的手机。 我也没有智能手机。 那是只在紧急情况下用的旧翻盖式。 “也许我们应该在电脑上查一下食谱，然后打印出来，”小鸟说。 “不。”我轻敲我的头。“都在上面。” 我只需要把比例弄对。 “烹饪就是化学！”我像妈妈那样在锅里烧开水，在上面放一个金属碗，然后把巧克力和黄油搅拌成奶油般的美味。 当我们把光滑融化的巧克力放在柜台上时，它立即变成了一种看起来像鹅卵石泥的东西。 我沮丧地嚎叫着。“这是怎么了？”小鸟尖叫道。 “我不知道！”好吧。别慌，我告诉自己。 你可以解决这个问题。我检查锅底，发现有水珠凝结在一起！

"Aha!" said Birdie. "The chocolate seized. It's when chocolate gets all mushy instead of luscious and silky. I saw that once on a cooking show." "Right. It's because it came into contact with moisture." I slapped my forehead. "I should have thought of that! That's basic chemistry. We've got to start all over again." I glanced up at the clock. It was 4:00 p.m. Dinner would be in one hour because Mom wanted to eat early tonight. She had to be up at the crack of dawn tomorrow for her fitness boot camp class. I pulled out a clean glass bowl and set it over the pan of boiling water. This time everything had to be perfect. "The chocolate looks great," I said a few minutes later. "And smells amazing." Leaning over, Birdie admired the rich walnut-brown color. "Super creamy," she exclaimed. "And this time, we'll wipe off the condensation right away." Just as I was about to pull the glass bowl off the stove, it shattered with a loud pop. Like a rain of hail, broken bits of glass and globs of chocolate hit the floor. "What's that noise?" asked Mom. Uh-oh!

“啊哈！”小鸟说。巧克力卡住了。 巧克力会变得糊状，而不是甜美柔滑。 我曾经在一个烹饪节目上看到过。” “正确。这是因为它接触了水分。” 我拍了拍额头。“我早该想到这一点！”这是基础化学。 我们得从头再来。” 我抬头看了一眼钟。 那是下午4点。晚餐将在一个小时后开始，因为妈妈今晚想早点吃。 她明天天一亮就得起来参加健身训练营的课程。 我拿出一个干净的玻璃碗，放在一锅沸水上。 这一次，一切都必须完美。 “巧克力看起来很棒，”几分钟后我说。 “闻起来很香。”小鸟俯下身，欣赏着那浓郁的胡桃褐色。 “超级柔滑，”她惊呼道。 “这一次，我们会马上擦掉冷凝水。” 正当我要把玻璃碗从炉子上拿下来时，它砰的一声摔碎了。 玻璃碎片和巧克力球像冰雹一样落在地上。 “那是什么声音？”妈妈问。 啊哦!