The story of a cook

Chapter 341 Dumpling Contest
The October [-] National Day is coming soon, and the hotel should be busy again.

Qiuping called and asked me if I had time on October [-]rd. If I had time, I would go to her partner's house to meet her partner's parents on behalf of her parents and make the marriage final.I asked her if she had talked to her parents about this matter, and she said that she had finished talking, and her parents asked me to go.

October [-]st was the time when the countryside was busy harvesting autumn, and the second sister and second brother-in-law didn't have time to come to see Qiuping's partner's parents, so I did it for them.

Besides Qiuping, the head chef also approached me, saying that the provincial capital is going to hold the "National Golden Autumn Dumpling Cultural Competition" during the National Day, and Linjiangxuan Dumpling House is a must.Participation is participation, but a booth needs to be set up at the venue of the competition. I need to help find a master who can carve large-scale sculptures to carve a set of booths.

I told the head chef that there was no problem, and asked him when the competition would start. The head chef said that it will be held on the weekend of next week, which is the day before the Mid-Autumn Festival, and it will be held for three days in total.

I know how to carve, but the large-scale carver booth is still far behind. Fortunately, I have met many friends in the chef industry over the years, and one of them is a famous carver.The master's surname is Zhang, and his cooking skills are average, but there is nothing to say about carvings. Radish carvings, foam sculptures, ice sculptures, and dough sculptures are all fine.I called Master Zhang and told him about it, and Master Zhang said it was no problem, he would come over next Friday to help with the carving, and he could directly arrange the booth on Saturday.

Mr. Huo was going to ask me to lead the team to participate in the competition, but I didn't agree, and told him to ask the head chef to lead the team, and I will not participate in this matter.It's better not to participate in this matter. If you have time, it's better to cook well, and improve the cooking level is the real thing.

To participate in the dumpling competition, and it is still nationwide. These past few days, the noodle group has been busy, and they have all started to practice their skills.This time the competition is not like the previous competitions. The previous competitions were held in other provinces and cities. This time it was held in front of the house. It would be embarrassing if they didn't get a ranking, so the entire Linjiangxuan paid more attention to it from top to bottom.

In the past two days, Li Dashan, the person in charge of the noodle group, has been working overtime every day after get off work, directing the four people preparing for the competition to repeatedly practice making noodles, preparing ingredients, rolling skins, and wrapping.

There are several competition items in the dumpling contest.

The first is face to face.Within the specified time, each contestant uses one catty of the same flour to knead the dough, and whoever has the highest standard of dumpling noodles will win.

Making noodles with dumplings is a technical task, not just mixing noodles and water together.As the saying goes, the dough that the daughter-in-law who hits is kneaded, how much water is added to a catty of flour, and how much salt is added.In addition, skills are also needed in kneading the dough. When kneading the dough, the dough should be reserved first, because the kneading starts after the dough is reconciled, and a little dough needs to be added during the kneading process. If the mending noodles are not left out, it is easy to appear the phenomenon of sticky noodles when kneading the dough, and it is not good to knead.The kneaded dough is smooth and elastic, with just the right hardness, and it is very smooth to use.

Hemian pays attention to "three lights", that is, pot light, hand light and case light.That is to say, after the dough has been reconciled, the basin for kneading the dough should be smooth and clean; there should be no remaining flour, and there should be no sticky flour on the hands, so it should be clean;

A good pastry chef must be able to make noodles to this level, and can’t make noodles everywhere. There are noodles on the basin and noodles on the hands, which doesn’t look neat.

The second item is dumplings.Within the specified time, place the dumplings according to the specified number of grams, whoever places the most and the standard wins.

Generally, the weight of a dumpling is about thirteen grams. The size of the dumplings wrapped in such a big weight is just right, and the taste is also good.It is said that big dumplings are affordable, and big dumplings are affordable, but the taste is not good. If the dumpling skin exceeds [-] grams to more than [-] grams, it needs to be served with [-] to [-] grams of dumpling filling. When such dumplings are cooked It takes a long time for the dumpling stuffing to mature. After the dumpling stuffing is cooked, the dumpling skin is a bit overcooked, and it doesn't taste like flour.

I have seen the fastest dumpling worker who can make thirteen grams of dumplings in 1 minute and put down 120 dumplings, which is considered a master.

The third item is rolling dumpling wrappers.

Rolling dumpling skins is definitely a technical job. The rolling pin used by dumpling workers is the kind with two pointed ends, which requires both hands to roll the skins at the same time. The average housewife can’t do this job, so they can only use straight rolling pins to roll the skins.Rolling dumpling wrappers with both hands is a compulsory course for dumpling workers. The dumpling wrappers rolled out in this way are well-proportioned and have a belly in the middle. When filling the dumplings, the belly in the middle of the dumpling wrappers can be stretched to make the dumpling wrappers evenly thick and heated during cooking. Uniform, the maturity can reach the same.

Dumpling workers who don't know how to roll the skin with both hands will feel very awkward when they start to learn to roll the skin. They can't make it together with both hands. It is easy to wear the skin of the little finger, and it will bleed in severe cases, which is very painful.Experienced dumpling workers will wrap a Band-Aid on the little finger, so as not to rub the finger.

A skilled dumpling worker will roll out twelve dumpling wrappers at the same time, six in each hand.

Rolling the skin with both hands is the basic skill of dumpling workers.

The fourth item is making dumplings.

The comparison of making dumplings is to see who makes them faster and better.The quality and speed of making dumplings depends on two aspects, one is whether the basic skills of dumpling workers are solid; the other is dumpling filling.If it is stuffed with pork and sauerkraut, the general dumplings are made quickly and well. If it is stuffed with vegetarian three delicacies, it is not easy to wrap it, because the stuffing of vegetarian three delicacies is relatively loose, and if it is not well wrapped, there will be spots on the dumpling skin. The phenomenon of leek leaves, at the same time, it is not easy to stuff the dumpling skins. At this time, it can be seen that the basic skills of the dumpling workers have come. The dumplings with good basic skills will be made quickly and well. Just slower.

Comparing these four items together, you can see the level of a dumpling worker. You can knead the noodles, prepare the ingredients yourself, roll the skins and wrap them yourself. After this process, the level of craftsmanship can be seen immediately.

If the dumpling noodles are reconciled in advance, it is only necessary to prepare the dumplings, roll the skins, and make the dumplings. The most basic requirement for a dumpling worker is to reach one hundred dumplings in half an hour.I have seen the fastest and most standard production of 160 dumplings in half an hour, which was the champion of the competition at that time.

In addition to competing in the skills of pastry and dumpling workers, the competition also competes in the skills of filling and stuffing masters.Competing with the skills of the stuffing masters is the highlight of each competition, and at this time you can see which master's level is high or low.

The chef prepares the dumpling stuffing and wraps it himself. Whoever has the best craftsmanship and makes the dumpling filling delicious will get the highest score from the judges, and the one with the highest score is the champion.

In addition to these traditional dumpling competitions, there are also display of special dumplings, such as cabbage dumplings, ingot dumplings, goldfish dumplings, jade rabbit dumplings and so on.

There are all kinds of fancy dumplings, which are pleasing to the eye.

Dumplings are a traditional Chinese delicacy, loved by the common people.Especially in the north, there are dumpling restaurants on almost every street.The provincial capital held the Golden Autumn Dumpling Contest, and by the way, the Golden Autumn Dumpling Food Festival was held to present a gourmet meal to the people in the provincial capital during the Mid-Autumn Festival.

I don't have much interest in the competition, and I have more or less learned about the competition with Master.Master said that the current competition has been deformed and out of shape, and it is not as good as it was at the beginning.At the beginning, the competition was about real skills. At that time, whether it was a chef or a pastry chef, everyone had to show their real skills. Whoever had the highest level was the champion.Later, the competition gradually began to have a commercial flavor, and many awards were almost all determined by default. Whoever got the most money would be given a medal for ranking.

Master told me an incident that happened when he was a judge of a competition.

It was the early 90s, and the provincial capital held a cooking competition for young chefs. After several rounds of competition, ten chefs were left to enter the final.

During the finals, each chef is required to cook two dishes, one is the prescribed dish "cooked chicken with shredded chicken", and the other is the chef's choice, which is a free-flowing dish.

When making the prescribed dish "Chicken Shredded Cooked Chopped Vegetables", the master had a dispute with several judges.

"Chicken Shredded Cooked Chopped Vegetables" is a fire dish, which emphasizes that the heat is in place, dry and neat, the chicken shreds are white and tender and smooth, and the pinched vegetables are crisp, tender and refreshing.To be honest, this dish is very difficult to cook. Everyone knows that pinching vegetables (mung bean sprouts, removing the root and top, the middle section) is easy to produce water, and it is difficult to make it without juice and thicken.This has high requirements on the chef's fire control.In addition, the shredded chicken must be smooth and tender, and it needs to be white and crystal clear. This is also a test for the chef's knife skills and oil skills. If the knife is not good enough, the chicken shreds cannot be cut well, and the chicken shreds cannot be smoothed well if the oil temperature is not good.

Master said that when the ten chefs finished making this dish and brought it to the judges' table, and the judges began to taste and score, all the judges were shocked by one of the "cooked shredded chicken".

The "chicken shredded cooking pinch vegetables" looks like a plate of pure white jade silk like jade crystal clear from the outside.It can be seen how far the chef's knife skills are, not to mention superb. At the same time, it can be seen that the chef's handling of chicken shreds has reached a master level, and he can sizing and oiling the chicken shreds. It is as white and crystal clear as pinch vegetables, which is not something ordinary people can do. It depends on how well they understand chicken to be able to do this.

Master said that he was shocked at the time, even if he did it himself, he might not be able to do so.The taste is very good when you pick up the chopsticks to taste it. The shredded chicken is smooth and tender, the pickled vegetables are refreshing, moderately salty, and the taste is the best among the ten dishes of "cooked pickled vegetables with shredded chicken".

But it is such a high-quality "chicken shredded cooking" that when the judges scored at the end, the scores given by the judges were not high except for the master who gave a full score. "All got high marks.

The master's violent temper came up on the spot, and he walked directly off the judges' platform, and brought the plate of "cooked shredded chicken and pinched vegetables" to the other judges.

"Are you blind and didn't see it, or your tongue was numb and didn't taste it? You gave such a good dish so little points, and I ask you if you are ignorant of your conscience?" Master shouted at several judges.

Several judges did not speak, nor did they look at Master.

Master raised his voice: "This 'cooked shredded chicken' dish, no matter how it is handled with the knife or the shredded chicken, it can be seen that the chef has made it with heart, and the basic skills are very solid. In addition, the frying is also very good, and the chicken is silky smooth. Tender, fresh vegetables, the whole dish is beautiful in shape, white and crystal clear, I can say that I can't make it, no one is at this level, you only give such high-quality dishes, I don't know how much money you have spent. ! Embarrass the cook!"

"I won't be the judge anymore, whoever should be the judge, I, Huang, can't afford to lose this person!"

The master left angrily after speaking, leaving the other judges sitting there staring at each other in embarrassment.

Later, the news that Master angrily reprimanded the judges in the competition had been spread in the chef circle for a while, and the organizing committee of any competition would not ask Master to be a judge any more, fearing that he would not be able to close the scene by making trouble on the spot.

If you don't ask Master to be a judge, Master is also happy to be free, so you can enjoy fishing when you have nothing to do.

Ever since Master told me about this incident, I have lost interest in some culinary competitions. Ranking medals that are not based on real skills are meaningless, so it is better not to participate.

(End of this chapter)