Everyday Life Starting with Food Wars

"Contestants and spectators! Welcome to the final battle of the 19th 'King of Mahjong' Tournament!"

"The four groups of players standing on this stage are all top performers in this competition, but! This competition can only determine one 'King of Mahjong'!"

The host paused, drawing everyone's attention.

"So now I announce the topic of this competition: Breakfast!"

"It doesn't matter if it's dry or wet, and there are no restrictions on ingredients. Whatever you bring—porridge, noodles, fried dough sticks, eggs, or pastries—as long as it's the breakfast you're best at and that best represents your culinary skills, it's fine!"

"Furthermore, the judges for this competition will no longer be the three main judges; everyone present will be a judge for this competition."

"The purpose of the Mahjong King Competition is to determine the chef who can truly win over all the diners, and the diners are not just the professional judges, but also every one of you who love food!"

"Although the total score for the third round will be determined by the three judges, each diner present will also have a vote to cast for the contestant they choose."

"And for the four groups of contestants, you also need to make enough for all the diners present to enjoy."

"The third round of the competition will last three hours!"

"Therefore, I hereby declare the competition officially open!"

Chapter 49 Four Gods Seafood Eight Treasure Buns (Part 1)

As the timer started, the other three groups on stage quickly sprang into action and rushed toward the food preparation area.

Chen Yuxing did not act immediately; he stood there, looking at the food section, lost in thought.

Breakfast.

He actually knows quite a few breakfast dishes. In his previous life, he knew classic Chinese breakfast dishes such as xiaolongbao, shengjian, potstickers, scallion pancakes, tofu pudding, soy milk and fried dough sticks, etc. There are also many recipes in the cookbook that can be made into breakfast dishes, such as three-egg shumai, dragon beard noodles and crystal shrimp dumplings.

However, there are actually two options for breakfast.

This round of competition requires all diners to taste the food, which is similar to the breakfast topic in the accommodation training program. Speed ​​is essential, since the diners who arrive so early are probably not having eaten breakfast. The earlier you prepare the food and let the diners taste your dishes first, the more advantageous it will be.

Or they might choose not to prioritize speed, but instead focus on making a lasting impression on everyone through the flavor of their dishes.

Actually, if the opponent's strength is average, any recipe will work.

However, the remaining three teams of opponents are not ordinary chefs either. Whether it is Chef Zhou from Guangzhou Restaurant or Chef Zhang from Tao Tao Ju, they are both well-known chefs. Even the dark horse team from Shunde has made it into the top four from among many chefs.

Chen Yuxing knew that his skills were still somewhat inferior to those of the chefs above him. If he chose to pursue speed in this level of competition, he felt that he would have no chance of winning.

Only those products that impress in both taste and appearance have a chance, even if it takes more time.

Having decided not to pursue speed, Chen Yuxing quickly figured out what he wanted to do.

His consciousness rapidly flipped through the book of gourmet food, finally settling on a particular page.

Along with the Soul-Suppressing Noodles, a recipe from the King of Noodles, Logan, is unlocked – Four Gods Seafood Eight Treasure Buns.

This dish is also a unique skill of the Bai Luo family. It uses Shu Han old dough to ferment the dough, and the four different colored buns correspond to the four mythical beasts of the four directions: Azure Dragon, White Tiger, Vermilion Bird, and Black Tortoise, as well as the four flavors of sour, sweet, bitter, and spicy.

The dough itself is made from fermented Shu Han old dough, and the filling is a combination of eight kinds of top seafood - shark fin, abalone, sea cucumber, scallop, crab, shrimp, squid and halibut.

Finally, the dish is slowly steamed in a clay pot and then served on a small bamboo boat.

The only problem is that it's too complex.

Whether it's preparing seafood or making noodles, it takes a long time. Even if all the ingredients are prepared and all the procedures are streamlined, it still takes almost an hour.

Not to mention that nowadays both ingredients and preparation need to be done on-site.

Chen Yuxing turned to look at Hojo Miyoko, thought for a moment, and decided to make the Four Gods Seafood Eight Treasure Buns, but the process could be simplified a little.

"What's wrong?" Hojo Miyoko saw Chen Yuxing staring at her without saying a word or moving, so she waved her hand in front of Chen Yuxing.

"Nothing, I just want to know what we need to do," Chen Yuxing replied.

"Let's go, let's go to the ingredients section and get the ingredients we need." Chen Yuxing took the lead and walked towards the ingredients section. "I plan to make steamed buns."

"Steamed buns?" Miyoko Hojo was clearly taken aback.

This choice is too ordinary; it's not a strategy Chen Yuxing would use at all.

"Yes, but there will definitely be more of the regular kind of steamed buns."

Chen Yuxing waved to Hojo Miyoko in front of the ingredients area: "Making the kind of buns I want to make will be a bit time-consuming, so we need to prioritize all the steps."

"What do you need me to do? Just tell me." Hojo Miyoko didn't waste any more words.

"We need eight kinds of seafood: shark fin, abalone, sea cucumber, scallops, crab, shrimp, squid, and halibut. All of these are essential. They should all be available in the ingredients section. Pick some fresh ones and take a few more."

"Are you going to use all eight kinds of seafood in the buns?" Miyoko Hojo looked at Chen Yuxing with some surprise. "The ingredients aren't the problem, but preparing the seafood will take a lot of time."

“Yes, so we need to speed things up. We need to process the seafood together, and then after processing the seafood, we can prepare the necessary ingredients for the dough.” Chen Yuxing nodded.

“Okay.” Hojo Miyoko didn’t ask any more questions and chose to trust Chen Yuxing.

She quickly ran over to the seafood section to get the ingredients she needed.

Chen Yuxing walked in another direction. He needed to take out a small piece of old dough that he had always kept in his bag. After all, it was not quite right to make it with ordinary dough; he still needed to use Shu Han old dough.

While Chen Yuxing and his team were preparing, the other three groups of contestants were also busy with their own tasks.

Chef Zhou from Guangzhou Restaurant was clearly well-prepared. He took a large piece of fresh pork liver and picked out a few pieces of pork tenderloin. His apprentice was already carrying several large bowls filled with soaked rice, indicating that he was going to make congee.

Chef Zhou has worked at Guangzhou Restaurant for decades, so classic congee dishes like "raw-cooked congee" are easy for him. His pork liver congee and "Jidi" congee are famous in Guangzhou's culinary circles. Choosing this dish as the final dish shows that he is bringing out his best.

Zhang Dana's side was completely different. He used wheat starch, fresh shrimp, bamboo shoots, and a few pieces of pork with alternating layers of fat and lean meat. Anyone with a discerning eye could tell that he was making shrimp dumplings. As the top of the four kings of Cantonese dim sum, it looks simple but actually requires a lot of basic skills.

The preparation of shrimp dumplings is also very particular. The dough is made from wheat starch and cornstarch. Fresh shrimp need to be washed, shelled and minced into a paste. Fatty pork also needs to be cut into small pieces and blanched to make the meat refreshing and not greasy. The finished shrimp dumplings are thin and translucent, so you can see the filling inside.

The dark horse team from Shunde was a bit of a mystery to the audience. Instead of rushing to get the ingredients, they wandered around the condiment area several times before finally picking up several large pieces of fresh beef brisket, a big bag of flour, a few tomatoes, and a bunch of cilantro.

Then A-Qiang said something to his kitchen helper, who then turned around and brought back a clay pot. The clay pot with beef brisket should be a stewed dish. Compared to the other groups who were making regular breakfasts, they were doing something a bit unconventional.

Chen Yuxing also focused his attention on his workbench, preparing to process the ingredients.

Time is quite tight. Although there are three hours, it would be too late to finish if we waited until the three hours were up. By then, the diners might have already finished eating the other three dishes.

So now we have to make the most of every minute. The four-colored dough and seafood filling need to be prepared at the same time. Chen Yuxing first took out a small portion of the old dough from his bag, put it in a bowl, and covered it with a damp cloth.

Just then, Miyoko Hojo ran back carrying two full baskets of seafood. She put the baskets on the counter and started taking them out.

"Now that we have the ingredients, let's get started," Chen Yuxing said, glancing at the seafood.

After placing everything on the counter, Hojo Miyoko took out a small bag and handed it to Chen Yuxing. Inside were pale yellow dried scallops and sea cucumbers. Since these were dried goods, they were not placed with the other seafood.

"Alright, Hojo-kun..."

After taking over, Chen Yuxing began to assign tasks, "First, we need to arrange the processing order of the eight kinds of seafood. Dried scallops and sea cucumbers take the longest to soak, so we must soak them first. Dried scallops need to be soaked in warm water with a small spoonful of cooking wine to remove the fishy smell and enhance the flavor; sea cucumbers need to be soaked in cold water, with the cold water covering the entire sea cucumber and then changing the water every twenty minutes or so."

Listening to Chen Yuxing's words, Hojo Miyoko quickly got to work. She first added some warm water to a small pot and turned on a low heat, then added dried scallops and cooking wine. She put the sea cucumber in a large bowl and added cold water to soak it.

"In the meantime, we'll process the live seafood and dough ingredients first," Chen Yuxing continued. "The crabs and shrimp need to be killed and peeled on the spot, so I'll handle that. The sourdough starter is already warming up. We'll prepare the dough after we've finished processing these."

"Hojo-kun, could you please help me prepare the ingredients for the four-color dough?"

"We need spinach juice to adjust the blue color to correspond to the Azure Dragon, black sesame powder to adjust the black color to correspond to the Black Tortoise, carrot juice to correspond to the red color to correspond to the Vermilion Bird, and the last one is the original color to correspond to the White Tiger. The four colors are distinct and correspond to the four mythical beasts."

Miyoko Hojo nodded and began to prepare.

Chen Yuxing picked up a cleaver and began processing the live crabs. The crabs were still very lively, their claws constantly waving.

He picked up the crab, pressed down on its navel, and pried open the shell. He then used a cleaver to quickly separate the crab meat from the crab roe. He placed the crab roe in a small bowl for later use, and chopped the crab meat into small pieces.

The same applies to shrimp. Use the back of a knife to cut open the shrimp's back and pull out the shrimp vein. Then, repeatedly pound the shrimp meat with the knife until it becomes sticky.

Squid, or cuttlefish, also requires careful handling. It's more complicated than shrimp or crab. You need to soak it in salt water to remove the mucus, then split it open layer by layer, remove the useless cartilage in the middle, and cut it into small pieces.

"The dried scallops are ready."

Just as Chen Yuxing finished processing the squid, Hojo Miyoko brought over the soaked dried scallops. The scallop meat, which had been somewhat shriveled, had become plump again after absorbing the water. Chen Yuxing took them and tore them into shreds by hand for later use.

"The sea cucumber will probably need some more time. I'll take care of the flounder."

Miyoko Hojo picked up a kitchen knife and began to prepare the halibut.

Halibut flesh is very tender, but it is also very easy to break apart, so you have to be very careful when deboning halibut.

Miyoko Hojo used a boning knife to slowly peel the fish meat off the bones, and soon the fish meat was completely removed and placed on a plate.

Chen Yuxing was preparing the abalone. First, he took a small knife and peeled the meat out along the shell, removed the internal organs, and then cut the meat into small pieces. He then pounded it a couple of times with the back of the knife and marinated it in cooking wine for a while to remove the fishy smell.

After all the seafood has been prepared, it's time to season it.

The eight types of seafood each have a completely different umami flavor. For example, crab and shrimp have a sweet and umami flavor, while scallops and abalone have a salty and umami flavor. Therefore, the seasoning needs to be carefully controlled in proportion, so as not to suppress the umami flavor of the ingredients, but to let them blend together to form a distinct flavor.

Chen Yuxing took oyster sauce, white pepper powder, ginger juice, and a little cooking wine and put them in a bowl to make a base sauce. Then he mixed all the seafood together and poured it in to stir.

Seasoning eight kinds of seafood is a skill. Each type of seafood has its own unique umami flavor—crab and shrimp are sweet and umami, scallops and abalone are salty and umami, sea cucumber is gelatinous and umami, and flounder and squid are delicate and umami. The proportions of seasonings must be precisely controlled so as not to overpower the original flavor of any ingredient, while allowing the eight umami flavors to create distinct layers and progressions in the mouth.

Chen Yuxing prepared a base sauce with oyster sauce, white pepper powder, ginger juice and a little cooking wine, poured it into the filling and started stirring. After stirring, he set it aside.

The juice for the four-color dough prepared by Hojo Miyoko is also ready.

After blanching the spinach, it was cooled with ice water to maintain its green color. Then, it was put into a food processor and blended, and then filtered through a sieve to extract pure spinach juice.

Black sesame seeds are roasted over low heat until fragrant, then ground after cooling.

The same applies to carrots; simply juice them and then filter them to get orange-red carrot juice.

Once the sourdough has warmed up to the point where it springs back when pressed with a finger, you can start dividing the dough.

He divided the starter into four equal portions, adding different proportions of flour and corresponding ingredients to each portion.

The first batch of spinach juice was added, and the dough gradually turned bright green as it was continuously rotated.

The second batch, with the addition of black sesame powder, gradually turned the originally white dough black and eventually became slightly oily.

The third batch of carrot juice was added. The carrot juice, which was originally orange, gradually turned vermilion after being added to the dough and repeatedly pressed.

The fourth part retains its original color, so you only need to add water and a little milk to whiten it.

Kneading the dough took nearly twenty minutes.

Four different colored dough balls are placed side by side on the cutting board.

Emerald green, jet black, vermilion, and snow white—the colors contrast sharply.

"It looks so good." Hojo Miyoko couldn't help but praise the four-colored dough.

"It's not over yet," Chen Yuxing sighed.

After preparing the dough, Chen Yuxing divided the large bowl of seafood into four portions and placed them in four large bowls, each corresponding to a different color of dough.

Seafood also needs to be seasoned again.

The bright green spinach dough corresponds to the Azure Dragon, which belongs to the Eastern Wood element and represents 'sourness'. Add a little aged vinegar and lemon juice to the seafood bowl in front of the Azure Dragon dough and stir.

The jet-black sesame dough corresponds to Xuanwu, which belongs to the north and represents 'bitterness'. Add some prepared dried tangerine peel and bitter melon juice to the seafood bowl in front of the Xuanwu dough and stir.

The vermilion carrot dough corresponds to the Vermilion Bird, which belongs to the fire element of the south and represents 'spicy'. Add some chili peppers and red bean paste to the seafood bowl of Vermilion Bird dough and stir.

The pure white dough corresponds to the White Tiger, which belongs to the Western metal element and represents 'sweetness'. Add some rock sugar and dried scallops to the seafood bowl containing the White Tiger dough and stir.

Next came the dough. Chen Yuxing first rolled out the four colored doughs into long strips, then cut them into small pieces of the same size, and then rolled each piece into a dough sheet.

The four colors of dough were all placed on the cutting board, arranged neatly in four rows and four columns.

Main text

Chapter 50 Four Gods Seafood Eight Treasure Buns (Part 2)

The four colors of dough were rolled into roughly the same size wrappers, with green spinach, black sesame seeds, red carrots, and white plain wrappers all neatly arranged on the cutting board.

"Hojo-kun, could you please bring me those four portions of prepared filling, and also prepare a clay pot?" Chen Yuxing instructed Hojo Miyoko while kneading the dough.

Hojo Miyoko quickly moved all four large bowls to his side, then preheated the casserole and lined the bottom of it with a layer of bamboo leaves.

This prevents the buns from sticking to the bottom and adds a touch of aroma.

Chen Yuxing was quick as well. With his right hand, he used a bamboo stick to pick up a ball of seafood filling and put it into the dough of the corresponding color. He quickly pinched out small pleats and twisted them. Soon, four kinds of buns were formed under Chen Yuxing's hands.

"Steaming process."

Chen Yuxing added water to the casserole, arranged the buns in order, covered the pot, turned on high heat, and then turned on medium heat to steam them slowly after the water boiled.

As time passed, the buns in the casserole began to expand little by little, the dough became smooth and plump, and the four colors became brighter and brighter during the steaming process.

During this time, Chen Yuxing asked Hojo Miyoko to keep an eye on the cooking time of the steamed buns, while he went to make the final preparations.