Upper Crust

“I got it.”

It was an hour or so before the bakery opened for its second day. However all that had been on the two ponies minds since yesterday was the review Five Stars would have penned last night. Despite Pinny having the always more calm nature of the two it had been wearing on his thoughts as well. He had just kept a calmer appearance up for Cookie so that she wouldn’t go into full freak out mode.

Once they had both arrived and started prepping for today’s business, he had found a few minutes to slip out at around 8 to go get a copy of The Manehattan Gazette from one of the many street vendors located all over the city who sold them. He was just coming back inside clutching it in a magical glow next to him, having levitated it back.

“Well?” Cookie asked expectantly.

“Give me a moment, I need to leaf through the pages. Huh, Princess Twilight is coming to visit…”

“Never mind that. Get to the reviews, the reviews!” Cookie barked, watching with impatience as Pinny now used his magic to turn the pages of the paper. Towards the back middle they found the page spread. It wasn’t just their bakery that Five Stars had written about, in fact one restaurant that had opened on the same day as them had a larger section on the page. Pinny felt Cookie breathe a sigh of relief next to him.

“Well at least if it’s bad it’s a smaller section, perhaps nopony will notice?” she asked.

“It’s The Gazette dear. This is pretty much the paper that ponies in the city read on a daily basis. Unfortunately I can’t ease your mind unless I tell a flat out lie.” Pinny replied.

“Mmmm…” came the concerned response from Cookie. “I can’t read it. Can you read it out to me please?”

“Fine.” Pinny said, leaning in a little closer to the paper to read the tiny print on the page. It was a considerable write up. He started to read aloud.

“As most of you know, I am an avid fan of sweet treats and confectioneries that the ponies of the city have to offer. When I heard there was a brand new bakery opening in Bronclyn on the corner of Farrier Avenue in an area absolutely devoid of such a place I was rather excited to go and have a taste of their offers on opening day.” Pinny read, coming away from the text to talk to Cookie. “Well it seems positive so far…”

“Keep reading!” was all the mare replied.

He obliged her request and carried on reading the rest of the page without stopping. “The bakery is called Upper Crust which I am not sure is having a dig at some of the ponies of the city or the two owners attempts at a delightful pun I am not sure. In any case I thought the naming clever, so I hoped the food inside would reflect that. I talked to a few previous customers. Now readers, you may recall I said this was a new establishment but the two ponies running it are far from new to the baking game. It turns out they both ran a food cart for many years in the local park, a fact confirmed by some small but pleasant conversation inside where I did as I always do, purchase one of everything on the menu.” Pinny paused for a moment to take a breath. It was hard to read such a lot of text in one go.

“The interaction I had with the two owners was hospitable enough, as with anything new in this city they were rather rushed off their hooves but took the time to answer my questions and the key point, accommodate the rather difficult task of removing one slice of bread from each loaf for me to try. My apologies if you bought a loaf there yesterday and it was a little shorter. The store itself is pleasant and reasonably priced, another boon the two have earned. You can either take your food away as I did myself or there is ample seating to dine in. Now onto the important bit, the food itself. Baking is a tough game in this town, whilst the two have picked a prime spot for their bakery I would encourage them, if they choose to read this, to really get inventive with what they offer. This may be unfair criticism because it was their first day but I found nothing particularly inspiring to the palette on offer. That is not to say the food was not good. In fact everything I ate was baked to perfection and extremely tasty. I particularly would like to recommend the cookie I tried. Very good indeed.” Pinny continued to read, he saw Cookie smile at the comment about the cookies rather wide. Remembering her words though he carried on.

“However there was nothing there I have not purchased at other bakeries before. To stand out in Manehattan you have to be bold, exciting and make a statement about your food. If you are local to the area and want good, wholesome baking I’d recommend Upper Crust, but if you’re looking for something to really wow you, give this bakery a miss. As always I shall return in a month to see if things have changed for a follow up review, but for now I give Upper Crust four out of five stars. They’ll have to do a little more to earn the final star from me.”

Pinny finished reading the review and turned to Cookie. “Well, actually I’d say that was pretty positive. Four out of five isn’t bad at all.”

“He said we’re boring.” Cookie said, looking a little dejected.

“Now now dear, he was constructive. He just said we offer the same sort of food as other bakeries in the city. I mean he’s not wrong and it was out first day, we’re just trying to get our hooves on the ground first.” Pinny said trying to reassure Cookie.

“I know...it’s just I doubt a review like that is going to earn us a huge amount of extra customers.” Cookie sighed.

“Well, we have a month.”

“What do you mean we have a month? What until we shut down because nobody wants to buy our boring baking?” Cookie asked back. Pinny just chuckled to himself.

“No until he returns, he said he’d do a follow up review in a month remember? I say when we have free time we come up with some new and exciting things ready for his return. Start selling them a bit beforehand so it doesn’t just look like they’re for him. Who knows, they might be a hit and we won’t need to worry about a follow up review. You’re creative dear, I’m sure you and me can put our heads together and come up with some exciting foods.” Pinny said with a smile.

“But when? We’ve only just opened, we’re so busy. When are we going to have free time to think of new things to bake Pinny?” Cookie asked.

“We’ll make time, now come on - don’t be so down.” The stallion said, giving her a warm hug to take the edge off her concerns. “We’ll work it out and make sure that next review gets us all five stars. For now, lets just worry about today and making a bit more money huh? Personally I’m more worried about paying off our bills.”

“Well we need customers for that, hopefully that review won’t put them off.” Cookie said, still obviously rather worried.

“It won’t, like I say heck he was actually quite positive about what we’re doing, we might actually be busier today.” Pinny replied, still in full on reassurance mode.

“I suppose so, I’ll get to baking.” Cookie said, putting the newspaper under the counter and pushing on with the day. All the time she was working before opening time the mares mind was racing, her thoughts focused on what she could put together to really wow Five Stars. By the time the day was done, she already had a few.

“I think I’ve got something.” she said to Pinny.

“Something what? Oh good work today. Wasn’t as busy as I’d hoped but we broke even at least.” he replied, head somewhat buried in the till as he counted up the money.

“Something we can really use to pull ponies in. It’ll need a bit of work beyond just baking but I think I’ve got an idea that will start to earn us some extra customers, then I’ve got a few more treats I’ve been thinking about that will cement it in. Can we talk about it when we’re home?” she asked.

“Of course! I knew that brain of yours would be whirring away over the day. Sometimes your concerned nature does actually help us out.” Pinny said smiling. “I’m pretty beat, let's close up and go home."

That evening, Cookie would explain her idea. She had to work out the finer details, but that was what discussion about it would be for. All in good time, first though they had to prepare the store for tomorrow and get everything cleaned up. It could wait a few hours.