The Game of Life

Chapter 746: Chapter 745: Overly Complicated Soup

Jiang Feng, after reading the details of the dish, found that he was even less able to fall asleep.

The memory from Jiang Weiming was short but rich in content, he had not only obtained the Jiang Family’s genuine New Year’s Eve dinner S-level recipe ‘Jin Yu Bai Cai,’ but he also watched Jiang Chengde cook for several hours, with a large part of the dishes being ones he had never seen before.

So much so that after reading about the dishes, Jiang Feng had little interest in ‘Jin Yu Bai Cai,’ and his mind was filled with the dumpling wrapped in egg wash that Jiang Chengde had made many times.

Having watched for so long in his memory, Jiang Feng could only recognize that the outer layer of the dumpling should be made from a mix of tofu and fish, but what was inside, he truly had no idea—the dumplings had been pre-wrapped and parboiled, so during cooking, Jiang Chengde only needed to perform the subsequent steps.

Jiang Feng really wanted to know how exactly that dish was made.

For the New Year’s Eve dinner, everyone wants to eat something good, and that dish, with its frequent appearances, must also taste the best.

Sitting on his bed thinking about the dumpling for a long time, Jiang Feng found himself more and more sleepless, and glancing at his phone, he saw it was already past 3 a.m. In this time period that only true ‘cultivation’ experts could stay awake, Jiang Feng felt not the slightest bit of drowsiness; he even wanted to go to the kitchen to make a dumpling, the kind wasn’t important, but the way it was dipped in egg wash, just like Jiang Chengde’s technique, was what mattered.

Jiang Chengde’s spoon-flipping technique was simply too stunning.

Just thinking about it, Jiang Feng felt it was at a level he could not reach.

Even though his knifework had not yet reached the Grandmaster Level, he found himself eager to practice flipping the spoon.

Trying hard to push the image of Jiang Chengde flipping the spoon out of his mind, Jiang Feng felt that since he wouldn’t be able to sleep anyway, he might as well watch the video tutorial on ‘Jin Yu Bai Cai’ to learn how the legendary cabbage with the taste of immortality was made.

He had already seen how to cook the cabbage in his memory, but he hadn’t seen how to make the abalone and sea cucumber soup. As he expected, the video tutorial was divided into parts; the first part was the method of cooking cabbage that he had seen before in his memory, the second part was the method for making the soup.

This dish’s soup was more difficult than the cabbage.

In this regard, it was somewhat similar to ‘Boiled Cabbage in Supreme Soup’; although the fresh taste came from the cabbage, the real challenge was that pot of soup.

The progress bar of the soup was a whole 10 hours.

10 hours!

The video tutorial only showed close-ups, featuring only the cook’s hands. It was obviously Jiang Chengde’s hands on display during the preparation of the ingredients; a pair of broad and powerful hands, with calluses and scars from being scalded with hot oil—evidence that they belonged to an experienced chef.

Since the soup was made purely from marine products, the initial preparation of ingredients was very troublesome, as it was necessary to ensure the ingredients were clean and free of foreign objects, yet also maintain their integrity so as to avoid any damage from external force before they were put into the pot.

Just judging from the method, making the soup was not difficult, but it was extremely time-consuming and labor-intensive. Of the 10 hours of video tutorial, more than 9 hours were spent on simmering the soup, with locations for simmering constantly changing.

Initially, all the ingredients were mixed with water in the pot, brought to a boil over high heat for a while, and then the soup was separated and put into jars. The ingredients were set aside separately, added a little at a time, with a new batch of ingredients being added at regular intervals, always on low heat. This process of adding ingredients lasted for over 6 hours, occasionally requiring the lid to be removed to stir and inspect the progress of the stewing ingredients, as someone needed to stay close and watch over it, similar to tending to ‘Buddhas Jumping over the Wall.’

Of course, Jiang Feng watched this part by fast-forwarding through the progress bar. After all the ingredients had been added, which took about another half an hour, the pot was sealed with lotus leaves, and only then could the person walk away to tend to other matters, as long as the fire in the stove was kept alive.

And these hands performing the tedious and complex task were a pair of delicate and pale hands, well-maintained, clearly belonging to a young woman.

Without a doubt, the remaining steps must have been done by Jiang Huiqin.

It was not until Jiang Feng finished watching the video tutorial that he understood why the dish had disappeared from the Jiang Family’s New Year’s Eve dinner table following Jiang Huiqin’s marriage.

‘Jin Yu Bai Cai’ is easy to make, but the abalone and sea cucumber soup is difficult to stew.

Apart from Jiang Huiqin, the Jiang Family probably couldn’t find a second person who had the time on the eve of the Lunar New Year, let alone the attention to detail and patience, to spend an entire day tending to a pot of soup.

Even Jiang Feng, who was willing to hang a pot of broth every day and spend a lot of time practicing the making of crab-stuffed oranges, and never found cooking troublesome, thought the preparatory work for this golden and jade cabbage was really too much hassle.

Being unable to leave for over seven hours to do anything else, just for a pot of soup that’s only really suitable for frying cabbage and not much else, Jiang Feng felt that he probably wouldn’t have the patience to do it.

But the buff from this dish was actually quite decent, and if it were a festive occasion where the whole family gathered together, Jiang Feng wouldn’t mind spending more time making a dish that would make everyone happy.

Perhaps it was because the video tutorial on making the soup was incredibly dry, boring, long, and tedious that even Jiang Feng, who sped through by dragging the progress bar, still managed to make himself drowsy, yawned, closed the attribute panel and fell asleep on his head.

When Jiang Feng got up to brush his teeth the next day, he saw the long-lost dark circles under his eyes in the mirror.

“Morning, Fengfeng. I got up late today, the dumplings are still not ready in the pot, and I didn’t make the soy milk. If you want something to drink, just pour yourself a glass of milk.”

To Jiang Feng’s surprise, he saw faint dark circles under Wu Minqi’s eyes as well.

Obviously, she didn’t go to sleep immediately after returning to her room yesterday; instead, she chose to stay up late cultivating.

Wu Minqi yawned and looked listless.

There was chilled pure milk in the fridge. Jiang Feng opened the fridge, took out the milk to pour himself a glass, and poured one for Wu Minqi as well, then put the remaining milk back in the fridge. That’s when Jiang Feng noticed there weren’t many dumplings left in the fridge.

They would probably be finished in a couple of days. Clearly, Wu Minqi hadn’t made any dumplings these past two days.

During breakfast, Jiang Feng became acutely aware that there was something seriously off with his Qiqi; she was very much off.

Today’s dumplings were not spicy dumplings but clear-broth ones!

Clear-broth ones!

Of course, Jiang Feng didn’t mean to discriminate against the clear broth. The main thing was that it was quite strange to see dumplings without red oil in their home bowl.

“Qiqi.”

“Hmm?”

“Eat less for lunch today.”

Wu Minqi: ?

“Didn’t I tell you last night? I’ll make pigeon swallow dove for you this afternoon.” Jiang Feng flashed a smile at Wu Minqi.

“Oh.” Wu Minqi didn’t show much reaction and just continued eating her breakfast.

Her response made Jiang Feng even more certain that his Qiqi was indeed deeply troubled by some elusive inspiration, causing her to act quite abnormally.

The original reaction of his Qiqi wouldn’t have been so indifferent!

His Qiqi absolutely adored his cooking!

Source: Webnovel.com, updated on N𝘰vgo.co