The Best of Twilight Sparkle's Twilight Time

by Greatmewtwo

Candy Thermometers, Featuring Discord

The next video clip Twilight queued up for her compilation was the segment that Lyra Heartstrings and Bon Bon suggested. To her, Lyra and Bon Bon were entertaining in that they were textbook best friends unlike her colleagues at old Crystal Prep. They talked together, ate together, drank juice together, and played with each other's hands. Lyra was into creativity and science fiction, but her parents always saw this as a quirk to be celebrated. Bon Bon, on the other hand, enjoyed the sweeter things in life like candy, despite her overall valuation of friendship that governed her work ethic.

Twilight was also captivated and enthralled a bit when she remembered that Lyra told a story about how she and Bon Bon met when they were children. The long and short of it was that as kids in kindergarten, Bon Bon used to be bullied a lot over the fact that she was able to eat gummy bears and small chocolate Smoochies while everyone had to get bland and puffy rice cakes. Many days, she would be crying because many of the other boys and girls would conspire to steal her Miss Everyday lunch box to see what goods she had in it, but she was always there to hold her hand, regardless of how desirable her snacks were. Unable to see her best friend getting bullied week in and week out, she stood out from the predators and volunteered to stand guard at both of their lunch boxes; soon as vultures could get on the attack, she would ward them off with whatever crayons she was armed with, defending her and her lunch at the same time. So moved was her act of kindness and deviation from the pack that they almost never left each other's sides. Anyone who threatened them, even as the teachers were watching their stories on TV, knew never to mess with the bond of good friends.

Remembering such fun stories, Twilight remarked about it in her interesting segment about candy, as she got the camera rolling again.

"Candy. It's dandy and it's sweet. When I did this one, I was just transferring to Canterlot High when two very best friends warned me about this one particular school counselor who everyone called Discord. Even though he was a bit of a pain, he totally changed over time, and I invited him to record a segment while I tried to figure out what became of my time at Crystal Prep. But here's the next segment about candy and sweets."

"And we're back with more Twilight Time," began Discord with his grayish skin, brown coat, and odd haircut. "Summer vacation's been a doozy for Twilight Sparkle, especially at Crystal Prep with the Friendship Games, so I, Discord, shall be taking over for her until everything is resolved. Anyway, my questions today include one from sweetiebons, and she says:"

Dear Twilight,
I just came across this thermometer that reads "soft ball" and "hard crack" and stuff like that. What does that mean?

"Sweetiebons, this is a rather simple question with a less-than simple answer. What you found is what they call in the candy business a candy thermometer," he continued as he pulled one out for demonstration.

"Unlike a meat thermometer, they can read a higher range of temperatures typical of ovens, especially as the temperature of the sugar solution governs how much of a concentration of sugar there is and therefore what kind of structure it assumes."

In the video, Discord had a demonstration ready to roll with numerous beakers of sugar solution and candies to help him as visual aids on the table.

"In the candy world, the temperature of the sugar solution you work with can assume any of seven stages, primarily named for what happens when it's exposed to water. At the thread stage, the syrup is barely heated past the boiling point of water, and it's still watery enough to be syrup."

As he talked, he doused chocolate syrup onto what appeared to be a Pinkie Pie vinyl.

"At the soft ball stage, you can make a very soft ball with it, like what you'd make fudge and fondant with."

From off the camera, he produced a wooden bat with two red stripes adorning the head and whacked the soft ball, producing a shattering screech and a voice telling him that it was a new record.

"Firm ball-stage sugar," he started, "lets you make nice, yummy, sticky caramels."

With that, Discord proceeded to stick an Applejack vinyl into four caramels. He spoke as he had three sculptures of candy in the form of several other ponies made for some of the students in the school, especially one of rock candy for Maud Pie, a nougat sculpture for Sweetie Belle, a marshmallow sculpture of Rarity, and a gummy treat form of Gummy; Pinkie Pie's pet alligator.

"Hard ball candy gives you those rock candies, nougats, marshmallows, and gummy bears."

He went on to take a small hammer out of his coat for his next few demonstrations. Made simply of wood, he took care to avoid making a mess in Twilight's basement.

"Soft Crack sugar will harden when cooled and break after being bent a bit, like taffy and butterscotch," he remarked, breaking a taffy Twilight's taffy horn.

"Somewhat not least, hard crack has so little water that it gives you rigid candy, such as those lovely lollipops and toffees that make up your holiday shopping lists. And finally, caramelized sugars are notable in that they turn a brownish color as the sugar itself burns, but that's another story for when you decorate your desserts."

As he ended, he loaded those purple-tinted brown sugar glass needles into a prop weapon based on one in the game, Halogen.

Twilight continued to review the video and reflected on Discord's progress as a functioning member of society. It was kind of depressing knowing that he went to university with Principals Celestia and Luna, only to realize that he would be on medication for a time to treat his own schizophrenia. With that, Twilight ended her editing for the day and saved her progress. It was now time for supper, a meal of meatloaf with mashed carrot and corn.