The Black Gold of Cooking: Soy Sauce (2)
"You little rascal...!"
The more flustered Catherine felt, the hotter her anger burned.
Karem was supposed to be serving his punishment, after all. The sentence wasn't even finished, and here he was, popping up on his own whim!
It was absolutely, positively not because he had betrayed the sweet dessert she had been looking forward to by obsessing over some weird yeast-fermented bean dough instead.
Absolutely! Not! Because! Of! The! Dessert!
Yet Catherine couldn't help but freeze.
As the air from the corridor pushed into the room, cutting through the thick, coppery stench that had filled every corner, an aroma so dense she simply could not ignore it brushed against the tip of her nose.
A faint alcoholic scent of a kind she had never encountered in her life.
Right on its heels came a sweet-and-salty fragrance that rushed in and left a deep, lingering umami on her tongue from smell alone.
Catherine lowered the arm she had raised and tilted her head.
The rage that had flared up in her mind vanished without a trace; in its place curiosity bloomed, full and bright.
"What on earth is this smell?"
"The aroma's rather nice, isn't it?"
"No. I thought something that reeked that horribly would produce something just as foul. I was expecting the stench of garum."
"Eh? Horribly? Ah. Aaaah."
"Ah? What's with the 'ah'?"
"I think it's leftover smell from the failed meju. Just a moment."
"There's no need to open a window."
The Catherine that Karem had tried to stop simply flicked her fingers, weaving a light purification spell. An invisible barrier swept through the entire room.
The terrible stench that had choked the chamber vanished completely.
And the fragrance rising from the Abundance Oak Barrel exploded outward like underground water finally finding its outlet, claiming the whole room in an instant.
"Wow. That smell really was awful."
Karem's nose had gone completely numb after that first brief exposure when he entered; only now did he realize just how nightmarish the room had reeked.
Well, anyone ambushed by a stench like that would have every right to be angry.
But Catherine had no intention of staying angry. More precisely, she no longer had the mental space for it.
When she drew a deep breath, the nose that had been tormented without end by the irregular, hideous smells from her first entrance came back to life.
A touch of strong distilled spirit.
Then a brief, inviting wave of sea breeze.
A thick, honeyed fruitiness.
And finally, through the scent that seemed to wrap around her entire tongue, a subtle umami that made her mouth water.
The aromas that followed were the same.
There was a mild sweetness, but nothing that could compare to the rich, savory scent that had come first.
Yet the gentle, toasty fragrance that underpinned it all felt like fermented bread dough waiting for the oven, or like malted barley steaming for beer. Soft and comforting, it soothed Catherine's nose after it had been forced to process far too much information in far too short a time.
"So. This savory smell is what you call the so-called successes among the few that worked?"
"Yes. I must have gone through dozens—no, hundreds—of batches."
The past few days had been nothing short of hellish. Just recalling them made Karem's head spin.
Boiling peas, peeling them, mashing them evenly, mixing in flour and yeast, shaping them into bricks, tying them with straw, wrapping them tightly and stuffing them into the 100x Magic Barrel, then pulling them out—fail and discard, start over; succeed and still start over—hundreds of times.
He had thought the magic tools would make it easy. That had been a delusion.
Secretly boiling peas by the sackful before dawn, peeling them, mashing and shaping them, stuffing them into the barrel and hauling them out again and again—every single step was pure hard labor!
But the fruit of that labor was glorious beyond words.
Look! Behold and applaud! This luminous, fragrant black liquid!
"Kid. Why do you look so moved all by yourself?"
"No reason. Just... the past few days of suffering flashed through my head."
"Hmm. So that liquid? Seasoning? Alcohol? Anyway, what's it called?"
"Uh..."
Karem had been so absorbed in the soy sauce that he had never considered the name. His mind locked up solid.
How do I localize soy sauce? If I just call it ganjang Korean-style, they'll say they don't know what it means and the pronunciation is weird. Better go with something familiar. Yeah, that has to be it.
He gave his head a vigorous shake to clear it.
"It's a seasoning first of all, and the name is... uh... soy sauce."
"What? Soy sauce?"
"Yes. Soy sauce."
Catherine frowned without thinking.
What rootless, random name was that supposed to be?
Still, compared to the (from a Europa perspective) truly atrocious naming sense Karem had displayed so far, it wasn't bad.
The name was concise, the pronunciation somehow impressive, and even if she had no idea what it meant, the sound itself was pleasant enough.
"Did you invent this yourself?"
"Uh, yes. Probably? Have you ever heard of anyone making sauce from fermented bean bricks like this?"
"I've eaten cheap garum made from low-grade fish, and I've tried paste made from beer dregs and yeast leftovers in Eisenwald, but beans? First I've heard of it."
"Since you're already here, why not try a little taste?"
As he spoke, Karem scooped some soy sauce with a small tasting spoon he had prepared ahead of time and approached her.
From a distance the sauce had looked pure black, but up close Catherine could see the deep brown that lightened toward the edges of the liquid pooled in the metal spoon.
And the smell.
A salty note, yet sweet and savory at the same time.
The aroma of the soy sauce was so addictive she felt embarrassed for ever thinking he was making some kind of garum.
"Don't tell me it only smells good and the taste drops straight into the underworld like garum?"
"Haha, you still don't trust me enough."
"You cause incidents every time I start to forget, so of course I don't. But is this all there is?"
"It's insanely salty if you just eat it straight."
"Hmm. It does smell salty."
Catherine shot Karem a sidelong glance, then carefully sipped the soy sauce from the tiny spoon.
Slurp.
"Kh—?!"
"Did you choke? Here's a handkerchief—"
"Ahem, ahem! No need. Put it away."
She had simply been startled by the fierce saltiness that slammed into her mouth.
Calming Karem's fussing, Catherine gave a small cough and rolled her tongue against her palate, savoring.
It was only half a dessert spoonful at most.
Just a few drops, and it was this salty.
She was about to grumble about how much salt he must have dumped in when an overwhelming umami blooming across her entire tongue sealed her lips shut.
This was made from beans?
The scent had carried a faint nuttiness, but the taste was completely different.
Once the fierce saltiness became familiar, an indescribably complex fruitiness gently filled her mouth.
Just as she tried to pick apart the various fruit notes layered over garum's umami and balsamic vinegar's light fragrance, a new wave of savoriness that had been waiting beneath the flavors wrapping her tongue seized every nerve and demanded her full attention.
Of course, when salt already stimulating the tongue met rising umami, saliva flooded like a tidal wave.
She swallowed the remnants naturally, yet the presence remained vivid.
No—once the saltiness washed away with the saliva, the lingering fragrance met the umami that refused to fade and fiercely rekindled the appetite Catherine had briefly forgotten while thinking of dessert.
Grrrroooowl.
Hunger at a completely inappropriate moment.
Catherine felt an emptiness that was not unpleasant at all.
"The umami of garum. The rich fragrance of balsamic vinegar. Denser than gravy sauce, more aromatic than garum, cleaner than balsamic, lighter than gravy... and it's just beans?"
The only real flaw was a slight chalkiness left on the tongue at the end, but for an original sauce eaten plain—without pairing or additional ingredients—having only that single aftertaste as a drawback was impressive in itself.
"Hah. To develop something this magnificent. Why on earth..."
"Well, I already made sauce from tomatoes. No reason beans couldn't work too. More than anything, though... it's for Young Master Godwin."
"What? Young Master Godwin?"
"Oats just don't pair well with butter, you see."
Karem resealed the Abundance Oak Barrel brimming with soy sauce.
"His Lordship needs to lose weight, so he can't use butter freely."
That was why soy sauce.
Unlike butter, which had to be added in chunks, a single spoonful of soy sauce was enough to elevate flavor.
When seared and sautéed, it deepened taste and aroma so dramatically that ordinary seasonings couldn't compete. It worked for salads, soups, and stews as palate cleansers, for grilled mains, and of course for sauces—its uses were endless.
Eating only raw vegetables and plain boiled meat to lose weight was the mark of an amateur.
A true master's diet let you eat deliciously while still shedding the pounds.
Of course, half of it was competitive spirit toward the tomato paste he had created himself, and half was pure nostalgia—a slightly foolish reason—but what did that matter?
Karem grinned to himself, already imagining the harmony of butter and soy sauce.
"But you still haven't solved the biggest problem, have you?"
"Pardon? What problem?"
"The oats. The oats. In the end you're going to feed them to the young master, aren't you?"
"W-well... yes? Why does that matter?"
"Even if the person himself agreed, the biggest barriers are still waiting."
"Barriers?"
"Yes. And not just one—two. No, if you're unlucky, three."
Karem could only blink.
Who on earth would openly object when the eldest son of the Felwinter family himself wanted to eat it...?
Two people—no, three—immediately came to mind.
"Duke and Duchess Felwinter... and Lord Iona...?"
Catherine raised one eyebrow as if to say, Finally noticed?
"The moment cooking is involved your eyes spin. You're going to feed precious livestock feed to the valued eldest son, and you think they'll sing praises?"
"Um... I won't get locked up for lese-majesty, right?"
"Who knows?"
Catherine shrugged and shook her head.
Karem chewed his lip, anxiety rising.
So much time had already passed since he boldly announced the diet plan that he couldn't order different substitutes now.
No—before that, he couldn't even think of any other substitutes.
"Well then, kid. What are you going to do?"
"At this point there's only one way, isn't there?"
"Right, you don't have any other—haaaaa?"
"I have no choice but to get permission from the Duke and Duchess."
"Wh-what?!"
"If both of them permit it—no, even if just one of them does—there's a chance. Especially Duchess Felwinter, since she was the one who told Young Master Godwin to lose weight in the first place."
"...Fine. Even if you get punished, I'll make sure you don't end up in a cell."
Catherine shook her head as if he were beyond help.
Still, the idea wasn't entirely bad.
Perhaps success at such a young age had made him arrogant. If so, letting him experience failure here and build a foundation for later wouldn't hurt.
With lukewarm eyes she watched the crown of Karem's head as he tidied the workspace.
Damn. I've also been secretly fermenting doenjang separately over there. If I pull that out too, things are really going to explode this time, aren't they?
The person in question, of course, was thinking something entirely different.
Thanks to Catherine's consideration, when Karem submitted a request for an audience, the Duke and Duchess of Felwinter happened to be enjoying a light, cozy chat. The request was accepted at once, and the audience was granted.
"Oats? You're saying something as humble as that will truly help our Godwin lose weight? Hmm. If you're that confident, go ahead and try."
"Oats, is it. Well, it might be good for Godwin to have the experience."
They were actually allowing this?
Catherine couldn't hide her look of utter disbelief as she watched the ducal couple cheerfully grant permission instead of exploding at Karem's proposal.