From selling box lunches to becoming a famous Chinese chef

It was the afternoon of the rest day, and the chefs from all over the country had not yet taken a rest. Instead, they had already started making various preparations for tomorrow's banquet.

The most important thing for chefs everywhere is cooking soup.

As the saying goes: the singer's voice is like the cook's soup.

Whether a chef’s dishes are truly delicious or not, the key lies in the soup they prepare.

The way chefs cook soup in different places is basically the same.

Chicken, pork bones or beef bones are all required, and ham needs to be added to the soup, except for some ethnic minorities.

Some people also add some meat into the soup to increase the flavor.

The soup of Shandong cuisine is made by adding green onions, ginger, cooking wine and peppercorns.

The peppercorns used here cannot be from Sichuan and Chongqing, but must be from the Qi and Lu regions.

At the same time, when cooking the soup, Feng Zhengming chose the best Dahongpao peppercorns and soaked them in rice wine in advance.

Feng Zhengming will chop the peppercorns that have been soaked in rice wine in advance into onion-pepper paste together with green onions later.

Onion and pepper paste is very important in the process of sweeping the soup later.

Of course, after chopping it together with green onions into onion and pepper paste and then diluting it with rice wine, it can also be used as a seasoning when cooking.

Like these little tricks, chefs from all over the world have some secrets that are never easily revealed.

During this communication, no one hid anything from each other, but instead showed off their skills openly.

Feng Zhengming also saw Cantonese and Hong Kong chefs preparing abalone sauce.

They not only use old chickens and pig bones, but also add pig's trotters, chicken feet and other things.

They will separate a portion of the ingredients, fry them in oil to color them, and then stew them in the soup bucket together with the non-fried parts.

Of course, the key to abalone sauce is to add some abalone.

There are some differences between Hong Kong and Cantonese chefs here.

Their choice of abalone in stewed abalone sauce makes a difference.

Hong Kong chefs will choose some imported abalone.

Obviously, Hong Kong chefs feel that imported ingredients are of better quality.

Feng Zhengming also noticed that the Shanghainese chefs had different ways of frying scallion oil from the Shandong cuisine chefs.

Shandong cuisine usually uses Qi and Lu green onions to fry green onion oil.

The scallion oil in local cuisine is made by frying the green onions first, and then adding the shallots.

Moreover, in the process of frying scallion oil, the white and green parts of the scallions are fried separately.

When frying scallion oil in Shandong cuisine, a certain amount of lard will be added.

The fried onion oil in local cuisine is basically made from soybean oil.

In addition to scallion oil, Shandong cuisine also requires fried pepper oil.

Sichuan pepper oil is usually a must when making braised dishes.

When I saw Feng Zhengming and his Shandong cuisine chef, they prepared a pot of pepper oil in addition to scallion oil.

This surprised many chefs from other places.

In the past, most chefs from other places knew that Shandong cuisine chefs had to use scallion oil.

But I didn’t expect that they would prepare a separate bottle of pepper oil.

The oil used for frying peppercorns is made by mixing peanut oil with some sesame oil.

The frying process is really fragrant.

It makes it impossible for other chefs who are also preparing ingredients in the kitchen to ignore them.

But soon the more pungent and pungent spicy smell overwhelmed all other smells.

This pungent, spicy and choking smell appeared.

Needless to say, the chefs in the kitchen also knew that it should be the Sichuan chef who was preparing the red oil.

The participating chefs were busy discussing and preparing ingredients for tomorrow's banquet.

The chefs also came to the kitchen to observe.

Some judges also came to the kitchen to watch.

Among them, Master Liu, the champion of the first national competition, looked at the scene in the kitchen and couldn't help but sigh with everyone.

"I'm really a little envious of their current kitchen environment, which is much better than when we first participated in the competition. We didn't have such good conditions back then, nor did we have such rich preparations."

Another judge was also one of the top ten chefs in the first national competition.

He is also the youngest judge in this session. Master Lu from Hubei Province nodded in agreement.

"What conditions do they have this time? They can use a lot of foreign materials. How could we use such rich materials in the first session?

The materials available for the second session cannot be compared with those available for this session."

This has indeed been recognized by the judges and masters who participated in the first and second sessions.

Now, more than ten years have passed since the first national competition.

Over the past decade or so, along with the development of the domestic economy, there have indeed been many changes.

It is precisely because of the rapid development of the domestic economy that more people begin to pursue delicious food.

It can be said that being a chef is a popular profession all over the country nowadays.

Most chefs enjoy very good wages and benefits.

Especially in the developed cities along the southeastern coast, there is an urgent need for capable chefs.

Like this national competition held in Shanghai.

Many bosses came to the site to observe and some have even started contacting some chefs privately.

However, because it is still during the competition, most chefs are busy with their own things. Some bosses try to contact the participating chefs, but it is not easy to meet them directly.

While everyone is busy preparing ingredients in the kitchen, they will also get together to chat and exchange their understanding of cooking techniques.

Jiang Chengzhe and Long Kunbao came to Feng Zhengming to communicate again.

"I see that your Shandong cuisine soup seems to use quite a lot of ingredients, and you even use Sichuan peppercorns, and you use a high fire to boil the soup at the beginning. Wouldn't the soup be turbid? It's not good for cooking, right?"

After hearing what Jiang Chengzhe said, Feng Zhengming smiled and replied: "We have a process of cleaning the soup in Shandong cuisine."

Long Kunbao immediately said, "Sweeping the soup should be considered a technique for making clear soup in your Shandong cuisine."

Feng Zhengming nodded: "Yes, it was a unique technique in the past when there was no MSG, and many palace dishes also use this method."

Jiang Chengzhe thought for a moment and asked, "It seems that there are similar techniques in Sichuan cuisine."

Long Kunbao said with a smile: "Since it was used to replace MSG in the past, it must have been used in many places."

Then Long Kunbao asked Feng Zhengming: "When you sweep the soup, do you also use the white slop and the red slop separately?"

Feng Zhengming nodded: "Yes, we need to use white slop and red slop to sweep the soup once."

Jiang Chengzhe obviously doesn't know much about the mainland's Tang sweeping.

“What are white swill and red swill?”

Feng Zhengming smiled and explained: "Usually, white swill is chicken breast minced into paste, then diluted with water to make white swill, and red swill is pork or beef minced into paste."

Jiang Chengzhe was a little surprised: "Is there any that use beef?"

Feng Zhengming nodded: "Yes, some use beef. Of course, in order to save costs, you can use chicken legs to make red slop." After talking about sweeping the soup, Feng Zhengming also asked Jiang Chengzhe and Long Kunbao about how to make abalone sauce.

The two did not hide the secret from Feng Zhengming, but took him to see the abalone sauce being made on site.

Abalone sauce is something that all Hong Kong and Cantonese chefs must know how to make.

Overall, the preparation of abalone sauce is somewhat similar to that of stock.

A lot of old chicken, pork bones, pig trotters and chicken feet are needed to stew the flavor.

Just keep the abalone sauce thick.

Feng Zhengming took a closer look and couldn't help but say, "The way you make the abalone sauce is very similar to the scallion sauce we use for our scallion-fried sea cucumber."

After hearing what Feng Zhengming said, Jiang Chengzhe was very curious: "By the way, your scallion-fried sea cucumber is made by using scallions to simmer the sea cucumber?"

Feng Zhengming nodded: "Yes, it is actually cooking sea cucumbers with scallions, but the scallions need to be fried, and then the fried scallion oil and scallions need to be steamed."

Jiang Chengzhe thought for a moment and asked in surprise, "I've watched the video of your previous competition. It seems that when you make scallion-fried sea cucumbers, you also have to season the sea cucumbers in advance? It seems that your seasoning process is very similar to our abalone sauce?"

Feng Zhengming smiled and nodded, "That's why I said your abalone sauce is very similar to the scallion sauce of our scallion-fried sea cucumber."

Actually, through the interaction between chefs.

There are many similarities in the process of preparing materials in different places.

Perhaps the cooking methods in different places may be different, and the seasonings may also have different tastes in different places.

However, a lot of the preparatory work in the early stages and too many processes in different places are very similar.

This can also be seen as the fact that the roots of Chinese cuisine do have a unified source.

Because they needed to prepare ingredients, the chefs simply had dinner in the kitchen.

Chefs from all over the country use the leftovers from their preparation process to make some regular staff meals in the hotel kitchen.

At this moment, there is no creativity or competition among the chefs.

Everyone was very simple and took out some local home-cooked dishes and cooked them as home-cooked dishes to share with everyone.

For example, Feng Zhengming used a piece of Yuanbao meat, paired it with some black fungus, day lily, green pepper, and two eggs, and fried a very homely osmanthus meat in the kitchen.

Although this dish is quite homely, it is cooked with the strong fire in the kitchen and Feng Zhengming’s cooking skills.

The aroma of the fried osmanthus meat spread throughout the kitchen.

Similarly, chefs from the three northeastern provinces each made three versions of sweet and sour pork.

There are versions with sauce and versions with cooking sauce, and a newer version adds tomato sauce.

The Cantonese chef prepared a stir-fried crab with garlic.

The Sichuan chef used the meat from cooking soup to make twice-cooked pork.

The Hunan chef served a stir-fried beef.

The Huaiyang cuisine chef Zhang Quande not only cooked a simplified version of Yangzhou fried rice.

He also removed the bones of the old chicken after cooking soup, and fried the chicken with diced pork and bamboo shoots to make stuffing. Together with the chefs of Su cuisine, he made three-diced dumplings for everyone to eat.

The Zhejiang cuisine chef and the Fujian cuisine chef worked together to make a water shield fish ball soup by hand-making fish balls and pairing them with water shield.

The Fujian chef also made some braised meat with leftover pork.

The chefs in Gangcheng also used some leftover ingredients to stir-fry some side dishes.

Jiang Chengzhe even made a baked lobster with cheese.

In the kitchen, chefs from all over the country really showed off their talents and made sumptuous dishes using leftover ingredients.

We also prepare different staple foods such as steamed buns, rice noodles, noodles, fried rice, and pancakes according to the different eating habits of different places.

When chefs from all over the country have prepared the dishes and meals, everyone puts together what they have prepared.

It was a really sumptuous dinner.

It was even more sumptuous than what the hotel had prepared before.

During the sumptuous dinner, the chefs tasted dishes from different regions.

I also took the opportunity to recommend some dishes from my hometown to others.

Everyone communicated with each other during the tasting process.

Some inherent stereotypes are gradually eliminated.

For example, the impression that food in the south is sweet and food in the north is salty.

In fact, both the north and the south have different dishes, both sweet and savory.

On the contrary, some dishes from the Midwest are generally spicier.

Especially in Sichuan and Chongqing, spicy food is often paired with numbing sensation, which makes some chefs in the east feel a little uncomfortable with it.

It was also when Feng Zhengming ate the spicy shredded chicken made by a Sichuan chef that he experienced for the first time the huge difference between the Sichuan and Chongqing peppercorns and the Shandong peppercorns.

After eating just a little bit, Feng Zhengming felt his entire mouth and tongue were numb.

Jiang Chengzhe took a bite and couldn't help but exclaimed: "Oh my God, this is too spicy, and this is so numb, I feel like my tongue and lips are numb."

When Feng Zhengming heard Jiang Chengzhe's exclamation, he couldn't help but laugh and said, "You are really brave. I only ate a little bit, but you dared to eat a big mouthful."

Jiang Chengzhe said with a bit of a lisp: "Damn it, this is really not suitable for me."

Long Kunbao brought a bowl of water shield and fish ball soup over, handed it to Jiang Chengzhe and said, "Come on, have a sip of soup. This water shield is delicious with fish balls. It's very fresh."

Jiang Chengzhe took the bowl and took a sip of the soup first.

When drinking soup, it is natural to drink the water shield floating in the soup into your mouth.

When Jiang Chengzhe took a bite of the water shield, the unique crispness combined with the deliciousness of the fish soup made him feel particularly comfortable instantly.

"Wow, this is delicious. This is called water shield? This dish is quite delicious."

When the Zhejiang cuisine chef heard Jiang Chengzhe's exclamation, he smiled and came over and said, "Water shield is a specialty of our West Lake."

As soon as he finished speaking, the Suzhou cuisine chef immediately said: "We also have Taihu."

This made everyone laugh.

The Zhejiang cuisine chef said: "Yes, there is also water shield in Taihu Lake."

Feng Zhengming also went to get a bowl, scooped up the water shield, fish balls and soup with a spoon, put them in his mouth and tasted it. It was indeed delicious.

"It's really delicious. The water shield has a nice crunchy texture, and the fish balls are also very fresh."

The Fujian chef immediately said: "Speaking of hand-made fish balls, that is our specialty. We absolutely do not add any starch. We just use the fish meat to beat it and squeeze it out to make fish balls."

Here, people were talking about how to make fish balls, while over there, chefs of Shandong cuisine, Huaiyang cuisine, Cantonese cuisine, Shanxi cuisine, Henan cuisine, etc., were exchanging skills in making steamed buns and some pasta.

The three-diced buns made by Zhang Quande and the Huaiyang cuisine chefs today are indeed special.

During the exchange, Zhang Quande also mentioned several other Yangzhou dim sum specialties.

"The taste of Emerald Shaomai is definitely different from that of Shaomai in other places. We use blanched green vegetable leaves as the filling, so the taste is also a bit special."

The Cantonese chef said: "You can compare it with our custard buns."

Naturally, chefs in the north were not convinced and said that the north must be good at making noodles.

If the old masters hadn't stopped them, the chefs might have really wanted to make a batch of noodles from different places to compare.

Such a joyful and frank exchange atmosphere really made chefs from all over the world feel comfortable and at ease. (End of this chapter)