The Kiln (coalition only) pizza cake
#1

outfit but with this i genuinely cant stand him



The kitchen in The Kiln wasn't exactly built for a cooking class, but he was going to make do with what he had! There was only one oven, but he had taken the liberty of bringing a portable pizza oven to set up on a countertop. The rest of what they needed was spread across the small island. A tub of three pre-proofed and risen dough balls that he'd made the day before, given that he wasn't looking to make this a days-long process. Really, there wasn't going to be much to the whole ordeal, and it had been born out of a joke, but he was looking forward to it nevertheless.

Along with the dough were cans of San Marzano tomatoes, a bottle of olive oil that Mathis had kept from Benji, who had brought it with him from home for the short time he lived in the states. It was the one relic of his childhood he wasn't opposed to cherishing. Of course, there were cloves of garlic, basil, and in the fridge was the fresh mozzarella to be added.

Optimistic that it would be a fun event for them all, Mathis was ready to greet the first arrivals at the door, proud of his theatrics that consisted of setting the overhead music to play classic Italian music. A bit much, but he was committing to the bit here.

"Ciao!" He greeted with a wave of his hand as the first of his companions entered.
#2

outfit



Isolde and Charlie arrived in tandem, of course. Against the bitter chill of a particularly cold day, she clutched her companion's hand as they huddled their way up to the front door, looking forward to the warmth of the building and, of course, everything about pizza. It seemed to her that it would be pretty hard to fuck it up, right? How hard could it be?

What she wasn't expecting was to be greeted by Mathis in an apron that boasted the Italian flag, with appropriately themed music crooning through the building. She paused, then barked a laugh, smiling at him with genuine joy rather than incredulity.

"Ciao," she echoed their high-spirited King. "Wow, Mathis. You went all out, huh?"
#3

outfit



Mathis was a riot. It was funny as you got to know him, because on the outside he might have come across as serious and stuffy. But over the years Charlie had definitely come to know better. And no illustration of that was better than this. Overly opinionated about pizza? Yes! Willing to put on music and wear his homeland's flag while teaching them this opinion? Also yes!

Charlie was glad to be here, and grinned as Isolde took the words right out of his mouth.

"You're from Italy, right?" 83 Teehee, just checking!
#4

Outfit



Today was the day that a revelation hit Noah out of nowhere, pushing his way into the building at the tail end of Charlie's statement. This whole entire time that Noah had been apart of this group, he had always assumed that it was a Spanish accent that tinged their leader's voice, that it was Spanish words that would pop into his conversations from time to time, only to find out today that he had been totally wrong.

Italian, who in the hell would have ever considered this! Suddenly the whole pizza thing was making sense, and Noah was let in on a joke that he hadn't even considered before now.

He, of course, was feeling pretty stupid about the whole thing, but he wasn't about to reveal his ignorance to the rest of the group either and so he'd quickly plaster a smile onto his face as he raised a single hand in greeting.

"Yo, this looks like it might just be enough for me."
#5

outfit is icon w/ black jeans



So like...he happened to be a little late. That happened when you lived across the county and were also a forgetful youth bad at keeping time. Lucky for him he couldn’t have been too late. Just the last to enter on the tail end of Noah’s words.

"Aye, don’t hoard it all." Offered with a toothy grin as he sought to bump a shoulder into the tall cheetah. Eyes scanned the rest of the room as he noticed two new faces! It must have been Spartacus and...whoever the other number had been!
#6
The first to arrive were the two he was most familiar with, and likely the ones to be most accepting of his theatrics. They'd put up with him this long, after all. He was glad to see his efforts appreciated. "Spain, actually." He joked to Charlie, but it was all in jest, of course. It was painfully apparent where he was from today.

Up they went, soon to be joined by Noah, who declared his claim to the food. Antony was there to defend it. "There should be enough for everyone," He said in response to the youngest and newest of their group, whom he was glad to see among the lot of them. "But, if not, then I will claim it was more for the experience than the food." He declared with a small wink.

Moving to circle around the island, he waved them all in, "Alright, gather up. I have a plan for you all. We don't have the means for everyone to make their own, so it will be two on one pizza." Excluding him, of course. He was the instructor! "But, this will be more than a pizza class; we can treat it as a socializing exercise. Team building, si?" His intentions were to make it so no one felt too far out of their own element. What better way than to put them all on the same level? "Isolde you and Antony will pair up, and Charlie and Noah. Sound good?"
#7
Noah wasn't so far behind, weaseling in just in time for more banter. She scoffed at his remark, figuring that honestly... each of them could eat literally everything here by themselves. Not far behind their towering companion was a much younger face, and Isolde considered him with a smaller smile, curious. This guy was literally a kid.

Mathis piped up again, utilizing his kingly position to lead them through instructions. A team building exercise, huh? And here she was, getting pitched with the new kid. Isolde fixed him with another smile, a little friendlier. They needed to be a close-knit coalition, after all, didn't they?

"Sounds good. Nice to meet you, Antony." Agreeing and introducing herself in one breath, she shifted toward the youth in their midst and put out her hand to shake. The cheetah in her soul tilted forward with the movement, chirping and keen. Hello, stranger.
#8
Charlie smiled in greeting to Noah, his face less and less new to him all the time. Guy was tall, though--how much did someone that tall eat? Did the number go up that much to be notable? Anyway. Hardly mattered, and Charlie--plus Timeshare--was very interested in the very youngest among them as he arrived. Knowing Antony was someone's child made his age make sense, but goodness, it did make Charlie miss working at the high school pretty much instantly.

Greetings, and then Mathis was quick to sweep them into line.

The division into pairs... sound good? "Hey, did you forget the package deal you got on us?" Charlie said, jerking his thumb at the woman he usually arrived--and would leave--with. But it was with a smile as it was all a joke. They were independent people in spite of how it looked sometimes, and while being separated was hardly a choice he would have made on his own, he also had no issue with switching it up and working with Noah.

"You have to fight me for the food rights at the end," he told Noah, completely not meaning it. And maybe only a tiny bit jealous that Isolde got to get to know the kid best first. Pleasantly jealous, maybe.
#9
Noah would grin down towards Antony, bumping his elbow against the incoming shoulder with a chuckle. It was nice having another face around that wasn't so deeply connected with some other group and leader that had long gone. It helped make it seem like he was more apart of the group and not just some fourth wheel that had tagged along towards the end of their creation.

It also meant he wasn't the newbie anymore, which was always nice.

As for the pairing, Noah was feeling his own bit of jealousy, although not for the same reason as Charlie. No, if they were splitting up the inseparable couple for the day, Noah would have much preferred spending it with Isolde rather than Charlie. It wasn't that he had all that much of a problem with Charlie, honestly, he kinda liked the dorky guy but he also preferred being around beautiful women so there was that as well.

Lucky bastard got to spend every day with her, and now Antony was taking up the time that they were apart. Noah was just absent on luck it seemed, whatever, he'd gotten that icecream date at least.

"Sorry man, looks like your stuck with me." He'd hum, moving to drape an arm around Charlie as if to solidify this fact. "And I've heard I'm an amazing fighter." >:3
#10
Why was he paired with the older woman? He wanted to be paired with Noah. >:v

Which wasn't a direct dig at anyone. She seemed nice. Everyone here did. He just felt like...y'know. Noah was more his speed than anyone else here. Not like a million times his age or probably burdened with grown up mind. Regardless he had been taught manners enough for him to not throw a damn tantrum over pizza pairs.

"Yo." He offered with a toothy grin, his hand would even politely meet hers for a shake. Not his usual greeting, but blah, blah, bonding or something. His cheetah would react like an overzealous cub. Which it truly tended to be most of the time despite the appearance of being full grown.

"You ready to win this thing?" Asked as he bounced on his heels with a bit of that cub energy.
#11
He grinned to himself as they settled into their pairs, briefly begrudging, but all accepting it easily enough. Yay, for new comfort zones! "Are we already descending into a competition?" He questioned as talk of fighting and winning sparked up. Teasing, but maybe something of competition would be fun. "If that's the case, I have to be the judge, and keep the winning one to myself." He joked, and as he did, he pulled from a counter four white aprons to hand out to each of them. They didn't have to wear them, but where was the fun in being a pizza party pooper?
#12
Charlie had a quip about being split up from her, and she grinned over at him briefly in the middle of Antony's handshake. She'd never complain about being paired with Charlie, but they could always use bonding with the others, right? Her attention moved back to the cub, and his literal chub-like beast, which hers received with light-hearted joy. High spirits abound.

"Fuck yeah," she assured him with a sly sort of smile, glancing over to Mathis then. She shook her head as her grin shrank into pursed lips of playful disapproval. She'd fight him for a pizza sooner than a throne, even if the odds were frightfully stacked.

"We know where you sleep, Mathis," she warned him jokingly as she took her apron, moving to loop it over her head, and then slapping her hands together. Time to win this thing.
#13
"Then you know that I keep a guard jaguar, Isolde." He quipped back in playful warning. In reality, Mathis was the one more likely to be a "guard" anything, but they weren't going to talk about how he'd actually killed someone in the past. Pizza!
#14
Charlie went only the slightest bit tense under Noah's arm. Kid was... just tall in a way that was intimidating, on top of just being a seasoned cheetah. Still, it was all smiles and Charlie bit down on the reminder that Mathis had beaten Noah, and so far the younger man's track record wasn't a flawless win streak so...

But all he could do was squint merrily up at his partner of the hour before his ears were catching the rest of the conversation between Isolde and Mathis as the latter handed out aprons--one of which Charlie would lean over to claim without complaint. Of course he'd wear it!

"Sorry, Mathis, but I think I might be even less afraid of Frank than I am of you."

Submissive concerns had never really been a point of play in any of his cheetah hierarchical feelings. Mathis was certainly formidable. Frank was as well, even if he was a less known entity to the cheetahs. But didn't change the fact that there was nothing there to shrink back from in all his experience.

Mathis would not get away with pizza thievery.
#15
Noah didn't know who this Frank was, but he had a vague idea of what they meant by Jaguar.

Why he would be guarding Mathis however was so far out of his reach that Noah just let it sort of fly past his head into the world beyond, more than ready to get started with this whole pizza experience.

"I might remind you you're outnumbered either way." He hummed confidentially, releasing his arm from around Charlie so that he could stand straight once more. "Now are you gonna start teaching, or do I need to go get another Tostitos for us all to share?"
#16
Antony didn't fucking understand any of it. He did understand that he liked this chick's answer. It was good and solid. His style.

So he slipped on his own untied, loose apron as they finished their little conversation.

"Come oooOoooooOOon." He groaned soon after Noah's words with a toothy grin to Mathis. He wanted to make pizza already!
#17
The retort earned a laugh, and her smile persisted through the rest of the boys' banter. She was indeed the sole female in their midst, but it didn't bother her much. She could play rough and tumble with these little shits any day. "Better make it a Digiorno next time, Noah."
#18
Was he that much scarier? Maybe it was the accent.

Anyway! He was being threatened with more awful pizza, so he figured he may as well get to it. "Digior...No." He punned, grinning as he clasped his hands together. "Alright, firstly, we will begin with dough. I have already made it for us, but I will be happy to share a recipe for good dough once you all realize how superior it is." He began and moved to open the tub, grabbing each wrapped dough ball (there were more in the fridge in case of accidents) and placing one before each pairing, then himself on the opposite side of the island.

"We start with stretching the dough into shape. For Neopolitan pizza, crust is most important. So, follow carefully." He instructed, and moved to grab one of the three small bags of flour from the center of the table. "First is the flour. We will use a lot, it is important the dough is not sticky. So," He unrolled the paper, and shook the flour onto the counter before him into a sizable pile. Then, trusting the others to do the same, moved to unwrap the dough from the tea towel it was in, and plopped it onto the top of the pile. "Cover every part, but don't squish into it just yet." He instructed, carefully moving the ball about to cover every side of it, hands precise and steady from years of handling clay.
#19
Alright, they were doing this! The younger kids were basically chomping at the bit, and who could blame them? No one hated the idea of fresh pizza, right?

With the instructions ongoing, Charlie decided to take the cold dough and handle it a moment even in the plastic wrap. Then he handed it off to Noah to unwrap while he grabbed the flour to begin flouring their work surface. Messy business, but actually pretty fun. Flour was somehow softer than it looked and there was satisfaction in putting his hands into it.

"Is it possible to use too much?" he asked.
#20
"You bet." He bellowed for Isolde's comment, head shaking as Mathis was quick with his ridiculous pun.

Still had him laughing though.

The laughter wouldn't last long as the confusion set in, Noah's brows quirking as he listened to the instructions and quickly found himself lost in them. Dough, flower, stretch but don't squish into it... How did you stretch without squishing!?!

He was going to leave this all to Charlie, or he would have until he was suddenly being handed the dough and all Noah could do was stand there stupidly cradling it. He said to coat it in flour, so what if they just...

"Here." He plopped it into the flour with a grin. "Save time and coat it like it's fried chicken."
#21
Antony had never been great with instructions. Especially vague ones like "do a bit of this and then this" which sounded like gibberish to him.

He would take point on the flour. A bag in his hands before he tipped it over. Dumped a grand amount right onto the counter surface they had. A mini-mountain of flour!

"Little more?" Which would likely be very unnecessary but he still tipped out a liiiiiittle bit more without waiting for a response. Oops!
#22
Listen. She loved Charlie. Truly, deeply, with all her heart. But it didn't do much to temper her competitive streak. As such, she was watching and listening to Mathis very closely, absorbing what she could of it all. Her gaze dropped to Antony's hands as he dumped flour onto the counter, laughing abruptly for the sheer ridiculous amount of it. Noah seemed similarly childish, or maybe just playful, plopping his dough ball into Charlie's flour field.

"Can always add more later. Can't remove any once it's in," she advised her teammate with a smile and a raised brow, pulling the dough from its towel and lowering it carefully onto Flour Mountain, sending little avalanches of white away from the great doughy meteor. She'd set to rolling it about to coat it evenly, glancing among her companions with a small smile. Hard not to be in a good mood with all this.
#23
"Possible, si," He confirmed as he coated his own, watching as they all went about their... erm, unique techniques. Noah, though, did have the right idea. "More or less. Just toss around until the outside is coated. When that's done, push aside the excess," He did just that, lifting his dough so he could sweep the extra flour to the side before placing it back down on the counter before him.
#24
Fried chicken pizza! Now that was an idea. So Charlie said it out loud, quietly to Noah lest Mathis be culturally offended, "Do you think we could make a fried chicken pizza? Is that a thing?" But he was busy with his hands making sure they had collectively coated their dough ball. Seemed so, and as Mathis had said... Charlie took it upon himself to make his hand into a scoop and push what remained to the side so it wouldn't get worked into the dough, presumably.
#25
Fried chicken pizza... Now that was an idea Charlie.

Noah's lips would pull upwards, head bobbing in an impressed fashion as a tongue pushed against the inner part of his lower lip. "We're gonna test that." He promised, glancing back towards Mathis as he lowered his voice.

"Get this sucker to teach us how to make it, and then throw it in the freezer for later." >:3
#26
He was not super helpful!

Sprinkled a little flour here and there before he pushed aside the excess. Then....awkwardly grabbed it by like the fistful?! Then crammed in back in the package?!

Yeah, that had to be how to store leftover flour.
#27
Antony literally grabbed flour like a three-year-old grabbing dirt, and Isolde couldn't help the sharp laugh that escaped her as he shoved it back where it had come from. Not the most expert method, perhaps, but it did the job well enough, she guessed. There were worse things in the world to waste than flour.

She watched him a moment longer, holding the dough ball in her white-coated hands, and then looked to Mathis again, awaiting the next step.
#28
The thing about being a Were with Were hearing when you were standing across a kitchen island from two men with relatively deep voices was that even if they were trying to be quiet, it was impossible not to hear. They were conspiring to use his teachings for evil. Evil. Actually, he'd had buffalo chicken pizza once, and it wasn't that bad.

Still. This was Neopolitan style >:[.

Meanwhile, Antony... well! He did clear some of the flour away. He'd just... have to let him keep that bag of flour. That was fine! This was fun and not stressful at all. He just needed to turn off a part of his brain that transformed into an obsessive gremlin when he stepped foot into the kitchen. Teaching pottery was one thing, mistakes were meant to happen to learn. Cooking had a lot less wiggle room. His mother hadn't been all that forgiving in her lessons of what she instilled in him, and it was hard to not regress into the straightforward control that she possessed when conducting her kitchen. Italian mothers were, simply, very mean when it came to food.

But he was not an Italian mother. He was an Italian... teacher! Eesh, alright, his teachers had been sort of mean too. He was just here to help. That was better put.

"Make sure nothing is sticky." He announced first, "Then shape your dough into a round disc shape, flatten it out with your palms if you have to." He instructed, doing it himself.When it looked like a fat pancake, he looked up, lifting a flour coated finger to garner their attention to him. "Now, very important step. You will use your fingers to press the air in the dough out to the edges, making a crust."

He demonstrated, using his fingers pressed together to pat them into the dough, squishing the air beneath them as he prodded them backward toward the bubbling edge. "Start at the bottom, then go up," Once the crust was created at the bottom half of the dough, he switch direction, kneading his fingers upward to send the drought bubbling up on the edge of the dough furthest from him. "Don't stretch or pull, just press it."
#29
Noah was a riot of a guy, wasn't he. It left Charlie to laugh quietly in conspiracy, well aware that there likely was no secrecy here but not caring. Let Mathis try to stop them!

All in all, Charlie was finding himself hungry. No surprise, but really he might have just eaten bits of dough at this point if he hadn't been one of the adultiest adults in the room.

Considering maybe three... or at least two and a half of his students were terrors, Mathis was being very patient, and in spite of plotting evil with Noah, Charlie did aspire to listen and listen well. He wanted to make new skills to take home and be good to Isolde with! And everyone loved pizza, it was a simple fact. No disputing.

He pat at their dough ball to make sure it felt nice and... dry, he supposed. And it did! Noah had done good. "Here, you try," Charlie said, urging Noah to follow along. Noah struck him as... a hands on learner. Charlie was too, but he could go either way. And he was pretty sure he'd have to get his hands in there at least a little to keep sorting things out. If they were going to win. Which they were.
#30
Noah's brows would furrow some as he watched Mathis, eyes falling back to their own ball of dough as his lips pushed out in contemplation. How the hell were they supposed to make it really big if they couldn't stretch it? Clearly, Mathis didn't know what he was doing, or he was doing it way harder than necessary and so Noah would go about doing it the way that suited him best.

The quicker way.

Hands pressing into the dough, Noah would tug the corners out further, pinching the ends for the ultimate crust, making it bigger and bigger until- "Fuck." The middle snapped, a hole bubbling up in the middle. "Your method's not working." He decided, totally willing to turn this back around to Mathis.
#31
"Let's like...rotate who is pressing?" He asked before his voice dropped into a hushed whisper. "Mainly so that it looks like I'm helping too." It was definitely easier to let Isolde do all the work! But! This was supposed to be some sort of group thing so. He should probably play along better.
#32
Boys. Isolde grinned at the young man beside her, shaking her head for his conspiratorial murmuring. Pressing the dough down to replicate a fat frisbee, she leaned a little closer to him. "If you make me do all the work, I will eat all the pizza," she warned, some cross of playfulness and absolute seriousness in her tone. Still, she pressed her fingers into the center, admiring the way it softened and flattened beneath her hands, ushering air out to a section of the edge before she nudged Antony with her elbow. "Come on, get in there."
#33
His eyes were on you, Noah. He'd seen him do the opposite of what had been advised, grinning as he shook his head. "Sorry, was the accent to thick on the last part?" He teased, brows lifting quizzically. And in a surprisingly-not-that-bad American accent impression, he said slowly and clearly, "Only press, don't pull, buddy." It sounded like... well, like a foreigner obviously doing a generic American accent, but to Mathis, he sounds exactly like all of them in this room.
#34
"Oh goodness, no, Mathis, that was unsettling, don't do that again," Charlie was first to complain about Mathis moving straight into uncanny territory. He couldn't look at him if he was doing that!

It seemed Noah's impatient had cost them, but Charlie's decision was to try and fix it by reaching in past Noah to try and squish the torn edges together again. It was fine, it'd go under sauce, right?
#35
What. The. Fuck. Was. That.

Noah would blink stupidly as he just stared at Mathis in response, totally ignorant of Charlie's attempts to rectify the crust that he'd destroyed. He would however give a very slow nod of his head in response to the words that Charlie offered instead.

"Never again."
#36
He honestly didn't doubt that she would eat the whole thing. Not like in a "damn you look like a lady to eat a whole pizza by yourself" way. Just. He was pretty positive they all ate a lot okay. It was why they weren't making just one pizza as a whole group. Duh.

Antony had just started to get in on pizza pulling when Mathis started being...weird. Dude was already weird but like he tried to sound very American?! Buddy.

"Glad this isn't a voice acting class." Mumbled with an elbow aimed towards Isolde.
#37
Noah struck her as a poor student, given his blatant disregard for the instructions. Where they were suggested to press, he pulled instead, tearing crust. Isolde laughed, and then laughed again, more loudly, when Mathis gave his stiff attempt at an American accent. The men berated him, and she snickered when Antony nudged her. She nudged him back, but shook her head, pressing her hands into the dough with a little more vigor. "Don't listen to them, Mathis, I thought it was fantastic." In a weird way, sure, but it was delightful. "Noah's just hardheaded."
#38
He relished the reaction, grinning like a wild animal with a fresh kill. He chuckled, nodding in agreement to Isolde's reassurance. "A tough crowd, si?" He declared, slipping back into his natural lilt. "Now, to fix your dough..." And he would instruct them through the rest, trusting that the fear of hearing his awful impression would be encouragement enough to follow along better this time.
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