Chapter 194: In Front of the Start Line (1)
Chapter 194: In Front of the Start Line (1)
As always, time showed no consideration for anyone’s circumstances.
Rose Island’s opening was already less than a month away. There were still no customers, of course, but the atmosphere in the kitchen had grown noticeably more tense.
And now, Jo Minjoon was standing in the middle of the market, frowning at an orange in his hand.
“This isn’t very good quality, is it? The sweetness seems lower than usual too.”
“Why would the quality be bad…… …… Fine. It is a little less sweet than normal.”
“Are you really going to be like this? If you keep it up, I’m going to Trudy ajumma’s shop.”
(Translator’s Note: Ajumma — A Korean form of address or reference for a middle-aged or married woman. Traditionally connected to an older meaning referring to a married woman, it became an ordinary social term in modern Korea. Its tone varies considerably with context: it may be familiar and practical, affectionate, teasing, or potentially impolite when used towards someone who considers herself too young for the label.)
“Ah, don’t be like that. The difference isn’t that big. It’s still quite sweet. Just slightly less than usual.”
“That slight difference can determine everything in cooking. So where are the good ones? Don’t you have any?”
“Sorry. I think the distributors didn’t maintain the proper temperature during transport.”
The man sighed with an embarrassed expression and glanced at Jo Minjoon.
Even for someone like him, who had spent nearly his entire life selling fruit, the difference was difficult to distinguish by appearance alone. Yet Minjoon had noticed it without even tasting the orange.
All the man could do was click his tongue.
Jo Minjoon crossed his arms and sighed.
“Then why did you accept the shipment? You should’ve sent it back. I suppose today’s no good. I’ll come back tomorrow.”
“No, don’t do that. At least look at the other produce.”
“I’m not planning to buy only a little. It’s not my card I’m using.”
Leaving the disappointed merchant behind, Jo Minjoon turned away.
Maya and Justin followed close behind him.
“Wow, Chef. You’re amazing. How can you tell how sweet it is without even tasting it?”
“I want to be able to do that someday too…… Is there some trick to it?”
“Colour and smell. Texture as well.”
Of course, the system played a small part too.
But Maya and Justin walked with their noses practically in the air, full of pride.
It made sense.
Of the four demi chefs, they could confidently say that Jo Minjoon was the best when it came to purchasing ingredients.
There had never been a time when Minjoon brought back poor-quality produce.
If you bought ten onions, there was a good chance at least one would have something wrong with it. But Jo Minjoon checked every single one.
It had even led some members of the kitchen team to suggest that Minjoon should simply take charge of all ingredient shopping.
Naturally, there was no chance he would accept.
Waking up early every morning to buy ingredients was not easy.
Yet despite the inconvenience, Maya and Justin actually looked forward to these trips more than anything else.
The crisp morning air.
The fragrance of countless fruits mingling together.
The endless colours of the ingredients, more beautiful in their eyes than even a field of flowers.
But none of those were the real reason they enjoyed coming.
They certainly helped clear the mind, but the true entertainment lay elsewhere.
That entertainment was……
“Look over there. The chefs from Pesto Pesto. After Chef Minjoon rejected those oranges, they aren’t buying them either.”
“The Glacier chefs are practically following us around. They’re watching everything we don’t buy.”
This.
Of course, no one followed Minjoon around if a head chef or sous chef had personally come to shop.
But when demi chefs or lower-ranking staff were sent out on errands, following Jo Minjoon was an easy way to avoid bad ingredients and find only the best produce.
He had effectively become a market guide for ingredient shopping.
It made sense.
By now, Jo Minjoon was practically a celebrity among the merchants.
Not because of his Absolute Taste.
Not because he worked at Rose Island.
But because he could distinguish the condition of ingredients better than merchants who had handled them for decades.
How could someone like that not become famous?
He had started to feel like an elite even within the culinary world.
Of course, simply working at Rose Island was already enough to be considered elite, but Minjoon’s calm demeanour and knowledge far beyond his age gave those around him a peculiar sense of pride.
Enough that Maya and Justin almost felt as though they ought to walk more stylishly just because they were beside him.
As usual, Justin drove on the way back from the market.
He spoke excitedly.
“Shopping is always easy and fun when we come with you, Chef. It feels like I’m walking around with a celebrity.”
“How can a chef find the market difficult? Doesn’t it feel like an amusement park? Whenever I see lots of high-quality or interesting ingredients, I feel like I’m on holiday.”
“But unlike the demi chefs and prep cooks who take turns, I have to come every day. No matter how much you like something, you’ll get tired of it if you have it every single day.”
“Hang in there. It’ll get easier once you lose the apprentice title.”
Jo Minjoon looked at him warmly, as though he understood exactly what Justin was going through.
He had once been an apprentice himself.
And worse, an apprentice under a truly unpleasant and twisted person.
That was why he understood Justin’s position.
If the head chef was the busiest person mentally, then the apprentice was the busiest physically.
They handled every imaginable kind of menial work.
Maya watched the way Minjoon treated Justin and fell into thought.
Even if she had ended up assigned to the molecular gastronomy section, perhaps becoming Jo Minjoon’s assistant had actually been a stroke of good luck.
He was gentle without being a pushover.
Strict without being difficult.
His attention was always on cooking, and he never tried to lecture her about things unrelated to it.
Most importantly, he did not treat the people around him badly.
Of course, the other demi chefs were not much different, but Minjoon was especially considerate of other people’s situations.
Whenever Maya tried to complain, the other prep cooks would immediately cut her off with the same response.
At least you’re Chef Minjoon’s assistant.
The moment they returned to the kitchen, they had to get straight to work.
When most people thought of molecular gastronomy, they imagined machines and equipment.
But in Maya’s experience, far more time was spent working with unusual ingredients.
Agar.
(Translator’s Note: Agar — A plant-based gelling substance extracted primarily from red algae, especially species of Gelidium and Gracilaria. Agar production developed in Japan during the seventeenth century, traditionally traced to the discovery of kanten around 1658. Unlike animal-derived gelatine, agar sets relatively firmly, remains stable at higher temperatures, and can form gels at very low concentrations. It became important in microbiology during the late nineteenth century and is now widely used in Asian confectionery, food manufacturing, and molecular gastronomy.)
Dextrose monohydrate.
(Translator’s Note: Dextrose monohydrate — A crystalline form of glucose in which each glucose molecule is associated with one molecule of water. Glucose was isolated and studied by European chemists during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, while industrial production from starch expanded during the nineteenth century. In professional cooking and food manufacture, dextrose is less sweet than ordinary sucrose and can influence sweetness, freezing point, browning, fermentation, and texture. In ice cream, sorbets, and modernist preparations, it is particularly useful for controlling crystallisation and producing a softer frozen texture.)
Lecithin.
Tapioca maltodextrin.
Sodium citrate.
(Translator’s Note:Tapioca maltodextrin — A starch-derived carbohydrate powder commonly produced from tapioca and used in modernist cooking to convert high-fat liquids such as oils, nut pastes, or melted fats into dry or semi-dry powders. Maltodextrins became important industrial food ingredients during the twentieth century, while their ability to transform fats into powders became especially prominent in molecular and modernist gastronomy during the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries.)
(Translator’s Note: Sodium citrate — Sodium citrate, commonly trisodium citrate in culinary applications — A sodium salt of citric acid used as an acidity regulator, buffering agent, and emulsifying salt. Citric acid was first isolated by Carl Wilhelm Scheele in 1784, while citrate salts later became widely used in food processing. Modernist cooks use sodium citrate particularly to produce smooth emulsified cheese sauces by helping proteins remain dispersed rather than separating into curds and fat.)
Ingredients like those.
That also meant spending a great deal of time checking the condition of doughs, gels, powders, and other preparations made using them.
Of course, that alone was not enough to make the section overwhelmingly busy.
But taking those preparations and actually turning them into finished dishes demanded constant work from both the hands and the mind.
And if it was already this difficult before opening……
Maya did not even want to imagine what it would be like once customers began arriving.
If there was one thing the prep cooks had learned during the preparations for opening, it was that the difference between a demi chef and a prep cook existed for a reason.
It was not simply a matter of cooking skill.
The demi chefs became tired too, but once they started cooking a dish, their concentration never wavered.
You could visibly see them pour their entire attention into the food.
Watching them made it impossible for the prep cooks not to feel motivated.
“Maya. Taste this.”
Jo Minjoon held out a plate.
Maya looked down.
On it were transparent noodles dusted with white powder, topped with coriander and lemongrass.
She asked, “What is this?”
“Thai-style rice noodles with calf broth. I turned the broth into a cream, then powdered it and simmered it again. It isn’t finished yet…… but tell me what you think of the flavour.”
“……It would be my honour.”
She looked far too apprehensive for someone calling it an honour.
That was understandable.
Jo Minjoon’s molecular gastronomy dishes had been rather……
Interesting.
Almost astonishing.
Which also meant……
You never know whether you’re about to go to heaven or hell.
Maya squeezed her eyes shut and put the noodles into her mouth.
The instant she bit down, her eyes slowly opened again.
Admiration spread across her face.
She chewed, swallowed, then clapped her hands.
“Wow. This is actually pretty good. It’s the best thing you’ve made lately.”
“Really?”
“But if I had to point out something disappointing…… the flavour of the broth powder doesn’t seem very deep.”
Jo Minjoon nodded heavily.
Lately, what interested him most was broth.
There was a significant difference between the way Eastern and Western cuisines treated it.
In many Eastern cuisines, broth was consumed as it was.
Western cuisine, on the other hand, tended to use stock as an ingredient for soups, sauces, or preparations such as demi-glace.
The problem was that both approaches were extremely demanding.
Demi-glace and broth could both seem like basic preparations……
But making either one properly was far from simple.
There were plenty of Korean soup-and-rice restaurants where people devoted their entire lives to perfecting the flavour of a single broth.
……I do have recipes, though.
He had visited several good soup-and-rice restaurants throughout Koreatown.
And Jo Minjoon knew all of their broth recipes.
The problem was that most of those restaurants simmered enormous quantities of beef at once.
On top of that, someone remained by the fire twenty-four hours a day to make sure it never went out.
“Is this what you’ve been obsessing over lately?”
A voice suddenly came from beside him.
It was Rafael.
He picked up a fork, twirled some noodles around it, and put them into his mouth.
After chewing, he nodded.
“It tastes good, but the depth isn’t there.”
“I think it’s because I couldn’t give the broth enough time.”
“Did you use commercial stock?”
“No. I made it myself. I thought handmade would definitely be better.”
“I’m not sure about that. With this level of depth, you might actually be better off using a commercial product. You shouldn’t dismiss something just because it’s mass-produced. Factory products might all seem similar, but there are plenty made with genuine care.”
“Yes. I know. But…… I feel like the customers who come here will prefer something we made ourselves.”
“That’s true.”
Rafael thought for a moment.
“Then why don’t you make it properly yourself? I’ll allow it.”
At those words, Jo Minjoon stared at him in confusion.
Rafael smiled.
“That broth. Make it with your own hands.”
*
“……I was wondering where you’d disappeared to. Are you seriously doing this insane thing?”
Kaya stared at Minjoon as though he were an idiot.
It was night.
There were only three people left in the kitchen.
Jo Minjoon.
Kaya.
And Anderson.
Jo Minjoon answered with a relaxed smile.
“To be honest, I’ve wanted to try it at least once. Slow food. I’ve never properly made something like this with my own hands before.”
“There still has to be a limit. People don’t just climb into a spaceship because they feel like visiting space.”
“Ay, you can’t compare this to that.”
“……You really are hopeless. Seriously.”
Kaya sat down on a counter.
Anderson frowned immediately.
“That’s my worktop.”
“Oh. Sorry, my arse. I put something strange on you.”
Kaya hopped back down and patted her backside.
Jo Minjoon sighed.
“If you’re only going to mess around, go home. It’s already late.”
“You say that, but you’ll get lonely if I leave.”
“Who gets lonely while cooking?”
Jo Minjoon answered casually as he skimmed the fat rising to the surface of the broth.
Kaya leaned her head over his shoulder.
“The smell of pork is going to soak into the entire kitchen. How long do you have to boil this?”
“Twenty-four hours.”
“………You’re going to stay like this the whole time? You’ll hurt yourself.”
“I’ll be fine if I take a few minutes’ break every now and then.”
“All this suffering just to make fancy ramen soup.”
“……Hearing you describe it like that suddenly makes me tired.”
Jo Minjoon laughed.
While Kaya massaged the back of his neck, Anderson spoke.
“Cooking aside, we need to sign the lease for the house soon.”
“Have you two decided?”
Jo Minjoon asked without taking his eyes off the broth.
There were two possible places they were considering.
One was in Beverly Hills.
The other was in West Hollywood.
The former was close to Rose Island, while the latter was closer to Kaya’s Grand Chef restaurant.
Of course, neither was dramatically farther than the other.
Kaya answered.
“I like Beverly Hills.”
“Why?”
“There are too many crazies in Hollywood.”
Minjoon understood what she meant.
Hollywood attracted every kind of artist imaginable, and people around the area tended to be rather……
Unusual.
Anderson spoke.
“But the Beverly Hills place…… you both already know, right? It only has a master bedroom and one other bedroom.”
“We know.”
Housing in Beverly Hills was extremely expensive.
With their salaries, finding somewhere with three bedrooms was difficult.
That meant at least two of the three of them would have to share the master bedroom.
Anderson shrugged.
“Then there’s only one thing left to decide. Who gets the master bedroom? You two?”
He looked between Kaya and Minjoon.
“Or Minjoon and me?”