The Rise and Fall of the Last Imperial Cook

9. First Test of the Dishes

Translator: Luo Yixin

Proofread by Peter Gong

Located on the west bank of the canal, Clay Street of Huishan Mountain is a remote place, far from downtown of Wuxi. Irregularly curved along the foot of the mountain, the street is lined with two kinds of shops — clay figurines shops or restaurants. The clay figurine shops are tiny, running small businesses, while those luxurious and upscale restaurants are built huge and tall.

The daytime business of clay figurines is brisk. It is said that Wuxi Clay Figurine Big Ah Fu is so spiritual that once the buyer take it home, the whole family, especially children, will be blessed and protected. Therefore, whether it is people in Wuxi City or surrounding cities and towns, or strangers who come a long way to Wuxi, they will bring many Big Ah Fus back as decorations, toys or gifts for relatives or friends.

Instead, the business of restaurants here is slack during the day, since there are few who will eat in such a luxurious restaurant, whether they are coming to buy clay figurines or to enjoy the scenery of Huishan Mountain. But at night, the business in these restaurants will become booming. Take a boat to ride on the canal, and take a stroll to appreciate Huishan Mountain. Besides, these restaurants make tea and dishes with the water from the Second Spring in the world. In this way, it will appear to be exceptionally classy with the combination of tour and nature, and this is why the rich in the city prefer to feast their guests here. There is a doggerel at that time, “Cross the canal, see Huishan Mountain; water of the Second Spring, for good soup.” This exactly describes the scene here.

Those who have meals at the foot of Huishan Mountain are rich people being particular about food, so the restaurants here are luxurious and high-end. Apart from Wuxi specialties, there are many other authentic local cuisines. But after all, rich people only account for a small proportion, and they do not give a banquet to show off every day. Therefore, although the seemingly prosperous restaurants in Huishan Mountain are of top class and achieve greatand profits, there exists a fierce competition among them. If restaurants don’t have their own superior specialties, fail to launch attractive, new cuisines very often, or can’t cater to their customers in a certain aspect, they will soon be eliminated from Clay Street.

Huiquan Hall, previously named Wangshan Restaurant (Seeing the Mountain), is preparing to reopen. The restaurant could ill afford to operate due to fierce competition, and the salt merchant, Zhao Hudong, who often comes to Clay Street for dinner, takes it over and reopens after some renovations.

There are many people sitting in the hall when Xu Zhiwei arrives at Huiquan Hall. At the two Eight Immortals tables (old-fashioned square table for eight people) in the middle are the owner Zhao Hudong and his close friends; there are also chief managers, accountants and others. The rest sit far away from the two tables, including those applying to be chefs and some nearby pleasure-seekers.

These chef applicants appear to sit scattered in the hall, but they are actually waiting in line by number. Recommended by this or that Chef Clique, they take the recommendation letter in advance to get the number and go to the kitchen to make their testing dishes in order. Each applicant is required to cook two dishes, one cold and the one hot, for the people sitting at the two Eight Immortals tables to taste. They judge the dishes and decide whether the applicant is qualified to be their head chef.

The upmarket restaurants like Huiquan Hall have high demands in recruitment of chefs. First of all, they must have a good control of Two Things. What are the Two Things? Board and Hearth. A good control of the board is also called Board Cooking or Knife Chopping in chef’s jargon, which is categorized into major board, helping board and auxiliary board, or first knife, second knife and third knife. This is mainly for making cold dishes, placing plates, as well as decomposing ingredients and side dishes. Therefore, making cold dishes is actually a test of the control of the board. On the other hand, the control of the Hearth in chef’s jargon refers to Food Cooking, Stove Burning, or Pot Boiling, which is about making hot dishes. The chef beside the stove mouth should be unique. Once he stands in front of the hearth, this is his whole world. No one can help him, nor does he need a helper. Even if a master on the side perceives something wrong, he can’t interrupt the chef until the dish is finished.

Xu Zhiwei enters the restaurant with his apron baggage on his back, which seems remarkably big compared with others’. The apron baggage is a unique symbol of chefs in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River. In the previous days, the chef usually carried with him a chopping knife and a few spatulas, which were wrapped in an apron. Later on, the baggage develops into a special strong tarp with the fineness of food and the increasing varieties of kitchen utensils, and there are special tools for some specialties and private cuisines. For example, the apron would not fit the whole set of knives and spatulas of Xu Zhiwei. But no matter what kind of cloth it is and how it is wrapped, this baggage is called apron baggage. In other places, chefs may use pack baskets or carried baskets, and of course, they may also use cloth.

Seeing Xu Zhiwei carrying the chef’s unique apron baggage, the doorman thinks that Xu is an applicant who has already got his number, so he politely ushers him to sit down among the chefs waiting in line. Xu Zhiwei is so puzzled that he follows what the doorman tells him. He casually finds a corner and sits down.

Sitting in the corner, Xu Zhiwei is actually near the door from where the dishes are ready to serve, and he locks his eyes and nose on the door where dishes are passed. After the applicant comes out from behind the door with his dishes, Xu could identify what most of the ingredients are and how they are made into dishes as long as the smell of food wafts when the curtain is lifted. Even if there are a few ingredients that cannot be identified from their smell, Xu Zhiwei still could determine what they are before they are served on the Eight Immortals tables based on his observation of the shape and color of the ingredients.

There is no lack of gastronomical geniuses among the applicants who have made their testing dishes today. Besides, it is possible that some of the ingredients are prepared by these applicants themselves, since some of the dishes are so ingenious that they must be made with special ingredients. Even if the Imperial Kitchen, a place rich in superb ingredients from all over the world, has never had dishes made with such cooking methods.

For example, two of the cold dishes, “Grilled Meat Soaked in Plum Juice” and “Yam Marinated with Ginger “, are made in special methods that were unknown to Xu. There are also a few hot dishes that could reflect the chefs’ talent in terms of the selection of ingredients and the mastery of heat and seasoning. Take “Fried Whitebait with Three Kinds of Wild Eggs” as an example, it is fried with not only whitebait from Taihu Lake, but also wild duck’s eggs, pheasant’s eggs, and wild quail’s eggs. The delicious and tender features of whitebait are fully exploited, and the three kinds of wild eggs are mixed in a perfect proportion. Its taste is obvious when they are divided and endlessly fragrant when they are together, so to speak.

Although he knows that there are geniuses among the chefs, Xu Zhiwei becomes more assured and confident. It is a horse race for cooking skills, since everyone cooks his own specialties, but no one could tell which dish is more delicious. But if you know the details of other chefs’ dishes, you can adopt certain tricks to prevail over them in a tactical manner. Of course, only those who are superior among those talented chefs could make it for their cooking skills have reached an extraordinary level.

Xu Zhiwei is exactly such a superior genius, so he not only carefully identifies the ingredients of these dishes and judges their pros and cons, but also quickly conceives how to prevail over other chefs. However, the problem is that what he should do is not to surpass a certain dish, but to outstrip all the dishes that have been served before. This is not difficult but impossible instead.

On top of that, there is another problem that Xu Zhiwei doesn’t know yet. The chefs who make their testing dishes are arranged based on their number, but he has no number at all, so even if he comes up with ideas to beat others, he doesn’t have any opportunity to put into practice.

The people at the two tables in the middle have been tasting the food slowly and whispering to each other. They all wear a calm expression, especially Lord Zhao, who has been pulling a long face. It is obvious that none of the dishes have perfectly satisfied them so far, that is to say, the person who is eligible to be the head chef of Huiquan Hall hasn’t appeared yet. There are fewer and fewer chefs waiting to make the testing dishes. It seems that it is a fat chance for them to select a suitable one today.

Although Zhao Hudong is not a millionaire in Wuxi City, he could enjoy his whole life with his family salt business. But nowadays, the salt tax and the number of salt merchants have been on the increase, so the salt business is much worse than before. In this case, he turns to find a new way to accumulate wealth. This is why he takes over Wangshan Restaurant and reopens it as Huiquan Hall.

Although he has never done business in the catering industry, Zhao Hudong has tried many delicacies in his life and kept those tastes in mind, whether it is Wuxi cuisine or other famous dishes of all kinds of cuisines. Besides, spending a long time in restaurants, he understands the simple truth that a single special dish could serve for three years. No matter how well the authentic dishes of various cuisines are made, they are accessible in many other places. Therefore, a restaurant must have its unique characteristics, even if there is only one specialty, it can support the business of the restaurant. People come to the restaurant for this dish, but they will never order just one dish. And it will be years after people have grown tired of this dish. This is how a single special dish could serve for three years.

But Zhao Hudong does not come across such a dish today. Although the testing dishes are all famous cuisines and some of them are ingenious in technique and taste, they are not good enough to be able to support the whole restaurant.

Xu Zhiwei also sees that. Among the testing dishes made by those talented applicants, there are indeed some with their distinctive characteristics, but their tastes are nothing special. It is the same as the “Feast to the Emperor’s Taste”; the more critical it is, the less daring one is to play his best card lest it turns to be self-defeating.

But this kind of dish trial is different from the “Feast to the Emperor’s Taste “, in which the emperor tends to choose the dishes to his taste. Instead, the judges at the Eight Immortals tables will try all the dishes. In this way, it is a big disadvantage to the chefs at the back, since the variety of dishes has set an invisible trap for these chefs in terms of taste—it is difficult for the dishes served later to stand out with so many tastes emerging before—-these chefs have to avoid the trap with ingenious techniques.

Theoretically, the best solution for this situation is to rinse the tasters’ mouths so as to get rid of their impression on the previous flavors. But what Xu Zhiwei thinks about is another solution, which employs cooking techniques superior to rinsing.

Among the chefs who have already made their dishes, there are not only cooking masters, but also some well-known gastronomical geniuses in Wuxi City, who may eclipse other chefs no matter how well their dishes are made. As for those inferior applicants, they will lose hope after seeing these famous cooking masters, and some even slip away in advance shamefully. Besides, it avoids embarrassment if they later encounter again or work together without this competition.

Therefore, when it comes to the posterior numbers, there seems to be no response even if the servant calls for the applicant several times, since the chef with the number has already given up and left.

Seeing Xu Zhiwei sitting there motionlessly and the call of the number getting no response, the doorman comes to Xu Zhiwei to ask his number.

Xu Zhiwei shakes his head at the guy confusedly. He doesn’t know he needs a number and he doesn’t get any number. But the guy misunderstands that Xu Zhiwei has forgotten his number. Without any response to the number the guy is calling for, he pushes Xu Zhiwei in with this number to test his dish.

There are few chefs left to test dishes. Zhao Hudong’s long face looks even more rigid. It could be seen from his expression that he has not yet chosen the right chef he wants.

And the good ingredients in the kitchen have almost run out. There are not too many ingredients in the kitchen of a restaurant that has not officially opened, so experienced chefs will bring some ingredients and seasonings with them for their own dishes. The other chefs ranking ahead have used the best ingredients.

Xu Zhiwei looks around in the kitchen, not for the ingredients to use, but to see what ingredients left that could be fully used. The dish he is going to cook now has no recipe—it is completely an extemporaneous show. Only in this way can he take advantage of his superb cooking skills to dwarf all the dishes served before him.

It is not a fight of dishes in chef’s jargon. It is a borrowed taste that only real masters can understand. The so-called borrowed taste is to highlight the special features of one’s own dishes on the basis of the previous tastes left in the judges’ mouths and memories. It can be the accumulation of flavors or the stimulation of another unique flavor.

Although there are few good ingredients left in the kitchen, they are not all vegetables, and there is still meat left. But it seems that Xu Zhiwei doesn’t care about the meat. He is deliberately searching for vegetables—the vegetables that are agreeable to him.

He chooses his first ingredient, the oily gluten almost untouched on the shelf. It is the most common ingredient in Wuxi. It takes some time for his choice of the second ingredient. He wanders around and finally finds a small old pumpkin outside the kitchen. Although the pumpkin is found later, he handles it first for he wants to use pumpkin to make a cold dish.

In fact, there are only pumpkin vines at this season, so the pumpkin Xu Zhiwei finds is an old one harvested a year ago. Generally speaking, the pumpkin can be stored for only about three months, and it will turn black and deteriorate when frozen. But if it is dried in the shade of a ventilated cellar, the storage time can be doubled. With straw bedding and a shelf of eight to ten centimeters above the ground, it’s very likely to be preserved for a whole year.

The preservation for a long time wrinkles the peel of the pumpkin. After being dried in the shade with good ventilation, the water in the pumpkin is all consumed. But the remaining pulp is tight and sweet.

After choosing gluten and an old pumpkin, Xu Zhiwei is ready to start Food Processing. Food Processing, in chef’s jargon, means to process the main ingredients as required, and then prepare all the necessary ingredients and seasonings.

With mere two ingredients, Xu Zhiwei begins the Food Processing, which puzzles other chefs and the servants in the kitchen. They are all cooking experts, and they all know that Xu Zhiwei is competing for the Head Chef with oily gluten and pumpkin as the main ingredients. However, only God can make it on such an occasion with cooking masters competing for Head Chef. No matter how maverick the two vegetables are made, it is impossible to eclipse the previous delicacies.