The cap twisted open.
Zhu Qing’s pristine fingers moved, grasping the cap, as the cara swept over her confident cheek, towards the widening opening of the bottle.
"Swoosh—"
Instantly, rainbow lights took over the broadcast screens above the competition arena.
The audience stirred, the guests stood up in unison, even professional chefs like Jintan Shun, Dojima Yin, and Saito Chiyokuro, who were just there for a cao, were amazed—what was with this rainbow light?
"Miracle Wine?"
On stage, Lei Zhe and Desani, the Lin Giants from the ’Gourt Society,’ were staring non-stop at the cocktail bottle that emitted the rainbow glow.
"My goodness—"
Below stage, "Burning Purple Rose" Andrea’s red lips parted, clearly recalling the recipe for Miracle Wine, which had been lost for so years.
Beside her were Inspector Catherine and "Dragon Tar" Sta, both with tight expressions on their faces.
It wasn’t just the rainbow light.
The mont the light erged from the bottle, a dense fragrance of fruit juice, like water sprayed from a sprinkler, shot in all directions, and suddenly, the venue transitioned from the chilly late autumn season to a garden abundant with sumr fruits. At this mont, anyone who took a breath felt an overwhelming sense of rewards reaped.
Suddenly, amidst the scent of the fruit juice, a delicate aroma of wine lingered on.
People seed to see a group of shrine maidens, grinding freshly harvested autumn rice with stone millstones, carefully removing the bran, cooking the milky-white polished rice, and then kneeling on tatami mats. With their right hand holding a small wooden bowl, while their left hand lifted the large sleeve of their kimono to cover their mouths as they chewed the rice grains and spit out the juice...
"Sake!"
The red-haired judge "Yoshitsune" shook his head, breaking free from the culinary fantasy crafted by the scent of fruit and wine, focusing intently on the cocktail bottle in Zhu Qing’s hand, and laughed, "Using sake as the base, infused with fruit wine?"
"Such blending and infusing thods, truly traditional and nostalgic!" lancholy surfaced in the judge’s eyes.
"I’m reminded of the old plum wine too."
A female judge began to speak.
Her long, straight black hair flowed down, exuding a mature charm. Now, as she spoke, her voice was no longer the ethereal mist it was at the beginning but settled firmly in the heart, "Let’s taste it!"
The audience vigorously rubbed their eyes, coming back to their senses.
"Please—"
Zhu Qing poured the wine, placing 5 steady glasses in front of the judges.
These 5 glasses of wine, each with a rainbow effect, while clearly mixed with the sa kind of fruit juice, exhibited layers of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet in the transparent glass cups.
Moreover, the layered rainbow colors ca with a neon light effect, twinkling in the eyes of onlookers, accentuating that breathtaking beauty even more.
Miracle Wine!
"Ding!"
The Nuliang in the center, with a bartending silver spoon, tapped the edge of the glass, creating ripples on the surface of the wine. The colors seed to rge and intertwine at that mont; within the ripples, worlds seed to materialize. The elder stared in awe at the barely visible worlds, exclaiming, "...this wine, it reminds of that legendary bartender from the past, the only one who could craft the Miracle Cocktail. He died on a hunting trip, leaving behind incomplete recipes in his notes, which no one has been able to restore until now..."
Speaking, a fervent desire glinted in his eyes.
"Has a similar wine finally appeared?"
Without further ado, Nuliang grabbed the glass, Yoshitsune and the other three judges almost simultaneously lowered their heads, lips approaching the rim of the glass, and gently, cautiously, sipped a small amount.
Astounding!
As soon as the judges took a drink, they beca still.
"The first taste... early spring!" said Nuliang, with pupils reflecting a landscape of lting snow and budding shoots breaking through the earth, "The wine and fruit juice have a light fragrance, very faint, with a crisp and llow taste!"
"The second flavor, late spring!"
Nuliang was shaken, then he saw the scenery of cherry blossoms in full bloom during April and May. Miko picked the cherry buds, soaked them in wine, and it seed he tasted the cherry wine in his imagination, with the nectar breeding in his mouth. Yet simultaneously, the wine and the delicate fragrances began to evolve from a trickle into a stream.
"Boom!"
Suddenly, the season of spring morphed into the harshness of sumr.
The fragrance of wine and fruit burst forth unexpectedly. The five judges felt their mouths twitching, sothing wanting to force its way through their clenched teeth. They couldn’t help but open their mouths and gently exhale, releasing the rainbow that cos after sumr’s sunshower.
Early sumr, midsumr, late sumr.
The wine beca increasingly rich and intense, with three sumr flavors transforming one after another, imrsing the judges in the fantasy of savoring chilled fruit juices amidst the chirpings of sumr night insects.
All at once, the high-pitched lody of wine and fruit dropped to a bass line.
In their pupils lurked the distant sky of autumn, vast and clear.
Then ca the cold winds of winter’s season.
The two flavors of spring, the three flavors of sumr, as well as the flavors of autumn and winter — seven stages of flavors in total — made the five judges feel as though they had traversed the cycle of the years. In the end, when the wine and fruit juice completely lded, the judges were deeply intoxicated.
The arena was silent for at least ten minutes.
"Perfect!"
A voice broke the atmosphere. The red-haired judge who called himself ’Yoshitsune’ shook as he put down his glass. He pulled up his hood to cover his head, hiding half of his face in the shadow, as if enduring sothing.
"This is not the Miracle Wine but the Perfect Wine! The Wine of Ages!" he exclaid loudly.
Clang!
Another cocktail glass fell to the ground and shattered.
The third judge, a monk wearing a basket-hat, uttered a Buddhist chant: "The miraculous Rainbow Fruit naturally has seven different stages of flavor, which is a characteristic of the ingredient, not surprising... But the base wine that blends it also has corresponding flavor changes, and the chef has imbued deeper anings and concepts into these taste changes with culinary spirit. It is truly an inspired stroke!"
"Perfect mastery of ingredients!"
Nuliang said in a low voice: "The miraculous Rainbow Fruit, it is the original material for the Miracle Wine, perfect! That chef in the past mastered its seven stages of flavors, hence the creation of the ’rainbow cocktail.’ But that chef used Food Dominator to control the ’Rainbow Fruit,’ although the wine was good, it could not intoxicate one by itself."
After he finished speaking, he paused.
The fourth judge, a black-haired woman with an ethereal presence, spoke: "Infinite culinary aning!"
She emphasized ’culinary aning.’
"The reason why we say ’perfect mastery’ is mainly due to the ’change’ in culinary aning!" the female judge exclaid with amazent, "The two stages of spring, the three stages of sumr, and the solo lodies of autumn and winter, each phase brings a true gourt world... The key is, there are sounds associated with them: the tinkling of spring’s lting streams, the buzzing of sumr night insects, the rustling of autumn winds, the harsh scraping of the cold winds as if cutting with a knife..."
The audience, upon hearing such lavish praise from the judges, beca agitated.
The seven stages of flavor were already impressive; after all, that Rainbow Fruit, upon first ntion, sounded remarkable.
But seven flavors corresponding to the changing seasons of spring, sumr, autumn, and winter, the cycle of the years, that was rather fantastical.
The culinary heart, culinary aning.
These things are of a spiritual realm, one cannot truly understand without tasting.
The judges didn’t elaborate further. Kogawa Shinyiro coughed, about to ask the judges to score, when suddenly the Chief Judge Nuliang spoke up: "I have tasted the culinary aning of harmony... Chef Zhu, can you resolve my doubt?"
The culinary aning of harmony?
Beside, several Lin Giants were simultaneously taken aback.
Lan Chuhai glanced at Zhu Qing’s profile, saw the strange smile creeping across her face and felt a sudden chill:
Was this the secret of her ’wine’ cooking?
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