Saugata Chakraborty

It all began, as these pickles invariably do, with a spot of bother with Aunt Agatha. You see, the annual Ganymede Club bake-off loomed upon the horizon, casting a shadow of trepidation upon the normally sun-dappled brow of my esteemed chum, Bingo Little. This year, Aunt Agatha, a woman with a pastry pan for a heart and a rolling pin for a soul, had devised a particularly fiendish pie. A Moroccan Apricot Surprise, she called it, positively brimming with saffron, cardamom, and enough chili peppers to send a battalion of Cossacks into a tango.

Now, Bingo, like myself, wouldn’t know a cardamom pod from a cricket bat, but when Aunt Agatha, eyes glinting like a magpie in a chutney jar, declared his entry vital to Ganymede Club glory, he was putty in her flour-dusted hands. And so, I found myself enlisted as his culinary co-pilot, navigating the treacherous shoals of this gastronomical Everest.

The baking commenced in a flurry of whisking and rolling, with Agatha barking orders like a Sergeant-Major on a sugar high. Eventually, the pie emerged from the oven, a golden behemoth wreathed in a fragrant cloud that made my eyebrows do the Charleston. “Voila!” declared Agatha, puffing out her chest like a pouter pigeon. “One bite of this, darling Bingo, and the Ganymede trophy is as good as ours!”

Bingo, bless his cotton socks, was never one to disappoint an expectant relative, especially one armed with a rolling pin. He sliced the pie with the reverence of a surgeon dissecting a priceless truffle, and popped a generous wedge into his eager gob.

For a moment, he chewed in contemplative silence. Then, his eyes bulged like poached gooseberries. A strangled gurgle escaped his lips, followed by a cough that would have cleared a fogbank off the Thames. His face contorted, turning the colour of a prize beetroot, and sweat beaded on his brow like diamonds on a duchess’s décolletage.

“Agatha, my good woman!” I cried, leaping up as he clutched his throat with the air of a man being strangled by a boa constrictor with a particularly spicy temper. “What, in the name of all that is holy, have you put in this monstrosity?”

“Why, just a dash of my secret chili paste, darling,” chirped Agatha, oblivious to the inferno raging within Bingo. “Gives it a bit of a kick, you know.”

Kick? This thing wasn’t kicking, it was doing the Highland Fling in a volcano! Bingo, meanwhile, was gurgling like a drain, his eyes watering like a tap left on in a monsoon. I rushed to his side, visions of St John’s Ambulance sirens flitting through my mind.

“Don’t panic, old bean!” I cried, desperately fanning him with a tea towel. “There must be something we can do!”

Just then, inspiration struck me like a custard pie to the kisser. “Milk, Bingo! Milk! Drown the fire!”

With the grace of a hippopotamus on roller skates, I dashed to the fridge and poured a gallon of the white stuff down Bingo’s protesting throat. It was like throwing petrol on a bonfire, but in reverse, I hoped. Miraculously, it worked. The flames in Bingo’s eyes subsided, replaced by a watery gleam of relief.

“By Jove, Bertie,” he gasped, wiping his brow with a trembling hand. “You saved me from a fate worse than Aunt Mildred’s fruitcake!”

The Moroccan Apricot Surprise, alas, never saw the light of the Ganymede bake-off. But that night, over a soothing cup of chamomile tea, Bingo and I vowed never to trust Agatha’s “secret ingredients” again. And as for me, I’ll stick to my tried-and-true jam sandwiches – at least I know what’s in those. After all, one can never be too careful when it comes to the culinary creations of our dear aunts. You never know what fiery surprises might be lurking beneath that golden crust.

(The above piece is the second pastiche I have ever tried, imitating the inimitable P. G. Wodehouse.)