novelraw Chapter 294 - 206: Iron Plate Skewers and Fruit Fried Ice Cream
Chapter 294 - 206: Iron Plate Skewers and Fruit Fried Ice Cream
When it comes to the character of these two, Lin Chen naturally has no doubts, because they both have restaurants under their names and wouldn’t do anything to damage their reputation.
The next thing to consider is what snacks to prepare for tomorrow.
It’s a rare chance to impress renowned chefs, so he must make something that is visually appealing, aromatic, delicious, and ideally with a performative aspect.
Besides, it should meet the essential needs of street vending, being quick to serve, tasty, and possible to prepare in advance.
Speaking of performance, the tantalizing image of teppanyaki squid immediately comes to mind.
"Wait a minute, teppan? Teppanyaki seems to be one of the cooking techniques Little Japan excels at, perfect!"
Aside from teppanyaki squid, teppanyaki barbecue is also a performative snack, with a variety of options, just right to use marinating skills, and give this Sakura Chef a crash course.
Since we’re using the teppan already, might as well go all the way.
French cuisine is famous for its desserts, and as a Michelin Chef from the Romantic Country, Chef Marchello is surely skilled in making desserts, so let’s have him do stir-fried ice cream with fruits.
Stir-fried ice is a specialty from the south of Great Xia, which later became popular nationwide, becoming a unique street snack.
Stir-fried ice is known for its variable ingredients, myriad flavors, and easy, quick preparation, making it perfect for summer.
Luckily, it’s summer now - one batch can make many portions, delicious, appealing, and fun. These foreigners surely haven’t seen it before.
Aside from stir-fried ice, the snow ice on the food truck can also be used, both methods together, dealing with world-class chefs must go hard.
As for himself...
No rush, let’s think slowly, there’s still time.
Turning his head to glance at Lucas for a few moments, he suddenly realizes it’s been a while since he prepared something nice for this guy, so he asks directly.
"Old Lu, is there anything you’d like to eat that would be suitable for selling at the stall? I’ve planned for the two of them, one to make teppanyaki barbecue and the other to make fruit stir-fried ice and snow ice, and you’ll still make your ice jelly, but for myself, I haven’t thought of anything yet."
"Me?"
Lucas points at himself, "Hey, you’ve finally remembered me, eh? I thought I’d already become a pure tool person by now~"
He just jokingly complains a bit, then starts to think seriously.
"To be honest, I’m a bit tired of making ice jelly, and fridge space here is limited. Unless kept in the restaurant’s kitchen, we can’t prepare much. If we make it tonight, it will be ready for tomorrow, and anyone can serve it."
"But I’m quite interested in those knife-shaved noodles, I’d like to try them. Most foreigners probably haven’t seen noodles made like that. Is there any dish that could go with knife-shaved noodles?"
As soon as he finishes speaking, he adds, "By the way, is there any crayfish for sale around here? Eating some spicy crayfish in the summer would be great, and the sauce could mix with the knife-shaved noodles nicely."
"Spicy crayfish with knife-shaved noodles?"
Lin Chen is stunned.
Not to mention, that’s a pretty good idea. At previous stalls, he tried using spicy crayfish sauce to make hand-grabbed seafood and mixed instant noodles, and the customer feedback was surprisingly positive.
If we do this, it’s quite fitting for the gourmet festival atmosphere, delicious, pretty, and most importantly filling, without worrying about customers ordering a lot at once, and can fetch a good price.
With some free time now, he quickly calls Boss Magna to confirm.
Crayfish are a completely different species from lobsters, usually living in dirty environments like streams, ditches, and fields. A seafood vendor probably wouldn’t deal with them, right?
After asking, it turns out he was right, Boss Magna doesn’t sell crayfish.
So he logs into the supplier platform to check Shunfu’s back end. There are some, but they’re frozen, not fresh crayfish.
Maybe... ask Boss John?
"What’s that, crayfish? Sure, plenty of them! They’re so overrun in the ponds that no one eats them. I’m actually worrying whether I should find someone to deal with them, no idea why the boss even wanted to bring them in."
"Great! Please don’t get rid of them, save them all for me. I’ll use them at my stall tomorrow! Could you catch them as soon as possible, deliver them tonight if you can, the sooner the better!"
No one eats them, which means dirt-cheap prices, it’s gonna be another profitable day!
"Really?"
Lucas’s eyes light up with excitement, eagerly licking his lips.
"Will we have our fill? We should do some flavors, garlic and spicy for sure, right? I could eat seven or eight pounds myself!"
"If you eat it yourself, you clean it yourself!"
"No problem~"
Hearing there’s free food, what’s a bit of work? He eagerly agrees, patting his chest, while already imagining how he’ll photograph everything tomorrow.
He hasn’t taken any pictures today, as he’s been too busy. Tomorrow’s schedule doesn’t seem too packed, and the dishes they’re making are perfect for photography, certain to grab the audience’s interest.
Lin Chen glances at the personnel setup on site, his group of four people, Jonathan’s group of three, plus the two head chefs, a total of four service staff, four who can cook independently, Lucas counting as half, only able to help with desserts and such.
Given the situation, it seems like there might not be enough dishes?
After thinking carefully, he still decided not to add new categories.
Whether it’s cleaning crayfish or skewering ingredients for teppanyaki, pre-processing fruits, etc., it all requires a lot of time and manpower.
Jonathan should stay as an assistant; can’t have everyone assigned, or it would be troublesome if things get too busy.
Of the four girls, two will handle the cashier and packing, the other two will assist, plus Lucas, with four helpers, there shouldn’t be any more out-of-stock situations like today.
With today’s experience, ordering at night should be more or less clear; buying more certainly won’t go wrong.
If there are leftovers, he can just sell them himself on Monday.
They still need to consider the amount of crayfish; Boss John isn’t sure how many pounds can be caught from the fields; these things reproduce so quickly that the total population can multiply several times in just over two months.
If crayfish aren’t enough, he’s ready to switch directly to the hand-held seafood method from last time, and it’s still timely for Boss Magna to deliver on short notice.
After going through the whole process in his mind and confirming nothing was missed, he began introducing tomorrow’s dishes to Chef Marchello and Chef Nagishiro Sho.
"Fried ice with fruit?"
Marchello’s eyes showed obvious interest, "Can ice be fried? Are you setting the teppan to below zero?"
"Yes! That’s right, it’s below zero!"
Lin Chen showed them a fried ice video he found online, and even though Nagishiro Sho wasn’t tasked with this, he enthusiastically joined in to watch.
In their understanding, teppanyaki was always about heating; they never thought it could be reversed to cool.
After watching the whole video, their eyes gleamed with bright light.
"Such a simple concept, why didn’t it ever occur to us before?"
The two were not at all complacent despite reaching their current heights; rather, thanks to non-stop exposure to new knowledge in the past two days, they realized their own shortcomings and thought limitations.
"Lin, then what do I do?"
Unable to contain himself, Nagishiro Sho asked eagerly, his face full of expectation.
"It’s still teppanyaki, but with some differences, likely a type Mr. Nagishiro is good at."
Lin Chen then pulled up another video, showing a scene filmed by a food blogger; the entire cooking process was done on a small round iron plate.
Drizzle some oil, place the prepared meat skewers, constantly press, flip with an iron spatula, and finally sprinkle some onions or green onions, it looked very simple.
"Just... like this?"
Nagishiro Sho blinked incredulously, thinking Lin Chen was kidding.
Such a level of cooking could be easily done by even a trainee.
"Of course, that’s not all."
Lin Chen smiled and played another video, showing a flame performance of street teppanyaki squid.
Marchello raised an eyebrow: "Not bad, flame performance on an iron plate, very suitable for such a stall setting, I must admit you Great Xia people are truly skilled in creating food, and your ideas are very innovative."
Nagishiro Sho’s expression improved greatly; this method was similar to the onion flame mountain in their Japanese cuisine but without pouring in alcohol, the flame seemed to appear out of thin air.
By comparison, Great Xia’s method appeared more exquisite and didn’t leave customers with a sense of deliberate performance.
But the question was, how did the fire ignite in the first place?
Lin Chen mysteriously smiled, "Let’s keep it a secret for now, Mr. Nagishiro can brainstorm himself, and I’ll demonstrate to you in the morning to see if it’s what you’re thinking."
"Hey, interesting."
Seeing this kid start to sell mystery again, Marchello felt a surge of competitiveness inside.
After witnessing the below-zero teppan fried ice, he felt like his thinking had opened a whole new window.
Given the brainwave of Great Xia people, the secret of the fire on the teppan might be even simpler than imagined.
He did not ask Lin Chen, nor did he search online; he planned to figure out the principle with his own mind.
He had a strong premonition: as long as he could grasp this novel way of thinking in Great Xia’s cooking, his culinary skills would improve significantly.
At his level, everyone’s cooking skills were more or less similar; the difference lay in the ability to innovate thoughts.
A chef who can continually innovate is truly a talented chef.
As times progress, those who can’t keep up with the trend are bound to be eliminated.
Next, Lin Chen picked up a pen and paper, and began jotting down the flavors needed for fried ice and the types of teppanyaki skewers for tomorrow.
"Teppanyaki squid must be there, divided into squid tentacles, squid strips, and large squid, also octopus legs, then small beef skewers, tenderloin, beef fat skewers, beef tendons, pork belly, chicken cartilage, peeled shrimp..."
"For the veggies, there must be potato chips, baby cabbage and green beans are needed, as well as enoki mushrooms; what about lotus root slices? Write them down first, oh, and also leeks..."