Food: Starting with Wonton Noodles

To Zhou Yu's surprise, after he finished packing up and washing the dishes, Jiang Yan called out to him.

She handed Zhou Yu a round, puffy bag containing the contents.

Jiang Yan said softly, "This is a Shatin pomelo from my hometown. I didn't know if you liked it, so I only took one."

Shatin pomelo, also known as golden pomelo, is a popular fruit for moon-viewing in Lingnan during the Mid-Autumn Festival every year.

The Shatin pomelo from the eastern mountainous region of Lingnan is the most famous.

However, now that the Mid-Autumn Festival is over, there are far fewer pomelos available in the market.

Seeing that Zhou Yu didn't speak, Jiang Yan added, "I haven't properly thanked you for helping me before. My family just sent me some pomelos, which are a local specialty and taste delicious."

The pomelo was sent from home, and she picked out the best one to bring to Zhou Yu.

Zhou Yu smiled and said, "Thank you, I also really like eating pomelos."

After seeing that Zhou Yu had accepted the gift, Jiang Yan left with light steps.

......

When Zhou Yu returned home, Cao Xuezhen and Zhou Weiqiang were still watching TV in the living room.

The two were engrossed in watching a war movie on some unknown channel, ignoring Zhou Yu.

Zhou Yu opened the pomelo, broke off segments and placed them on the table, and only then did the two of them come to their senses.

"Hey, isn't this a Shatin pomelo from MZ? Where did you buy it?" Cao Xuezhen was a little surprised to see Zhou Yu bring back fruit.

The pomelos from Shatang in northern Guangdong are indeed delicious, and you can still find them during festivals, but they become rare after the Mid-Autumn Festival.

"A friend gave it to me, oh? It's very sweet and delicious. You should try it too."

Zhou Yu broke off a segment and ate it. The pulp had a very distinct grainy texture, and the sweet fruity aroma burst forth, making it very refreshing.

Cao Xuezhen clearly liked him very much, so she also complained about Zhou Yu:

"Your friend should have given you this for Mid-Autumn Festival, or at least asked her to buy it for you. The pomelo your dad bought for Mid-Autumn Festival was awful."

"We just met, didn't we?" Zhou Yu said with a smile.

Ignoring Zhou Weiqiang's attempts to explain to Cao Xuezhen that he had bought the pomelos from someone he knew, Zhou Yu returned to his room.

After the system started calculating the results, Zhou Yu opened the system and began to check:

Chef System

Today's satisfied customers: 170 (Click to view detailed customer wish list)

[Wishlist tasks claimed/Completed: 1/0]

[Recipe already mastered: (Click to view details)]

Today's settlement rewards:

[Today's Customer Satisfaction Rewards: Oyster Sauce Peeled Grapefruit (to be claimed); Mung Bean Soup (to be claimed)]

[Basic Settlement Bonus: If the number of paid customer orders reaches 100 today, the sales revenue will be quadrupled.]

Seeing that the daily settlement rewards had returned to normal, Zhou Yu breathed a sigh of relief.

However, he didn't expect that the system's reward recipe today would include pomelos peeled with oyster sauce.

What's this? They saw I brought back a pomelo and wanted me to cook it for them?

Zhou Yu knew about the dish "braised pomelo peel" in Cantonese cuisine, but few restaurants made it now, so he had never eaten it.

Since he had brought back ingredients today, Zhou Yu was quite interested in recreating the dish.

But once Zhou Yu clicked to claim the recipes and the two recipes were absorbed into his mind, he was dumbfounded.

No, is this dish really that complicated?

Traditionally, it takes two days just to remove the bitterness from the grapefruit peel.

Zhou Yu finally understood why no one was making this dish anymore.

However, after incorporating the memory of this dish, Zhou Yu still decided to make a replica.

Because this dish is really interesting.

Besides the characteristic of "eating what is in season," Cantonese cuisine also has two other major characteristics: "using expensive ingredients readily and preparing simple ingredients with finesse."

"Expensive ingredients should be treated and used like cheap ingredients" means that expensive ingredients should be treated and used as if they were cheap or ordinary ingredients.

The most famous example of a dish made with simple ingredients but refined presentation is peeled pomelo.

"Refining simple ingredients" does not mean using inferior ingredients, but rather using simple, ordinary, and difficult-to-process ingredients.

For example, peeling a pomelo. Normally, pomelo peels are thrown away because they're worthless.

However, the pomelo used for peeling is the opposite; it's best to use an unripe, still green and tender Shatin pomelo.

In the past, master chefs in high-end restaurants would only use the peel when making this dish, discarding the pulp.

It's not just a waste; unripe pomelos are sour and astringent and shouldn't be eaten.

The only pity is that the pomelos Jiang Yan gave me were too ripe, so I need to remove as much of the pith from the peel as possible when cold-soaking them.

Fortunately, the pomelo has already sweetened, and the peel is not as bitter as the green peel, so the cold soaking time can be reduced by more than half.

If you start preparing now, you should be able to finish by tomorrow.

With that in mind, he first ordered a portion of alum from a pharmacy on a food delivery platform.

There's a pharmacy downstairs, but I guess it's closed.

The name "ferrous sulfate" sounds like a modern chemical, but it is actually a natural mineral that is widely used in traditional cuisine, especially in tofu dishes.

After placing the order, Zhou Yu received the bonus of doubled sales again.

Today, in addition to the fixed quantity of cucumber dessert, 134 servings of wonton noodles were sold, doubling the previous amount to a total revenue of 7160 yuan.

With the revenue finally returning, Zhou Yu breathed a sigh of relief.

Seeing that there were no new updates to the wish quest, Zhou Yu started processing the pomelo peels.

Seeing Zhou Yu carrying a pomelo peel into the kitchen, Cao Xuezhen was a little surprised. She asked, "Why aren't you sleeping so late? What are you preparing to cook this time?"

Zhou Yu: "No, I just thought the peel of this pomelo was quite nice, so I wanted to make a pomelo peeling dish. I'm just soaking it for now, and I'll officially start making it tomorrow."

Zhou Weiqiang was surprised: "You can use grapefruit peel in cooking?"

Cao Xuezhen said with a touch of nostalgia, "Oh, so it's peeling a pomelo. Come to think of it, it's been many years since I've had one."

Unlike Zhou Weiqiang, Cao Xuezhen's father, who was also Zhou Yu's maternal grandfather, belonged to the earliest group of people to engage in business.

Initially, he fled the village because of speculation and profiteering. Later, after the economy opened up, he returned as a businessman.

Not long after Cao Xuezhen came of age, Zhou Yu's maternal grandfather took her to the provincial capital to sell clothes.

However, after her grandfather had an affair and abandoned his wife and children, leading to a series of ridiculous and absurd romantic tales, Cao Xuezhen severed ties with him.

Now that Cao Xuezhen heard that Zhou Yu knew how to make this dish, she also became somewhat interested.

Cao Xuezhen's first meal in Guangzhou was at Koufu Seafood Restaurant near the Thirteen Factories.

Cao Xuezhen still remembers that her father ordered a steamed sea bass, a dish of pomelo peel with oyster sauce, and a dish of stir-fried milk.

This greatly shocked Cao Xuezhen, who was from a rural area and had just left the provincial capital.

That was the first time she had ever eaten fresh, steamed sea fish.

It was also the first time I experienced that grapefruit peel could be used to cook, and it could be made so delicious.

Don't doubt why Cao Xuezhen, who was clearly from G City, had never eaten steamed fish.

Because of the special trade and transportation conditions of that era, even people living by the sea, unless they were always on the beach, were likely to come into contact with more seafood, mostly salted fish.

This is why, even today, Cao Xuezhen still has a special fondness for dried pomfret cooked overnight and semi-dried.