Scrapcooking, or an Adventure in the Divestiture of Germ-Awareness
written by Espin Sinclaire
The recollections of a bumbling first year as she traipses through cooking and magical cookery; written solely for the MCOOK class.
Last Updated
05/31/21
Chapters
7
Reads
463
Chapter 3 – A Famous Disaster
Chapter 3
Who’s the Detective?
My Da was so fascinated by the mysterious case of Archibald’s blowing up in his youth, he took up a job in the Ministry of Magic’s Misuse of Muggle Artefacts department at the earliest available opportunity (much to my chagrin – if Scourgify can’t be trusted, Muffle cleaning products certainly can’t be, and not a week has gone by since my third birthday that Da hasn’t brought home some dusty, grimy, bacteria-ridden “artefact” from work). Theories abound in our very own living room, where Da has dedicated an entire wall to his Archibald musings. A greater collection of black-and-whites, fraying yarn, yellowing newspapers cut-outs, and spider webs does not exist north of Birmingham. It’s the scariest place I know.
Alas, I digress. As I’ve said, Da works for the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts department. He’s adamant – and I think I am, too, by extension – that it was neither Archibald nor his wand that did the “blowing up”, but rather the spoon, quite independent of the other two. Allow me to explain.
Archibald became the Royal Pasty Chef of King James I and his assorted family in 1603. Very shortly thereafter, on 5th November, 1605, James I was the target of the infamous, but ultimately failed, Gunpowder Plot – an altogether different, but not entirely dissimilar, “blowing up”. Now, many believe Guy Fawkes, the orchestrator of the plot, was a mere Muggle – no wizard would resort to such messy means of murder when a flick of the wand would do just as well – but in all reality, Fawkes was a Squib.
According to the writings of his immediate family, Fawkes was known to moonlight as an ordinary Muggle, and became enthralled by what he described in his private writings as “primitive Muggle politics”. He surrounded himself by the quintessential Muggles of the day, Roman Catholic revolutionaries, to help hide his identity. Over time, this company started to subconsciously appeal to Fawkes’ deep-seated, but ultimately unacknowledged, resentment of his magical family, and he became taken up by their cause. This lead to the Gunpowder Plot.
Fortunately for James I, it was actually Archibald who uncovered the plot. The gunpowder Fawkes had planned to use actually contained a number of uncommon magical ingredients, including Exploding Ginger Eyelash and Fire Seed, which Fawkes had purchased from the very same shop from which Archibald happened to be purchasing Dragon meat for his Dragon tartar. Given the unusual cocktail of ingredients in Fawkes’ basket, Archibald became suspicious and began to investigate. After discovering Fawkes was a member of the Roman Catholic revolutionaries, he quickly took extra precautions to protect the King, casting a number of protective enchantments in the castle cellars which ultimately tripped up Fawkes.
Fawkes should have been hanged for his crime. Muggles recall very famously that Fawkes jumped to his own death on the scaffold leading up to the hanging platform, rather than be hanged. Having no magical capabilities himself, it’s reasonable to believe he did, in fact, die, but that discredits Fawkes’ family. A neat Disillusionment Charm and some tricky transfiguration work saved Fawkes’ life.
Fawkes was not quick to forget Archibald, and, in fact, became obsessed with revenge. He bought an Invisibility Cloak, and began to stalk Archibald, looking for any moment of opportunity.
At the same time, and although his life had been saved, James I was suspicious of Archibald’s strange amount of knowledge concerning the Gunpowder Plot. This fed into James I’s existing paranoia around magic, and, after reading “The Discoverie of Witchcraft”, he became quite mad. Archibald spent the remainder of his career on edge, terrified that James I would uncover his secret. He became so concerned he actually ceased to carry his wand with him to work must days, relying on Muggle recipes and the occasional magical ingredient instead of spell work. His wooden spoon was entirely ordinary, a Muggle piece he’d bought from a street vendor for its whimsical design, but he relied on it heavily in all of his cookery instead of magic. Archibald knew the King would never be able to use this, his most faithful tool, against him in any accusations of magic, and, after a number of years, he began to think of it as a kind of amulet, a protection against the King’s tyranny. Archibald, so he claimed, was just an ordinary Pastry Chef with an ordinary spoon.
Naturally, this did not escape Fawkes’ notice.
Per usual, Archibald didn’t have his wand the day of the fatal explosion, but he did have his ever faithful, and entirely non-magical, spoon. What he didn’t know was that, the night before, Fawkes had tampered with the spoon. It was rare that Archibald left his spoon unattended, but he happened to do so that evening so as to have the use of both hands while torching some Crème Brulée for the Royal Family’s entertainment. Under the cover of his Invisibility Cloak, Fawkes affixed a magically-infused gunpowder bomb to the spoon. The very next night, on 14th July 1623, under the stress of mixing a particularly tough batter, the bomb exploded, destroying all of Archibald and, indeed, all of Little Dropping.
The moral of the story, I believe, is that if Archibald had been more germ-aware, he would have lived. The spoon must have been filthy, covered in old bits of food, germs, and, for all we know, mould. He should have relied on more than one spoon. If he’d left his work spoons at work, and his home spoons at home, Fawkes wouldn’t have been able to plot against him the way he did.
My Da was so fascinated by the mysterious case of Archibald’s blowing up in his youth, he took up a job in the Ministry of Magic’s Misuse of Muggle Artefacts department at the earliest available opportunity (much to my chagrin – if Scourgify can’t be trusted, Muffle cleaning products certainly can’t be, and not a week has gone by since my third birthday that Da hasn’t brought home some dusty, grimy, bacteria-ridden “artefact” from work). Theories abound in our very own living room, where Da has dedicated an entire wall to his Archibald musings. A greater collection of black-and-whites, fraying yarn, yellowing newspapers cut-outs, and spider webs does not exist north of Birmingham. It’s the scariest place I know.
Alas, I digress. As I’ve said, Da works for the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts department. He’s adamant – and I think I am, too, by extension – that it was neither Archibald nor his wand that did the “blowing up”, but rather the spoon, quite independent of the other two. Allow me to explain.
Archibald became the Royal Pasty Chef of King James I and his assorted family in 1603. Very shortly thereafter, on 5th November, 1605, James I was the target of the infamous, but ultimately failed, Gunpowder Plot – an altogether different, but not entirely dissimilar, “blowing up”. Now, many believe Guy Fawkes, the orchestrator of the plot, was a mere Muggle – no wizard would resort to such messy means of murder when a flick of the wand would do just as well – but in all reality, Fawkes was a Squib.
According to the writings of his immediate family, Fawkes was known to moonlight as an ordinary Muggle, and became enthralled by what he described in his private writings as “primitive Muggle politics”. He surrounded himself by the quintessential Muggles of the day, Roman Catholic revolutionaries, to help hide his identity. Over time, this company started to subconsciously appeal to Fawkes’ deep-seated, but ultimately unacknowledged, resentment of his magical family, and he became taken up by their cause. This lead to the Gunpowder Plot.
Fortunately for James I, it was actually Archibald who uncovered the plot. The gunpowder Fawkes had planned to use actually contained a number of uncommon magical ingredients, including Exploding Ginger Eyelash and Fire Seed, which Fawkes had purchased from the very same shop from which Archibald happened to be purchasing Dragon meat for his Dragon tartar. Given the unusual cocktail of ingredients in Fawkes’ basket, Archibald became suspicious and began to investigate. After discovering Fawkes was a member of the Roman Catholic revolutionaries, he quickly took extra precautions to protect the King, casting a number of protective enchantments in the castle cellars which ultimately tripped up Fawkes.
Fawkes should have been hanged for his crime. Muggles recall very famously that Fawkes jumped to his own death on the scaffold leading up to the hanging platform, rather than be hanged. Having no magical capabilities himself, it’s reasonable to believe he did, in fact, die, but that discredits Fawkes’ family. A neat Disillusionment Charm and some tricky transfiguration work saved Fawkes’ life.
Fawkes was not quick to forget Archibald, and, in fact, became obsessed with revenge. He bought an Invisibility Cloak, and began to stalk Archibald, looking for any moment of opportunity.
At the same time, and although his life had been saved, James I was suspicious of Archibald’s strange amount of knowledge concerning the Gunpowder Plot. This fed into James I’s existing paranoia around magic, and, after reading “The Discoverie of Witchcraft”, he became quite mad. Archibald spent the remainder of his career on edge, terrified that James I would uncover his secret. He became so concerned he actually ceased to carry his wand with him to work must days, relying on Muggle recipes and the occasional magical ingredient instead of spell work. His wooden spoon was entirely ordinary, a Muggle piece he’d bought from a street vendor for its whimsical design, but he relied on it heavily in all of his cookery instead of magic. Archibald knew the King would never be able to use this, his most faithful tool, against him in any accusations of magic, and, after a number of years, he began to think of it as a kind of amulet, a protection against the King’s tyranny. Archibald, so he claimed, was just an ordinary Pastry Chef with an ordinary spoon.
Naturally, this did not escape Fawkes’ notice.
Per usual, Archibald didn’t have his wand the day of the fatal explosion, but he did have his ever faithful, and entirely non-magical, spoon. What he didn’t know was that, the night before, Fawkes had tampered with the spoon. It was rare that Archibald left his spoon unattended, but he happened to do so that evening so as to have the use of both hands while torching some Crème Brulée for the Royal Family’s entertainment. Under the cover of his Invisibility Cloak, Fawkes affixed a magically-infused gunpowder bomb to the spoon. The very next night, on 14th July 1623, under the stress of mixing a particularly tough batter, the bomb exploded, destroying all of Archibald and, indeed, all of Little Dropping.
The moral of the story, I believe, is that if Archibald had been more germ-aware, he would have lived. The spoon must have been filthy, covered in old bits of food, germs, and, for all we know, mould. He should have relied on more than one spoon. If he’d left his work spoons at work, and his home spoons at home, Fawkes wouldn’t have been able to plot against him the way he did.
