Chapter 429 - 164: One Yuan Per Skewer...

Chapter 429: Chapter 164: One Yuan Per Skewer...

Johansson had moved here from a small town in Northern Europe called Marstrand.

Back in Marstrand, a man from Huaxia had once come to town and rented a room in Johansson’s family home.

One day, his parents were both out at sea, fishing.

Johansson had lunch with that uncle from Huaxia Country, and as a young boy, he became instantly infatuated with one of the ingredients in that meal.

It was springy, tender yet chewy, and had a fragrant flavor he had never encountered before!

He later learned that the dish was called pig’s feet.

After the uncle left, Johansson couldn’t forget the taste of the pig’s feet. That Christmas, his father promised to buy him something he had always wanted.

Johansson said, "I want to eat pig’s feet!"

His father wasn’t exactly keen on the request, but seeing the look of anticipation in his son’s eyes, he took him to the local supermarket and bought a can of pig’s feet.

The young Johansson excitedly opened the can, took out the pale, tender-looking pig’s foot inside, and took a huge bite...

Being a proud young boy, he fought back the violent churning in his stomach and, under his parents’ watchful eyes, forced himself to finish the entire slimy, mushy pig’s foot!

’I swear! That was the most disgusting thing I have ever eaten in my life!’

’I can’t imagine why the same ingredient could have two such extremely different tastes!’

’Ever since then, the sight of meat makes me sick! God, I’ll never eat another bite of meat for the rest of my life!’

This was the self-introduction that eight-year-old Johansson gave on his first day at his new school after moving to Malaysia.

As a result, Johansson, who hadn’t eaten meat in over three years, had the build of a four or five-year-old despite being eight.

Most importantly, his long-term avoidance of meat had caused his immune system to weaken, and he would get sick several times a year.

This was a constant headache for his parents.

When he saw someone at the cooking station cutting up cooked pig’s feet and threading them onto a bamboo skewer...

Johansson slammed his hands on the table in agitation. "I don’t want to see that!"

Su Chen gave an awkward shrug and said to the three people who had paused, "With so many ingredients, some will be well-received, and some won’t. Carry on."

Liu Ahbao, however, gloated slightly. "Some ’Sushi God’. He was the first to ring the bell and ended up with a zero. How embarrassing is that?"

Su Chen glanced at Yoshikazu Ono, who was returning from the stage.

Just moments before, he had thrown the sushi he’d made into the trash can, a sight that made many in the audience wince with regret.

Su Chen just shook his head and smiled faintly.

If the competitor from Japan insisted on bringing the Ono Family’s rigid methods to the competition, he was certain they would ultimately... return in failure!

If the six judges had actually tasted the sushi before scoring, Su Chen believed Yoshikazu Ono would have definitely received a high score.

The ingredients they used were the absolute finest and freshest in the entire market!

That’s why it’s said that at the Ono Family’s restaurant, customers can’t place orders. Instead, they eat whatever is being made that day.

Because back when Jiro Ono was still active, his family would go to the seafood market to select only the best ingredients. If certain ingredients didn’t meet Jiro Ono’s standards, he simply wouldn’t make sushi with them that day!

From this perspective, their sushi restaurant was indeed a very responsible establishment.

But in Su Chen’s view, ’if you only ever select the most premium ingredients, then what’s the point of a chef?’

He didn’t approve of that kind of culinary philosophy.

While lost in thought, Su Chen noticed the rich, fragrant aroma of the spices wafting from the rapeseed oil was beginning to subside.

’The aroma of the spices has almost completely evaporated; it’s all infused into the rapeseed oil now!’

’It’s time for the final step!’

Immediately, once the oil temperature had dropped slightly, Su Chen poured the pre-mixed blend of three types of chili peppers into the wok all at once.

SIZZLE!

In an instant, the calm oil erupted into a boil, its surface bubbling furiously.

Along with it came the spicy fragrance of the chili peppers. The aroma was just right—not at all overpowering, but you could still sense the fragrant heat within it!

He pushed and pulled the ladle through the wok several times, scooping up a spoonful of oil and pouring it back in. The rapeseed oil had now taken on an incredibly enticing, chili-red hue!

"Ah Bao! A hand here!"

Liu Ahbao swallowed the saliva that was constantly pooling in his mouth. "Coming!"

A fine-mesh sieve was placed over a stainless steel basin. He poured the oil from the wok through the sieve, filtering out all the spice residue and chili flakes, leaving only the clear, red oil to flow into the basin.

"Boss, a batch of chili oil like this could sell for a lot of money on the market!"

Su Chen sighed. "It used too many ingredients. Hardly anyone makes chili oil like this anymore..."

Nowadays, most businesses, even those in Sichuan Province itself, just buy their chili oil pre-made online.

This brought to mind a particular characteristic of Sichuanese seasoning.

The fragrant spice, far more intense than in other cuisines, can perfectly mask any unpleasant odors from certain ingredients. It’s precisely because of this trait that large-scale factories can get away with reusing some materials when producing chili oil.

In the end, all that mattered was that the numbing, spicy, and fragrant flavors stood out...

Any other off-flavors would be completely undetectable beneath such an intense profile.

Pure, handmade chili oil like Su Chen’s was truly a rarity on the market these days.