Sprout made a left turn down an alleyway in downtown Maretime Bay, around the back of the larger buildings of the downtown area, pulling a wagon full of decidedly surplus crops from gardens and farms all around town.

After Hitch had given him the go-ahead to organize a community food pantry, he had spent the rest of the morning asking around, and the pony with the available storage space had also come with quite a bit of expertise; Sander, the Director and Head Chef of Maretime Bay's culinary school, or the more lengthy title of 'Maretime Bay Academy of Culinary Arts'.

Sander, with a light gray coat and blonde mane, stood at the rear double doors of the building with a clipboard as Sprout came up with yet another wagon full of ingredients.

"I sincerely hope you are ready for a break, Deputy Cloverleaf," Sander told him as the red stallion brought the wagon to a stop in front of the delivery area.

"If I take a break now, the longer these deliveries are going to take, Mr. Sander," Sprout replied as he gently lowered the front end of the wagon to the ground, so the helpers could proceed with bringing the delivery inside for storage.

"From what you've told me, there's no way we're getting this done by the end of the day anyway, Deputy Cloverleaf. When I called Sheriff Hitch to confirm that this was the plan for this surprising surplus, he made sure to point out that you were on reduced duty because of your injury. Now with all these extra ingredients to go through, my students are going to have a lot more hooves-on practice. So instead of you making several more trips on that leg of yours, I'd much rather tell the Sheriff that you were taking the appropriate amount of breaks by accepting an invitation to lunch here at the academy to thank you for this rather generous suggestion of yours."

Sprout gave the academy director a light smirk. While he didn't quite appreciate the subtle strong-arming, it's not like he was going to turn down a free meal. Especially not one created by the up-and-coming culinary classes at one of the finest institutions in town.

"Alright, point taken. I am getting a little hungry anyways," Sprout admitted, as Sander led him into the building proper.

Beyond the refrigerated, frozen, and dry storage areas, was where most of the education in this building took place; not in classrooms, but in a half dozen kitchenettes and full size cooking areas. After that was a large dining area, and in between that and the front offices and four rooms reserved for traditional classroom learning, was a considerably more formal dining area, with round tables for two or four, instead of the much longer tables and benches.

To help offset operating costs and keep tuition low, the academy frequently held "practice dinners" for the in-training chefs. Both traditional and more experimental menus were offered two to three times a week, and tables were usually full because prices were quite reasonable due to both the experimental nature of the menus and lack of professional experience of the cooks.

It was still lunch time, and prep was likely just beginning for today's dinner service, so Sprout had the formal dining area to himself as he was shown to one of the smaller tables in the center of the room and took a seat.

"I know you're used to the faster places in town, but how's a salad and gourmet deep dish supreme pizza sound?" Sander asked.

"Sounds perfect. Say, how's Diggy been?" Sprout replied, referring to the director's husband.

"He's doing splendid. I'm not absolutely confident that you'd be able to keep a secret, Deputy, so I'll just say that we've been planning something big soon, and all this reunification stuff may have just given us a decent shove towards that goal," Sander told him.

"That's probably for the best. I've got plenty on my plate, and I don't want to accidentally blab about something if you're not ready to tell everypony," Sprout agreed.

"I appreciate that, Deputy. Now, please make yourself comfortable, and the first course will be up shortly," Sander told him, before trotting back to the kitchens.

Sprout leaned back in the comfortable chair, and almost immediately figured that the atmosphere the room was missing was the hushed dining conversations of other diners; he was the only one in here until the seating started for the dinner service. He dug his phone out from his saddlebags and started scrolling through ClipTrot, but it wasn't even five minutes before his attention was drawn to a plate of fresh greens, croutons, and a tureen of some kind of dressing was set on the tablecloth in front of him.

"I've gotta be honest, I usually go right for the pizza, so this is a new dining experience for me," Sprout admitted.

"It's our traditional house salad, and I highly recommend trying it with the raspberry vinaigrette dressing," Sander replied, pointing at the tureen. "Please enjoy."

Setting his phone down on the table next to the plate, Sprout removed the lid from the tureen, took the small ladle, and drizzled the pink transparent dressing over the salad greens, before grabbing his fork. Once he got a couple greens, and a crouton on the fork, he took a bite, and...

'Whoa...' Sprout thought to himself, as he remembered to chew and not drool on the tablecloth. As he took in the crunch of the fresh greens, the crumbling texture of the crouton, and the explosion of sweetness of the dressing, he came to realize everything he had been missing all of those times he had skipped the salad bar and went right for the pizza buffets.

The stallion normally ate quickly, but here, he was content to savor each and every bite; slowly enough to where he was just finishing up the last bite as Sander was bringing the main course. Good thing, too, because he wasn't sure he was going to be able to resist licking the salad plate clean.

"That was the best salad I think I've ever had," Sprout told him, as the salad plate was removed from his place at the table. "To be fair, I haven't had a lot of salads in my time."

"Nevertheless, an appreciated compliment, Deputy, and now, the main course."

Sprout had to resist whimpering in anticipation as a personal-sized deep dish supreme pizza was placed in front of him, cheese bubbling underneath the marinara sauce on top, hiding the garden's worth of vegetables underneath. The sparkling wine poured into the goblet above his silverware helped him remember the kind of formal setting he was in, and he minded his manners enough to cut into the first slice with a knife and fork, instead of pick it up with his hooves.

"Suddenly I'm glad this is as small as it is, because I'm certain I'd hurt myself if this was a regular sized deep dish," Sprout told him.

"Enjoy, Deputy, and do save room for desert," Sander replied.

"So, all this to get me to take a break and relax, huh?" Sprout asked after swallowing his second bite.

"Half to get you to take a break. The other half was to thank you for all the ingredients we're nearly overflowing with now," Sander clarified.

"Well, I'll take the excitement where I can find it. Because sooner or later, even with reunification, things are eventually going to settle into routine again for me. So I've got to strike while things aren't boring," Sprout said before taking a third bite, already pulling a second slice to his plate after taking a sip of wine.

"I hope you never viewed your job as boring, Deputy Cloverleaf," Sander offered. "You did a marvelous job as interim sheriff when Hitch was away."

"No, I wasn't," Sprout immediately countered. "Not when it mattered most. When my mom was in the basement of Canterlogic bolting that monstrosity together, I was frozen at my desk, unsure of what to do. If Hitch hadn't come to snap me out of it, I don't know what would have happened."

"But Hitch did snap you out of it, and when he did, you saved lives. I certainly don't want you to think that you're back to playing second fiddle, Deputy. Some ponies are natural leaders, and some are natural supporters. I don't want you to push yourself too hard while you're recovering, because if you permanently injure yourself, you'd rob Sheriff Hitch of the excellent support he's been getting from you. What about today, and how quickly you've taken the chaos of this new plant-based magic, and organized these donations for us? If that's not some crazy-good community outreach, Deputy, I don't know what is."

"Alright, alright," Sprout said, unable to hide a smirk as he took the last bite of pizza. "Point taken."

Another chef came out with another plate as the pizza pan and dinner plate was removed from the table, and once again Sprout began to drool as a moist slice of chocolate cake was placed in front of him, with a dessert fork. As he cut into it, and molten chocolate flowed out from the inside out onto the plate, he had to hold back a shudder of anticipation.

'I really am going to hurt myself...'

Author's Note

Apologies for how long it took me to get an update out. The students are back, work has gotten busier, and I've re-subscribed to and am currently no-lifing SWTOR for the past week.