Chapter 75: Unexpected Collaboration (3)
Chapter 75: Unexpected Collaboration (3)
Just as Kaya had said, when Jo Minjoon stopped simmering the chicken thigh directly in the sauce, it became comparatively less tender. But that did not make it worse. Rather, the fibres of the meat pulled apart more distinctly, and the flavour of the chicken itself, which had previously been buried beneath the sauce, now came through faintly on his tongue.
[Soy Sauce Dak-galbi]
Freshness: 93%
Origins: (Too many ingredients to show)
Quality: High
Cooking Score: 8/10
Jo Minjoon gave a helpless laugh as he stared at the system window. He had never imagined he would be able to make an 8-point dish this way. Of course, in cooking, if you followed a good recipe properly, half the work was already done…
“It’s definitely better than before.”
He put another piece of dak-galbi into his mouth and nodded. The reactions of the others were not much different.
Joanne looked impressed as she said, “This is exactly my kind of food. The chicken and the sauce really suit each other.”
“Thanks.”
“…Wait. Now that I think about it, this isn’t the time to be impressed. What’s going on, Minjoon? Why have you been cooking so well lately?”
Instead of answering, Jo Minjoon merely smiled awkwardly. Truthfully, he had also felt his skills steadily improving. He no longer felt as stifled as before, but there was still some impatience. Cooking Level 7 was right in front of him. If it had still been far away, perhaps he would not even have looked at it, but now that it felt close enough to reach, his greed only grew stronger.
“Tomorrow’s going to be a war.”
“I don’t know about that. If you make something unpopular, you won’t get the chance to be busy even if you want to. The side that actually gets that war-like rush will probably be the winner.”
At Anderson’s words, everyone nodded. And inwardly, each of them hoped that no matter how exhausting it became, they would be among those fighting that war.
-
Caprese. Arancini. Bruschetta. Broccoli soup. Eggplant lasagne. Mapo tofu. Dak-galbi. Frittata. Strawberry chiffon cake. Tiramisu.
(Translator’s Note: Arancini —Sicilian stuffed rice balls that are generally filled, coated in breadcrumbs, and fried. Their distant origins are often connected with rice dishes introduced during Arab rule in Sicily between the ninth and eleventh centuries, although the modern breaded and fried forms developed later. Typical fillings include ragù, cheese, and peas.)
(Translator’s Note: Bruschetta —Grilled or toasted bread traditionally rubbed with garlic and dressed with olive oil, with tomatoes and other toppings common in modern versions. The name derives from a central Italian verb associated with roasting over coals. The preparation grew from rural central Italian traditions of tasting newly pressed olive oil.)
(Translator’s Note: Frittata —An Italian egg dish prepared with ingredients such as vegetables, meat, herbs, or cheese. Unlike a French-style omelette, it is generally cooked more slowly and may be finished in the oven rather than folded around a filling. Forms of cooked egg mixtures resembling modern frittata have existed in Italian cuisine for centuries.)
Those were the ten dishes the contestants had chosen.
The contestant everyone envied most was Hugo, who had chosen caprese. It was a dish that could be completed simply by preparing the tomatoes and mozzarella properly and finishing them with basil. Aside from handling the tomatoes correctly, there was not much difficulty involved. However, Hugo was also the only contestant who had chosen a salad-style dish. Honestly, salad was difficult to win many votes with. If two contestants had chosen salads, it would have been almost certain that both would end up near the bottom.
Kaya had chosen a rocket frittata, an Italian omelette. Truthfully, frittata was a difficult dish to make genuinely delicious. You mixed meat and vegetables into beaten eggs and baked the whole thing. Described that way, it sounded extremely simple, but the simpler a dish was, the harder it became to give it a distinctive flavour. That was precisely why Kaya had chosen it.
(Translator’s Note: Rocket —Called arugula in North American English and rucola in Italian, rocket is a peppery Mediterranean leafy green cultivated since antiquity. It was eaten by the ancient Romans and remains particularly common in Italian and Mediterranean cooking.)
Her frittata scored 8 points. She mixed prosciutto, mozzarella, mashed potatoes, rocket, basil, tarragon, and other ingredients into the beaten eggs before baking them. Then she fried shallots, garlic, peperoncino, and other aromatics to make a tomato sauce and poured it over the top. That was all, yet it was still the best frittata Jo Minjoon had ever tasted.
The day after the mission was announced, at three in the afternoon, everyone was busy preparing in the kitchen for the customers who would soon arrive. The judges moved between the contestants, checking the progress of each dish. Alan eventually approached Jo Minjoon.
“Minjoon, are your preparations going well?”
“The sauce has fermented properly. There shouldn’t be any problems.”
“I heard you said your dak-galbi was worth 8 points. I seem to be seeing more and more of those from you lately. The risotto, the jelly, and now this dak-galbi.”
“I can only improve. There are too many good chefs around me not to. Actually, Kaya’s advice helped a lot with this recipe.”
At Jo Minjoon’s words, an ambiguous smile appeared on Alan’s face. Jo Minjoon was not so oblivious that he failed to understand what that smile meant, so he sighed.
“Now even you see us that way, Chef?”
“Actually, that’s one of the privileges of being around the two of you. If you didn’t want people speculating, you shouldn’t have revealed your secret in the first place.”
“…Let’s just cook.”
“Good. You sound like a professional.” Alan smirked and moved on to Kaya.
She had already put one batch into the oven and was whisking the eggs for the next. Normally, people skipped this step because it was troublesome, but whisking them thoroughly produced an incomparably softer texture.
Alan nodded. “What ratio of eggs to milk are you using?”
“Twice as much milk as egg. Of course, if the eggs are a little watery, I use less milk.”
“You’re meticulous. Kaya, I know you never formally studied cooking. As far as I know, you learned by watching people at the market, and that was about it. So how did you learn details like that?”
“By feel.” Kaya answered briefly.
Alan’s eyebrows twitched before he asked again, “I doubt you learned all of it through instinct alone. Was there really no one who taught you?”
“The people at the market. Some of them were good at certain things, but usually only one or two dishes. Most of the aunties weren’t especially good cooks, so I had no choice but to rely on my senses. It’s not that difficult anyway. When you make dough, you notice what happens when you add more water or milk. You can tell the difference between pouring in hot water and cold water. And when the outside is searing, you can feel how the inside is cooking. Honestly, do you really need to study that separately? I don’t think so.”
“Cooking schools don’t exist for nothing.”
Kaya merely snorted instead of answering.
In truth, she tended to dismiss the importance of formal learning. Given her circumstances, perhaps that was only natural. Kaya had spent only eight years as a student, and even during those years, she had never had the leisure to properly learn anything. Perhaps it was not that she looked down on people who studied. Perhaps it was envy disguised as indifference. At least, that was how Alan saw it.
It was also something viewers had begun saying. They saw her harsh attitude as a defence mechanism: acting strong, pretending she understood everything, watching people her own age live ordinary lives and admiring them while refusing to admit that she wanted the same. That vulnerable side of her might have been one of the reasons she had fans rather than only critics. At times, she looked too fragile to hate completely.
Alan sighed inwardly. He understood that kind of reaction. Once, he too had—
…This isn’t the time to think about that.
“I’ll be expecting good food.”
Alan ended the conversation formally and checked the clock. It was 4:50. The customers would begin arriving soon.
He went to the stage in front of the kitchen, where the judges exchanged glances. Joseph raised his voice.
“In approximately ten minutes, the customers will arrive. You’ll be serving a steady flow of guests for the next three hours. Are you ready?”
Before the contestants could answer, footsteps and voices became audible from the hall beyond the kitchen doors. There was no reason for the staff to make that much noise deliberately. The customers had arrived.
Jo Minjoon swallowed. At the same moment, Joseph shouted, “All right! Go greet your customers!”
The ten contestants each picked up their trays and headed into the hall. It was time for victory and defeat.
-
Mila Quinn considered herself something of a food critic. She had eaten all kinds of food and had once been able to distinguish flavours quite clearly.
The reason she thought of that ability in the past tense was simple. She could no longer taste things the way she used to. It was not because she was ill. Once she entered her forties, her sense of taste had simply dulled, as happened to many people with age. Even when she ate the same food, the flavours no longer felt as vivid as they had when she was younger. Because of that, meals had gradually become occasions tinged more with regret than pleasure.
Even so, she had travelled thirty minutes to come here for one simple reason. She was a fan of Jo Minjoon and Kaya. More precisely, she was an enthusiastic fan of the clumsy romantic atmosphere the two of them kept creating.
In fact, many of the people who had come today were not primarily here for the food, but to see the contestants themselves. It felt almost like a fan signing event. When the kitchen doors opened and the contestants entered the hall, the crowd reacted with a mixture of excitement and bewilderment.
Jo Minjoon looked gentler in person than he did on television. Perhaps he had the kind of face that suited a schoolteacher. It was almost surprising to remember that someone with such a calm expression could swear. Just looking at him now was enough to make people feel at ease. Mila had lived long enough to think she could read that much about a person. He was a good person. She felt that instinctively.
Kaya, on the other hand, was completely different from Jo Minjoon. She was not wearing her usual smoky make-up today, but her eyes were still sharp and the corners of her lips were raised confidently. Even so, there was a faint tremble there, as though she were forcing herself to look composed.
Those two really would suit each other.
As Mila grew older, she had become increasingly interested in other people’s relationships. She knew it was nosy, but curiosity was difficult to suppress. Mila smiled warmly as she looked at the two of them.
But after briefly explaining their dishes, Jo Minjoon and Kaya returned to the kitchen. Mila swallowed her disappointment and could only accept the dishes served by the staff.
The first thing she took was Jo Minjoon’s dak-galbi. Jo Minjoon had said it was based on Korean cuisine, but Mila thought she could sense something Japanese in it as well. Was it because of the soy sauce?
She took a bite while thinking that, then froze.
Huh?
The expression that appeared on her face was not one of simple pleasure. It was confusion.
She had not been surprised merely because the food was delicious. It was not unpleasant either. What startled her was how clear the flavours were.
Mila lifted another piece of chicken with a dazed expression and smelled it lightly. The aroma of ginger and slightly sweet soy sauce tickled her nose. The saltiness was restrained, and there was a gentle sweetness beneath it, but the flavour of the sauce touching her tongue was only the beginning.
Chicken thigh was naturally tender, but because of that, its texture could sometimes become indistinct. This was different. The moment she bit into it, the moist meat pulled apart almost like mozzarella. Normally, cooking chicken in soy sauce could easily bury the flavour of the meat itself, but here, the taste of the chicken remained remarkably clear.
How long has it been since I tasted something like this?
A shiver ran down Mila’s spine. She had always thought Jo Minjoon’s greatest strength was his sense of taste rather than his skill as a chef, but she had never imagined he could produce flavours this vivid. The ginger stimulated her tongue and seemed to sharpen her senses, allowing her to notice a balance she normally would not have been able to perceive.
Was she imagining that consideration had gone into the dish specifically for someone her age? Perhaps that was only her own interpretation. But whatever the reason, Mila was experiencing a satisfaction she had not felt in a very long time.
She smiled brightly and turned her gaze towards Kaya’s frittata, her heart beginning to race like that of a young girl who had forgotten her age.
-
“I enjoyed the meal.”
An elderly blonde woman smiled gently at Jo Minjoon. Her expression was so genuinely happy that he smiled back.
“Thank you. Have a good day.”
“It already is. Hold on to her tightly.”
“…I’ll interpret that as advice to hold my knife tightly.”
Caught off guard by the unexpected remark, Jo Minjoon answered with an awkward smile. The woman laughed before leaving the hall.
She was the final customer.
Jo Minjoon finally relaxed. Perhaps because he had been less nervous than expected, the three hours had passed surprisingly smoothly.
He had refilled his buffet tray four times. As expected, Hugo had refilled his the most, with five trays. Even so, Jo Minjoon’s result was not bad at all. In fact, he was among the better-performing contestants.
Besides Jo Minjoon and Hugo, the contestants who had refilled their dishes four times were Chloe, Kaya, and Sasha, and all of their dishes had cooking scores of 8. Anderson had also made an 8-point eggplant lasagne, but it was not the sort of dish people felt like eating repeatedly. The same was true of Marco. There was nothing to criticise about his chocolate tiramisu, and it had also scored 8 points, but after eating so much rich food, many customers chose Sasha’s fresh strawberry chiffon cake instead of Marco’s heavier tiramisu. As a result, Sasha had performed better.
The votes could still change things.
Each refill represented approximately twenty portions. One serving was worth one point, while one vote was worth ten points. In other words, a single vote was equivalent to roughly half a refill. New customers had entered every hour, and there had been five hundred in total. If a contestant secured even around one-tenth of the votes, they would probably be safe from elimination because the number of servings taken was already substantial.
If anyone had reason to worry, it was obviously—
Marco.
Even if his vote count was high, Jo Minjoon thought Marco had only refilled his dish twice. That meant roughly fifty servings in total. Honestly, it was not a very high score.
After the final customers had left, Alan stood in the hall and spoke in a calm voice.
“The scores have been tallied.”