From Now On, This Dried Soup Will Be a Blessing to Those Who Can't Cook
From Now On, This Dried Soup Will Be a Blessing to Those Who Can't Cook
The promise that even someone who knew nothing about cooking could make a decent soybean paste stew was what hooked me. I followed Lucas toward the small kitchen attached to Riman's house.
It wasn't just that I wanted to eat doenjang-jjigae.
'A person with no cooking skills can still make delicious food.'
That was the line that snared me.
It smelled like money.
My instincts were screaming.
If Lucas was telling the truth, this thing was a gold mine.
That was why I was walking with him toward the cramped kitchen tucked away in Riman's lab.
"No need to go all the way back to the restaurant. A few basic ingredients are all it takes."
Lucas grabbed the ochre-colored powder and a reddish one and headed for the kitchen.
"You're seriously telling me you just sprinkle that powder into boiling water and the dish is done?"
"Yes. Let's try it together."
Camilla took her place beside him as they walked.
"What do you need me to do?"
"Just follow my lead. That's all."
"All right. It's not actually difficult, is it? Because I have never cooked a single dish in my life."
"Not at all."
"......."
She stood at his side.
'He's tall....'
She'd sought him out time and again, haunting the knight order's galley and now this restaurant, but she'd never stood quite this close to him before.
Until this moment, Lucas had always been the cook and she the customer who came to eat his food.
Cook and customer.
Supplier and consumer.
A professional relationship, and they'd kept precisely that much distance between them.
She acknowledged his culinary skill, obviously, but their personal connection had never deepened beyond that.
Even though she'd chased after Lucas for years and eaten his cooking for just as long.
Naturally, she didn't consider that her own fault.
Lucas was the one who kept deflecting, always insisting he wasn't good enough.
She was idly gauging the height difference between them when Lucas held out a piece of freeze-dried mushroom.
"Is that the mushroom you dried with your freeze-drying method?"
"That's right. Hold out your hand for a moment."
She extended her palm, and Lucas placed the mushroom on it.
Then his hand closed over hers, guiding her fingers to crush it.
"Wha— wait."
She barely had time to register her surprise.
Crack.
The mushroom crumbled inside her grip.
"Remarkable, isn't it?"
What should have been a pliable mushroom had snapped apart as easily as a dead twig.
She'd never seen anything like it.
Conventional drying almost always relied on blasting ingredients with hot air. Any living thing subjected to that kind of process inevitably changed character, lost something essential.
This was different.
Yet she couldn't keep her attention on the mushroom.
Sudden physical contact.
Camilla was a brilliant merchant, a decisive head of a trading company, a level-headed noble lady — but a man's hand on hers was profoundly unfamiliar territory.
"I, well, that...."
"Incredible, isn't it? All the moisture is gone, yet there's no structural deformation."
"So it seems...."
"Add water and it returns to its original state."
Lucas sprinkled water onto one of the broken mushroom fragments.
The piece drank the moisture and swelled back into the same plump, yielding thing it had been before it was dried.
Camilla's eyes weren't on the mushroom. They were fixed on Lucas's hand, still resting over hers.
The unfamiliar sensation sent a jarring thud through her chest — the physical drop of her heartbeat.
Thump.
What was that?
That — just now.
It was a feeling she'd never once experienced in her entire life.
The details of the freeze-drying process he'd invented.
The supposedly simple cooking method.
Every last bit of it blinked out of her head for a moment.
The rough, callused texture of Lucas's sturdy fingers pressed against her skin, and before she knew it, she swallowed hard.
Gulp.
The sound was so loud that she jolted and, without thinking, glanced at Lucas.
'Did he hear that?'
But he was still gazing at the revived mushroom, apparently oblivious.
"Fascinating, right? Just add water and it turns soft again."
Buh-bump. Buh-bump.
Her heartbeat was ringing in her own ears.
Whose heartbeat?
Don't tell me — mine?
'No. That can't be.'
Even after Lucas drew his hand away, the memory of it resting over her knuckles remained maddeningly vivid.
The pounding in her chest slowly began to subside.
'I was just startled.'
That was all it was — a shock from an unfamiliar sensation.
"Ahem! So — so how do we actually cook with this?"
"Simple. You bring water to a boil, add the freeze-dried ingredients and the soup powder, and let it boil."
Lucas picked up a spoon and scooped some of the ochre-colored powder into a small bowl.
"To make doenjang-jjigae, we'll use a spoonful of the doenjang soup powder, half a spoonful of gochujang powder, plus salt, MSG, soy sauce, and minced garlic."
He measured the ingredients from Riman's kitchen into the bowl alongside the powders.
"But at that point, you're just cooking normally."
"Ah, don't worry. This is just for testing — I prepped these separately in advance. Eventually, all the seasoning pastes will be blended together and then freeze-dried into a single powder."
"So later, you'll dry the finished sauce and sell it as a packet?"
"Exactly."
Lucas flashed her a sunny grin.
Camilla, who had been meeting his eyes, turned abruptly away.
'Wh— what was that just now?'
She couldn't look him in the face.
Staring into a counterparty's eyes and reading their true intent was exactly how she'd secured every successful deal in her career.
She should have been watching his eyes at the moment he spoke, gauging whether he was telling the truth, how confident he truly was.
But just then, she hadn't managed to hold his gaze for even a second.
"Is something wrong?"
"Wha— me? No. No, nothing."
What's wrong with me?
He put his hand over mine for one second and I'm acting like this?
Camilla — head of Golden Wagon — acting like this?
'That's ridiculous.'
Flustered and blushing over a man?
What am I, a teenage girl?
And of all people, the man in question was Lucas. Someone she'd been around constantly for years. She'd always thought his food was delicious — never once had she looked at him as a man.
"Then you try it, Lady Camilla."
His voice landed suddenly close to her ear, startling her into looking at him.
She'd never heard a man's voice from this close before.
Not since she was a child, standing near her father.
The whole situation was excruciatingly awkward.
"Y-you want me to mix it, like you just did?"
"Yes."
"All right."
She picked up a spoon.
This was her first attempt at anything resembling cooking. Until now, a spoon had been a utensil for eating, not for preparing food.
"'A spoonful' — does this look about right?"
She scooped some of the powdered doenjang base and held it up.
"That's about right. The more you add, the deeper the flavor. It might get a little salty, though."
Lucas leaned toward her to hand her the soy sauce.
For an instant, his scent reached her.
The rough, lived-in smell of a man who'd spent years working in a kitchen — a blend of seasonings and the faint edge of honest sweat.
She'd started this because she smelled money.
Right now, she couldn't smell money at all.
One particular scent kept lingering in her head instead.
The scent of a rough-hewn man....
'Stop it. That's — enough!'
She shook her head and did exactly as Lucas instructed, adding the last seasoning and stirring it together.
"Th-this is it, yes?"
"Exactly. Normally, this would be the finished instant soup base."
Lucas tipped the mixture into the water just as it hit a rolling boil. She followed his lead and added her own.
"Unfortunately, we don't have any tofu on hand right now, so it won't taste quite complete."
"I — I already know that. That this is just a test."
Camilla heard herself force a little extra sharpness into her voice, embarrassed by the fact that she'd just been standing there letting a man's smell distract her.
She studied the dried ingredients, grasping for something steady to look at.
Freeze-dried radish, onion, mushroom, cabbage — and even meat.
"You're going to add all of this?"
"Everything except the meat."
"Why not the meat?"
"This batch is frozen raw, just for testing. The final version will use fully cooked meat that's been dried."
"Ahh."
Her reply came out hollow.
Under normal circumstances, she would already be calculating projected revenue from these products.
Instead, she was moving like an automaton, doing whatever Lucas told her to do.
The moment the soup powder and dried ingredients hit the water, that familiar scent of doenjang-jjigae began to bloom.
It wasn't the deep, layered aroma of what he served at the restaurant, but it was unmistakably real — enough to pull at the senses.
She ladled a sip of the furiously boiling stew.
Not identical to the restaurant version, but more than enough to satisfy her tongue.
"It's good."
"You did well."
Lucas smiled at her.
"H-hmph! This much is nothing for me."
She crossed her arms and angled her face away, practically shouting to hide her embarrassment.
"I-it's easier than I expected."
"That's the whole point. We can make it so even nobles with zero kitchen experience can prepare and eat it."
"That's... good."
It was a superb product.
Her head still felt hot, which made it hard to think clearly about commercial potential, but her instincts told her everything she needed to know. This was the kind of item that was going to draw crowds.
It didn't have to stop at doenjang-jjigae, either. You could dry regional sauces from all over the empire and turn them into powders — just add water and boil.
Doenjang-jjigae, budae-jjigae — it didn't even have to be Lucas's own cooking.
'People in the capital could taste dishes from every province.'
It wouldn't be a perfect replica of the local flavor, obviously. But it would make people curious — and once they were curious, they'd take an interest in the actual regional cuisine. Tourism would rise naturally.
Her mind was finally cooling back down, and it raced ahead.
This was revolutionary.
One question nagged at her, though.
"Lucas — you don't really have a reason to make this, do you? Why bother?"
"Call it a personal dream."
"A dream?"
Instead of answering, he stared pensively into the middle distance.
The expression was new to her.
He'd always presented her with that polished, businesslike smile.
Camilla thought he looked striking.
"......."
"So? What do you think?"
"Handso—. W-what? What do I think about what?"
"The soup-powder doenjang-jjigae. How does it taste?"
"It tastes good. I think it's promising. Won't other chefs push back against this, though?"
"Quite the opposite. They'll welcome it."
"Why?"
She looked at the finished stew — a dish she'd completed without doing anything that felt like real cooking. Cooks were supposed to welcome this?
"Just like you can sear some beef brisket and add it to the pot to make chadol-doenjang, every chef's skill level will produce a different variation. The base is the same, but the final taste will still reflect the person who makes it."
He'd thought that far ahead.
In that moment, Camilla wanted him — badly. Wanted to make him hers.
She had no intention of letting anyone else take him.
'He said he doesn't want to work as a personal chef....'
Then what about marriage?
The heat surged back into her cheeks.
'I've lost my mind. What am I even thinking....'
***
Once the brief cooking demonstration wrapped up and she'd confirmed the commercial viability of the freeze-drying system, Camilla pledged serious investment.
— Get me the powdered soup as fast as possible. I'm taking it back to the capital and distributing samples to the nobles. We have to run blind tests before this business launches, don't we?
I hesitated a little at the mention of distributing samples to nobles.
The Princess Diana problem.
Still, if we could keep my name off it entirely, I figured handing out samples to the capital crowd would be harmless.
'I'll just make a version that's tailored to imperial palates.'
A powdered cream soup loaded with tomato, milk, and cream — something like a rosette-style instant base.
'Western cuisine isn't my specialty, but I can fake it well enough.'
I promised Camilla I'd hand over finished prototypes within three days and headed back toward the restaurant with her.
She walked beside me keeping a noticeable distance.
'Something's off today.'
I'd sensed it while we were cooking together — a stiffness, a thread of nerves she didn't normally show.
"Why are you walking so far away?"
"Y-you don't need to know!"
The moment I asked, Camilla, who'd been striding ahead, snapped at me and pulled even farther away in a fluster.
"Don't come any closer."
"......."
I had no idea what was going on, but I returned to the restaurant alongside a slightly prickly Camilla.
"What's all that racket?"
A commotion erupted from in front of the restaurant.
"You think you're walking into an eatery with that filthy, untrimmed beard? Absolutely not!"
"This pointy-eared brat dares insult my beard?!"
"What? Pointy-eared brat? You stunted little lump of a dwarf?"
"This pig of an elf has no shortage of insults, does she!"
"Hey!"
There was the dwarf who'd apparently arrived with Camilla, red-faced and shouting at Andrea. In the corner, Bldi was shivering and watching the fight unfold.
"Andrea, what are you doing?"
"Boss!"
The woebegone expression Andrea turned on me the moment she spotted me stiffened the instant her eyes landed on Camilla.
"What is that woman doing here?"
Before I could answer her question, the dwarf was bellowing at me, his black beard quivering.
"You're the owner here, brother? What in blazes is wrong with your staff management?!"
What a mess.