39. Cooking The Manga Dish

Xiangling continued to read. She was increasingly impressed with the manga the more she flipped the pages. Starting from the culinary academy, of which only 10% of them could graduate, the building that Xiangling thought was a castle, and a long-distance communication device.

"This communication device reminds me of the thing the Grand Sorceress of Mondstadt had when she visited Liyue two years ago. Is this device in the manga inspired by that device?" She said while glancing at Guoba. But he just tilted his head as he didn't understand what Xiangling meant.

Since no one answered her, she flipped page after page while enjoying the story.

"But, this academy. Nearly all who enrolled in the academy were people from wealthy families. And they are looking down on everyone who owns a small restaurant. This is terrible."

Then, a new heroine appeared.

"God's tongue?"

At first, she thought that the heroine was an incarnation of a god. But, she was thinking too much.

Well, the heroine has an ultra-acute sense of taste. With it, she can detect even the tiniest imperfections in any dish with only a single taste.

Xiangling felt it must be incredible to have such a tongue. If she had, she could tell when her dishes weren't good enough, and made improvements afterward.

A few moments later, Xiangling has reached the third chapter where the food is ready to be served.

"Furikake Gohan? It must be a kind of dish from Inazuma. And what are those transparent cubes? And they melt in the heat of rice…"

Reading up to this point, Xiangling drooled while her eyes were sparkling after seeing the delicious looking food in the manga.

Xiangling immediately closed the manga before standing up. She handed the manga over to Guoba before she pulled up the net she had previously thrown into the sea. And even if the catch wasn't much, it was enough to try new seafood recipes. After seeing the dish in the manga, she couldn't help but wanted to immediately try cooking the same dish.

— — — —

Wangshu Inn, Bishui Plains.

The boss of the Wangshu Inn, Verr Goldet, sat on her desk while holding a new manga. As an undercover agent of the Tianquan, she has an intelligence corps to gather information throughout Liyue, except for The Chasm as that region is too dangerous for his men. Naturally, Manga Impact is also on her radar.

"How interesting. It seems that the author is also a chef. Yanxiao probably sensed the arrival of a new rival after reading this." Verr Goldet laughed quietly after reading from the first to the fourth chapter of Shokugeki no Sōma. Then, she stood up and walked into the kitchen.

In the kitchen, she saw a man preparing the ingredients for cooking. He is a tall and well-built man with rugged features, fair skin, and dark eyes. His hair is black, short, and spiky. He wears a brown vest over a short-sleeved white undershirt. That man is Yanxiao, a chef at the Wangshu Inn.

Hearing the sound of high heels behind him, Yanxiao looked back.

"Oh, boss. Any more orders?"

"Don't you want to try to read the manga?" Verr Goldet asked him.

Yanxiao naturally knew such a book as it had been the talk of the visitors recently. But, he wasn't interested in that thing since he felt cooking was more enjoyable. He shook his head.

"I'd rather experiment with new recipes than read the manga."

"Hehe. Are you sure? Look at this!" Verr Goldet put the manga on the table in front of him.

"Food Wars? Does it tell a story about a cooking competition?"

"I'm not sure. This was just published today. The story is about a young boy who has the skills to cook and enrolls in a culinary academy that has a 10% graduation rate. But don't get it wrong. This not only tells the story of the young man, but also the dishes that are served, accompanied by an explanation of how to cook and what the ingredients are."

Hearing her explanation, Yanxiao frowned. It was unbelievable if someone dared to give out the recipes through the manga since a lot of people would read it. Perhaps, the one who made the story just wanted to troll and gave the false ingredients. However, since his boss said so, he decided to give it a try.

Then, he started to flip the page of the manga.

After a few minutes…

"This… I need to try!"

Yanxiao prepared the ingredients from potatoes, mushrooms, onions, packs of bacon, butter, wine, sweet liquor, and soy sauce.

He started to peel the potatoes and sliced them. Then, he chopped the mushrooms and onions into equally-sized Brunoise. The next step is steaming the potatoes until they are softened. So he steamed them for around 17 minutes.

While doing so, he fried the onions and mushrooms with a tablespoon of butter until caramelized.

After the potatoes had finished steaming and the mushrooms as well as onions were cooked, Yanxiao started mashing the potatoes, then mixed the mushrooms and onions until the ingredients were even in the bowl. He also didn't forget to sprinkle the salt.

A few moments later, he formed the mix into a log shape before wrapping it fully, without leaving any gaps. Then he tied it with the cooking twine.

After tying it, he baked it in the oven, at least until the bacon was golden.

While waiting for it to cook, he prepared the sauce. He brought the wine to a boil for around 10 minutes before adding the butter, sake, and soy sauce to the wine, then cooking them further for 2 minutes.

When the baking was done, he removed the twine. Then, he poured the finished sauce onto the roast slowly.

The tantalizing and fragrant aroma of the roast pork struck Yanxiao's nose. Even the appearance of the dish tempted him to try it himself.

Verr Goldet who was at the reception desk immediately knew that the dish was ready to be served. So, she immediately went to the kitchen.

After looking at the dish, she exclaimed.

"That… Although it looks a little bit different, it is definitely similar to the one in the manga."

"Well, looks like I baked it wrong. Only one side is crunchy and the others aren't."

"But, it still looks delicious. Let me try first."

Without waiting for Yanxiao to reply, Verr Goldet picked up a knife and fork. Then cut the pork and try a bite.

As soon as her tongue tasted the bacon juices soaked into the mashed potatoes, she couldn't resist taking a few more bites. Yanxiao was surprised when looking at her expression. Then he glanced at the manga.

"This recipe is real. Did that mean the author of this manga is an expert in the culinary world?"

Yanxiao didn't expect that the recipe in the manga wasn't just trolling. He was impressed with the author who is willing to share his knowledge in the culinary world through the manga.

— — — —

Meanwhile, the latest manga stock, Food Wars: Shokugeki no Soma is almost sold out thanks to someone.

It was Xiangling who actually surprised the customers at the Wanmin restaurant when she managed to make Roast Pork: Just Kidding no different than in the manga.

Actually, many of the customers didn't realize that the dish was from a manga. But when someone noticed that Xiangling's dish was the same as the poster on Manga Impact, the customers try to read the manga by borrowing or buying it immediately.

Now, they realize that the recipes in the new manga are based on real-life dishes. They also knew that the author was the owner of the shop. However, they didn't understand why the owner of the shop was willing to share the recipes through the manga. On the other hand, they admire Xiangling who could even imitate the dish on her first try.

As for Xiangling herself, she felt a deep respect for Ryūhei who could even think of how to make the fake Roast Pork. Xiangling tasted herself that the Pork Roast: Just Kidding was so delicious, and it didn't take a lot of meat as the main ingredient to make it.

She muttered.

"Perhaps I should ask for some advice from him. Just like how he told me to make another octopus dish at that time."