Issue 09: 3D-Print Pizza Party
Issue 09 · Ages 6–11

3D-Print Pizza Party

Tech: 3D food printingJob: Chef-preneur Authors: E. H. Ackerman & J. D. AckermanARQS Press
Reading band: Ages 6–11Headline tech: 3D food printingThe job: Chef-preneurLocation: Sunbeam Community Kitchen, beside a rooftop herb garden and a busy Saturday makers’ market
The Hook

Chef Marisol needs twenty mini pizzas for the makers’ market, but her food printer keeps making shapes more scarf than supper. The crew gets hired as chef-preneurs—real products, real customers, and no “Cheese Thunder” topping.

Cast in this issue
Comic Pages
PAGE 1
PANEL 1Sunbeam Community Kitchen opens onto a basil-and-tomato rooftop market. CHEF MARISOL: "Chef-preneurs, make, price, and serve twenty mini pizzas. Twenty coins, plus five if all sell." JAY: "Bet. I am ready to sell pizza to my own mouth."
PANEL 2CHEF MARISOL: "Wash hands, cover loose hair, use approved ingredients, read orders, never touch hot trays." Tray logs it. Glitch sees Jay’s puffy hairnet. GAG: It labels him “FRESHLY BAKED.” JAY: "I have achieved doughnut-head status."
PAGE 2
PANEL 3Rae points to the nozzle. RAE: "A 3D food printer squeezes food in layers, following a computer shape. Layer by layer, it can make shapes hands take longer to make." TRAY: "Then we bake the dough so it becomes pizza, not edible squiggle." JAY: "Every squiggle deserves a dream."
PANEL 4The printer makes a neat star base and sauce dots: “LAYER 18 OF 24.” CHEF MARISOL: "That is it working—science-club star pizzas." JAY: "Big brain food!" GAG: His flour toss lands as a perfect white mustache. RAE: "Congratulations. You are an ingredient."
PAGE 3
PANEL 5Jay loads extra-cheesy dough but taps “spiral sample,” not “star batch.” A looping ribbon coils around his apron. GAG: He poses in a slow pizza scarf. JAY: "Behold: wearable lunch!" CHEF MARISOL: "Fun shape. Wrong order."
PANEL 6TRAY: "Six star bases and six minutes gone. We have ingredients; restart correctly." Rae takes her new belt tool, the Dough-Dot Caliper. RAE: "It measures nozzle width: too wide means Blob City, too narrow means sad string." JAY: "Blob City has excellent rent."
PAGE 4
PANEL 7Rae calibrates; Tray selects “STAR—TWENTY”; Jay checks every base against a picture card. Crisp stars, circles, and a tiny rocket appear. JAY: "Vibe check: printer is workin’ it." CHEF MARISOL: "Now take orders professionally." Jay writes “basil” twice, carefully.
PANEL 8Customers buy hot garden-herb pizzas. Jay nearly bows too low with a tray; Rae steadies it. GAG: Pizzas slide together one inch, then stop in perfect cheesy formation. CHEF MARISOL: "Twenty coins plus five-coin sellout bonus." TRAY writes: "Ledger line: 09, Chef-preneur wages and sellout bonus, plus 25 coins. Total: 194 coins." JAY: "Do holograms eat pizza? Science asks."

Tech Talk with Rae

RAE’S TOOL-BELT BOX: A 3D food printer follows a digital shape and pushes food through a nozzle in thin layers. It can repeat a shape, but needs clean ingredients, a checked design, and a chef. It cannot tell when someone chose “pizza scarf.” TRY IT: Stack crackers or fruit into a shape; what does each layer add?

The Job Board
  • Job title: Chef-preneur
  • Who hired us: Chef Marisol, Sunbeam Community Kitchen
  • Rules of the job: Clean hands; covered loose hair; approved ingredients; checked orders; clear of hot trays.
  • What went wrong: Jay printed a cheese-and-dough scarf, not six star bases.
  • How we fixed it: Rae calibrated with the new Dough-Dot Caliper, Tray restored the batch, and Jay checked picture cards.
  • What we got paid: 20 coins shift pay + 5-coin sellout bonus = 25 coins. Crew Bank ledger total: 194 coins.
Slang Decoder
Bet** — yes; I’m ready.Big brain** — cleverly thought out.Vibe check** — a check of how things are going.Workin’ it** — doing a great job.

The crew’s first food business is heating up! A 3D printer makes star-shaped pizzas layer by layer—until one button turns lunch into Jay’s newest outfit. Can they save the batch, earn a sellout bonus, and keep pizza scarf off the menu? The stage lights are calling!

Full-colour modern children’s graphic-novel cartoon with thick clean ink and saturated friendly colour: at Sunbeam Community Kitchen’s rooftop market, Tray is a warm-brown-skinned 10-year-old with short curly black hair and a lightning-bolt shaved part on the LEFT, chunky blue-framed smart glasses with a camera dot on the right lens, mustard-yellow gear-patch hoodie, teal cargo shorts, bright orange sneakers, and slim drone-zipper-pull backpack, checking a star-pizza list. Jay is a lighter-brown-skinned freckled 8-year-old with wild messy black hair, one missing front tooth, lime rocket-print T-shirt, red gadget-pocket shorts, mismatched striped and polka-dot socks, and chunky glowing-lace purple sneakers, wearing a pizza scarf. Rae is a dark-brown-skinned 12-year-old with two long black braids with gold bead cuffs, purple rolled-sleeve utility jumpsuit, safety goggles on her forehead, smartwatch on her right wrist, silver-and-pink high-tops, and a tool belt holding a wrench, Propeller Gauge, Dough Scraper, Fold-Out Safety Whistle, Pocket Tripod Clamp, and Sunlight Meter, Nutrient Nudge Pipette, Spoke-Saver Wrench, Quiet-Click Label Maker, and Dough-Dot Caliper, adjusting the printer. Include layered star pizzas, herbs, flags, and Glitch.

All 22 issues← Issue 08: The Chatbot That Wouldn’t Stop JokingIssue 10: Hologram Headliners →

This issue in print

Issue 09 appears in the collection Tray & Jay: World Explorers with its full-colour comic illustration, Tech Talk page, Job Board card and Slang Decoder.