Chapter 878: Extra Story 3: The Rise of Jiang Feng (Part 3) Chapter 878: Extra Story 3: The Rise of Jiang Feng (Part 3) “`
Almost the mont the Great Grandson ascended to the throne, everyone gave their most genuine reactions.
Enthusiasm, eagerness, and loud voices.
“Son, let’s have iron pot stewed goose. This goose is especially good, perfect for stewing in an iron pot!” Jiang Jiankang grabbed the goose’s neck again.
“Feng, how about crispy-fried glutinous rice paste? Uncle Jianye believes you can do it!” Jiang Jianye exclaid with longing.
“Bro, I want to eat sticky rice-stuffed duck. Last ti I didn’t even get any of it.” Jiang Junlian said with a look of grievance.
“Little brother, Nine Turns Intestine!” Jiang Zaidi, Jiang Shoucheng, and Jiang Ran, the three brothers, chorused, their voices loud enough to burst through the roof.
Even Mrs. Jiang joined in the fun with a smile, “I think the sticky rice-filled lotus root that Jiang Feng made last year was quite tasty.”
As many Jiang Family mbers there were, that’s how many dishes they wanted for the New Year al.
Jiang Feng knew well that even though he had beco the latest head chef for the New Year’s Eve dinner, it would be impossible to satisfy everyone’s desires on that day. To be precise, the Jiang Family’s New Year’s Eve dinner was not about satisfying everyone’s desires.
Sir never cared about what everyone wanted to eat because he knew very well that whatever he made, everyone wanted to eat it.
Jiang Feng should also be clear that, with his current cooking skills, everyone loved whatever he made. The question was what he wanted to make.
With two days left until New Year’s Eve, the most pressing matter was deciding on tonight’s dinner.
The responsibilities of the head chef for the Jiang Family’s New Year’s Eve dinner extended beyond the al on the eve of the Lunar New Year. The scope of duties covered the entire New Year period up until the fifteenth night’s Lantern Festival al, including breakfast, lunch, and dinner, even the dumplings and pastries brought when visiting relatives and friends.
The joy of ascending had not yet been felt when Jiang Feng experienced the troubles of being a king.
Having great power indeed felt exhilarating, but approving petitions was no easy task.
“Enough with the noise. Eat what’s there. What, if it doesn’t suit your taste, you won’t eat it? If you won’t eat it, pack your things and roll back to the city now. You have food and still whine; we didn’t ask you to lift a finger.” Grandpa Jiang beca angry, “What are you standing around for? Help out if you should, clean if you should clean. What? Is the house already clean? Or do you think we three old folks can get this big house spick and span? Are we your nannies? Can’t you see your rooms are never cleaned? Have the tables been wiped clean, the floors been swept, the dust been cleared? What are you loitering for? Acting like lords?”
The crowd instantly scattered like birds and beasts, and even sisters Jiang Junqing and Jiang Junlian grabbed their school bags and returned to their rooms to do howork.
Jiang Feng, along with Sir and Jiang Weiming, went to the kitchen to prepare ingredients.
As soon as he entered the kitchen and saw the familiar sight of various cuts of pork that had already been prepared, Jiang Feng knew sothing was wrong.
His style of cooking was completely different from Sir’s.
Sir’s specialty dishes were mainly pork, and specifically large cuts: chunks of pork belly, elbows, ribs. These characteristics were particularly evident at the Jiang Family’s New Year’s Eve dinner table.
From cold dishes to braised at platters, to hot dishes and main courses at the Jiang Family’s New Year’s Eve dinner, pork was a primary ingredient; even the dumplings were mostly filled with pork, and mornings typically started with marinated pork noodles. The entire New Year revolved around pork.
This was Sir’s style, not Jiang Feng’s.
Due to the influence of a ga, Jiang Feng’s cooking style was sowhat shaped by the recipes from the ga. Besides the congees he was proficient at, the first dishes that ca to mind for Jiang Feng were mostly from ga recipes and those he rembered learning.
Apart from a few simple and quick dishes, most complex ones required the use of rich stock.
This implied that once Jiang Feng took over the Jiang Family’s New Year’s Eve dinner, the style of the al would shift from the traditional Shandong cuisine with pork as the mainstay to a mixed style dominated by rich stock from various schools of cooking.
Jiang Feng looked at the basin full of pork and faced a dilemma.
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“Grandpa, I don’t think I need this much pork to cook…”
Sir said indifferently, “Why bother telling them anything? If there’s leftover pork, just use it to make dumplings and distribute them to all the households.”
Jiang Feng got the point.
Consequently, the Jiang Family mbers, who were still cleaning the house and hadn’t even wiped the tables dry, received an urgent task from the newly appointed head chef of the Jiang Family.
Jiang Feng needed more hens, a variety of seafood, different kinds of fish, shiitake mushrooms, winter bamboo shoots, and other fresh vegetables. There were no specific quality requirents; the only requirent was freshness.
The ingredients Jiang Feng needed were much easier to find than the ultra-high-quality pork Grandpa Jiang had requested last year. Despite the approaching New Year, with their well-established local connections, the Jiang Family mbers managed to gather everything within two days: seven to eight hens, thirty to forty pounds of various fresh fish, piles of crisp fresh vegetables, and streams of other vegetables that Jiang Feng hadn’t specifically asked for but were purchased anyway since they were spotted.
Once the ingredients were in place, the broth started simring.
At ho, unlike in restaurants, there are fewer stoves, making it impossible to simr many broths at the sa ti. However, with the many mbers of the Jiang Family each having large appetites, a delicious broth is great, but not as satisfying as the original abundant and filling pork dishes.
Now a mature chef, Jiang Feng naturally wouldn’t make such a rookie mistake. Therefore, the broth had to be started a day ahead, simring nonstop from morning until night so that by the twenty-ninth day of the Lunar New Year, the Jiang Family’s ho was filled with the rich and tempting aroma of broth from inside out.
The Li Cuihua family, who lived closest to the Jiangs, were the first to catch the scent, and they caught it most clearly. Other families that were farther away only thought to themselves about what delicious dish the Jiang Family was preparing for the New Year as they passed by and slled the broth, but they would forget about it after they walked away.
But the Li Cuihua family was miserable. They slled it from morning till night, and nothing tasted good to them, not potato chips, not spicy strips, not even braised pork, nor the blood sausage personally made by Grandpa Jiang and delivered by Mrs. Jiang a few days ago.
Zhao Liang originally was lying on the bed happily playing “Save the Canyon,” but after slling the broth, he no longer wanted to play or to continue being a hobody; he wanted to go out more, socialize, and interact with others. His concrete plan was to walk next door, socialize with the Jiang Family mbers, and negotiate a free al with them.
After slling the aroma all day and holding back until dinner ti, Zhao Liang couldn’t stand it anymore. He put down his rice bowl and asked his mom, “Mom, what exactly are they cooking next door at Grandpa Jiang’s house? It slls so good!”
Zhao Liang’s mom was eating eggplant with little interest and replied perfunctorily, “It must be chicken broth for sure, isn’t that what you’re slling all this ti?”
“But our chicken broth has never been this fragrant, and besides, who stews chicken broth for a whole day?” mumbled Zhao Liang.
“Can our cooking be compared to that of Grandpa Jiang next door? You know about the ancestral chefs in their family, each one a master chef from state-owned restaurants. Can it be the sa?” said Zhao Liang’s mom.
Hearing her daughter-in-law talk like this made Li Cuihua unhappy. Although the Jiang Family’s cooking skills were an undeniable fact, she was now the one responsible for cooking in her family, and she felt that her daughter-in-law’s words implied criticism of her cooking as not tasty.
Li Cuihua slamd her chopsticks down on the bowl and stopped eating.
“Liangliang, let’s go!”
“Where to?”
“To the backyard to catch a hen to bring over. Haven’t they been looking for hens these past few days? Let’s bring one over for a visit and see just what they’re up to today,” declared Li Cuihua with vigor.
“Okay, Granny!” Full of energy, Zhao Liang put down his chopsticks and headed to the backyard to catch a chicken.
Grandmother and grandson, carrying the hen, headed next door.
After the two had gone a distance, Grandpa Zhao spoke slowly, “All this talk about going next door to see, isn’t she just looking to mooch a al?”
Zhao Liang’s dad nodded. “But today, the sll is indeed strange next door, so fragrant that it makes everything else tasteless.”
“How would one hen be enough?” Grandpa Zhao stood up. “That old woman always thinks things through carelessly; always in such a rush, always frantic. Co on, let’s catch another hen and bring it over too.”
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