In the 1970s, it started with contracting out communal dining.

"Brother Chen, do you mean the dried pickled vegetables my mom brought are exactly the ingredients for your new dish?"

On the way back, the two ran together, and Wu Xiaochun asked breathlessly.

Chen Wei explained it to him, and Wu Xiaochun finally understood.

He immediately slapped his thigh: "See? I told you so! This time when I went back, my mom insisted on bringing me some dried preserved vegetables. Look, they came in handy! What do you call that? That's fate! Brother Chen, see how useful I am!"

Chen Wei was amused by his boastful manner and laughed heartily, nodding quickly.

"Yes, yes, thank goodness for you this time! Otherwise, I wouldn't know how to cook this dish!"

Time is of the essence, so let's skip the small talk.

The two quickly returned to the cafeteria's kitchen.

Fortunately, Chen Wei had soaked the dried plum vegetables in water before leaving. Now that he came back, the leaves were golden yellow, thick, and had already unfurled.

Chen Wei took one out of the water, rubbed it with his fingers, and said it should be ready in a little while.

Taking advantage of this time, he burned off the hair on the pork skin over a fire, then scalded it again to remove the skin, washed it clean, and placed it on the cutting board, intending to analyze the recipe.

As soon as Chen Wei placed the pork and dried plum vegetables on the cutting board, he silently recited a command and opened the system panel.

"Activate recipe analysis skills!"

He silently recited the command in his mind, and the semi-transparent light screen in front of him immediately appeared.

As the circle above was deciphered, the progress bar reached 100%, and several lines of text appeared on the system panel.

[Ding— Recipe analysis successful, you have obtained the recipe for Twice-Cooked Pork with Preserved Mustard Greens]

Oops! This isn't the dish Chen Wei wanted.

But it's okay, there are still two more chances to analyze.

Chen Wei frowned, but instead of opening the recipe, he restarted the recipe parsing function.

As the light sphere on the system panel returned to 100%, the system notification sound appeared again.

[Ding— Recipe analysis successful, you have obtained the recipe for Stir-fried Pork with Dried Plum Vegetables]

Sure enough, even if you get the ingredients, you might not be able to decipher the recipe.

Chen Wei was not in a hurry and continued to activate the recipe analysis function.

This time, the system finally figured out the recipe for steamed pork with preserved mustard greens that he needed. As the system notification sounded, Chen Wei was overjoyed.

Quickly reach out and select the recipe provided by the system.

The recipe clearly states this.

[Dish Name: Steamed Pork with Dried Plum Vegetables]

[Grade: Cantonese Cuisine (Beginner)]

[Note: This dish uses common ingredients, employs solid techniques, has a neat presentation, and is savory with a sweet aftertaste. It lacks fancy seasonings, making it a good choice to impress the judges' palates.]

What follows is a series of recipes, seasonings, and cooking methods.

Chen Wei looked at the recipe twice, making sure he understood all the steps before closing the system panel.

Chen Wei began preparing the ingredients.

Steamed pork with preserved mustard greens is actually not a complicated dish to make, and it doesn't require very high knife skills.

It's considered a fairly basic home-style dish in Cantonese cuisine, but it's not easy to make it well.

Every step must be taken carefully and meticulously, leaving no room for carelessness.

Take this pork belly, for example. Since it's pork belly with skin, you must first singe off any remaining hairs on the skin and scrape off any dirt with a knife. Then, put the pork belly in a pot of cold water, add rice wine, and blanch until it's set and cooked through.

After taking them out of the water, you need to drain them and brush a thin layer of dark soy sauce on the pig skin while it's still hot, then let it dry and get colored.

This step is particularly crucial for this dish; whether the final product has a bright, even red color without turning black depends on this step.

Finally, there's the processing of the dried plum vegetables.

Preserved mustard greens need to be repeatedly dried during the pickling process, so they inevitably get some dirt and sand.

Therefore, it needs to be soaked in clean water for more than 40 minutes, repeatedly scrubbing and washing to remove all the mud and excessive saltiness before squeezing out the water and chopping it for later use.

Chen Wei casually scooped out the dried plum vegetables from the large basin, looked at them, tore off a small piece, carefully put it in his mouth, tasted it, and then nodded in satisfaction.

After rinsing the dried plum vegetables three times with clean water, they were finally clean.

Chen Wei gently squeezed the leaves with his hands to remove excess water, but without drying them out completely, leaving them slightly moist.

This way, the dried plum vegetables can absorb the meat juices during the steaming process.

After properly preparing the dried plum vegetables, quickly start a pot of water to boil. Put the pork belly into the cold water, along with scallion segments, ginger slices, and cooking wine.

This step is to remove the fishy smell, and the cooking time should not be too long, otherwise the meat slices will become dry.

The pork belly chunks fell into the boiling water, and under the heat of the pot, they gently rose and fell with the boiling water. Chen Wei kept a close eye on the situation in the pot and gently stirred it with a large ladle.

After cooking for about 20 minutes, the pork belly was finally cooked through.

He took the pork belly out and set it aside to drain, then turned to the stove to get some dark soy sauce.

While it was still hot, I applied dark soy sauce to the semi-dry pork skin. The moment the dark soy sauce was applied, the pork skin immediately took on a rosy and translucent color.

"good!"

Chen Wei nodded, and the next step was to slice the slices.

The pork belly should be cut into thin, even slices so that the juices and saltiness of the preserved mustard greens can blend perfectly together during cooking.

Don't underestimate this slicing process. Although it's just about cutting a large piece into smaller pieces, there's a lot more to it than meets the eye.

If the meat is sliced ​​too thinly, it will fall apart after steaming. If it is sliced ​​too thickly, the saltiness will not penetrate, making the meat dry and unpalatable, thus ruining the whole dish.

However, this step was not difficult at all for Chen Wei, who knew the recipe by heart. The pork belly was evenly sliced ​​into thin slices of about half a centimeter under his knife.

Viewed from the side, each piece of meat is a perfect pinkish-white, with translucent fat and distinct lean meat texture. Combined with the almost translucent skin from cooking, it looks like a piece of fine Hetian jade.

"Plop—"

Wu Xiaochun, who had been standing by and secretly learning from the master, watched intently, but at that moment he couldn't help but swallow hard.

This kid's head is full of thoughts about food!

If Lin Jun were here, all his attention would probably be on his own recipes!

Chen Wei raised an eyebrow in thought, then smiled with relief, figuring that Lin Jun would learn this dish sooner or later anyway.

His attention returned to the preparation of the dishes. He bent down and took out a rough porcelain bowl from the cabinet, first placing the preserved mustard greens soaked in sauce at the bottom of the bowl.

Then, the sliced ​​pork belly pieces were neatly arranged skin-side down on the preserved mustard greens, and then soy sauce, oyster sauce, sugar, cooking wine and other seasonings were poured into the bowl in turn.

Each grain is so precise it seems to have been measured with a balance scale, and every seasoning is added just right.

"Put it in the pot! Steam over high heat!"

With a flick of his wrist, Chen Wei said with delight.