I'm the Culinary God

Lin Xu was no stranger to chicken meatball.

He’d already made plenty of similar dishes before, and was completely at ease with it.

But today, since the chicken was going to be turned into rice porridge, his interest was piqued.

Xie Baomin first used the back of his knife to finely pound the Chicken Breast, then, based on the amount of Chicken Breast, placed a few chunks of Cooked Pig Fat on top.

Then he kept using the back of the knife to pound, turning both the Chicken Breast and Pork Fat into a fine paste.

As he pounded, Xie Baomin said to Lin Xu:

"If you don’t add Pork Fat, the texture won’t be rich, but too much makes it greasy, so normally you keep the Pork Fat under thirty percent, and you’re basically fine."

The thirty percent ratio isn’t absolute, because some Chicken Breast is leaner, and some Pork Fat has higher fat content, so you can’t treat it as a fixed rule.

While pounding with the back of the knife, Xie Baomin kept explaining to Lin Xu.

But seeing Lin Xu idle with nothing to do, he said:

"Don’t just stand around, junior brother. There’s Spinach over there—use the juicer to squeeze out some Spinach juice. Only use the leaves, not the stems. Tai Chi Chicken Porridge is a two-color combo, normally the green is done with Spinach juice."

Old Gao on the side said:

"Don’t limit your junior brother with that kind of talk. Two-color Chicken Porridge can be done in many ways—the red from red rice, black from ground seaweed or fat choy, even purple, blue, coffee color and so on, all can be made. In cooking, technique can be a limit, but you must never let your imagination be limited."

The little disciple was amazingly gifted; he mustn’t let a single sentence from the senior disciple box in his thinking.

Lin Xu silently took note and nodded, saying:

"I’ve got it, Master. I’ll practice more later and make a Five-colored Chicken Porridge."

Lin Xu was actually just saying that casually, after all Tai Chi only uses two colors. With five colors, the contrast in hues would be much stronger and the presentation would look better.

But just as he finished speaking, a system notification sounded in his mind:

"Host has resolved to make a five-color Chicken Porridge, triggering side quest[Five-colored Chicken Porridge]: Host must, before midnight on New Year’s Eve, make one Five-colored Chicken Porridge rated no lower than Superior. Upon completion, reward: one Perfect Level vegetarian imitation dish lottery draw."

Vegetarian imitation dish lottery draw?

That’s a pretty good reward—make a Superior dish and get a Perfect Level reward, that’s a cross-tier bonus.

But Lin Xu had barely been excited for a minute when he discovered that the Cooking Learning Card in his inventory was now locked, and the Memory Exchange Card was showing that it would only unlock on the first day of the new year.

Damn!

He’d just thought it was a great thing and forgotten about the rule that he couldn’t take shortcuts on quest dishes.

Happy for nothing... Lin Xu muttered inwardly, deciding that when Master cooked later, he absolutely had to watch the steps carefully—there was no way he was missing out on this quest reward.

He picked off the washed Spinach leaves and used the juicer to squeeze out a bright green vegetable juice.

Once it was juiced, he set it aside, waiting for further use.

Xie Baomin used the back of his knife to pound the Cooked Pig Fat and Chicken Breast into a fine mince, then cracked in two Egg Whites, piled all the meat paste together again, and pounded it once more so the meat paste and Egg Whites would fully mix.

Only after all that was the pounding step for the meat paste finally done.

Next, he carefully scraped the meat paste into a bowl with his chef’s knife, then looked at Old Gao and asked:

"Master, are you doing it or am I?"

"You season it directly, and explain the key points to your junior brother while you’re at it."

"Got it!"

Xie Baomin turned to Lin Xu and said:

"Watch closely, junior brother. From here on, the steps are different from the chicken bean curd and other dishes you usually make with chicken meatball—every step has its own particular logic."

Lin Xu, hearing that, immediately pulled himself together and watched Baomin’s movements with full concentration.

He saw Baomin pick up a bowl of Chicken Soup and slowly pour it into the pounded chicken meatball, then use chopsticks to stir and whip it so that the chicken meatball, which had been stuck together, could blend into the Chicken Soup.

When that was done, he took a fine mesh strainer and strained the loosened chicken meatball once.

"There are membranes in Chicken Breast. If you don’t remove them, the texture will be bad and the porridge won’t be smooth enough, so you have to strain it to clear out the membranes."

When they were pounding earlier, Lin Xu had thought there was no straining step; he hadn’t expected it to be left until now.

After straining, Xie Baomin added over half a bowl of Chicken Soup to the chicken meatball.

The meatball mixture, already quite thin, became even thinner. Once he’d combined it evenly, he added a small spoon of salt and a touch of fine white sugar to boost the umami.

He kept stirring, letting the seasonings dissolve.

Then he set it aside. Taking advantage of this moment, Baomin cracked five Egg Whites into a bowl and rapidly whisked them with chopsticks.

Lin Xu asked curiously:

"Didn’t you already add Egg White just now? We still need more?"

"Yeah. Those just now were to increase the viscosity of the meatball; these are to increase the silky mouthfeel. That way the Chicken Porridge will actually feel smooth when you eat it."

This dish was really particular.

Compared to the dishes he’d learned before that also used chicken meatball as the base, this Chicken Porridge was indeed a bit more troublesome and complex.

Once the Egg Whites were fully beaten, Xie Baomin brought over the chicken meatball that had cooled to about the right temperature and added some starch water to increase the viscosity.

Then he poured in the beaten Egg Whites and kept stirring, letting the Egg Whites and starch water fully blend into the meatball.

After that, Baomin poured out half of the meatball mixture and added the vegetable juice Lin Xu had just juiced, mixing it into a green meatball paste.

When this step was done, Old Gao said: