Abnormal Gourmet Chronicle

Chapter 1235 592: Lu Ziye_2

Not to mention that this snack can be taken away, bought whenever and eaten whenever, and you can even skip work for 20 minutes just to buy one and eat it at your desk.

Fresh flower cakes have been warmly welcomed by food lovers, and even workers from Spring City, while eating them, have tearfully claimed that this is the best fresh flower cake they've had in their lives. It's even better than the ones from their most famous local shop that sells freshly baked flower cakes, and they strongly urge Master Qin to visit their hometown during the New Year to teach their local chefs how to make them.

That plan was so well thought out that Zhao Cheng'an heard about it in Hangzhou.

Fresh flower cakes have been welcomed by food lovers and even received affirmation from Chen Juan. Chen Juan, who rarely comes to Yunzhong Restaurant, usually waits for Wang Gen Sheng to bring snacks home, made the rare move of visiting twice a day, just to catch the freshly baked flower cakes.

But these flower cakes did not win Wang Gen Sheng's approval.

The delicious ones didn't receive Wang Gen Sheng's approval, and the bad ones didn't either.

After Qin Huai stabilized the quality of fresh flower cakes, he began making versions with a 100% chance of failing, thinking that maybe Wang Gen Sheng's taste back in the day was just unique, preferring cakes heavy on oil and sugar, baked excessively to make the crust very dry.

Qin Huai executed this idea successfully.

Perhaps too successfully.

Successfully achieved heavy oil and sugar, with rose merely as a garnish, baking time overly long, cake crust dry enough to crack, making people doubt whether Qin Luo made this fresh flower cake.

When Wang Gen Sheng tried this version for the first time, he took a bite and didn't say a word for three minutes.

Then immediately issued a disclaimer, stating that his friend's skills are excellent, and this isn't the way Red Silk Cakes should taste. The Red Silk Cakes he had back then were indeed tastier than regular fresh flower cakes, maybe not as good as Qin Huai's fresh flower cakes, but definitely comparable, and certainly not this hard to eat.

Ouyang was also present when Wang Gen Sheng tried this version of the fresh flower cake, he didn't believe it and took a big bite, then didn't say a word for ten minutes.

Afterwards, Ouyang secretly complained to Shi Dadan, asking Shi Dadan if Wang Gen Sheng had offended Qin Huai. How did the delicious fresh flower cakes suddenly turn out this bad?

Wang Gen Sheng's disclaimer provided Qin Huai a new direction, suggesting that Red Silk Cake may be unique, unconventional, and distinct, but it's definitely not one of those bizarre snacks made palatable by nostalgic memories.

First of all, it has to be delicious.

Based on this concept, Yunzhong Restaurant has been consistently producing high-quality fresh flower cakes, stable in their deliciousness.

Food lovers have gone crazy over them.

Nearby office workers who haven't had a fresh flower cake during this time can't even lift their heads at their desks and have to keep their mouths shut tight.

The aroma of fresh flower cakes eaten by colleagues is too enticing, if they don't keep their mouths shut tight, tears of regret might easily flow from the corners of their mouths.

Food lovers have gone crazy, and Qin Huai is also feeling a bit crazy.

Qin Huai didn't expect that, despite the difficulty being moderate and unnecessary to involve Zheng Siyuan in the discussion, the progress on this snack has been stagnant for so long.

Despite the lack of progress, Qin Huai does not intend to involve Zheng Siyuan. Qin Huai knows very well that the current lack of progress is due to his unfamiliarity with Red Silk Cake, lacking a clear concept, while Wang Gen Sheng's ability to articulate his taste is extremely limited, and he is a complete novice.

Involving Zheng Siyuan would not benefit his culinary development or future career at all, and Zheng Siyuan definitely doesn't have the recipe for Red Silk Cake (Qin Huai asked), so there's no need to involve him unnecessarily.

Qin Huai can bear this burden by himself, as this is his side task, after all.

For Qin Huai, he is now facing two dilemmas.

One is Wang Gen Sheng's description of the Red Silk Cake's flavor, focusing on its very sweetness without being cloying. Considering Wang Gen Sheng isn't someone who loves sweets, and people back then didn't consume sugar as much as they do now, his definition of "very sweet" should be on the sweeter side of normal sweetness.

This difficulty isn't too high, with Qin Huai's current seasoning skills, as long as the direction is clear, he can certainly nail it in a very short time.

Moreover, Wang Gen Sheng didn't say the flavor of Qin Huai's fresh flower cake deviated too much, just that it's somewhat different, which means the overall direction is not wrong, there's an issue with the details of the ingredients.

Red Silk Cake likely added other ingredients for flavoring on top of the rose cake's basic ingredients.

The bigger challenge Qin Huai faces now concerns the pastry crust.

It's very dry, yet needs to be a puff pastry, prone to crumbling excessively when touched, and the texture is different from the current fresh flower cake Qin Huai creates, and most importantly, Red Silk Cake must be delicious, meaning there should be no technical problems.

With Qin Huai's current pastry techniques, achieving these contradictory and complex conditions is virtually impossible.

Now, Qin Huai doesn't want to bring in Zheng Siyuan, he rather wants to bring Zhao Cheng'an.

"These are all the problems I've faced after a week of making Red Silk Cakes. Zhao Cheng'an, what do you think? I personally feel the issue with the filling is trivial, but the crust really gives me a headache. What kind of pastry technique would allow me to make it technically excellent, yet dry and crumbly, still tasting good?"

"And it has to be long-lasting."