Pork Cutlet Is the True Food of a Knight
Pork Cutlet Is the True Food of a Knight
Heimer.
A knight of House Britten.
Born and raised in the Britten Viscounty, he was spotted by one of the viscount's knights and rose from squire to full knighthood. Barely three years had passed since his investiture—still a greenhorn.
He had ridden out on a handful of bandit subjugations alongside Viscount Britten. A knight with a modest share of real experience.
His favorite thing in the world was a good, hot meal after training.
Of course, a rural southern viscountcy wasn't exactly brimming with famous restaurants.
Liana, insisting Heimer had no sense of taste, had enthusiastically introduced him to any number of celebrated eating houses. Privately, none of them had struck him as particularly special.
"Sir Heimer, you honestly don't know what you're missing. This place is the real deal."
If anything, Heimer preferred the food their household cook prepared.
The cook himself always claimed he was no great talent, but to Heimer, who'd grown up in the viscountcy, his cooking was better than anything else in the world.
And no wonder: much of it followed a style slightly different from the rest of the Empire's south. Every meal felt uniquely his own.
"The cook's food is truly delicious. It makes knighthood worthwhile. Hahaha!"
Nobody except the household retainers and knights serving within the territory was permitted to lay hands on the viscount's cook's food.
The mere privilege of eating it had him convinced he'd made the right choice in becoming a knight.
A high salary mattered less to him than good food. That was the greater reward knighthood had given him.
Liana had said much the same thing.
"With all the food I've eaten across the Empire, I can say with absolute cer-tain-ty that the skill of our viscount's cook is not to be underestimated."
She'd traveled to the capital several times in the viscount's retinue. Her discernment was, at the very least, greater than Heimer's own.
And she had declared it plainly.
The cook's skill was far from shabby.
She had been so certain.
"Haah...."
"Liana, what's wrong? Sighing in front of your food like that."
"Nothing."
Liana had taken one bite of the dish the cook brought out, then let out a gusty sigh.
It was strange.
She was not the sort to wear that expression in front of a meal.
"...."
Clink. Clink.
She picked at her food, heaving another sigh with every spoonful.
"Liana, eating like that is rather discour—"
"Hah. Thank you for the meal."
It was a mercy the cook was no longer present. Otherwise it would have been an outright breach of etiquette, a wound to his honor.
Liana, who had always praised his cooking, was acting so oddly that Heimer followed after her and asked.
"Are you feeling unwell today?"
"That's not it."
"Then why in the world...."
Liana hesitated a long moment before forcing the words out.
"I've... tasted something divine."
"Divine, you say?"
"Do you know what Bulbaek is?"
"Bul... what?"
"Bulbaek! Bul-baek."
"I have no idea. What is it? Bulbae-ku?"
"Haah, I'm jealous. Jealous of your tongue for never having tasted it."
Liana clasped her hands and gazed at the empty air.
A blissful look crossed her face, then she licked her lips and began to smack them softly.
The sudden shift startled Heimer.
He even began to suspect he'd chosen a terrible day to start a conversation—perhaps one of those magical days.
"You remember the outsider who settled in the viscountcy a few months ago, don't you? Sir Lucas, the knight who came from the capital."
"I'm aware. Former Imperial Knight, they say."
"And you know I helped him set up his eatery on the viscount's orders?"
"Yes, I do. I heard you were even hoping to recruit him into the order...."
"He made me Bulbaek and fried rice, and it was the most delicious thing I've ever tasted. You have to try it later, sir. He's opening in three days—I recommend you go at least once. By the way, first place is mine."
"...."
"At last, our Britten territory finally has a proper restaurant."
Curiosity had brought him here.
He knew the opening was still three days off, but he'd figured he could ask for the senior's forbearance: a junior knight hoping for the benefit of his senior's insight.
He was simply dying to know how good this Bulbaek and fried rice really were, to provoke that kind of reaction.
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★★★★★
The Bulgogi Baekban and the fried rice are absolutely delicious.
So good I ended up stealing the owner's food right off his plate!
The owner is friendly and the food is fantastic.
Recommended menu: Bulgogi Baekban - add fried rice!
-Liana, Viscounty Administrator-
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And there it was, tacked up out front—a message in Liana's own handwriting.
He'd come expecting something along the lines of Bulbaek, but what arrived looked like a variation on a cutlet.
"This is Donkatsu. It resembles a cutlet, but it's a different dish."
"I cut it into pieces and eat it, like this?"
"Yes. Cut it into manageable slices yourself. Churai, churai."
"...Understood."
He stared down at the enormous cutlet-like thing before him.
Even for a knight, it was a daunting amount for one person.
'So the draw isn't flavor, it's volume?'
A small pang of disappointment settled in.
A cutlet was the kind of dish anyone could make decently, no master chef required.
Give a cook decent meat and oil, and you had your baseline.
So his expectations hadn't been high.
Rustle.
The instant the knife bit into the Donkatsu, the sensation in the breading felt different.
'The sound....'
Even though the thick sauce had had plenty of time to soak in, the coating still held its crispness.
Shhk. Shhk.
It was different.
Unmistakably different.
He hadn't even tasted it yet, but he knew.
Wielding a blade was fundamental to knighthood.
And the same held true even when the blade was a dinner knife.
A knight's quality was measured by how acutely he could read the sensations traveling through his sword.
'The meat is alive.'
Ridiculous.
The pork had been pounded thin—how could the meat still be alive?
He speared a slice. Lifting it, the clean white flesh of the meat revealed itself beneath its finely dressed coat of batter.
The meat, still holding its juices, proclaimed its presence without the slightest harm to the breading's crispness.
'Impossible.'
A cutlet with this color?
Liana's words came rushing back.
'I've... tasted something divine.'
He had a sudden feeling he might be about to taste something similar himself.
And then: a single bite.
Crunch! Juicy!
The crisp coating, the rich, clinging sauce, and the meat so tender it wrapped softly around his tongue.
Every element asserted itself, dancing together inside his mouth.
"Whoa...."
The harmony of the three components defied reason.
Yet if you pulled them apart to inspect each one, was any of them lacking?
Not at all.
"Is this what a real cutlet is?"
Heimer asked, astonished, and Lucas corrected him.
"It's Donkatsu. Western-style Donkatsu."
"Donkatsu... It's really nothing like the dish I thought I knew."
He couldn't hold back his amazement.
"Hahaha."
Every time his fork lifted another chunk, a laugh escaped him involuntarily.
"Wow. So this is Donkatsu."
The man was a skilled cook, no question.
The rumors also said he had been a knight of terrifying ability....
"Sir Lucas, this Donkatsu is genuinely delicious."
"Eat your fill. A knight ought to eat well, don't you think?"
"Yes, sir!"
His fork and knife refused to rest.
'The edges are a treat in themselves, but this center cut of meat is out of this world.'
The crispness along the rim was a delight, but the thicker, meatier center was just as extraordinary.
The texture was peculiar.
The first chew: a firm, springy sensation struck his teeth alongside the crisp coating. The second chew: the batter and meat harmonized, their textures melding into a single chord. And by the third chew, the meat melted cleanly away, spreading its savory depth through his mouth almost before he could register it.
Unbelievable.
Even Heimer, for all his ignorance about food, understood.
This was the kind of dish you'd struggle to find even in the capital.
It was definitely Pog meat. The same common Pog meat you saw everywhere.
'What on earth have I been eating all my life?'
When he came to his senses, he'd already put away half the Donkatsu.
Normally, that would have been enough to fill him, but right now it felt nowhere near sufficient.
His stomach cried out.
—Give us more food! We're not satisfied!
That had never happened before.
For the sake of efficient training, he always set down his spoon the moment he was reasonably full.
Right now, training was the last thing on his mind.
'Just eat. For now.'
It would be a waste.
Leaving this behind uneaten would be too much of a waste.
He ate the cabbage salad, too.
The crisp crunch of the cabbage and its tangy bite sharpened his appetite even more.
It neutralized the richness of the meat and the frying oil, cleansing his palate clean.
"Mmm~."
By this point, the coating—now thoroughly soaked through and sodden with sauce—offered an entirely new flavor.
The crunch was gone, but what replaced it ran deeper.
How to put it.
The seasoned competence of a veteran enriched by time, perhaps?
How could a single dish hold so many different flavors?
It was a breathtaking taste.
'This Donkatsu contains a knight's whole life.'
The meat was a knight's will; the batter, his passion and body; the sauce, the experiences a knight must endure.
That first bite of crisp Donkatsu had held a greenhorn—youthful, brimming with vitality and passion, yet inexperienced and unrefined.
But the Donkatsu that transformed bite by bite revealed a knight's journey toward seasoned mastery through the passage of time.
The knight's body, worn by years, could no longer match its former self—but the experience and hard-won composure that took its place filled the void where passion had faded. That was the veteran knight now pierced on his fork.
Time had stolen the breading's crispness, but the meat—the core—had never surrendered its integrity.
'Hold on... Could it be....'
Staring at the meat on his fork, Heimer felt something click in his mind.
The passage of time.
The greenhorn and the veteran.
A fledgling knight who'd shown up as a customer.
A retired veteran treating that junior to a meal.
And a Knight Restaurant.
This was no simple hospitality.
It was a lesson.
'A teaching: that even when hardship and adversity strip away your passion, you will not fall so long as you hold fast to the pride a knight must carry.'
Heimer looked at Lucas's back as he washed the dishes.
Sir Lucas.
He'd heard the man was a famous knight who'd served in the Imperial Knight Order before becoming a cook.
Now it was clear why he had been given this dish.
'A chivalric code offered by a retired senior to his junior.'
Liana had said the restaurant was called a Knight Restaurant.
The sign was written in Sir Lucas's own language, she'd told him.
Knight Restaurant
He felt he understood why this place bore that name.
Because it was a restaurant opened by a retired knight to realize a dream of his own—and because, even in that pursuit, it was a restaurant that never lost a knight's essence.
This eatery was chivalry incarnate.
The fork trembled in his hand.
Whatever circumstances had forced his retirement at a young age, the fact that he still called it a Knight Restaurant must mean he still carried a knight's heart.
The briefest glimpse of a single knight's life swelled his chest with emotion.
Just how straight a path must a man walk, for someone as shallow in chivalry as himself to see that path laid out in the food he ate?
Tears welled in Heimer's eyes as he ate his Donkatsu.
Weeping while receiving a senior's teaching—how shameful.
He couldn't bear to let that sight be seen, so Heimer kept his head bowed and put the rest of the Donkatsu into his mouth.
Rookie knight or retired veteran: the Donkatsu remained the same.
Donkatsu was chivalry.
Chivalry was Donkatsu.
Eating Donkatsu was no different from partaking of chivalry itself.
"Snff. Snffle."
The pride of a knight tasted better than anything Heimer had ever eaten.
Of course, the man in question—Lucas—interpreted Heimer's little weeping noises rather differently.
'Setting aside the national pride, K-Food really is damn good.'
Still, having someone get that emotional over my cooking... it does feel nice.
The corners of his mouth kept tugging upward on their own.
Too embarrassed to show that face, he couldn't bring himself to turn around, even though the dishes were long since done.
'Still, is it really cry-worthy good?'
Embarrassing.
And on the board outside the restaurant, a new review note was pinned up.
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★★★★★
Eating Donkatsu, I have understood what true chivalry is.
I, Heimer, will engrave the owner's teaching upon my heart, never forget it, and strive ever forward.
I will patronize this Knight Restaurant until the day I become a true knight.
I will not forget this kindness, sir.
Recommended menu: Western-style King Donkatsu - If you are a knight, you must eat this.
-Heimer, Knight of the Viscounty-
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Are all knights like this?
I told them to write a food review, and he went and wrote a chivalry review.
"This guy's a proper weirdo, too."
Grasping chivalry from a Donkatsu.
Knights are a pack of eccentrics.