Food Wars!: Delicious Food of the Heavens

Mito Ikumi picked up a beef ball, weighed it in her hand, and then swung her arm and slammed the beef ball hard onto the kitchen counter.

The beef balls that landed on the table lived up to their amazing elasticity; not only did they not break, they bounced back high and landed back in Mito Ikumi's hands.

"How did you do that?"

At this moment, Mito Ikumi's expression was indescribably complex.

"What?"

Lin Yu didn't quite understand what the other person was saying, and his tone was filled with doubt.

"If it's about the method, I already explained it..."

That's not what I meant!

Mito Ikumi suddenly spoke up, her voice urgent, interrupting Lin Yu.

Mito Ikumi shifted her gaze from the beef balls in her hand, raised her head, looked at Lin Yu with a complex expression, and slowly spoke.

"What I mean is... after getting A5 Wagyu beef, why did you choose to make this kind of dish?"

"When faced with such a top-quality ingredient with an absolutely superior taste, the most correct approach is to honestly use the simplest cooking methods to bring out the advantages of this beef."

"But why...why did you choose to mince the beef and make it into beef balls...How did you have the courage to do something that completely overturns the original texture of the beef?"

Aren't you afraid of failure?

"Or are you just that confident in yourself?"

Mito Ikumi's voice trembled uncontrollably as she spoke.

She looked into Lin Yu's eyes, anticipating his answer.

But she didn't know what kind of answer she was hoping for.

"How is that possible?"

Lin Yu laughed, his smile and voice both light and cheerful.

"I'm human, not a god, of course I'm afraid of failure!"

Mito Ikumi was somewhat bewildered, "Then why...?"

Lin Yu continued, "Actually, I had thought about this before. Now that we have such top-quality ingredients, why not make a dish that can fully bring out the flavor of this premium beef?"

"But then I thought, Mito, you would definitely do the same thing."

Mito Ikumi nodded subconsciously. After all, making the most of the characteristics of the ingredients is indeed the best way to cook such top-quality ingredients.

"Right, but if that's the case, then you and I are just repeating each other."

Lin Yu's face remained expressionless as he spoke in a matter-of-fact tone.

"A food battle where both contestants serve the exact same dish—that's just too boring!"

Boring!

Mito Ikumi was shocked.

"Just for that reason!"

Mito Ikumi blurted out instinctively, her tone filled with undisguised surprise. "Just for that reason? You've given up on a safe cooking method?"

"Otherwise what?"

Lin Yu shrugged, his tone completely indifferent, as if this food battle was not worth taking seriously at all.

"I've noticed that in most of the past food battles, Mito has used top-quality meat provided by her own company."

"While finding good ingredients is itself a skill of the chef..."

Suddenly, Lin Yu changed the subject.

"But I just feel that Mito has always been a bit too focused on the quality of ingredients, and the cooking methods she uses often follow the advantages of the ingredients themselves."

Mito Ikumi couldn't help but ask, "Is there something wrong with this?"

Lin Yu smiled and shook his head. "It's not that this is bad, but I feel that you, Mito... seem to have developed a path dependency."

"Path dependency?"

Hearing Lin Yu's words, Mito Ikumi's heart wavered.

"Yes, every chef naturally wants to use the best ingredients when cooking, which is perfectly understandable."

"But reality can't always go as planned. Have you ever thought about what would happen if one day you couldn't find quality ingredients, but you still had to cook?"

Lin Yu met Mito Ikumi's gaze, and the sense of oppression in her eyes grew even stronger.

"What should you do when you're faced with a situation where you can only use ingredients of average or even very poor quality for cooking?"

"I...I..."

Faced with Lin Yu's words, Mito Ikumi instinctively wanted to refute them.

She had no idea what to say. Her mind was a mess, and her thoughts were blank. She wanted to say something in response several times, but each time the words got stuck in her throat at the last moment.

As the heiress of the Mito Meat Products Company, her culinary experience from childhood to university, whether in daily practice or food battles, has always involved using a wide variety of ingredients, including beef, pork, and chicken...

In short, without exception, they are all the finest quality meats, and always have been.

She never even imagined that, backed by Japan's largest meat company, she would one day need to use ordinary-quality ingredients for cooking.

Mito Ikumi could certainly say with confidence, "I will never lack top-quality ingredients," since that's how she's always lived.

However, the reason why Mito Ikumi hesitated to speak several times was because her rationality told her otherwise.

Lin Yu was right!

Even if this situation has never occurred in her previous life, it doesn't mean that the probability of it happening is absolutely nonexistent!

Mito Ikumi's ability to gain admission to Totsuki Academy, become a follower of the "God Tongue," achieve a high academic ranking in her grade, and gain such a great reputation, naturally indicates that she is no fool.

With her intelligence, she could certainly see the problem that Lin Yu had pointed out so clearly.

Given her pride, she wouldn't contradict the other person even when she knew they were right, just to save face.

Mito Ikumi lowered her head, clenched her teeth, and her eyes were full of resentment.

Despite her extreme resentment, Mito Ikumi gritted her teeth and finally uttered a sentence.

"Lin Yu, you... are right..."

Looking at Mito Ikumi's expression, Lin Yu knew that she had internally acknowledged her own problems.

Lin Yu sighed, "Anyway, I'm not saying all this simply to criticize you."

"Just take it as a friendly reminder!"

"Go back and imagine a day when you no longer need to rely on the characteristics of the ingredients to bring out their full potential."

"On the contrary, when faced with a situation, you need to exert your own strength, take the initiative to manage the ingredients, and even take control of them, to bring out the less-than-ideal qualities of the ingredients in your own way."

"What should you do at this point?"

"Think about this problem carefully; it won't do you any harm in breaking through your current limitations."

After saying that, Lin Yu patted Mito Ikumi on the shoulder, then turned around, waved, and walked off the stage.

Only Mito Ikumi, still in shock and with a stunned expression, remained on the stage for a long time.