Recipe for Trouble

  Jared was blending something in a blender. “My super-duper extra-fantastic triple-chocolate smoothie!” he announced to Nancy when she said hi to him. He adjusted his glasses. “What are you going to make?”

  “A hot-fudge sundae,” Nancy told him. “Bess is making peanut-butter cookies, and George is making a blueberry crisp.”

  “Wow, I guess I have competition,” Jared joked.

  “Jared always wins everything. He won the science fair at our school last month,” Midori piped up. “And last year he won the spelling bee.”

  “You win stuff too, Midori,” Jared said to her. “You came in second at the science fair. And you came in third in the art contest.”

  “Fifth,” Midori said. She sounded kind of glum.

  Monsieur Jadot went up to the front of the room and clapped his hands loudly. “Ladies and gentlemen! Today is Bring Your Favorite Dessert Recipe Day. Annabelle and I will help you gather the ingredients you need to make your recipes. Let us get started!”

  “I hope no one’s going to dump salt into my apple pie!” Nancy heard Alison say to Brenda.

  The class got busy making their desserts. Monsieur Jadot and Annabelle supervised.

  As Nancy stirred hot-fudge sauce on the stove, she looked around the kitchen. Everything seemed okay. Nobody was complaining about weird things happening to their recipes.

  Then Nancy felt a tap on her shoulder. She turned around. Bess was standing there. She looked worried.

  “What is it, Bess?” Nancy asked her.

  “Have you seen the second page of my recipe?” Bess asked her. “It’s missing!”

  Nancy set her chocolate-covered wooden spoon down. “Huh? What are you talking about?”

  “My grandma’s recipe for peanut-butter cookies! She wrote it down on two pieces of paper. The second page is missing, and I can’t make the cookies without it!” Bess moaned.

  “Did you leave it at home?” Nancy asked her.

  Bess shook her head. “No! It was on the counter a minute ago. Now it’s gone!”

  Nancy turned the burner off from underneath her hot-fudge sauce. She walked over to Bess’s workstation.

  The first page of the recipe was sitting right there. It was next to a jar of peanut butter and a bright red bowl with flour in it. The recipe was written on yellow legal paper with lines on it.

  Then Nancy noticed something. Near the piece of paper were smudgy chocolate fingerprints.

  “Did you put those there, Bess?” Nancy asked her friend.

  Bess shook her head. “Uh-uh.”

  “George?” Nancy asked her other friend. George was busy making her blueberry crisp.

  “Nope. There’s no chocolate in my recipe,” George replied.

  Nancy knew they weren’t her fingerprints either. That must mean that whoever stole the second page of Bess’s recipe must have left the chocolate fingerprints there!

  “Follow me,” Nancy whispered to Bess. “Don’t say anything to anyone. We’ll find out who is making chocolate desserts. One of them has to be the recipe thief!” she said.

  The first person Nancy ran into was Alison. Alison was making apple pie. Her workstation smelled like cinnamon and butter.

  She’s not the one, Nancy reasoned.

  Kenny’s workstation was next to Alison. Kenny was busy mixing something in a bowl.

  Nancy was about to ask Kenny what he was making when she noticed something on the floor.

  It was Kenny’s backpack. Sticking out of one of the pockets was a piece of yellow paper with lines on it. It had chocolate smudges all over it!

  Kenny’s the thief! Nancy thought.

  6

  More Suspects in the Mix

  Nancy couldn’t believe it. She’d caught Kenny red-handed.

  He was the recipe thief. The evidence was right there in his backpack. And the chocolate fingerprints were even more proof.

  Did that mean Kenny put the toothpaste on George’s cupcakes, the baking soda and detergent in Nancy’s smoothie, and the salt in the sugar jar?

  Before Nancy had a chance to say anything, Bess spoke up. “Hey! Kenny Bruder! You stole my grandma’s recipe!” she exclaimed.

  Kenny turned around. He had flour all over his T-shirt. “Huh? What are you talking about, Bess?”

  Bess whipped the piece of yellow paper out of Kenny’s backpack. “This! You stole it so I would mess up my cookies and you could be Top Chef!” she accused. “That is so totally mean!”

  Kenny frowned. “Huh? I don’t know how that piece of paper got there. I didn’t put it there.”

  “Oh, so it just happened to be in your backpack? By magic?” Bess shot back.

  Kenny shrugged. “I don’t know. Whatever.”

  Nancy was about to speak up when she noticed something strange. Kenny didn’t have chocolate smudges on his hands.

  So how did the chocolate fingerprints get on the recipe and on the counter? she wondered.

  Nancy also noticed that Kenny wasn’t making a chocolate dessert. “What’s that?” she asked Kenny, pointing to his mixing bowl.

  “Huh? Lemon-cookie batter,” Kenny replied. “Can I go back to cooking now? Or are you two going to arrest me?” He snickered.

  Nancy grabbed Bess’s arm. “Come on, Bess, let’s go.”

  “But Kenny’s the thief!” Bess hissed.

  Nancy shook her head. “I’m not sure anymore. It might be somebody else.”

  • • •

  “I still think it’s Kenny,” Bess insisted.

  She, Nancy, and George were sitting in a booth at the Double Dip. The Double Dip was their favorite ice cream parlor in town.

  Nancy took a bite of her strawberry ice cream cone. This was her idea of a great spring vacation: eating desserts all day in class, then eating more desserts after class!

  “But where did those chocolate fingerprints come from, then?” Nancy said. “Kenny wasn’t making anything chocolatey.”

  “Maybe he ate something chocolatey, then later washed his hands,” Bess suggested.

  George’s eyes lit up. “Hey! Brenda made fudge. Maybe she stole your recipe, Bess!”

  Bess nodded. “I guess that’s true. She could have put the recipe in Kenny’s backpack to make him look guilty.”

  Nancy reached into her backpack and took out her blue notebook and purple pen. “I’m going to have to write all this down,” she said.

  She quickly found the page that said “The Case of the Messed-up Recipes” across the top of it. Under Suspects, she added:

  Brenda Carlton

  She made fudge today. Plus she really

  wants to win the Top Chef contest.

  Nancy glanced up from her notebook. “Tomorrow’s the last day of class,” she reminded her friends. “Our parents will be there for the special dessert party. And Monsieur Jadot will announce the winner of the contest.”

  “We’ve gotta solve the mystery by then!” Bess said worriedly. “If we don’t, Kenny or Brenda or whoever it is might try to ruin the party!”

  “We have three suspects now,” Nancy said. She trailed her finger down the open pages in her notebook. “Kenny, Annabelle, and Brenda. We also have a bunch of clues: the sparkly pink toothpaste, the box of baking soda, and the chocolate fingerprints.”

  “Hi, Nancy. Hi, Bess. Hi, George.”

  The girls looked up. Midori had just walked into the Double Dip. She was waving at them with a shy smile.

  There was a tall, slender woman with her. She looked a lot like Midori.

  The woman and Midori came over to the girls’ table.

  “Nancy, George, Bess, this is my mom,” Midori said. “Mom, these girls are in my dessert-making class.”

  “Oh, how wonderful!” Mrs. Tanaka gushed. “Midori has told me so much about this class. Her father and I can’t wait to come tomorrow and taste all the desserts you’ve been making.”

  Nancy was about to say something. But then she noticed a shopping bag hanging on Midori’s arm.

  The
shopping bag was from McPherson’s Drug Store in downtown River Heights. It was clear plastic, so Nancy could see right through it.

  Inside the bag were two things: a bottle of pink strawberry shampoo and a tube of strawberry-flavored Sparkly Smile toothpaste.

  Nancy’s heart started to beat faster. The toothpaste on George’s cupcakes had been pink and sparkly.

  Did Midori put the toothpaste on George’s cupcakes? Was she the guilty one?

  7

  Setting a Tasty Trap

  Nancy stared and stared at the sparkly pink toothpaste in Midori’s shopping bag. Did Midori put toothpaste on George’s cupcakes? Did she also put the baking soda and detergent in Nancy’s smoothie, dump salt in the sugar jar, and steal the second page of Bess’s recipe?

  Mrs. Tanaka was talking to Bess, George, and Midori about tomorrow’s special dessert party. Nancy had a plan.

  “Hey,” Nancy interrupted. “That’s my favorite kind of toothpaste, Midori!” She pointed to Midori’s shopping bag.

  Midori looked confused. “What? Oh. It’s my favorite too. I get it all the time.”

  “Kids’ toothpaste flavors! They’re practically like desserts, aren’t they?” Mrs. Tanaka said, chuckling. “Strawberry, banana, raspberry . . .”

  Midori didn’t act nervous when I asked her about the toothpaste, Nancy thought. She decided to try another approach. “So, Midori! Do you think you’ll win the Top Chef contest?”

  “Huh? Oh, I don’t know,” Midori said, shrugging. “Maybe. But I’m not good with desserts like you guys and Jared, you know?”

  “Jared, Jared, Jared,” Mrs. Tanaka said. She put her arm around her daughter’s shoulders. “Jared Stein is Midori’s best friend. She looks up to him like a big brother.”

  “Stop it, Mom,” Midori said. A deep blush crept into her cheeks.

  A waitress came over and told Mrs. Tanaka and Midori that there was a table ready for them. Mrs. Tanaka and Midori bid the three girls good-bye.

  “See you at the party tomorrow!” Mrs. Tanaka said, waving.

  Nancy waited until the two of them were all the way across the crowded room. Then she leaned across the table.

  “Midori had pink Sparkly Smile toothpaste in her bag!” she whispered. “We have to add her to the suspect list!”

  “Midori? She’s nice. She wouldn’t do all that bad stuff,” Bess said, glancing over her shoulder.

  “Maybe, maybe not. We still have to add her to the suspect list. Remember, we have to solve this mystery by tomorrow!” Nancy reminded her friends.

  Nancy picked up her purple pen and added Midori Tanaka to the suspect list.

  • • •

  Friday was a rainy day. Raindrops splashed against the windows of Monsieur Jadot’s kitchen. Nancy, George, Bess, and the other five kids worked to get ready for the special dessert party. They were all baking different kinds of cookies.

  “I’m making more of my peanut-butter cookies,” Bess told Nancy and George as she scooped peanut butter from a jar.

  “I’m making white chocolate-chip cookies,” George said. She shook a bag of white chocolate chips into a bowl.

  “And I’m making oatmeal-raisin cookies,” Nancy said.

  Nancy measured out a cup of raisins in a measuring cup. Then she frowned. “Our parents will be here in an hour,” she whispered to George and Bess. “And we still haven’t solved the mystery!”

  “We’ve got to be detectives and dessert chefs at the same time!” Bess whispered back. She glanced at the clock on the wall. “Fifty-nine minutes to go! We need a plan.”

  “A plan, a plan.” Nancy peered around the kitchen. She drummed her fingertips on the countertop.

  Just then, Kenny Bruder walked by. He reached into George’s mixing bowl and grabbed a fistful of white chocolate chips. “What are these, candy?” he said.

  “They’re white chocolate chips. Give them back!” George cried out.

  Kenny threw the chips back into the mixing bowl. “Yuck, no thanks! I’m allergic to chocolate.”

  Nancy, George, and Bess all stared at each other. “Allergic to chocolate?” Nancy repeated.

  “Yeah. It makes me break out in a rash. So what?” Kenny shrugged.

  “But there’s chocolate all over the place,” Bess said, glancing around the kitchen.

  “Monsieur Jadot knows I can’t eat it. My mom made him promise I could make desserts without chocolate in it.” Kenny shrugged again and kept walking.

  Nancy saw him reach into Alison’s mixing bowl and grab a handful of blueberries. “Hey!” Alison protested.

  “He’s allergic to chocolate! That means he couldn’t have been the one with the chocolate fingerprints,” Bess said after he’d gone.

  Nancy nodded. “You’re right! That only leaves three suspects: Brenda, Midori, and Annabelle.”

  And then something occurred to Nancy. “Hey, you know what, guys? There’s only one student in this room whose desserts haven’t gotten messed up.”

  George looked thoughtful. “Hmm, let’s see. My cupcakes got messed up. Nancy’s smoothie got messed up. Brenda, Alison, Kenny, and Jared got their butterscotch brownies messed up. And Bess’s recipe got stolen.”

  “That leaves . . . Midori!” Bess gasped.

  “I think she’s the one,” Nancy said, nodding. “There’s just too much evidence against her, like the sparkly pink toothpaste.”

  “Plus I think she was making a chocolatey dessert yesterday,” George added in a low voice. “It was chocolate mousse or something like that.”

  Nancy stared at Midori. She was across the kitchen, looking busy as she cracked eggs into a bowl.

  “I think I have a plan,” Nancy announced to Bess and George.

  “What are you three up to? Why are you not baking cookies?”

  Nancy’s head shot up. Monsieur Jadot was standing there, his hands on his hips.

  “Oh, we were just talking about . . . how to make our cookies yummier,” Nancy fibbed.

  “Annabelle and I have to go into the supply closet for more ingredients. When we get back, I’d better see you hard at work,” Monsieur Jadot told the girls.

  “Yes, sir,” Nancy said with a small salute.

  She waited until Monsieur Jadot and Annabelle walked out the door. Then she turned to Bess and George.

  “Guess what Monsieur Jadot told me? Oatmeal-raisin cookies are his favorite!” Nancy said in a loud voice.

  Bess and George stared at Nancy. “Huh?” Bess said, confused. “What are you—”

  “I’m sure my cookies will put me in first place for the Top Chef contest!” Nancy interrupted in an even louder voice.

  Bess’s eyes grew wide. “Oh . . . yeah . . . definitely,” she said, nodding slowly.

  “Way to go, Nancy!” George said.

  Nancy looked around. Midori seemed to be listening. Actually, everyone in the room seemed to be listening.

  “Okay,” Nancy whispered to Bess and George. “Let’s all go to the sink and wash our hands now.”

  “Huh?” George whispered back.

  “It’s part of my plan,” Nancy explained. “I just let Midori know that Monsieur Jadot loves oatmeal-raisin cookies.”

  “How do you know Monsieur Jadot loves oatmeal-raisin cookies?” Bess asked her.

  “I don’t. I just made that up. Anyway,” Nancy went on. “If we leave my bowl alone for a minute, Midori might be tempted to come over and dump salt in it or something. Then we can catch her in the act.”

  “Awesome!” George said enthusiastically.

  Nancy, George, and Bess walked over to the big sink and began washing their hands. Nancy glanced over her shoulder.

  Midori was approaching Nancy’s workstation. She was carrying a small bottle in her hand.

  This is it! Nancy thought.

  8

  The Culprit Confesses

  Nancy’s heart was racing. Any second now, Midori would stop at Nancy’s workstation and dump something nasty into her oatmeal raisin-cookie bat
ter!

  But Midori kept walking. She handed the bottle to Alison. “Here, I’m done with the vanilla,” Midori said.

  “Huh? Oh, thanks,” Alison said.

  Midori and Alison continued talking for a moment. Nancy was confused. Why didn’t Midori try to put something in Nancy’s bowl?

  And then Nancy saw a hand, then an arm, creeping up and over her workstation. The hand was holding a tiny vial.

  Someone’s hiding behind my workstation! Nancy realized.

  Without wasting another second, Nancy ran over to her workstation. She peeked around the corner to see whose hand it was. At the same time, she grabbed the person’s hand—hard.

  “Heeeeey!”

  The person stood up.

  It was Jared Stein!

  “Let go of my hand!” Jared complained.

  Nancy glanced into her bowl of oatmeal raisin cookie-batter. Jared had squeezed a few drops of blue food coloring into it.

  “You’re the one who’s been messing up everyone’s recipes!” Nancy said angrily.

  Jared looked around the room. Everyone was staring at him—including Midori. She looked really upset.

  Jared frowned when he saw Midori’s face. “Can I talk to you and George and Bess? In private?” he whispered to Nancy.

  Nancy nodded. “Sure. But you’re going to have to talk to Monsieur Jadot when he comes back.”

  “I know, I know.”

  Jared led Nancy, George, and Bess out into the hallway. It was empty.

  Jared adjusted his glasses. He cleared his throat. Nancy could tell that he felt really badly.

  “I know what I did was wrong,” Jared said finally. “The thing is—I wanted Midori to win the contest!”

  “What?” Nancy, Bess, and George said in unison.

  “She never wins anything,” Jared continued. “And I always win everything. Just once I wanted her to win. She’s my best friend.”

  “So you decided to put pink toothpaste on my cupcakes?” George demanded.

  “I kind of borrowed a tube of toothpaste from Midori’s backpack,” Jared admitted sheepishly.

  “And you put baking soda and detergent in my strawberry-pineapple smoothie?” Nancy said.