Chapter 178: The Person Who Showed Up on a Truck (4)
Chapter 178: The Person Who Showed Up on a Truck (4)
“I told you I wasn’t going to. If you keep fooling around, I’m going to punch you.”
As Kaya said that, she stretched out her fist and punched him in the shoulder. Jo Minjoon rubbed the spot and looked at her in disbelief.
“Who hits someone while warning them?”
“Don’t fret over the small stuff. Anyway, how was today?”
“It’s the same for me every day. Learn molecular gastronomy from the Head Chef and Sous Chef, research, try to develop a recipe…… Ah. I really want to head either the main or pasta station. Which one would you want?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think I’d hate molecular gastronomy. It sounds fun.”
“It would definitely be fun. It would feel like doing a science experiment too. But how do I put this? It doesn’t feel like I’m cooking…… and I want to focus more on the basics. That’s why I have no desire to win this recipe battle.”
“Let’s rest for a bit.”
Kaya stopped and plopped down on a bench to catch her breath. When Jo Minjoon sat beside her, she slowly rested her head on his shoulder and wrapped her arms around him.
Jo Minjoon spoke nervously. “Hey, what if someone sees us……”
“Who cares? I’m hugging my man.”
“But this is a bit much.”
“Oh, but casually kissing me in a café wasn’t too much? You made a picture of a twenty-something girl kissing a man spread all over the internet.”
Kaya lifted her head to look at Minjoon, then rested her cheek against his neck again. Jo Minjoon sighed.
“You provoked me quite a bit that day. You made it impossible for me to maintain my rationality.”
“What? So it wasn’t rationality, but a kiss based on instinct. Is that it?”
“Let’s call it emotion instead of instinct.”
Kaya looked up at him. Jo Minjoon looked down at her and spoke in a weary voice.
“You look really ugly right now.”
“Watch your mouth. I’m your girlfriend. I don’t expect you to be Romeo or Hamlet, but couldn’t you at least show Werther’s level of purity?”
“If you mean The Sorrows of Young Werther, isn’t that the one where the protagonist has an unrequited love and then commits suicide?”
“Yes. So be a little more grateful. You don’t need to love me without being loved in return, hmm…… or meet an ending like that.”
“I’m more shocked than grateful. When did you read something like that? It’s a classic, so it should’ve been difficult.”
At his words, Kaya smirked and pulled out her smartphone. After reading the lines on the screen, Jo Minjoon made a disgusted face. It contained summaries of all kinds of classic literature and masterpieces in only two or three lines. For The Sorrows of Young Werther, for example, it read, ‘Goethe’s novel. The protagonist suffers from unrequited love and commits suicide.’
“……What is this?”
“How to Become an Educated Person in Just Five Minutes, page one.”
Kaya laughed as she answered. Jo Minjoon gave no reaction and simply stared at her.
Kaya pouted and put her phone away.
“I haven’t learned anything. Everyone always looks down on me. So I wanted to prove I’m not as stupid as you all think I am! I wanted to be able to say things like that…… Was I being stupid?”
“More than that, I’m curious. You care enough to look things like this up, but why don’t you ever think about actually reading the books?”
“You said it yourself. They’d be difficult. Anyway, I want to give you some advice too. Molecular gastronomy. Wouldn’t it be easier if you thought of it this way? Just like this summary brings out the important parts of a book, molecular gastronomy brings out the uniqueness of each ingredient. I’m not confident I’d understand classical literature even if I read it, so I need summaries like this. I’m sure there are customers like that too.”
Jo Minjoon quietly listened to what Kaya was saying. She continued almost in a whisper, her voice and breath brushing against his chin.
“I know my man. If there’s a customer in front of him, no matter what the situation is, he’s the type to put everything he has into the dish. So stop worrying about the possibility of ending up in the molecular gastronomy section. And that challenge? Push yourself to win it. I don’t want you losing to anyone except me.”
“I already lost to Anderson, though?”
“Ah, seriously. Why would you bring him up? It was just a figure of speech. Just a figure of speech. You really can’t read the mood……”
Kaya’s words were cut off.
Jo Minjoon lightly kissed her and smiled. Kaya’s face turned red as she pulled the collar of her shirt up to her nose to cover her mouth and looked around.
“Hey! What are you doing when there are so many people around?”
Jo Minjoon smiled.
“Who cares if other people see? I’m choosing to kiss my woman.”
“……That makes you sound like a player.”
“I just repeated your own words back to you.”
“The nuance between hugging and kissing is completely different! Sob, sob. I’m worried. There isn’t some girl following you around in the kitchen telling you she likes you, is there?”
He wanted to say there wasn’t, but Ella’s face popped into his mind, and his mouth stopped.
Kaya did not miss that moment and immediately glared at him.
“There is.”
“She’s a six-year-old little girl. Don’t worry.”
“How can I not…… Wait. She’s six?”
Kaya now looked at Minjoon as though he were a criminal. Jo Minjoon stared back at her as if asking what was wrong with her. Kaya, looking as though she wanted no part in becoming an accomplice, lowered her voice and practically shouted in a whisper.
“I know you like younger girls, but isn’t that going too far? I’m only eighteen, and now a six-year-old……!”
“Rather than saying I like younger girls, I think it’s more accurate to say younger girls like me.”
“I need to put a mark on you to show you’re mine. Where should I stamp it?”
Jo Minjoon scratched his head before answering.
“If you want the law to help, I suppose a marriage licence?”
*
Kaya herself did not know this, but Minjoon did not treat the things she said as merely the words of his girlfriend. To Minjoon, Kaya had always been a role model, so hearing her thoughts was no different from receiving a lesson.
He wanted to become a good chef.
He wanted to become like Kaya.
That was why Jo Minjoon stopped calculating. The only thing he needed to think about when ingredients were in front of him was the recipe itself. That change in mindset was clearly reflected in how he now approached molecular gastronomy. His expression was more focused than ever, and his hands moved quickly.
Rachel looked at him with slight confusion.
“You seem more focused than usual. Are you finally starting to find molecular gastronomy fun?”
“It was fun from the beginning. But the thought that I might be stuck doing molecular gastronomy for a while if I won was frustrating me…… so I’m just going to throw those thoughts away. I believe in you, Teacher Rachel, and in Sous Chef Rafael. I have faith in myself as well. Not only can my molecular gastronomy skills improve, but my understanding of real cooking can improve too. I’m sure the two of you will guide me so that happens.”
Rachel simply smiled at Minjoon’s words.
Anderson, who was standing nearby, snorted.
“That’s only if you win.”
“You honestly have no desire to win, do you?”
Anderson looked guilty at Minjoon’s question.
It was not just Anderson. Janet and Javier were the same. All three of them would rather handle traditional cooking than molecular gastronomy.
Janet spoke in her usual indifferent voice.
“Judging by the way you’re talking, it seems you finally have a reason to win?”
“It’s a battle. Why do people fight battles? Obviously, to win.”
“……You call that a reason?”
Jo Minjoon nodded.
Janet looked at him as though she could not understand him at all. Javier gave a fake cough.
“Fine. I’ll give you first place. But I’m taking second.”
“……You mean second from the bottom, right?”
“Of course I mean second from the top.”
Janet, Anderson, and Javier all glared fiercely at one another.
Rafael, who had been watching the three of them, spoke in an aggrieved voice.
“Don’t be so blatant about hating molecular gastronomy. It’s delicious.”
“It is delicious, but it’s extremely annoying. And it isn’t tastier than traditional cooking. It’s simply a different kind of taste.”
“You need to understand the value of that difference!”
“I never said I didn’t understand its value.”
Janet answered calmly.
Rafael looked as though he wanted to shout, but in the end he merely sighed and shut his mouth.
Jo Minjoon stopped paying attention to them and focused again on the dish he was making.
Jelly had a much longer history than one might expect. The ancient Romans had solidified meat and broth and eaten them in jelly form. One newer method introduced through molecular gastronomy involved using agar.
Compared to jelly made with gelatin, agar jelly was chewier, but it also felt as though it broke apart more easily…… almost like noodles.
Jo Minjoon’s recipe was simple. First, he ground garlic, basil, and onion into chicken broth, then added agar, salt, pepper, and other seasonings before bringing it all to a boil. He then drew the mixture into a syringe and injected it into a silicone tube about the thickness of a spaghetti strand before cooling the tube in cold water.
The next step was the most difficult. It was also the part that seemed furthest removed from cooking.
He filled the syringe with air, attached it to the tube, and used the pressure to push the jelly spaghetti out.
At a glance, it might have looked comical, as though he were conducting an experiment, but Jo Minjoon was more focused than ever. First, he had to pinch the tube tightly around the syringe so no air could escape. Then he had to press the plunger carefully so the noodle would not break.
“……It’s complete.”
Jo Minjoon looked proudly at the noodle.
It was translucent, with a faint green tint.
But this was not the end. He still had to return it to the refrigerator and let it set for another twenty-four hours. After that, almost anything was possible. He could pair it with whatever ingredients he wanted, and as long as the temperature stayed below eighty degrees, it could even be served warm.
No one knew when she had appeared, but Ella was standing nearby staring at them with a dark expression. More precisely, she was staring at the jelly spaghetti Minjoon had made.
Jo Minjoon shook his head.
“Ella. I’m sorry, but I can’t give you this yet. Tomorrow, after it finishes setting, I can let you try some.”
Ella nodded, almost drooling.
Anderson watched her with an amused expression.
“Looks like you’re planning to submit this as your dish for the battle. Am I right?”
“Isn’t it fun? Normally, you’d have to chew the noodles together with the other ingredients, but with this, you can taste all the ingredients just by chewing the noodle itself. I think recipes like this are what make molecular gastronomy fun.”
“You won’t know whether it’s fun until you taste it.”
But Jo Minjoon had made it.
Anderson was already certain the dish would be interesting. At least, the Jo Minjoon he had observed until now was a genius when it came to developing recipes. In that respect, he was comparable even to head chefs. There had never been a recipe Jo Minjoon came up with that was not delicious.
And that was not simply because Jo Minjoon used the system to check a dish’s estimated score. These days, whenever he checked the expected score of something he created, it rarely fell below seven points. That alone showed how hard he had worked. When it came to handling a pan or knife, his cooking level might still only be seven, but in terms of creativity when developing recipes……
Jo Minjoon might already be far ahead of Anderson.
Although Anderson could not see the system, he sensed something similar. Jo Minjoon’s creativity was becoming increasingly sophisticated and meticulous. Sometimes, it reached the point where it genuinely frightened him.
Anderson quietly spoke.
“The recipe battle. Are you confident you can win?”
“Can an athlete enter the ring without confidence and expect to beat their opponent?”
“……This feels strange. I want to tell you to win, but I also don’t want to lose on purpose just to let you win.”
“Lose on purpose? Yeah, right. More like you’ll just lose.”
Anderson did not answer. He simply turned away with a complicated expression and headed back to his counter. Although the prize for first place was not something he wanted, he apparently did not want to lose to Jo Minjoon either.
Janet and Javier seemed to feel much the same. They each returned to their counters and diligently began thinking through their recipes.
Rafael clenched his fist in satisfaction, then suddenly hugged Minjoon and kissed him on the cheek.
Jo Minjoon recoiled in disgust and backed away.
Rafael grinned.
“Thank you, Minjoon. You gave them exactly the stimulation they needed.”
“……Did you have to show your gratitude with a kiss?”
“Sometimes I need to act like a white person.”
“If my girlfriend saw that, she’d throw a pretty good punch.”
“At you? Or at me?”
Jo Minjoon merely smiled instead of answering.
It was a meaningful smile.
Rafael began to tremble in mock fear.
“You must be dating quite the feisty woman.”
Jo Minjoon shrugged.
“She’s like the MSG of my life.”