Chapter 255 National Chef Teaching
This morning, the group went to HTV to watch the recording of the last "Hong Kong and Macau Chef King Competition". After careful editing, the plot is more compact and smooth. Lu Yongding saw that his nephew's companion was absent temporarily, and his nephew had to go on the stage alone, and he couldn't help but feel sad. Fortunately, Yue Ning came down to help in time, and the opponent also generously said that he didn't mind, which eased the tense situation.
At noon, Yue Ning led everyone to Hekun Restaurant, which won the second place in the Chef King competition. The owner and his son of Hekun Restaurant talked about their experience of participating in this competition and felt that they benefited a lot. Especially under the organization and coordination of Yue Ning, several restaurants carried out chef exchange activities. In the process of mutual learning, everyone's cooking skills have been significantly improved.
Zhang Hongxing was young and straightforward. He said excitedly, "Ade is already amazing. I really want to try his master's cooking skills."
As soon as he said that, he was kicked hard by his father. But Zhang Hongxing still said in a daze: "Dad, that's a national chef! If I can meet such a great chef, of course I want to learn!"
Boss Zhang is very proud of his son who works hard to master cooking, but sometimes he is worried about his son's straightforwardness. After all, most chefs in restaurants have bad tempers, let alone the state chefs who cook for state banquets and foreign heads of state.
Chef Dong asked with a smile: "Director Hu, you and your friends will discuss the details of the competition this afternoon. Lao Lu and I don't know much about these things. How about we take this opportunity to cook a few dishes for everyone, so that we can have some exchanges with everyone?"
Director Hu knew that Chef Dong had just reunited with his lost sister this morning after more than 30 years of separation, and understood that he was eager to show off his cooking skills to his sister. So Director Hu responded: "Exchange with each other and make progress together!"
In the afternoon, Lu Yongding and Dong Yinkui came to the Ningyan kitchen, where the two national chefs personally cooked their signature dishes.
Lu Peide introduced to the crowd: "This dish is created by Chef Dong. The difficulty lies in how to skillfully match the meat and vegetable ingredients. The delicacies of mountains and sea are gathered in one pot, and the method of simmering them separately is easy to fall apart if you are not careful."
Dong Yinkui explained with a smile: "Don't listen to Peide's mysterious words. It is indeed difficult to make it in a scattered way. It requires thousands of times of practice. However, there is another relatively simple technique for this dish, which is called grilled pork."
Dong Yinkui looked at the young man next to Chen Jinying. Jinying had told him before that this was her new apprentice after she came to Gangcheng.
Dong Yinkui waved to the young man: "Along, come here."
A-Long walked quickly to Dong Yinkui's side. News in Hong Kong spread very quickly, and everyone knew at noon that his master was actually the sister of the Beijing national chef. A-Long hurriedly called out, "Uncle Master."
Dong Yinkui said, "Cook this dish with me, and try the grilling technique."
Aaron quickly waved his hands and declined: "I just learned some techniques for stir-frying and cooking. I don't know how to braise vegetables, let alone braise them casually."
Dong Yinkui encouraged: "Grateing is easier to learn than cooking."
Chen Jinying also smiled and said to the little apprentice: "Study hard."
Encouraged by his master, A Long immediately stood beside Dong Yinkui.
Dong Yinkui began to introduce the ingredients of this dish in detail: "Ba Shan Hai, as the name suggests, is a dish that brings together delicacies from the mountains and the sea. The inspiration for this dish comes from the mushrooms I tasted when I went to Yunnan for an exchange, so I chose two types of mushrooms, morels and matsutake. If these two types of mushrooms are not available, other dried mushrooms can be used instead. The purpose of using dried mushrooms is to preserve their unique flavor. Another mountain delicacy is water-soaked dried bamboo shoots. In autumn and winter, winter bamboo shoots can also be used instead, which will be more tender. I have tried it, and the yellow bamboo shoots in Guizhou taste quite good. For seafood, abalone, large cuttlefish, and sea cucumber are used. In addition, they are paired with pork belly, tendons, and pork tripe. If it is a halal method, it can be replaced with lamb or beef. Beef tendons and lamb tendons are also suitable."
After introducing the ingredients, Dong Yinkui led A-Long to prepare the ingredients and blanch them. When everything was ready, he started to heat the oil in a pan: "Let's put the scallions in and fry them first."
A-Long followed Dong Yinkui's steps, and Dong Yinkui watched A-Long's movements while cooking. He fried the scallions and set them aside, then put the pork belly into the pan to fry out the fat, then put the pork belly in and stir-fry, then added the tendons, two kinds of mushrooms, and soaked bamboo shoots, poured in the water used to soak the mushrooms, added seasonings, and began to stew.
It would take at least an hour to stew the food here, so he could use this time to watch Chef Lu cook.
Lu's cuisine has always focused on soup, and it is important to take time to cook carefully. One afternoon is not enough time to cook carefully. And the ingredients prepared by his nephew in advance always felt a little lack of heat, so Lu Yongding decided to make a liver cake soup for everyone, which is one of the clear soup dishes in Sichuan cuisine. Although the soup stock from Ningyan was used, this dish is more of a test of the chef's skills.
Lu Yongding first mixed the pork leg and chicken breast, chopped them into a paste with the back of a knife, seasoned them, stuffed them into the soaked bamboo fungus, and then cooked the bamboo fungus in chicken soup.
After preparing the bamboo fungus, he began to chop the pork liver and chicken liver into fine powder with the back of a knife: "Liver cake soup can use only pork liver or chicken liver. I personally like to mix the two kinds of liver, which makes the taste more tender and delicate."
He chopped and removed the fascia, added onion and ginger juice, then poured in a spoonful of chicken soup, and filtered the liver pulp with gauze. Then, he dripped a few drops of lemon juice into the liver pulp, added a small spoonful of Moutai liquor, mixed in egg white and pea powder, poured it into a mold and put it in a steamer to cook.
"Steam it for about ten minutes. If you oversteam it, honeycombs will appear on the surface."
When Lu Yongding was using minced meat to make the clear soup, the liver cake was just steamed out of the oven. The surface of the steamed liver cake was as smooth as a mirror, and it shook when touched lightly with a spoon. He removed the liver cake from the mold and put it into a soup pot with a lid, then added a piece of bamboo fungus stuffed with minced meat and a few bean sprouts that had been blanched in water, and finally poured in the clear soup.
Lu Peide picked up a soup bowl and handed it to Zhang Hongxing: "Hongxing, you try it first."
Zhang Hongxing took the soup bowl with a smile on his face, took another spoon and said to his father, "Dad, I'll eat with you."
Boss Zhang reluctantly took the spoon, and the father and son tasted it together. Zhang Hongxing took a bite and exclaimed: "It's tender and smooth, and tastes like liver, but I can't imagine it's a soup made from liver."
Chen Jinying also picked up the soup bowl and tasted the liver cake that was as tender and smooth as tofu.
In terms of the skill of lifting the soup, Chen Jinying thinks she is not inferior, and this soup also uses the soup stock of Ningyan. From the taste alone, it is almost impossible to taste the difference, but as an insider, after careful tasting, she realized the uniqueness of the master's work. Just like those famous wines, the dishes made by the master always taste fresh and lively, which is exactly the culinary realm she has always pursued.
The apprentices may not be able to fully appreciate the subtleties of the dish, but the experienced chefs know that the national chef's skills are indeed well-deserved. As everyone ate and talked, before they knew it, waves of tempting aroma wafted from the pot, the aroma of mushrooms and meat blended together, making people salivate just by smelling it.
Dong Yinkui ordered A Long: "A Long, go find a bamboo grater."
Aaron quickly brought a bamboo grater and asked, "Uncle Master, is this okay?"
Dong Yinkui nodded in confirmation: "Okay."
Then he picked up a chopstick and said, "Poke it to see if the tendon is soft and the pig's stomach is almost cooked."
Aaron did as he was told and replied, "Uncle Master, it's OK."
Dong Yinkui continued, “Then let’s take out the ingredients inside and keep the juice.
"Aaron replied: "I understand."
"Abalone, sea cucumber and cuttlefish are all fresh ingredients. They cannot be cooked for a long time but must be well-flavored. We put these ingredients into the soup and blanch them quickly three times." As he said this, Dong Yinkui poured the three seafood into the pot, scooped them out with a colander after blanching, and repeated this operation three times.
"Let the juices in the pot reduce over medium heat while we prepare the dish."
Dong Yinkui took out a plate and said to A-Long, "Put a bamboo sieve on the plate."
A'long put the bamboo sieve on the plate as instructed. Dong Yinkui instructed him to first spread the fried scallion segments on the bottom of the plate, and then arrange the scooped ingredients neatly on the plate, forming a circle.
Afterwards, Dong Yinkui pushed the neatly arranged ingredients into the pot, making sure that the shapes did not fall apart. He said to A-Long, "Put the sieve into the pot together with the ingredients."
"Okay." A'long put the bamboo sieve and the ingredients into the pot.
“Turn on high heat to reduce the sauce. This dish does not need thickening because of the addition of pig’s pig tendons. The ingredients will be wrapped in the naturally concentrated sauce. Do you understand?” Dong Yinkui made a beautiful big flip with the spoon, and all the ingredients were turned over neatly.
Dong Yinkui moved the dishes neatly onto the plate and said, "Turn off the fire."
A-Long turned off the fire as he was told. Dong Yinkui put down the pot, took two chopsticks, and went to A-Long's pot.
The bamboo sieve is a grid made of bamboo. He inserted the chopsticks into the holes on both sides and moved the bamboo sieve and the ingredients to the plate. He said to A-Long, "Just take another empty plate and turn it upside down, isn't that enough?"
Aaron suddenly realized what was going on and brought the plate. Dong Yinkui told him, "Press it tight and turn it over."
Aaron turned the plate over, removed the plate on top, and then removed the bamboo sieve, and a complete dish appeared before him.
Dong Yinkui said: "Pour the sauce on it and it's done."
A-Long poured the juice from the pot onto the dish and successfully finished the dish. The two dishes were placed together, both with bright red juice and fragrant aroma.
An apprentice exclaimed: "Along, you are amazing! You made it exactly like Master Dong."
Dong Yinkui smiled and used chopsticks to pick up some vegetables and put them in the bowl: "You all try it. The dish made by A-Long will not taste much worse than mine."
He handed the bowl to Chen Jinying: "Jinying, try my brother's cooking."
Chen Jinying took the bowl from her brother and stared at the bright red tendons in the bowl. The sea cucumber was soaked in the thick sauce and was black and shiny, exuding an attractive luster. The charred aroma of fried scallions and the mellow aroma of meat and fat came to her face. She took a bite of the tendon. The soft and glutinous texture and the delicious mushroom flavor spread in her mouth. The mellow sauce wrapped the sweetness of the seafood, and there was no greasy taste of meat. Chen Jinying nodded and praised: "Brother, it's delicious."
Zhang Hongxing couldn't wait to come over, picked up the trembling sea cucumber and put it into his mouth. Boss Zhang couldn't help but taste it. The fat and lean meat slices were wrapped in thick sauce and melted in the mouth. The aroma of mushrooms and meat intertwined on the tip of the tongue, which was endless aftertaste.
After tasting the dishes made by her second brother, Chen Jinying tried the dishes made by her apprentice, A-Long. The cuttlefish was chewy and not tough, and the morels were full of gravy and full of flavor. A-Long was anxiously waiting for the chef's evaluation. Chen Jinying said, "It's very good, but it's a little bit off in terms of the cooking time."
Boss Zhang also added: "Most people really can't tell the difference."
A chef asked curiously: "With this unique skill, can we make all dishes that need to be chopped apart? For example, can we use this method to make braised fish heads?"
Dong Yinkui smiled and confirmed, "That's right."
Someone else asked: "Chef Dong, since grating is such a simple method, why do Shandong cuisine still require us to learn the big stir-fry method?"
Dong Yinkui explained: "There are still differences between the two. The big flipping spoon is faster and the heat can be controlled more accurately. This advantage of precision is actually not very meaningful. It's just that Jiaodong has always been rich in chefs, and our hometown is there. In the past, everyone carried an iron spoon to Beijing at the age of eleven or twelve to seek a living with their fellow countrymen. In Beijing, from the imperial chef to the street vendors, most of them are from Shandong. With more people engaged in this industry, major restaurants have higher and higher requirements for chefs. Major restaurants recruit chefs and test dishes. If you can't flip the spoon, don't even think about getting in. Gradually, the skill of grating and braising has been said to be inferior. Until I went to Henan recently, I found that the braised lamb and braised bluefish head in Henan cuisine both use the grating and braising technique. I thought, let the children cook the dishes first, and when they want to keep improving in the future, it won't be too late to slowly learn the big flipping spoon. There is no need to let children waste time on this skill that consumes energy but has little effect on the taste of the dishes."
Chen Jinying listened to her second brother's words and recalled the scene when her father taught them. Her father often said that if a Shandong cuisine chef could not flip the wok, he would be laughed at by his peers. She had the talent to practice, but people like Chen Jinlong who lacked talent could not learn well no matter how hard they tried, so why force it? Her father was so stubborn and inflexible when teaching his son. In the final analysis, it was because of his lack of teaching experience and did not know how to guide a child without talent. But the second brother would put himself in the shoes of the apprentice and think about how to help the apprentice master cooking skills faster. If Chen Jinlong had studied under his second brother, he would not be what he is today. In the final analysis, it was her father's narrow-minded ideas that delayed his son's development.
At this time, Lu Yongding reminded: "Boss, it's almost time to end. They are preparing to open the evening market."
Zhang Hongxing said with great interest: "Oh, Master Lu, Master Dong, there are only two dishes, too few, I haven't seen enough!"
Boss Zhang was speechless about his own son. Has it become his habit for him to take advantage of others?
Yue Ning stood at the kitchen door and said with a smile: "This year, all restaurants in the mainland will send teams to participate in the Chef King Competition. There will be plenty of opportunities for you to feast your eyes."
At noon, a TV station had already broadcast a news item titled "Chef Chen Jinying of Baohualou accused of 'improper conduct'". The news item reported that Chen Jinying was forced to go to Taiwan by her two elder sisters, and her elder brother came forward to defend her. Although Hong Kong is a small city, Chen Jinying is one of the most famous chefs of Baohualou, and this news has sparked a lot of discussion.
In the evening, HTV broadcast the news of the two chefs communicating in the kitchen of Ningyan. The news said that this Chef King Competition invited Chinese restaurants from all over the world to participate. Under Yue Ning's active promotion, the top chefs in China came to Hong Kong City for inspection. HTV is expected to invite top chef teams from Beijing, Shanghai and Yuecheng to participate. The two national chefs took this opportunity to carefully guide the chefs of Ningyan, which made the chefs gain a lot. In the news, Chef Dong's magical flipping of the spoon was amazing, and the dishes cooked by the two chefs aroused the appetite of the audience.
Ning Yan took the opportunity to launch the state banquet dishes "Liver Cake Soup" and "Braised Mountain and Sea".
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
