Volume 3: Dragon and Snake Movement Chapter 453: Rules are meant to be bent
Seeing that at Zhu Jing's table, the three top nobles all looked at him, but Chu Ying still looked nonchalant. However, after complaining, he suddenly changed the subject, "But this pumpkin soup is good, fragrant, with a hint of freshness. After it grows, leave me five kilograms of pumpkin every month! I've already said that I don't have money, and I don't want it if it's too expensive!"
Qi Jingshan also laughed and said, "I'm old, and this spicy taste is too harsh on my throat. I often cough in winter, and this taste is really a bit unbearable. But these potatoes are crispy, and if they are simply fried with vinegar, they should taste good. In addition, I am also curious about the method Zhang Shou just mentioned of boiling potatoes in salt water and then peeling and mashing them. Of course, this pumpkin soup is even better."
"If they grow well, just give me three to five kilograms of potatoes and pumpkins every month."
Hearing this, Ge Yong grinned unconsciously. He had tasted both dishes. The taste was secondary. Just from the taste, he had already vaguely realized the role of these things in replacing rice and flour. If it was really easy to grow, and could be grown on some wasteland, then he was sure that many farmers would be interested in trying it.
Compared with the predicament of having to dig up tree roots and grass to eat in years of famine, and compared with the misery of having to swallow Guanyin soil even though one knows that eating it will kill one, as long as these crops brought from overseas are easier to grow than wheat and rice, why not promote them?
So, Grand Tutor Ge smiled and said, "Zhang Shou, whatever you grow here in the capital, leave me... ten kilograms of each. There are many people in my family, and if we divide them up, there won't be much left!"
At this moment, Princess Yongping felt that today's imperial chef selection competition seemed to have turned into a food recommendation conference. The six important figures in front of her, who were either senior, had made great contributions, or were favored by the emperor, did not care much about the taste, but were more concerned about the ingredients from overseas. She had been cautious and had not moved her chopsticks just now, but finally couldn't help but stretched out her chopsticks.
Seeing that Zhu Ying noticed that she only picked up one potato shred, she raised the corner of her mouth and sneered. Princess Yongping, who had long been accustomed to it, was too lazy to pay attention to her. After tasting it carefully, she was prepared and did not feel that it was too spicy. Instead, the perfect spiciness brought out the freshness and fragrance. Not only did she not feel disgusted, but she even had the urge to take two more bites.
Fortunately, she has always had strong self-control. She put down her chopsticks and scooped a spoonful of pumpkin soup. After drinking it, her eyes lit up. She felt that the slightly sweet taste perfectly relieved the remaining spicy taste in her mouth.
As she savored the food, she looked up again and found that the two dishes were already empty. Zhu Ying even looked at her innocently and said, "There are so many chefs participating in the competition and so many dishes, so we only need to taste a little of each dish served. Otherwise, how can we have an appetite to eat the rest and how can we finish it?"
Hearing this, Zhang Shou smiled. That was what he said, and it sounded reasonable, but Zhu Ying took advantage of Princess Yongping's inattention and secretly moved to the side, and whispered to the eunuch to save it for Ah Liu later. Did he think he didn't hear it?
So, he could only cough and said, "I forgot. When serving dishes like this, the portions should not be too large. It's best for each person to have just one bite. Also, it's best to prepare tea for people to rinse their mouths, so that there won't be any aftertaste in their mouths that will affect their judgment of the subsequent dishes. Although this world can't be absolutely fair, we should at least be relatively fair."
His words immediately received the strong approval of Ge Yong, and when Chu Kuan saw Princess Yongping nod, he immediately summoned a small eunuch and ordered him to pass on the message. After a while, Lu Sanlang actually came upstairs.
The little fat boy smiled and bowed, then said seriously: "Teacher's idea is absolutely right, I noticed it too. Moreover, I feel that when tasting dishes, it is easier to suffer a disadvantage as you go to the end, but when it comes to judging and scoring, it is more disadvantageous as you go to the beginning, because there are not many dishes to compare with, so it is easy to lower the evaluation."
"So, I suggest that you all remember the general taste impression first, and then judge the overall taste after eating each dish. How do you think?"
Among those present, some had a deep impression of what kind of person Fatty Lu was in the past, like Weinan Earl Zhang Kang, while others, like Qi Jingshan and Chu Ying, had only heard of him but never seen him in person. However, everyone here had already seen what kind of person he was now, and they all thought that this kid was extremely cunning.
Therefore, no one was surprised that Lu Sanlang was so calm in presiding over today's event and making such a suggestion. Zhang Shou, who was nominally a teacher, laughed and said, "This method is very good. Otherwise, the ratings of the dishes served at the beginning will inevitably be biased. It is better to make comments while eating so that you can have a rough idea in your mind."
"After all, if you eat too much, the flavors will be mixed, and you may not be able to remember what the first few dishes tasted like. However, if you only summarize and judge at the end, it will be inconvenient. Think about it, Lu Sanlang. Everyone here may remember it perfectly, but after eating more than ten or twenty dishes, can ordinary people really remember clearly what the first dish tasted like?"
Seeing Lu Sanlang was slightly stunned, Zhang Shou said with a smile: "I think we can do this. After serving five or six dishes, let everyone make a judgment and select the two best ones. This way, we can make the most appropriate evaluation before we forget the taste completely. Of course, if you think my method is not good, you can start judging immediately."
Lu Sanlang was such a smart person that he realized immediately that Zhang Shou changed the mixed evaluation of thirty or forty chefs who were competing to make these thirty or forty dishes into a phased evaluation by five or six people. In the end, it would be easy to screen out a certain number of people to give extra points, which would be convenient.
He immediately nodded and said, "This idea is absolutely brilliant!" He was about to say that he would pass the message down, but then he remembered that Princess Yongping and the eunuch Chu Kuan, the seal holder of the Imperial Household Department, were here, and immediately asked with a smile, "Teacher, what do the princess and eunuch Chu think of this idea?"
Princess Yongping only hesitated for a moment, then nodded and said, "Dr. Zhang, this is a good idea. Even if I were to eat ten or twenty dishes and then be asked how I liked the first one, I probably wouldn't be able to remember it. So let's just judge five dishes at a time."
Seeing Lu Sanlang looking at him again, Chu Kuan smiled slightly and said lightly: "I am just following the princess' order to come out to watch the fun today. There is no room for me to interfere in this matter. Whatever the princess says, we will do it."
When Ah Liu finished telling the chefs and went upstairs, he happened to meet Lu Sanlang coming down from the third floor with a relaxed look on his face. The two looked at each other, and he saw Lu Sanlang smiling and giving him a thumbs up, saying, "For such a big event, the order is so well maintained. This was simply unimaginable in the past. Brother Liu, you are really awesome!"
"Thanks to those iron-clad soldiers in black with red scarves on their arms, they have maintained order so well. I saw from the window before that a petty thief was directly twisted out and beaten half to death. It was more effective than sending out the South City Army."
Ah Liu's reaction to Lu Sanlang's compliment was indifferent, with only an invisible arc rising at the corner of his mouth: "That's what they should do." I didn't expect that these people from the Iron Armor Gang were actually useful. It seems that they can be used better in the future.
When they passed each other, he whispered to Lu Sanlang, "Be careful that someone will question fairness."
Lu Sanlang laughed at Ah Liu's reminder and didn't take it seriously at all. No matter whether it was him, Zhang Shou, Princess Yongping upstairs, or even other nobles, no one was sure who would be chosen.
Because this is all about who cooks better dishes, not about who is more famous or who has a stronger background!
Therefore, after coming down from the third floor to the second floor, Lu Sanlang first announced the newly adjusted judging rules to everyone. Although everyone was agitated by this small change, how could they question the rules decided by the bigwigs upstairs?
What they didn't expect was that Lu Sanlang came to the railing and started shouting to the people below.
"Since there were a total of 35 chefs who signed up for the preliminary round, there were too many dishes, so since we were doing the extra rounds first, we would judge every five dishes. At that time, the scores given by the judges to each dish would be announced one by one, and then the best dishes would be selected from the five dishes. The two dishes with the highest taste scores would directly get five points, and the rest of the dishes would get two points. This is the extra round score."
At this point, Lu Sanlang paused, and then continued, "The main contest topic that Princess Yongping just announced is a total of 20 points, and the points will be based on taste. It will also be announced in groups of five. Of course, because there are too many chefs, dishes and snacks, not all of the invited guests upstairs can eat all of them. If they can't eat, they can designate other people to judge on their behalf."
"Finally, we will average all the scores to get each chef's main competition score, and add the extra competition score to get the final score of the chef on this preliminary day. The top ten will enter the semi-finals. As for other chefs or cooks who aspire to be imperial chefs, they can participate in the next preliminary day selection in five days. During this period, they can use nearby booths to show their cooking skills to the people of Beijing."
At the window on the third floor, Zhang Shou couldn't help but smile when he heard Lu Sanlang come up with more appropriate details. It can be said that the first imperial chef selection was a product of a sudden impulse. The so-called plan and details were all used to distort the rules. Even if someone had found out about it in advance, they would probably be dumbfounded now.
Because when he asked Zhu Ying to lobby the emperor, he made it clear that the first session would be a matter of feeling their way across the river, no matter how big the fuss was, as long as a royal chef with excellent cooking skills could be selected in the end.
It is worth mentioning that Zhu Ying came back to tell him that the emperor agreed without hesitation. The emperor also said with regret that if the first day of the competition had not been too shocking, he would have wanted to join in the fun...
With the two interludes of shredded potatoes and pumpkin soup, the sour duck with tomato sauce and the salty, spicy and fresh spicy fish did not attract much response. The extremely weird-tasting fried eel back with peanuts made Zhang Shou dumbfounded. Zhu Ying couldn't help but get angry that she had just put the meat dishes in front of Zhang Shou and completely forgot that meat dishes might not taste good.
When everyone's opinions on the first five dishes were announced one by one, the chefs below were immediately in an uproar, some were happy and some were sad. Even if someone wanted to make trouble, the dishes chosen by someone above were all announced clearly, and most of them had different choices. Many chefs who were not good at math were counting their fingers desperately.
When Lu Sanlang's calculations came out, it was exactly the two vegetarian dishes that had the upper hand, and at least three of the five chefs beat their chests and stamped their feet. Among them, Chef Lu, who came from the Shandong Guild Hall and had a bad temper and shared the same surname and clan as the head of the Guild, was the most indignant.
"Is it because I only used seasonings and didn't use those other overseas ingredients that the fewest people picked my recipe?"
As soon as he finished speaking, a voice even more irritable than his came from the second floor: "You idiot, it's a good idea to cook something like peanuts, which has a crispy texture, with the eel back, but what kind of eel back did you cook! If you fried it once before, it wouldn't be so soft and tasteless! You have completely disgraced the Shandong Guild Hall!"
Mr. Lu yelled a few words angrily at the window, and when he saw Chef Lu running away in fear, he pounded the railing hard, but he didn't even look at anyone, and just sulked there.
He had high aspirations but was incompetent. He insisted on coming to participate in the primary election. If he had known, he would have stopped him! Miss Zhu upstairs complained that the food was bad. The voice was so loud that he could hear it. In a blink of an eye, the whole room was full of sneers. He was frowning after eating it himself and was about to swallow it down. Who knew that the idiot was still yelling! I can cook better than you!
With Chef Lu as an example, the next six rounds went smoothly, although there were occasional upsets because some of the chefs who received five points for the extra question were not very famous, and were not the kind that were popular when they demonstrated their cooking skills nearby a few days ago. But after all, there was still the dim sum theme waiting for them, so even the chefs who fell behind were full of confidence.
When the first dessert was delivered to the second floor, the waiter said with a smile: "This is the work of Chef Song from the Crescent Moon Restaurant in Beijing. It is called Ginseng Fruit Birthday Ceremony." To be honest, he, a Beijinger, had never heard of the so-called Crescent Moon Restaurant...
As expected, as soon as he said this, there was a commotion on the second floor, and everyone was wondering which restaurant the Crescent Moon Restaurant was. When the eunuch who served the dishes took the boxwood plate from the waiter, he saw a large steamer filled with cute little pink figures holding longevity peaches, which looked lifelike at first glance. He was surprised but also had some doubts in his heart.
He had heard of ginseng fruit. It seemed to be in Emperor Taizu's favorite Journey to the West. It was said that eating it could make one immortal and have all the facial features intact, just like a little man... But if the dessert was really made into this look... Miss Zhu might dare to eat it, but would the princess dare to eat it?
Sure enough, when he brought it to the crowd, a lot of people frowned, and the four monks who were brought by Zhang Shou to eat and drink showed their disapproval. Only Zhu Ying was slightly curious when she heard the word "ginseng fruit", but she was immediately unhappy when she saw the real thing: "If it is the real ginseng fruit in Journey to the West, it's fine, but what's the point of using a fake one to fool people?"
Princess Yongping said bluntly: "Go away and tell that ingenious chef that people are always sympathetic to their own kind, let alone people. How many people dare to eat the snacks he made?"
Zhang Shou didn't expect that even Zhu Ying's reaction was so intense. He stared at the steamer for a long time, and suddenly he laughed.
