The Elf Enlightenment Movement (2)

Trace pizza back to its origins and you land in the distant fifth century BCE. People piled dates, cheese, and the like onto flat, wide bread and baked the whole thing together. And it isn't as if one or two stray records turned up. They crop up everywhere you look, which suggests the devastating power of bread, plus cheese, plus a few simple toppings was appreciated even then.

But the pizza we know—dough finished with tomato sauce and cheese, baked to a golden brown—is far younger than you'd think. It wasn't until the late eighteenth century that it was first made in pizza's true home, Naples, Italy.

The idea of pizza had existed for ages. So why did the form the modern world knows arrive so late?

Well... because they didn't know.

Europeans had no idea whether tomatoes tasted good, or whether ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠you were even allowed to eat the things. They weren't a vegetable native to Europe to begin with. Worse, there was a poisonous herb called belladonna that looked uncomfortably like a tomato.

In that light, Nuardel might actually have come out ahead. At least nobody here screamed "It's the devil's plant!!" and stomped every tomato in sight. They already knew it was a delicious crop, so all I had to do was the lightest touch. No need to clown around preaching the greatness of food, and no need to condemn elves for having the palate of a yard dog.

The dream of wanting to eat something delicious never ends.

Elves were no exception. My only job was to ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠show them the horizon of flavor. Past that horizon lay a place crowded with tastes far better than anything they knew. So what were they going to do?

It means nothing if someone else breaks the shell for you. You only truly wake when you open your eyes by your own choice.

All right, then. Time to begin.

Before I cooked, I exchanged the ingredients I couldn't get in Nuardel through the Mana Market.

All sorts of market goods floated up before my eyes. I scrolled down, searching for what I wanted.

Making hardtack last time had paid off. In the process I'd gotten my hands on the flour buried in the knight order's stores, and I'd skimmed beer foam to ferment the dough. That was when the flours and the yeast had been registered in the Mana Market.

Flour is divided by how much protein the wheat contains, and for a chewy texture like pizza dough or bread you have to use bread flour. Bread flour has the highest protein, and that's what builds the chew.

I hadn't come all this way to play mess sergeant again, and only Elioren, Iseria, Seiran, and Veila would be eating with me, so a reasonable amount would do. Exchange.

I traded for two kilograms of bread flour and twenty grams of yeast.

Italian pizza, unlike American pizza, is one pie per person. Or is it? Do Americans just eat that whole pie by themselves? Either way, I figured 150 to 200 grams of flour per serving and prepared more than that to be safe. Honestly, whenever I walk into an Italian pizzeria, I always feel the portion comes up a little short. This would be everyone's first pizza. If I could help it, I wanted them properly, perfectly full.

"Better get the dough started."

If a dish needs stock, you put the stock on first. If you have to render fat, you render the fat first. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠Dough takes two and a half hours once you count the rest, so it was better to get it going early.

In a large bowl I combined a kilogram and a half of flour with salt, warm water, and the yeast all at once. I held a little flour back, both to adjust the dough's consistency and to use as dusting flour. The flour drank the water in an instant and turned into a sticky mess. I mixed it partway in the bowl, then—

Splat!

I dumped it onto the counter where I'd scattered the dusting flour. Knead straight on the board and the water might run off, so I'd only brought it together in the bowl first.

Schluuup— sticky—!

"Doot-da. Sensory play."

This is why flour dough is fun. Still tacky, it clung mercilessly to my fingers. To bring the consistency in line, I added flour a little at a time and worked the mass. Slap! Squelch—! The flour I'd added drank the moisture down bit by bit, and the dough began to come right. It rolled across the counter, growing smoother with every turn.

The heart of pizza dough is to take it gently in both hands and knead it against the board in circles, rubbing it along the surface. No idea why. A famous old Italian chef just says to do it that way. If someone of that caliber tells you to, there's a reason.

And so the dough's consistency settled exactly where it ought to be.

"We're not done yet!"

I stretched the soft dough out wildly, then folded it over on itself. Repeat that, and layers form in the dough, and the texture comes out even better. Streeetch!! Pull—! I held out against temptation and saw the folding all the way through. Then, so it wouldn't stick later, I dusted the outside with flour and portioned it into neat round balls.

Now it only had to rest somewhere warm for about two hours. I set the dough aside and started on the sauce.

Tomato sauce splinters into plenty of variations depending on what goes into it. As for the sauce I meant to make today—

Cheese, surprisingly enough, could be found even in Nuardel. A fair share of elves would eat as far as eggs, milk, and even cheese, and perhaps because of that there were elves who had domesticated goats—both the common kind and the mountain kind—and made cheese from them. Meat, as expected, was another story. I could always exchange for it through the Mana Market if it came to that, but I still didn't have a full read on the palates of all four elves. There was no need to gamble on an ingredient that splits people clean down the middle.

Sssssss—

I started by sautéing minced onion in a pan of olive oil. The elves had a vegetable oil they used often, steeped with all sorts of herbs. It wasn't bad, but where I could, it was better to follow the original recipe. The moment the scent of onion began to creep up out of the pan, I dropped the prepped tomatoes into the heat.

SHAAAA—!

Tomato juice met screaming-hot oil, and the result was one spectacularly unhinged collaboration.

"Gaaah."

I kept sautéing through the sting ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠exploding across my forearms. In no time the pan was drowned in tomato juice. I crushed the tomatoes one careful pass of the spatula at a time and laid in a base seasoning of salt and pepper. This was also the moment for the bay leaf. Without moisture, its aroma never really comes out, so I would let it steep now and cook slowly off as the liquid evaporated.

Clack.

Clack.

Thirty minutes of spatula work, keeping the sauce from catching. At last most of the tomato juice had evaporated, leaving only the savoriness behind. It wasn't thick and pasty, but the tomato sauce had taken on a proper body.

Pizza takes a long time in the making of its parts. The assembly, and the baking, are over in a flash. Layer the ingredients in order, bake them about seven minutes in a preheated oven, and that's the end of it. There was still about an hour left on the dough's rest, so in a little while I'd tell Veila to come eat, and ask her to pass the word to the other elves while she was at it.

"I will not rebuke you for leaving home of your own accord. But Iseria, you must not do anything that would blacken the name of the elves."

"I'm sorry..."

"Most elves live out their long years inside the greenhouse called Nuardel. And so, when they taste human civilization—those brief lives bursting into gaudy flower, all that stimulation—they frequently lose control. From now on, you must be truly careful."

"Yes..."

"We can only be grateful that Sir Jinwoo is so mild-tempered. Honestly..."

In the parlor, Elioren had already heard a great many reports from Kang Jinwoo. She was his only daughter, so even if her temperament ran a little wild, he had soothed her, coaxed her, and looked after her. My teaching was wrong. He had accumulated knowledge across some three hundred years of life, and still he felt it: theory and practice really were different things. Elioren rose from his seat.

The lecturing had gone on from the moment Jinwoo left to see the city. Before he knew it, the sun beyond the window was sinking low. Surely, by now, Iseria had reflected enough.

She sat with her back perfectly straight, both fists clenched atop her knees. Her lips were pressed every bit as tight as those fists. Even so, she was his daughter. One look, and he could tell truth from falsehood. The Iseria before him was repenting in earnest.

"Stand, Iseria. It is about time for supper."

"Urk... yes."

"Hm?"

It must have been a suffocating stretch of time for her. And yet she gave off the air of someone reluctant to eat. She had always been a child who loved food. Was she not particularly hungry?

Tonight's supper would likely be the usual vegetable stew and Elskit. The green smell of the vegetables, the mild, clean broth, even the soft, mushy texture that made it easy to eat—truly a meal in which one could feel the grace of the World Tree. Soak the dry, slightly hard Elskit in it, and the fullness was satisfying as well. He found her mood a little odd, but he did not press. She had been scolded for hours. Her appetite might simply be gone.

The two of them had just stepped out of the parlor and turned their feet toward the dining hall when—

"My lady! My lady!"

Veila came running in a rush from the direction of the training grounds. She was a wreck to look at, and yet her eyes and mouth were smiling, so that she seemed like a herald who had run day and night to announce a victory. Only then did she notice Elioren was with them.

"Lord Elioren. You were together!"

"Yes. What is it, Veila? Such a hurry."

"I've come to tell you the meal—that supper is ready!"

Come to announce that supper was ready?

In the Sildiel estate, food was always waiting if you went to the dining hall at the appointed hour. What they ate never changed from day to day, so it was simply kept ready at all times. There was no way Veila didn't know that, and Elioren was puzzled. Before he could ask the question that had risen in his mind, Iseria opened her mouth.

"Veila, you don't mean...?"

"Yes, my lady. It's supper Sir Jinwoo prepared!"

"Oh, finally...!"

"Sir Jinwoo prepared supper?"

He had thought the man was out seeing the city. To think he had been cooking. They had kidnapped him, admittedly, because that skill of his was exceptional... which was precisely why Elioren had meant to have him refrain from the kitchen and instead offer him leisure. They had only just barely begged forgiveness for the drugged abduction. Putting him to work cooking would make the whole picture look wrong.

"Veila! How dare you set a guest to cooking!"

"Eek. Th-that is... Sir Jinwoo said he absolutely had to..."

At Elioren's rebuke, Veila flinched and explained. According to her, Jinwoo had insisted on preparing the meal himself, declaring that they absolutely had to try his cooking.

"Ahem... It cannot be helped. Let us go, then."

"Yes! You'll love it too, Lord Elioren!"

"Food Jinwoo made... heehee."

Setting those two odd ones aside, they made for the dining hall.

Seiran and Kang Jinwoo were already there, seated. Seiran looked as if he had just washed; hygienically, he was spotless. His face, however, was the same as Veila's. Look closer, and Iseria was no different. The scolding might have worn her out, but that alone was difficult to account for. From faces that had lost all their vitality, only their eyes stared at Jinwoo, vividly alive.

"Lord Elioren. You have come."

"Seiran, are you quite all right?"

"Ah... I believe I will be all right very soon."

What in the world was that supposed to mean? The elves around him seemed to have lost a screw apiece, and Elioren was beginning to find the situation more than he could grasp.

Then Jinwoo, having confirmed that Elioren had arrived, spoke.

"Ah, Lord Elioren. Do you eat cheese, by any chance?"

"I do. I do not indulge often, but yes."

"That's a relief. Please sit, then, and wait just a moment."

"I—I apologize, Sir Jinwoo. You were brought here against your wishes, and now you are even cooking for us..."

"Not at all... Lord Elioren."

Having answered Jinwoo's question in brief, Elioren offered the apology. Even if the man had volunteered, a discourtesy was still a discourtesy. Better to say at least the courteous word. Jinwoo, however, indicated that it was fine, leaving a faint resonance hanging after the words. And then he spoke as if making a declaration.

The instinct Elioren had honed across three hundred years flared to life.

Here. Now.

Something entirely new was quickening into being.