A Jewish family moves to the mountain, looking to escape the persecution that forced them out of Germany. Wanting to maintain a low profile, Professor Mann tells his family that they will not practice their faith, much to the dismay of his son Paul, who was looking forward to celebrating his upcoming bar mitzvah.

When a meteorite falls through the roof of the Baldwin mansion and lands on the recipe machine, everyone on the mountain takes its arrival as a sign of different things: Grandpa thinks that it signals his upcoming death; Ben that he'll win an upcoming spelling bee; and the Baldwin sisters that they should no longer make their father's recipe. Upon learning of cousin Polonius Baldwin arrived and filling the Baldwin sisters heads of dismantling the recipe machine, Grandpa takes matters into his own hands and tells the sisters why their cousin is on the mountain.

When John Boy learns that his stories need to be typed in order to be submitted to the various magazines to be published, he turns to the Baldwin sisters to see if he could borrow their father's antique typewriter. He then hides it out in the shed, where Mary Ellen soon finds it and accidentally sells it to the local junk man. After finding out what happened, they try to track it down before telling the sisters what happened.