From selling box lunches to becoming a famous Chinese chef

When I stepped into Chen Changsheng's home, although the house was not very good, it was obviously very clean inside and outside.

In front of the door, there was a yellow-haired dog lying down.

Hearing Chen Changsheng's voice, someone quickly came out from the room to greet him.

It was a woman who looked a little old, and there were several children following behind her.

Chen Changsheng still greeted Feng Zhengming and the other three people warmly.

"Come on, come in and sit down. You must have walked a long way and had a drink of water."

When the woman heard what Chen Changsheng said, she also greeted Feng Zhengming and the others warmly.

The four people entered the courtyard and sat down there.

The woman quickly poured water for Feng Zhengming and the others.

Feng Zhengming and the others felt a little embarrassed and stood up and took the tea from the woman.

The two children in the family were somewhat afraid of Feng Zhengming and his friends and did not dare to approach them, but they were still full of curiosity about them.

It is not difficult to see that although the houses in the village are relatively old, the lives of the villagers should not be bad.

You can still see it from everyone's mental outlook.

Chen Changsheng talked to Feng Zhengming and others, and told them that it was still a long way from their village to Qiucheng.

The woman was a little surprised when she heard this: "You guys are leaving?"

Feng Zhengming explained with a smile: "Yes, we are out for hiking, we have to walk."

Apparently the woman didn't quite understand what Feng Zhengming meant by hiking.

But the older girls around the woman seemed to understand.

"Granny, they are the kind of backpackers who travel on foot."

After hearing what the girl said, Feng Zhengming and the other three smiled at each other.

Ding Yuan looked at the girl: "You know a lot, you even know about backpackers."

This made the girl feel a little embarrassed, and she quickly hid behind her grandmother again, but she still looked at Feng Zhengming and the others curiously.

Chen Changsheng explained: "She studied in the city with her parents, so she knows a little more."

Feng Zhengming asked, "Which school do you study in?"

When the girl answered the name of the school, Feng Zhengming and the others were a little surprised that the girl actually went to school in the urban area of ​​Quancheng.

But on second thought, this village is indeed not far from the urban area of ​​Quancheng.

The girl's parents should be working in Quancheng.

I found out after chatting for a while.

It turned out that Chen Changsheng's son specialized in delivering green onions to the Quancheng Vegetable Market.

And it is one of the suppliers of Huiquanlou.

This is indeed a bit of a coincidence.

However, Feng Zhengming did not reveal his identity.

I sat at Chen Changsheng's house for a while and filled my water bottle.

Feng Zhengming and the other three said goodbye and left the village.

Then the four of them ran cross-country all the way, and it took another two or three hours before they finally entered Qiu City.

Entering the city, the nature is completely different from that outside in the wilderness.

The city was still brightly lit and some shops were still open.

Feng Zhengming and his friends found a hotel to stay in.

Then we found a small restaurant next to the hotel and had something to eat.

We went into the restaurant and ordered four dishes, as well as some steamed buns and noodles.

Originally, Feng Zhengming and his friends just wanted to eat something casually and didn't have any expectations about the taste.

When the food was actually served, the four of them ate it and found that it tasted quite good.

Feng Zhengming took a close look at the osmanthus meat on the table and said to the other three people with a smile.

"I can't believe that the osmanthus meat in this small restaurant is so good. You see, this osmanthus meat is made with pork belly, and the fat is fried out before adding the sauce."

Ding Yuan immediately asked: "Chef Feng, is there anything particular about this Feijiang?"

Feng Zhengming and Xiao He explained: "The key to stir-frying the sauce is that the oil must be hot and the sauce must be stir-fried thoroughly, that is, the sauce and oil must be mixed together."

Then Feng Zhengming took a bite and was very sure about the taste of this dish of osmanthus meat.

"It tastes really good, with a strong aroma from the wok. It's obvious that the chef is skilled."

After hearing Feng Zhengming’s affirmative opinion, the other three also picked up their chopsticks and wanted to try it.

In their eyes, it must be very difficult to get Feng Zhengming.

Ding Yuan, Gao Yongfu and Hou Dong each picked up some with chopsticks to taste.

After eating, the three people found that this dish of osmanthus meat was indeed quite good.

The key is just as Feng Zhengming said, the whole dish is full of wok flavor.

It is definitely the kind that is stir-fried over high heat throughout the process.

If this kind of dish is not fried over high heat, the taste will be much worse.

After tasting the osmanthus meat, the next dish was braised tofu with scallions.

This dish is quite delicious in Qiucheng.

The green onions from Qiucheng, paired with braised tofu, are full of green onion fragrance when served.

However, Feng Zhengming was not satisfied with this dish.

"This dish is not very good. After the tofu is cut into slices, the taste is not very good when it is cooked. I think the tofu should be cut into small pieces, like the Sichuan dish Mapo Tofu, so that it will cook better."

Hou Dong immediately took the opportunity to ask, "Brother Feng, how would you cook this dish?"

Feng Zhengming looked at the other three people and found that they all had expectant looks on their faces. They obviously wanted to know how he would cook this dish.

He simply explained to the three people how he would cook this dish.

"The key to this dish is to use good scallions. The scallions you use must be good. It's right to use the scallions from Qiucheng. Cut the tofu into small square pieces, like the ones in Mapo tofu. Fry them before you cook them."

Gao Yongfu laughed and interjected: "Every time it burns, it explodes."

Feng Zhengming nodded: "Yes, because it needs to be fried first, the tofu cut into pieces will be fried hard on the surface, but the inside will still retain its tender and smooth taste."

Then Feng Zhengming continued to talk about how he would burn it.

“After frying the tofu, leave some oil in the pan, add a star anise first, fry the aroma of the star anise into the oil over low heat, then add half of the scallions, stir-fry until the scallions change color, then add the sauce to the pan, stir-fry the sauce until it is cooked through, then add the tofu, stir-fry it first, and then add the clear soup prepared in advance.

Then after seasoning, start to slowly cook the tofu. The so-called thousand-boil tofu requires slow cooking over low heat to allow the tofu to absorb the flavor.

When the soup has thickened, add the remaining half of the green onions into the pot and stir-fry over high heat to reduce the soup.

Finally, add scallion, pepper and sesame oil, then serve. "

After listening to Feng Zhengming's narration, Ding Yuan, Gao Yongfu and Hou Dong couldn't help drooling.

Just by listening to Feng Zhengming's description, the three of them seemed to be able to smell the aroma of scallion-fried tofu.

At this moment, the shop owner suddenly came out. "Hello, I just heard you talk about how to make scallion-fried tofu. It sounds very professional. Are you a chef?"

Feng Zhengming introduced himself with a smile: "We just graduated from vocational school and know a little bit of cooking skills. I just said it casually just now. Please don't mind, boss lady."

After hearing what Feng Zhengming said, the other three looked at each other, and naturally did not dare to say anything.

The proprietress looked at Feng Zhengming carefully and seemed to think that Feng Zhengming looked familiar?
But for a moment, the proprietress couldn't remember where she had seen him.

After looking at it for a while, the proprietress smiled and told Feng Zhengming and the others not to be so polite.

"It's okay. I just heard you talk about how to make the scallion-fried tofu. It sounds really delicious. I'm really curious about what it will taste like when it's cooked."

Feng Zhengming then politely told the proprietress that he was just speaking casually.

"Madam boss, I was just saying that. The dishes in your restaurant are very good. You don't have to cook them the way I said."

Without waiting for the proprietress to say anything else, Feng Zhengming quickly changed the subject.

"Madam boss, Qiucheng's green onions are so famous, can you export them?"

When talking about Qiucheng scallions, the proprietress immediately laughed, and a look of pride naturally appeared on her face.

"That's right. Our Qiucheng green onions are very famous. We do export them. They are usually exported to Fusang in the east and the Southern Dynasty on the peninsula."

Feng Zhengming nodded: "That really brings honor to our Qilu and the whole country."

The proprietress laughed even more happily: "Hahaha, it's mainly because our green onions are good."

While chatting with the boss's wife about the export of green onions, Feng Zhengming actually thought of something to increase his uncle's foreign trade business. He could allow his uncle to export Qiucheng green onions and other Qilu specialty agricultural products to more distant countries through Grandpa Situ's foreign company.

Thinking of this, Feng Zhengming changed his mind and felt that his thoughts might be a bit unnecessary.

Uncle San’s company has been engaged in foreign trade, so he should be more familiar with this aspect than I am.

I'm afraid that Uncle San's company has already contacted some Qilu's specialty agricultural products for export.

As expected of Qiucheng, of the four dishes served on the table, except for the osmanthus pork, three were braised with green onions.

In addition to scallion-fried tofu, the other two dishes are scallion-fried pig's pig tendon and scallion-fried fish.

Braised pig's pig tendon with scallions is a classic Shandong dish that is quite exquisite.

When Feng Zhengming was eating, he found that the chef's skills in this small restaurant were really good, and the scallion-fried pig's pig tendon tasted very good.

The last dish, braised fish with scallions, was the main dish on the table for Feng Zhengming and his four companions.

The fish has a strong onion flavor.

The fish was also handled very well, with almost no fishy smell.

This shows that the chef is really skilled and knows how to clean the fish.

At the end of the meal, Feng Zhengming mixed the noodles with the soup from the scallion fish and ate a large bowl of noodles in big mouthfuls.

Feng Zhengming enjoyed this meal quite well.

So he told the proprietress some tips on how to cook fried green onions.

"Boss, you have a lot of green onions here, and you like to cook with green onions. I heard from my teacher at school that for green onion-cooked dishes, the green onions must be fried first to let the oil have the green onion fragrance, and then use the green onion oil to cook the dish.

I have a suggestion for you. Before frying the onions, you can blanch them in water first. This will make the onions taste better.

Also, fry some scallion oil in advance. After the scallions are fried, you can soak them in the oil, steam them in a pan with the oil, and then use them to make dishes like scallion-fried fish. The taste will be better.”

The proprietress was also a little surprised when she heard this. She didn't expect that this young man would come to eat and actually teach them how to cook.

But the proprietress still nodded and agreed with a smile, thanking Feng Zhengming for teaching her the tips.

After finishing his meal and before leaving, Feng Zhengming paid the bill. The proprietress wanted to give him a discount, but Feng Zhengming refused and still paid the actual price.

"Madam boss, you don't have to be like this. It's not easy to do business. It's hard to run a small shop like yours. We are also chefs. We understand the hard work of chefs. You don't have to give us a discount."

After paying the money, Feng Zhengming and his three companions left the restaurant and returned to the hotel to rest.

After they left, the chef and boss came out from the kitchen.

"Just now I heard a few people chattering about my food."

When the proprietress saw her husband coming out, she quickly repeated to him some of the things she had just heard Feng Zhengming say.

At first the boss listened with disdain on his face, but the more he listened the more he felt something was wrong.

Later, I heard about the details of refining scallion oil in advance and how to better bring out the aroma of scallions.

In particular, the proprietress repeated the recipe of scallion-fried tofu that Feng Zhengming had told Ding Yuan, Gao Yongfu and Hou Dong.

The boss' eyes lit up when he heard this, and he felt that he had really overlooked a lot of details.

"Great! Those guys really know how to cook."

The proprietress was a little surprised when she heard this.

“Are they good at cooking?”

The boss nodded seriously: "Yes, the method they just mentioned should be very good."

Then the boss simply went into the kitchen and got busy there, making a new serving of scallion-braised tofu according to the recipe that Feng Zhengming had relayed to him by the boss's wife.

This time, the moment the dish was taken out of the pot and served on a plate, the entire kitchen was filled with the rich aroma of green onions.

The boss brought out the freshly made scallion-fried tofu.

The proprietress was also very surprised when she smelled the fragrance of onions.

“This smells really good.”

The boss brought it to the boss lady and said, "Try it."

The proprietress immediately went to get two pairs of chopsticks.

Then the boss and his wife ate the plate of scallion-fried tofu together.

When you take a bite of the tofu, the first thing you taste is the delicious soup with a very strong onion flavor.

When you bite open the fried shell, you'll find tender and juicy tofu inside.

And when you eat it this way, there is no bean smell of tofu at all.

After a long period of stewing, the tofu has absorbed enough soup and the taste is really good.

The owner and his wife of the shop finished a plate of scallion-fried tofu without realizing it, not even a single scallion was left.

The proprietress looked at the empty plate and rubbed her lips.

"Your cooking skills have really improved a lot. This scallion-fried tofu tastes really good."

The boss laughed and said, "Those guys taught me well. I think if I follow what they said and stew the tofu with some broth, it will definitely taste better."

Then the boss told the boss lady: "If they come to eat again tomorrow, remember to give them a discount, and remember to ask me to come out and meet them."

The lady boss immediately agreed: "I was going to give them a discount tonight, but they wouldn't let me. If they come again tomorrow, I will definitely ask you to come out and meet them."

Then the proprietress muttered, "I always feel that the young man who talked about cooking looks familiar. I feel like I've seen him somewhere before."

The owner and his wife of the shop didn't know that they wouldn't have the chance to see Feng Zhengming for a long time.

It was not until several years later that the couple saw Feng Zhengming again on TV.

Only then did the couple realize who they had missed that day.

However, at that time, this small shop also became a very famous restaurant in Qiucheng because of a dish of scallion-fried tofu. (End of this chapter)