The Cheat Emperor of the Culinary World-Chapter 209 - 208: Learning and Applying on the Spot

Fu Yu casually stuck the order list on the wall and turned to ask Zhao Meng, "Chef Zhao! This..."

Just as he started speaking, a kitchen helper ran over in a hurry to report to Zhao Meng, "Chef Zhao! It's not good, the jar for marinating the lemon chicken feet has cracked!"

Upon hearing this, Zhao Meng immediately panicked, "How did that happen!"

As he was speaking, he was already rushing towards the storage room.

"Hey..."

Fu Yu instinctively called out, but the kitchen was noisy, and Zhao Meng was in such a hurry that he didn't notice.

Beside him, Zhang Jinyu asked with concern, "What's wrong, Chef Fu?"

Fu Yu glanced at the departing Zhao Meng and shook his head, "Oh, nothing."

The truth is, Fu Yu didn't know how to prepare this three-course banquet.

However, with the specialty home banquet recipe in hand, Fu Yu wasn't too worried.

After sending Zhang Jinyu to scrub pots, Fu Yu took the opportunity to quickly flip through the specialty home banquet recipe.

Searched for [Three-Course Banquet].

Instantly, three full pages of options popped up.

Although all three-course banquets, they emphasized seasonal timing and avoiding out-of-season dishes, so the selections varied.

Fu Yu looked through them one by one and finally settled on a set of three-course banquet dishes, mainly because the current kitchen had all the ingredients needed for this set.

Carefully noting down the required ingredients, Fu Yu sent this lengthy list to Zhang Jinyu, asking him to prepare accordingly.

When Zhang Jinyu saw it, he was dumbfounded, "How many people are coming? There's so much food on this banquet list!"

Fu Yu was also quite helpless; there were many details to consider with this three-course banquet.

First, seven cold appetizers: marinated tofu skin, mustard-flavored vermicelli, ... pig face salad.

Then a starter soup.

Next, stewed pork knuckle, sweet and sour rice, ... meatball soup, and finally a sweet and sour soup.

Counting carefully, what the heck!

Including staple foods, dishes, and soups, there were a total of 24 dishes!

This banquet was all about the ceremonial feeling.

With so many dishes, there was more than enough for two large tables.

Zhang Jinyu went off to prepare the ingredients, leaving Fu Yu alone.

Although there were dishes stewing in the pots, the pans were non-stick and the heat control skills were at max level.

He covered the pot lids, ignoring how the dishes were stewing, and focused intently on reviewing the specific cooking methods of the three-course banquet.

The pursuit of color, aroma, flavor, shape, and presentation in the entire banquet.

The full banquet's dishes were harmonious in color, vibrant and diverse, mostly featuring delicacies, seafood, wild game, and seasonal ingredients.

Using various cutting techniques like dicing, slicing, shredding, chunking, mincing, and shaping into balls.

Utilizing frying, quick-frying, roasting, stewing, simmering, and many other cooking methods to create various flavors.

Using full and beautiful serving vessels to make the entire banquet an organic whole.

If Fu Yu had read this opening paragraph of the specialty home banquet recipe a month ago, he would have felt somewhat intimidated.

But now, with multiple personal skills and the practical experience from the teaching class,

it was the first time Fu Yu felt he could somewhat take on the task! 𝐟𝗿𝐞𝚎𝚠𝐞𝚋𝕟𝐨𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝕔𝕠𝚖

The three-course banquet started with seven cold appetizers.

The soaked tofu skin was ready to be directly tossed and seasoned.

Fu Yu strictly followed the ratio in the specialty home banquet recipe for seasoning.

The mustard-flavored vermicelli and sweet and sour peanuts were quite fresh.

Qianlima didn't have these two cold appetizers.

Fu Yu followed the example and quickly handled it.

Soon three plates of cold appetizers were taken away.

The ham slices used in Qianlima had always been Jinhua ham, sliced thinly and arranged on a plate, bright red as fire and intensely fragrant.

However, not many customers usually ordered this dish, so the ham in the store was cut to order and well-preserved otherwise.

This ham was extremely hard, difficult to cut with a knife, usually requiring a saw.

Fu Yu instructed Zhang Jinyu to bring the unsliced ham to the kitchen counter.

Fu Yu picked up a knife, ready to cut.

When the knife tip touched the hard ham, Fu Yu applied force, and the ham immediately softened like tofu, easily slicing off a piece, perfectly thick and smoothly cut.

Zhang Jinyu watched in astonishment.

Was this still the Jinhua ham he remembered?

It was supposed to be hard as rock, and ordinary knives couldn't slice it...

When cutting, it usually required placing the ham on a bench, holding it down with one hand, and using a small saw to cut it into appropriately sized chunks before further slicing into smaller pieces.

Zhang Jinyu deeply doubted if what he had cut before was the same ham as this one in front of him!

Fu Yu finished slicing a plate of ham, instructed Zhang Jinyu to store the remaining pieces safely, and then started the steaming process.

He placed the cleaned and sliced ham into a dish for steaming, separated by water.

Meanwhile, Fu Yu started preparing marinated duck webs, using six duck webs as suggested in the specialty home banquet recipe.

After boiling out the blood water, he blanched the duck webs in hot water.

In a pan with a bit of oil, he stir-fried the duck webs with oyster sauce and a little chili pepper.

Then he added some water to begin simmering.

With both stoves occupied, Fu Yu instructed Zhang Jinyu to prepare the small fish, while he started on the pig face salad.

Zhao Meng returned just then.

The glass jar for the lemon chicken feet had inexplicably cracked, spilling marinade everywhere.

This batch of side dishes had all been marinated the night before, so after fishing out the chicken feet and changing containers, they were still usable.

When Zhao Meng returned, he noticed Sun Qingning had added too much seasoning, prompting a round of scolding.

Sun Qingning scrambled to make corrections.

Fu Yu wanted to mention the three-course banquet to Zhao Meng, but didn't get the chance.

After finishing the seasoning, it was time to take the duck webs out of the pot.

Following the plating suggestions in the specialty home banquet recipe, Fu Yu arranged them nicely on the serving tray.

He then brought out the steamed ham.

Finally, after making the pig face salad, he prepared the deep-fried small fish.

The seven cold appetizers were served one after another, taking Fu Yu only half an hour.

Next was the starter soup.

This soup was something Fu Yu had never heard of before.

Although the ingredients seemed plentiful, it was actually quite simple to make.

Tomatoes were cut into chunks, ginger was chopped, spring onion whites sliced into flower shapes, and garlic was smashed and minced.

Pork mince was mixed with half a spoon of salt, and a suitable amount of cooking wine was added.

He added a spoon of cornstarch and a little water, then mixed in the chopped spring onion and ginger, stirring well.

In a bowl of hot water, he took a bit of the meat mix, squeezed it with his hand, shaping it into balls about two centimeters in diameter from the base of his fingers, and placed them in the water.

Oiling a pot, he fried the minced garlic until fragrant, then briefly tossed in the tomatoes before adding the meatballs, along with the hot water, into the pot.

Once the meatballs were cooked and floated to the surface, he poured in an appropriate amount of tomato ketchup, added one and a half spoons of salt, sprinkled in pepper to taste, and mixed well.

Zhang Jinyu couldn't help but take a deep breath, "What kind of soup is this? It doesn't seem to have much in it, but it smells so fresh?"

Fu Yu chuckled, "This is called the starter soup. Once this bowl of soup is served, it's time to start making the hot dishes."