I don’t know any knowledge about cooking techniques, stones, and the gambling stone……
To buy the ingredients for Qi Fangzi, Yan Chu not only went to several spice shops but also went to a Chinese pharmacy.
It was not rare for medicinal herbs to be added to dishes, especially for braised food. It was very typical to put traditional Chinese medicine in the marinade. On the one hand, it could nourish the braised food, and on the other hand, it could make the flavor of the braised food richer. For example, herbs such as lemon grass, agarwood, female ginseng, and other herbs often appear in braised spice packets.
But the ingredients Yan Chu chose this time were more complex, and there were more than 40 kinds of spices and herbs, which was the most simple proportion in the braised recipe he knew now.
At first, he thought his 300 yuan would be enough, but who knew that just buying all these spices would have gone far beyond his budget? Fortunately, his mother gave him 200 yuan before he went out. Otherwise, it would not be enough to buy braised food ingredients.
There were many types of these herbs and spices, but the actual amount of each serving was minuscule. It was a pity to buy too few kinds of each serving. The employees of the spice store and the herb store were not willing to help you scale. Yan Chu looked at the large bags and small bags he had. These ingredients were enough for him to make four or five meals of braised food.
In particular, the older the marinade, the better. It absorbed the essence of the food after being stewed several times, and the braised food was more fragrant. On the contrary, when stewing the same amount of food ingredients, the spices that need to be added again would be reduced a lot.
“Buying so many things?”
Jin Xiujuan looked at the big and small bags in her son’s hand and felt a little distressed about the money.
“Did you buy the pig trotters from Old Wang’s pork shop? We bought the meat from him, and the price can be discounted.” She asked while looking at some pig trotters and pork heads bought by her son.
The Yan family’s breakfast shop mainly sells steamed buns and rice balls. The husband and wife were still very conscientious. They had not learned from some unscrupulous vendors to go to the wholesale market to buy bad pork without the quarantine certificates. The fillings used in the meat buns were all real fresh pork. The price of fresh pork in the vegetable market was rising day by day, and it would increase the cost too.
The couple picked up the goods from Wang’s pork shop every day. As a long-term customer, they had a small discount. If they could save, they would save money. Just before Yan Chu went out, Jin Xiujuan told him that if he wanted to buy pork, he would go to Wang’s shop to buy it and report her name.
“I bought it from Uncle Wang. Dad likes to eat pig ears, but you weren’t willing to buy them for my dad when the braised pork shop was expensive. This time, I asked Uncle Wang specifically for some of his unsold pig ears, pig tongue, and pig cheek meat. Today, let Dad eat to satisfy his craving.”
Yan Chu pointed to some of the ingredients he bought.
“Zhonghua, listen to me. Your son’s heart is all about you as a father. He even thought about the dish that goes well with alcoholic drinks for you in the evening.”
When Yan Chu returned, the couple kneaded the dough, cut them into pieces, and prepared the steamed buns to be sold tomorrow morning. Their muscles and bones were relaxed after hearing their son’s filial and considerate words, and no matter how tired they were, they felt it was nothing.
“Of course, this is my son.”
Yan Zhonghua used to be a quiet man, but now he could not help smiling, and his smile lines were stretched out.
“So many things. How about Mom helping you?”
Jin Xiujuan looked at the things in the bags her son was carrying. She had never seen many spices before. However, when she was a child in the countryside, her family killed the pigs and cooked braised food once a year, so she had some experience. Jin Xiujuan thought she should be better than her son’s sudden whim.
So many things, she did not know how much they cost. She would feel distressed if it really got wasted.
“Mom, I can do it myself. Don’t worry. The recipe is very detailed. You and Dad can merely wait and try my craft.” Yan Chu spoke positively. He thought he was following and watching the braising master, who made an untold number of braised foods. For the first time, even if he could not reach his level, the braised food was much better than that sold in ordinary braised food shops.
“Then watch the ignition. If it doesn’t work, tell Mom.”
Jin Xiujuan looked at her son’s determined appearance and was embarrassed to persuade her son again.
There were two kitchens in the house. One was inside the house, and the other was in a temporary shed in the yard. On weekdays, the couple would choose to be outside when they prepare breakfast for sale the next day, such as deep-fried breadsticks. Those things had a lot of smoke, and cooking them in the house would make the ceiling yellow.
This building was old public housing. The Yan family had no money to renovate, so all the installations were timeworn. The kitchen smoke exhaust was the most outdated smoke pipe, not the current range hood. The house was smoky and terribly hot when cooking some food that needed oil and fire.
However, it was also a wonder of the old public housing. Usually, at mealtime, the smoke pipes of every household began to emit white smoke. Standing outside the window, one could smell what food someone had cooked. If someone had cooked fish or meat, one could merely take the bowl, take a plate of pickles, and eat with fragrance. But such intriguing things hardly exist now.
In addition to some old neighbors who had not moved out, there were more tenants from other places. They worked hard for life, ate uncertain meals, and fell asleep when they returned. It was inevitable that people were indifferent.
When the Yan family started to sell breakfast, they still sold white congee. Later, fewer people bought congee, so it was no longer profitable. The stainless steel barrel initially used to make congee got put away. Now it seemed that it was ideal to be used to make gravy.
The recipe was essential to make a good pot of braised food and whether the soup stock was delicious was equally important.
If one followed the recipe strictly, it would take a day to boil the soup stock, and the raw materials needed for the soup stock were definitely not the chicken, pig, and cow bones Yan Chu bought from the vegetable market. It was just an unusual treatment under unique circumstances. Kitchen God’s Space asked him to complete the production of braised food today and received sincere praise from ten people, so he could only temporarily cut corners.
At noon, when it was time for lunch, Yan Chu began to put onion, ginger, garlic, and various seasonings in the soup stock and began to stew the marinade.
“This soup is really fresh.”
While boiling marinade in soup stock, Yan Chu especially left a small pot to continue cooking. Yan Chu felt the recipe was unusual when he cooked the soup stock. He hardly needed to add too much seasoning. The thick white broth was so fresh and made people speechless.
Jin Xiujuan felt that her son was really amazing. She had never tasted such fresh soup without any meat smell at her age, including the soup she drank when the children of former relatives and friends got married in the grand. I was not as good as the bowl she had now.
“Gulp— gulp—”
Yan Zhonghua did not speak but sped up his swallowing. After drinking the soup in the bowl, Yan Chu served him another bowl.
“I think it’s amazing. I’ve cooked soup before, but it’s never tasted as good as today. I follow the recipe in every step. Mom and Dad, do you think this is a secret recipe? I got it by accident.”
The white soup was rich, salty, and fresh, without any smell of mutton or a greasy taste. No matter how much one drank, it would not be too much. Yan Chu finally understood why people dare to call themselves master chefs. This cut corners version could make such delicious food. He could not imagine how delicious and magical the food produced by other more complicated recipes, which were perfectly still according to the requirements and proportions of those recipes.
Yan Chu thought, maybe as 007 said, he really made a profit this time. He should learn more skills like this. No matter which world he went to, he would not starve to death anyway.
“Where did you get this recipe?”
Jin Xiujuan hurriedly asked her son. At first, she thought her son wanted to make braised food excitedly after seeing a recipe in a book. Now, listening to her son’s tone, it was not like that.
“Mom, Dad, look at this.”
Yan Chu returned to the house and took out an ancient book that he used as a simple way to make old things. The pages were yellowed and a little brittle. The pages were densely packed, brush-written ancient characters that made them feel headaches. The ingredients and recipes vaguely could be seen recorded on it.
“I bought this from an old book stand before. I thought it was all about recipes. Don’t you sell breakfast at home? Maybe I could find some delicious and easy-to-cook breakfast and buy it for ten yuan. However, the texts on it are ancient characters. I also read a lot of books to understand the current braised recipe. I want to try the recipe in this book. Today I went to buy ingredients to make it.”
The original self only knew some ordinary home-cooked dishes. It was definitely problematic if his cooking skills suddenly improved, so Yan Chu made a reasonable excuse for his future changes.
The original, worn ancient books could be comprehended by those who know a little about antiques at a glance, but the Yan couple did not understand these, especially the densely packed old characters on them. They could only understand some parts of it by guessing.
In this way, they would only think that Yan Chu learned from this ancient book and would not doubt anything else in every new cooking skill Yan Chu learned and showed to his parents.
“Zhonghua, do you think our son has found treasure?”
The couple had a small range of knowledge and did not think about making money. They only thought their son was impressive and that he could buy good things just by purchasing a broken book.
“Hide this book well, don’t lose it.”
Jin Xiujuan did not dare to touch the tattered book because she was afraid of breaking it. Besides, she could not understand it. It was useless to read it. She just told her son that the book looked great. Keeping it well might become their family’s heirloom.
After drinking the soup in the bowl, Jin Xiujuan suddenly looked forward to the pot of braised food in the kitchen.
“What’s this smell? It smells so fragrant?”
It was fine at seven or eight o’clock, and the smell would disappear. But it was nearly nine o’clock when the smell began to get heavier and heavier. It still kept digging into people’s noses. It was not long after dinner, but after smelling the fragrance, the stomach started to growl and rebel.
Now, most of the elderly still live in old public housing, and most of them had gone to bed at this point but got hooked by this fragrance. They opened the window to smell better. Who on earth was so damaging? They cooked something good in the evening. Their mouths were watering.
The few youths in the community, especially young girls, who did not eat after eight o’clock in the evening, were led by the smell to stretch out their criminal hands, unpacking and cooking the instant noodles.
In the past, the most delicious instant noodles had little effect on this magical fragrance. After swallowing the noodles, it was the first time that instant noodles felt so unpalatable.
What were they doing*24doing*from 干 [gàn] that can mean as to do or to f*ck (vulgar)? Why was it so fragrant?
It was estimated to be a question that most residents in the community thought about tonight.
“Chu’er, your braised food tastes delicious?”
They had to get up early to set up a stall in the morning. Yan Zhonghua and Jin Xiujuan should have gone to bed at eight or nine o’clock, but this crime-inducing braised food at home made them get up and down from the bed. It was hard to return to their room with the greedy worms in their stomachs. The smell continued to drill into their noses through the crack in the door, which made people unable to sleep.
After going down a few times, the couple just gave up. They would not want to sleep tonight if they could not get a bite of the braised food.
“It needs to stew more, but if you want to eat it, I’ll take some of it for you first.”
Yan Chu poked some of the stewed ingredients with his chopsticks. This pot of gravy was the best for marinating pig’s trotters. But Yan Chu did not care much. He also stewed pork head meat and dried beancurd.
Some ingredients needed a short-time stew, such as pig trotters and pig head meat. Of course, it took a long time for the gravy to be fragrant and flavorful.
However, if his family had a craving to eat it, for the time being, there was no need to think about it so much.
Yan Chu picked up some dried beancurd, pork cheek meats, and a pig trotter.
Yan Chu squished the pig trotters with a pressure cooker before braising them in the pot so they could be softened faster and braised better.
The pig trotters had a faint luster of agate after stewed in red gravy. The fat layer shakes, making people’s saliva faster when served on the plate.
Yan Chu gently clamped with chopsticks, and the pig trotters got clipped into two parts along the joints, which was exactly half of the parents.
“How does it taste, Mom, Dad?”
Yan Chu put the meat in his mouth, and before he put it in his mouth, he asked his parents, who had already started to eat the pig trotters, the taste of the pig trotters.
“Woo—”
They could not speak at all. It was so, so, so delicious.
The pig trotters had been boiled for a long time, and the slightly viscous sauce on the outer layer was a bit thick. When you bit down, you hardly needed any teeth. You could only use your lips and tongue to sip the meat of the pig trotters. The flavor of various spices had reached a perfect balance on the pig trotters. After eating several bites, you did not feel greasy like when eating ordinary pig trotters.
They just wanted to take one bite and another.
Yan Chu made his first pot of braised food mildly spicy and slightly numbing because he intended to use it as the master sauce of braised food. If it was too spicy from the beginning, people who did not like spicy food might not accept the taste.
Regarding their son’s question, the couple could only express their love through body language and had no time to open their mouths.
“These pig trotters will taste even better and more flavorsome if they are marinated overnight.”
Yan Chu ate a mouthful of pig cheek meat. In Yan Chu’s evaluation, he could already give a high score of nine to ten, but in the master of braising’s evaluation, he could only get a passing score of six.
He was also a man who had experienced many different worlds and tasted different cuisines. He could give such a high evaluation. It was conceivable that he would attract much attention in this world once he reached the pinnacle of braised food.
Yan Chu became more and more satisfied with the Kitchen God’s Space.
The family tried every ingredient, each with its own characteristics. The pig trotters were soft, the pig cheek meat was chewy, the pig ear was crispy, and the dried beancurd was savory. Each kind of food was far more than the braised food sold in the outside braised food shop.
Yan Zhonghua and his wife ate until their bellies were bulging, so they relieved the cravings a little. Looking at a large pot of unfinished ingredients and listening to their son’s words that stewing for another night would add more flavor, they were very much looking forward to tomorrow.
“You go to bed first, Mom, Dad. I’ll bring some to Uncle Bai and Grandpa Jiang. Tonight our chimney is continuously expelling this smell. I’m afraid the neighbors are drooling now.”
Yan Chu’s boastful words amused Yan Zhonghua and his wife, but they also felt their son was right. It was really fragrant. They could not sleep just now and did not know if the nearby neighbors were the same as them.
They did not care about others, but the old residents in this building were friendly, so they should send some good braised food to them.
Originally, Jin Xiujuan was thinking of letting her son deliver the braised food the next day. After all, it was past 9 o’clock, nearly 10 o’clock now. But considering that the braised food would have to be cooked for another night, it would be a sin if those good neighbors could not sleep because of the greedy worms.
She generously commented on her son’s request and took out all the clean dishes.
“Your father and I will send them to Grandpa Jiang, and you will send Uncle Bai a little more.”
They were neighbors and also had close relationships. In Jin Xiujuan’s eyes, the Bai family was their future in-laws, and Bai Ling was the future daughter-in-law she would look after as her own daughter. If there were good things, they would naturally give them more.
“Uh-huh.”
Yan Chu bought quite a lot of ingredients today. He filled the Bai family with a pot of braised food and walked upstairs.
“Recognized the master by a drop of blood.”
Zhang Zifan hid in his room, closed the curtains, and after telling the nanny not to let anyone disturb him, he took out the jade pendants he bought today.
He was much more willing than Yan Chu. He cut a wound directly on his index finger with a knife, and blood flowed immediately. He took the bleeding finger and wiped the jade pendants one by one.
The first five did not respond. Almost every jade pendant was smeared with blood all over, afraid the amount would not be enough. The blood from his index finger was not enough when he was about to daub the sixth jade pendant, so he cut his middle finger.
When none of his fingers were intact, the last piece of jade pendant finally gave him a little reaction. The blood smeared on it was slowly absorbed, then he saw a beam of light rushing into his eyes.
Regardless of the pain in his ten fingers, Zhang Zifan jumped up in ecstasy, shouting noisily.
The nanny at home listened to the young master downstairs, thinking about the young master who always behaved strangely these days, and wondered if she should tell the old master and his wife about the young master. Otherwise, if something happened, she could not bear the responsibility.
Zhang Zifan did not know the nanny’s mind, so he could not wait to experiment as soon as he got the treasure.
The protagonist’s power in the story of 《The Urban Treasure Hunting King》 was all-powerful. As long as he carefully looked at a particular object, all its delight would appear in his mind. At the same time, he had the perspective effect. A gambling stone was known could not be penetrated by any instrument, yet this power could. In one scene, the male protagonist shone brightly at the Tengchong stone gambling conference, making a lot of money. Emerald, Fu Lu Shou crystal, blood jade with gold filigree, and purple jadeite were only the male protagonist who did not fancy it. There was nothing he could not find.
Zhang Zifan excitedly focused his eyes on the desk lamp at home. After a long time, his eyes were sore, and finally, a line of words appeared in his mind, table lamp, six months.
Two simple words. Unlike those illustrations in the novel, detailed introduction of an item to its manufacturing materials and technology, with only its name and manufacturing years.
Zhang Zifan did not think so much. He was also ecstatic that he had such a heaven-defying ability. He diligently tested every item in the room until his eyes were tired and his head began to hurt. Then he fell asleep.
“Little Chu, it turns out that your family is making delicious food. I said how the fragrance was so close to me. Your aunt and I were both in bed just now. And we were tossing and turning for more than an hour without sleeping, wondering what smells so good.”
Bai Jiandong, also known as Bai Ling’s father, liked Yan Chu very much. Before the unexpected encounter, the original self was indeed a good boy who most people could not find fault with.
The grades were in the middle range, enough to be admitted to an undergraduate university. Yan Chu was filial, honest, and most importantly, had thick eyebrows and big eyes. At first glance, people thought this young man was upright, not to mention that Bai Jiandong, who had grown up with him and regarded him as his son-in-law, naturally saw Yan Chu better.
“Yan Chu.”
Bai Ling had just been lying in bed. Hearing Yan Chu’s voice, she jumped up and combed her hair, making sure there were no sleep lines on her face before she came out.
Similar to the original self’s memory, but more youthful and childish than the haggard and embarrassed girl who finally appeared in the original self’s memory.
Her face was slightly round, and she wore a pair of black-rimmed glasses. She looked like an ordinary senior high school student, but her snow-white skin was particularly brilliant, which made her look transparent and fresh. It was the kind of appearance that made people feel close.
“Come here, Little Ling. Little Chu is here to bring you the braised food especially.”
Bai Jiandong took a sip of the wine with the braised food and started talking nonsense. Bai Ling gave her father an embarrassed look and then walked toward the dining table.
“What is it for me? It’s obviously for our whole family.”
She was used to the elders on both sides joking about their affairs. But the older she got, the more she understood about it, and the shyer she became, especially when her classmates around her also made fun of her about Yan Chu.
Bai Ling’s peripheral vision kept a focus on Yan Chu quietly. She had met Yan Chu yesterday, but for some reason, the look in Yan Chu’s eyes today made people even more flustered.
