Chapter 117 Super Strong Opponent
"How is this possible? If Lou Jiafu failed like Master Qiu of Chunfenglou, it's impossible that he failed in every dish. Even if he didn't get any points for any dish, it's impossible that he can't beat the chef of a restaurant in Australia City that only has a dozen tables and has been struggling all the time?" Asong didn't believe it at all.
"That's right! His character is not good, but his craftsmanship is OK."
A waiter at the food window said, "Didn't they say his wife is divorcing him?"
"Yes! Lou Jiafu is unlucky. His wife wants to divorce him at this critical moment."
"You're getting divorced, why would anyone care if you compete or not? This isn't a marriage."
"Who cares! He failed, that's a great thing. Our A-Ming has lost another strong opponent. It's very likely that the final will be between A-Ming and A-Hsiung. I'll be so happy!"
Axiong is Li Xinrong's apprentice.
"It's unlikely that he's getting a divorce." Yue Baohua prepared a fish soup. "He's been with me for so many years, and he's a very patient person."
Yue Ning nodded: "I'll go down and ask."
After lunch, Yue Ning went into the office with her grandfather. She called Yang Yuhe, who was a judge of the competition, and asked about the results of the competition, which had already been announced.
Yang Yuhe said, "Ningning, you'd better come and see for yourself. I see in this young man from the continent the aura of a chef who is no less than yours."
"From the mainland?"
"Well, he can't speak Cantonese, so his partner helped him translate."
"Ah? Is he cooking Cantonese food, or some other cuisine?"
"He should be able to cook a full-course banquet." Yang Yuhe laughed, as if to keep the secret and also to show off, "His last name is Lu, and he is from Beijing."
Yue Ning understood all of a sudden: "No wonder!"
Yue Ning put down the phone, looked up and said to Yue Baohua: "The one who beat Lou Jiafu is the heir of the Lu family."
Yue Baohua suddenly realized: "No wonder."
Cantonese cuisine became an influential cuisine because Guangdong merchants brought Cantonese cuisine to the north. In the late Qing Dynasty, there were already several famous Cantonese restaurants in Shanghai and Beijing, among which Lujia cuisine in Beijing was the most famous.
There is a saying about Cantonese cuisine: "Jiang in the south and Lu in the north".
Nan Jiang is the Jiang family that founded Fuyunlou. The Jiang family's craft was passed down to Boss Jiang, who also learned the true skills. However, neither of his two sons was interested in being a cook.
As a last resort, Boss Jiang recruited several apprentices, the most outstanding of whom were Yue Baohua and Luo Changfa.
The Lu family, which has taken root in Beijing, has passed down its cuisine from generation to generation. During the Beiyang government period, important officials were frequent customers of Lu's cuisine.
Yue Ning called Sophie and asked her to contact HTV. She wanted to watch the video of today's game with A Ming.
Sophie made the contact, and Yue Ning notified A Ming and A Xing who were on duty at Ning Yan to gather at the entrance of the TV station.
Yue Ning took the two of them into the TV station. The program director was still in a meeting. She asked the two to sit in the lounge area and went to Cai Zhiyuan's office. She made sure to say hello to her brother when she arrived.
Especially this morning when she was jogging, she passed by the newspaper stand again and found that the magazine had been replaced by another one. On the cover of that magazine, Cai Zhiyuan, dressed in a suit and tie and wrapped tightly, was hugging a female star who was said to have the most beautiful breasts in Hong Kong.
This magazine is a weekly magazine, so it couldn't have been taken yesterday afternoon, right? Then why did he have that expression on his face at the opening ceremony yesterday?
Cai Zhiyuan's office is divided into an inner and outer room. His secretary sits in the outer compartment, and the inner door is closed.
Yue Ning was about to ask the secretary to call in to report, but she saw the door open and a female celebrity in cool clothes walked out with enchanting steps. When she saw her, she greeted her lightly: "Miss Yue."
"Hello, Miss Zhang!"
This is the female star with big breasts. Yue Ning was leaning against the door of Cai Zhiyuan's office. When Cai Zhiyuan saw her, he wisely put down his cigar and opened the window.
Yue Ning walked in: "Your new love has already taken over, and you still come to my place to bother Sister Sophie? Brother, where is your face?"
"This is also my sister," Cai Zhiyuan said. "She wants to enter the entertainment industry, and her parents asked me for help."
Yue Ning was a little surprised. Isn't this Miss Zhang a sexy type? She asked, "You asked your sister to shoot a pornographic film and asked you to take care of her?"
"The movie her mother made before she retired was called 'Dragon and Phoenix'. Emperor Qianlong went to the south of the Yangtze River and played with Diao Chan by the Qinhuai River." Cai Zhiyuan said, "Her parents thought it was nothing wrong. Is it to devote oneself to art? Why are you so anxious?"
This broke Yue Ning's cognition. She had always thought that only those powerless female stars would choose that path for fame. She didn't expect that there would be a girl with such a wealth and background to take this path. All right! Dedicate yourself to art.
"What's the matter with you coming to see me?"
"No, just to say hello. I heard that Lou Jiafu was eliminated today, so I came to see the real situation."
Cai Zhiyuan laughed out loud: "This year's "Chef King Competition" is really worth watching. It's a pity that you didn't participate, otherwise it would definitely be more exciting."
Yue Ning raised his wrist to check his watch: "I'll go first."
"Go ahead!"
Yue Ning called A Ming and A Xing and went to find the old man together. The program was shot from multiple angles, and the old man found her a videotape with close-up shots of the two groups of contestants and took them to the screening room to watch it.
Yue Ning decided to watch Lou Jiafu's video tape first.
After fast-forwarding a long section of the introduction, we went straight to the cooking part. The ingredients Lou Jiafu picked were obviously safe rather than new in the preliminary round.
The cold dishes seem to be crispy pigeon and braised goose liver, these two dishes are Yue Baohua's specialties.
He took the duck feet and asked his apprentice to peel the shrimps. The hot dish was duck feet stuffed with various flowers? Another one was jelly oyster chicken pot?
The fish soup is made into soup, and the dry-fried beef is used as the staple food.
"These are dishes that Lou Jiafu can cook with his eyes closed, how could he fail?"
Yue Ning asked the projectionist to fast forward. Lou Jiafu’s cooking was quite standard and it was indeed a dish that one could cook with their eyes closed.
They quickly watched the video of Lou Jiafu cooking, and then watched the video of another team of contestants.
Both of them were in their early twenties. They brought a glass bottle containing a bottle of soup, which they said was their secret.
The two of them are not that coordinated at all, and basically the other one is just doing odd jobs for the chef.
The chef has to cut and cook, while the other one passes things to him.
The chef first fried chicken feet, pig's trotters and other ingredients and stewed them together with the old hen. Was he trying to make the soup?
Then he went to get other ingredients, including a pig's stomach, pork belly and pork skin.
In the video, the judges asked, "What is he doing?"
Yue Ning said: "Arhat belly."
After hearing Yue Ning name the dish, Ah Ming asked, "Where is this dish from?"
"From Tianjin. They say it looks like the big belly of Maitreya Buddha, 'a big belly that can hold things that are hard to hold in the world, and when it opens its mouth it laughs at the ridiculous people in the world.' It's a national banquet dish."
Another cold dish is braised duck liver, which is also one of Lu’s signature dishes.
When making hot dishes, he used the thick soup he brought with him to stew the fish belly. Lu's cuisine is famous for its soup, roasting, stewing and steaming, but they don't like to stir-fry over high heat.
Yue Ning saw how he processed the shrimp and understood it. She said, "Another state banquet dish, and one chosen by the leader to entertain foreign guests."
The chicken paste was put into the white soup and clarified again and again, finally getting a soup as clear as boiled water. The knife skills of this young man were no worse than Ma Yaoxing's, and the clam slices he cut were as thin as cicada wings.
The boiling soup is poured into the clam slices, and this is the dish of chicken soup with clams.
The final main course was a plain-looking chicken rice that was topped with their secret sauce.
They are all cooks, and they are all good cooks. You can tell the skills of this young man through the screen.
Seeing this, Ah Ming's cheeks trembled. He finally won against Master Qiu, and he hadn't been happy for two days. How come another person like this appeared?
Ah Ming looked at Yue Ning: "What's the difference between this person and you?"
"I know all the dishes he cooks, but he may not know the dishes I cook," said Yue Ning.
Hearing Yue Ning speak so confidently, Ah Ming felt relieved: "Then I feel relieved."
“Although I can cook his dishes, I may not be better than him, because they are the accumulation of more than 200 years of their family’s experience,” Yue Ning said quietly.
Amin was stunned. Isn't it the same as not saying anything?
"What should we do then?"
Yue Ning patted Ah Ming on the back: "You said at the beginning that it was no big deal to lose to Master Qiu? Why do you care so much now? This is the inheritor of the century-old official cuisine. Isn't it natural that he is better than you?"
Ever since Ah Ming defeated Chef Qiu of Chunfenglou, he has become more confident and even believes that he has a great chance of winning the title of Chef King. He is no longer the Ah Ming who he was at the beginning.
Now that such a powerful opponent has appeared, he feels so miserable that he wants to cry...
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