The Magical Food God of Hogwarts

Chapter 123 Lady Pomfrey Takes Me Flying

Lucas was stunned; he stared blankly at Mrs. Pomfrey.

Madam Pomfrey was the Head Nurse, Chief Physician, and Pharmacist at Hogwarts, having cured thousands of cases over her decades of practice. She was the only one working at the university hospital, yet she single-handedly transformed Hogwarts Hospital into a healing sanctuary second only to St. Mungo's Hospital for Magic and Wizardry.

Moreover, rumors circulated that St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Arts had repeatedly offered Madam Pomfrey high salaries, with each offer higher than the last, but Madam Pomfrey remained unmoved.

Aside from her superb healing spells, her skill in potions was comparable to Professor Snape's, only their approaches differed. Madam Pomfrey was also a potions master.

Now, such a master-level figure actually wants to join my research!

That's too modest! She's clearly giving me a boost! With Madam Pomfrey working on this project with me, my magical medicinal cuisine research will definitely progress by leaps and bounds!

Lucas stammered with excitement, "Mrs. Pomfrey... it would be my honor to have your guidance!"

Little did she know that Mrs. Pomfrey was also eager to succeed. For decades, she had been concerned about the health of her students and teachers, and she had tried her best to go further down this path. But in recent years, she had clearly felt that she had reached a career plateau and could no longer do better.

This wasn't a problem with her technique; her potion-making skills were already superb. The problem lay in her approach, in her theory. The near-stagnant state of healing spells and potions over the past century had effectively stifled her further exploration.

But now, Lucas's discourse on "medicinal cuisine" has opened a completely new door for her, showing her a brand new path leading to a higher level!

Through unique cooking techniques, medicinal herbs are skillfully combined with food, using the properties of the herbs to adjust the properties of the food, and then using the properties of the food to enhance the efficacy of the herbs, achieving a harmonious state where the herbs work with the food and the food enhances the efficacy of the herbs...

The envisioned magical medicinal cuisine is not only delicious and nutritious, but it can also cure diseases, strengthen the foundation, continuously improve and boost the wizard's physical fitness, enhance resistance, and even promote the wizard's magical power level!

This is the perfect treatment plan I've been dreaming of!

Treat illness before it occurs!

Madame Pomfrey gazed at Lucas, whose cheeks were flushed with excitement, and whose red hair shone brightly in the firelight, rising like flames.

Perhaps, the lofty goals of the wise physicians of past dynasties will one day be achieved...

She was thrilled and smiled. "Lucas, your idea is truly ingenious and fascinating. You don't need to be modest. I have plenty of confidence in potion preparation and healing spells, but I know nothing about cooking, so you'll have to take the lead."

"According to the theory of medicinal cuisine, it is ultimately a diet with miraculous effects, which requires a genius chef like you to take the lead."

"Let me be your assistant in this study."

At that moment, the kitchen fell completely silent.

All the house-elves stared in astonishment, their bat-wing-like ears standing up.

The elves who have worked at Hogwarts for generations know that Madam Pomfrey has a high status, outstanding reputation, and miraculous medical and potion-making skills. She even has a kind and golden heart and is willing to treat the accidental injuries of these lowly elves.

And now, the highly respected Mrs. Pomfrey has personally expressed her willingness to serve as Mr. McGregor's assistant and help him with his research on magical medicinal cuisine!

A loud sob escaped Lanqi's throat, his bulging eyes instantly filled with tears, and he couldn't help but burst into tears.

Mr. McGregor, what a great man! Even Mrs. Pomfrey was willing to assist him...

"Mr. McGregor, you truly are the heir to Hufflepuff!" The house-elves sobbed and embraced each other. "Mr. McGregor will surely carry on Lady Hufflepuff's culinary legacy and eventually become as great as Hufflepuff herself!"

"Alright, little elves," said Mrs. Pomfrey, "now is not the time for crying; our research requires quiet."

So the little elves immediately covered their mouths tightly, held back their tears, and nodded vigorously.

"Lucas, you've already experimented. As long as the temperature is right, the chicken soup won't react with the soothing medicine." Madam Pomfrey turned to Lucas, immediately getting into character, her expression serious and earnest.

"So, what are your next plans? How do you plan to develop a soothing chicken soup, rather than simply mixing chicken soup with a soothing drug?"

Lucas quickly replied, "Actually, the soothing chicken soup we're planning to research today is just a clever idea; it's only a semi-finished medicinal diet, a conceptual and technological exploration."

"True magical medicinal cuisine should be developed by repeatedly experimenting with magical materials and ingredients to re-determine the principal, auxiliary, and complementary ingredients, and then creating medicinal cuisine with truly long-lasting effects."

"This soothing chicken soup, however, doesn't have a long-lasting effect; it can only be described as..."

"Wait a minute." Mrs. Pomfrey's eyes lit up again. "Excuse me, what is meant by 'ruler, minister, assistant, and envoy'?"

Lucas quickly wrote down the relevant concepts on the small blackboard.

"The principle of monarch, minister, assistant, and guide is the basic principle of prescription formulation in Chinese medicine. It stipulates the primary and secondary relationships and functional positioning of different drugs in a prescription, ensuring that the efficacy of the prescription is synergistic and the primary and secondary drugs are clearly distinguished."

"The principal drug is the drug that targets the main disease or symptom and plays the main therapeutic role. It is indispensable. There is basically only one such drug in a single dose."

"The assistant herbs assist the principal herbs in enhancing their therapeutic effect, or they treat concurrent diseases or symptoms. A single dose typically contains one or two of these herbs."

"Adjuvant herbs mainly play three roles. First, they assist the principal and assistant herbs in treatment; second, they restrain the toxicity of the principal and assistant herbs; and third, they counteract the effects of the principal and assistant herbs, having opposite properties to them, thus having a synergistic effect. A single dose may contain one to three or even more of these herbs."

"The guiding medicine plays two main roles. First, it directs the medicinal power to the affected area. Second, it harmonizes the properties of the other medicines in the prescription. Generally, one or two of these medicines are used in a single dose."

Lucas finished speaking, and Mrs. Pomfrey stared intently at the blackboard.

Suddenly—

"Absolutely brilliant!"

Mrs. Pomfrey cried out, startling Lucas. She quickly realized her lapse, her face flushing slightly, but she continued muttering, "What a brilliant theory...it's amazing..."

'

Her silver hair trembled, and her eyes blazed with excitement.

The theory of monarch, minister, assistant, and envoy was not entirely new or unfamiliar to her. For thousands of years, the formulation and exploration of potions had followed a similar path, but wizards had not developed a systematic and precise theory.

Now, the appearance of the four characters "君臣佐使" (ruler, minister, assistant, envoy) is like a lighthouse suddenly lighting up in the vast darkness. This lighthouse had always been there, but had remained silent. Now, it suddenly shines brightly, and the previously hazy and indistinct route has become clear!

A thin layer of paper was gently peeled away, and what was once a vague feeling suddenly became a brilliant summary!

This is the essence of true teachings in a single sentence, while false teachings fill countless volumes!

Lucas suddenly felt a blur before his eyes, a tightness around his body, and the smell of medicine filling his nostrils. Mrs. Pomfrey gave him a warm hug.

"Fantastic, Lucas! This brilliant theory will have a huge and far-reaching impact on potions!" Mrs. Pomfrey exclaimed excitedly. "I must write a paper based on this and submit it to top publications like *World of Magical Potions*, *Royal Apothecary*, and *Solomon*..."

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"They must award us a Merlin Medal, at least a second-class one! Of course, the honor is secondary; the main thing is that this theory can make a huge contribution to the magical world."

Lucas blinked. "Uh, I feel like I've heard this somewhere before?"

Madame Pomfrey was thrilled and about to return to writing her paper when Lucas awkwardly called out, "Madame Pomfrey, what about the medicinal diet?"

Mrs. Pomfrey paused, embarrassed. "Uh, yes, Lucas, let's continue. I'm so sorry, I got a little too excited..."

Lucas continued, "Medicinal cuisine draws on the principles of traditional Chinese medicine, such as the concept of 'principal, assistant, and adjuvant' in food preparation. For example, the inspiration for my soothing chicken soup comes from a chicken soup made with four calming ingredients..."

He explained in detail the ingredients of the Four Treasures Chicken Soup for Calming the Mind: the principal ingredient is jujube seed, the assistant ingredients are poria cocos, lily bulb, and lotus seed, the adjuvant ingredients are old hen, red dates, and goji berries, and the guiding ingredient is ginger. Madame Pomfrey nodded repeatedly as she listened.

"What we're trying to do now is not to create a new formula for a combination of ingredients from scratch, but to directly add chicken as an ingredient to an already mature soothing potion."

"Existing soothing remedies use herbs as the principal ingredient, daisy root as the secondary ingredient, leech juice as the adjuvant ingredient, and dried nettle as the guiding ingredient. Adding chicken directly as an adjuvant ingredient doesn't change the original combination or efficacy, making it simple, convenient, and easy to develop. However, its efficacy cannot surpass that of soothing remedies, and it cannot create a long-lasting effect. Therefore, it can only be called a semi-finished medicinal diet..."

Mrs. Pomfrey understood perfectly.

She looked at the recipe for Muggle-style chicken soup with four calming ingredients that Lucas had written on the blackboard as the inspiration for her recipe.

Chop the chicken into pieces, put them in a pot of cold water with ginger, bring to a boil, skim off the foam, remove the chicken pieces and rinse them with warm water. Crush the jujube seeds, rinse them briefly with lily bulbs, lotus seeds, and poria cocos, and soak them for 10 minutes before use.

Place the blanched chicken pieces, crushed jujube seeds, lily bulbs, lotus seeds, poria cocos, 3 slices of ginger, and red dates into a soup pot, and add enough cold water to cover all the ingredients.

Bring to a boil over high heat, then simmer over low heat for 2 hours. Add goji berries 10 minutes before turning off the heat. Season with salt after the soup is cooked.

The medicinal herbs and ingredients, including jujube seeds, lily bulbs, lotus seeds, and poria cocos, are stewed with chicken.

Now we need to replace them with various medicinal herbs from the soothing potion...

Mrs. Pomfrey frowned. "Lucas, your experiment is unlikely to succeed. As you just realized, the soothing potion requires very specific temperatures to prepare and cannot be exposed to high heat. But your chicken soup must be simmered at high temperatures. How can the two be combined?"

Lucas said, "What I'm thinking now is to cook the chicken broth first, then let it cool down, using the broth as water, so that all the reactions of the soothing medicine can occur in the warm chicken broth. This deep integration might change the strange taste of adding the soothing medicine directly to the chicken broth, creating a delicious soothing chicken broth."

"A brilliant idea!" exclaimed Madam Pomfrey. "Using soup as water, how creative! You must always get high marks in Professor Snape's class, right?"

Lucas remained silent.

"But I'm afraid your idea is flawed. Although I'm not good at cooking, I know that the deliciousness of chicken soup lies in its temperature. If you cool the chicken soup down first, then warm it up, and then keep it at room temperature after it's finished, the flavor of the chicken soup will be greatly diminished, and it certainly won't achieve the effect you want," Mrs. Pomfrey said.

Lucas sighed softly, "That's what I think too, but I don't have a better solution for now."

Mrs. Pomfrey smiled: "Now is the time for my assistant to step in. Hmm? I happen to know of a more effective potion that needs to be kept at a high temperature throughout the preparation process, and is most effective when drunk hot."

Lucas's eyes widened.

"Excuse me, is Mr. McGregor here?"

A voice, utterly out of place in the warm and inviting Hufflepuff lounge, suddenly broke the silence.

With a loud bang, a bunch of exploding cards made a huge noise, and the pattern that had been painstakingly built for most of the time suddenly collapsed. Hannah stood up angrily.

"Who?!"

However, her momentum immediately faltered.

In the center of the common lounge stood a tall, thin young man. His skin was very fair, and his expression was aloof. The gold-rimmed glasses did nothing to soften his gaze; instead, they made him appear even more distant.

He wore a magnificent dark green robe, made of the finest materials, with understated yet luxurious gold thread embellishments on the collar and cuffs. Two badges were worn side by side on his chest: one was the coiled serpent of Slytherin, and the other was the shield of Hogwarts, with a large "H" surrounded by a lion, eagle, badger, and snake.

Faced with a group of badgers with varying expressions all looking at him, he simply stood there quietly, waiting for an answer.

"Hello, Mr. Victor Greengrass." Cedric stood up from the sofa. "Lucas isn't here right now; I heard he's in the kitchen working on developing new recipes."

He turned to the first-year badgers and introduced them: "This is Mr. Victor Greengrass, the head of the Hogwarts Student Council and the prefect of Slytherin Year 7."

The little badgers exchanged a glance.

Wow, a big shot has arrived.

At Hogwarts, prefects have the authority to assist professors in managing teaching and to add or deduct points below ten. In the fifth, sixth, and seventh years of each house, there are two people, one male and one female, making a total of twenty-four people.

The people who command these prefects are the Hogwarts Student Council Presidents, who are just a man and a woman.

As students at the top of the pyramid, their authority is in some respects the same as that of professors, and they also have the authority to add or deduct points for scores below 50.

It is said that if the male or female student council presidents intend to stay at the university, they will most likely be approved and become full professors after serving as teaching assistants for one or two years.

Hannah, Susan, Ernie, and Zacharias were more familiar with Greengrass, as it was one of the twenty-eight pure-blood clans, and one of the few that was still large and prosperous.

"Hello," Victor Greengrass said in a cold tone.

"What do you want with Lucas?" Ellie stood up and questioned him bluntly. Because of Snape, she didn't have a good impression of Slytherin.

"Good evening, Miss MacFastie." Victor Greengrass's voice was much softer. "I've been asked by Professor Snape to come and correct Mr. McGregor's 'Potion Coding Song'."

“But,” his voice turned cold again, “Mr. McGregor clearly finds the kitchen more appealing than potions. In that case, perhaps it’s no longer necessary.”

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