119: Chapter 119: The Professional Chef 119: Chapter 119: The Professional Chef Such a pity that the people here don’t yet eat chili peppers.
In this era, the main spices were Sichuan pepper, ginger, and cornelian cherry, with chili peppers only used as ornantal plants and dicine.
Such a good thing, utterly wasted!
Gu Youyou found so wild chilies not far from the hill behind her house.
At this ti of the year, the chilies were still tender and not as spicy as the ripe red ones, so she picked a few more.
She started by gutting and cleaning the fish, then salted it for marinating, and stuffed the fish belly with Sichuan pepper, chili, and ginger.
Start the fire for cooking rice first!
When Jin Zijin returned, he could see the smoke rising from his house from a distance, and he quickened his pace in slight surprise.
At this mont, Gu Youyou was putting the fish into the pan, and a thick enticing fragrance wafted from the pot—it was the aroma of various spices she had sautéed in oil!
“Zijin is back, have a seat for a while, we’ll be eating soon.
We’re having fish today, and you can also taste my cooking skills!”
Was this the first ti Gu Youyou cooked alone, and the first ti she took charge of the wok, and she chose to cook fish which is the most difficult?
This fish had a strong fishy sll, hard to make palatable if not handled properly.
Not many in the farming community were good cooks, so they rarely ate fish.
Yet there were plenty of fish in the river, as long as one was willing to eat, there would be more than enough!
Jin Zijin put down his tools and the newly bought soybean oil, looking intrigued, and then sat by the stove to stoke the fire!
“You know how to cook fish?”
Gu Youyou was taken aback, feeling slighted, and said, “Are you the only one allowed to be capable?
Can’t I be capable as well?”
Jin Zijin: “…” Was her way of speaking always so pointed?
In fact, Gu Youyou was just concerned about Jin Zijin’s own secrets, and his continual, subtle attempts to coax information out of her!
Never did she expect Jin Zijin to say, “I can’t cook fish!”
Well…
no wonder she had never tasted fish cooked by him.
“Fish is very fishy, I don’t like that sll!”
Gu Youyou turned to look at him, smiling slightly and said, “The fish I cook isn’t fishy!”
Jin Zijin said, “To make fish that isn’t fishy, one must be a professional chef!”
Hearing this, Gu Youyou’s expression darkened.
After a while, she said, “Alright then, I am a professional chef!”
Jin Zijin looked at her and inexplicably chuckled!
Gu Youyou knew what he ant, always trying to pry words out of her and not allowing her to get annoyed!
“Make the fire a little smaller!” Gu Youyou said irritably.
After slling the aroma, which was spicy and delightful, she sprinkled a little sugar into the pot to enhance the umami taste of the fish!
This sugar had been secretly given to Gu Youyou by Gu Feng, who said her dicine was too bitter, and a little sugar would make it more bearable.
She hadn’t taken her dicine for a long ti, and as sugar was a valuable commodity, she had kept it.
But to use sugar for cooking fish…
Jin Zijin seed to have never seen this, so he asked curiously, “Is the sugar for removing the fishy sll?”
“No!” Gu Youyou shook her head and said, “Adding so sugar makes the fish taste better!”
Jin Zijin frowned and said, “The sugar Grandfather bought you was to ease the bitterness of your dicine after drinking it.
Are you wasting it on fish?”
Gu Youyou couldn’t stand to hear this and justified herself, “This isn’t wasting, it’s to make the fish tastier!”
“Being able to eat one’s fill is enough, what’s the need for fussing over taste?
Look at the villagers of Lotus Village, who cares whether their food tastes good or not?”
Gu Youyou was left speechless!
She never expected that Jin Zijin would be such a miser.
It was just a bit of sugar, was it worth making such a fuss over?
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