Chapter 3 – Chicken Dishes
Translated by Prosperousfood.com
Rehosted by Gumihou at kitchennovel.com
The groceries wet market nearby was very crowded. There were several greengrocers and fruits vendor in the wet market, offering a wild assortment of fresh vegetables and fruits for sale.
Because of the Vegetarian Virus, human beings had avoided eating meat for close to 80 years. One positive impact of this virus is that the chefs had managed to create a bewildering number of vegetarian recipes. Customers seeking vegetarian dishes have a wide range of options to choose from. The vegetarian dishes in this world are much tastier and richer in variety than that of Earth.
Of course, Ye Chui came to this wet market to not to purchase vegetables, but to purchase mutton. The mutton is the key ingredient in making roast lamb skewers, and he needs to marinate these muttons so that he can sell the roast lamb skewers at night.
Within the wet market, there were only a few stalls selling meat products. Although the vaccine had made meat safe for consumption, the majority of the consumers at this period in time had not adjusted their diet to accept meat yet. The inherent bias towards meat means that many of the citizens could not accept the concept of eating meat. This resulted in a strange situation – that most of the meats available for sale were much cheaper than the vegetables!
Very few people actually purchased meat products. This allowed Ye Chui to take advantage of cheaper prices to purchase roast lamb skewers for sale.
Talking about roast lamb skewers, Ye Chui is quite familiar with this dish. In his past life, he had sold roast lamb skewers as well when he was a teenager. This could be considered his point of entry into the cooking world.
After he was switched over into this world, he had to restart everything from scratch. The fact that he had ended up selling roast lamb skewers again is, in Ye Chui’s opinion, heaven’s will.
Of course, Ye Chui’s experience as a master chef on Earth gave him a huge advantage. The food that he had made and sold is of a much higher quality and standard. As a result, he managed to sell a large number of roast lamb skewers every night.
When the mutton store owner saw Ye Chui, he immediately greeted Ye Chui with a broad smile, “You came to purchase more mutton? Quick, come and see, these meats are very fresh and I just hurled them from the slaughterhouse this morning.”
Ye Chui had become a regular customer of this store. For the last two weeks, he had been frequenting this store to purchase the mutton he needs for his business, and is familiar with the store owner. Ye Chui nodded his head, and began to examine the meat.
For roast lamb skewers, the most suitable parts are the fore tendon meat, also known as shoulder shanks. Fore tendon refers to the meat on the two front legs of the lamb. This type of meat had muscles on them, and the muscles and meat are joined together. When roasted, the lamb skewers are really tasty.
Other than this cut, the meat on the back of the lamb, also called ‘Loin meat’ could also be used to make great lamb skewers. As well, the lamb rack is also a good choice.
The Cuts of lamb
Using his knowledge and eye for the cuts, he quickly chose the parts he wanted. He purchased a total of 50 jin (about 25 kg) worth of mutton. This should be enough to make approximately 1000 roast lamb skewers, and should be enough to last him for one night.
The price of the mutton here is relatively cheap. Each of the cuts he chose is only $20 per jin. 50 jin of the mutton only cost $1000. Considering that Ye Chui sold each stick of roast lamb skewers at $2 per stick, and minus his cost, he could make $700 or so per night.
For the boss of the mutton stall in the wet market, Ye Chui is one of his biggest customers. As such, he was very happy to serve Ye Chui. He cut the mutton accordingly to Ye Chui’s specifications. After cutting the mutton, he packed the large cuts of muttons neatly, and helped Ye Chui to hurl the heavy bags of mutton to Ye Chui’s tricycle, which was parked outside the shop.
After he had moved his purchases to the tricycle, Ye Chui recalled that he had promised his sister, Wang Shiyu to cook her a yummy lunch. Therefore, he looked around him and see what he could purchase to make the yummy lunch. Ever since he had been reborn, he had always spent the vast majority of his time preparing and tending to the mutton stall. He had not cooked in earnest for a long time, and he is quite eager to do so.
Looking at the few meat stalls available, Ye Chui suddenly set his eyes on a stall that specialize in chicken meat.
“Let’s have chicken for lunch!”
Ye Chui made up his mind and walked towards that stall.
This stall sells chicken that had been stripped of their feathers. The boss of this stall saw that there is a customer, and immediately tried to hawker his wares. But Ye Chi did not listen to a word he was saying, and instead, he looked around to pick the ‘best’ chicken. After a short while, he finally found a chicken that met his requirements, and handed it over to the stall owner to weigh it.
The boss was quite pleased that he had a customer who purchased something instead of just looking around. But he was quite curious at what Ye Chui was looking for when the latter was choosing the chicken. He asked, “Sir, just now I saw that you have looked at all my products before choosing that chicken. Is there anything that you are specifically looking for?”
Chicken meat had just been introduced to the dining table for less than 2 years. Even the boss of the stall that sells chickens could not be sure of the quality of his chicken. He just enquired out of curiosity.
To Ye Chui, choosing a chicken is not a secret. He then shared his views on choosing a chicken.
“When purchasing a chicken, you need to look at 4 points. These 4 points are the knife mark, the eyes, the skin and the chicken feet.
First of all, you should check for the knife mark. A good chicken should have a clear knife mark, and there should be traces of blood clot near the knife mark. This is because if a chicken died of illness, it will not have knife mark. If the chicken died before it was stabbed, there would not be any blood clot on the knife wound since its blood had already clotted.
Next, you should check the chicken eyes. A good chicken should have bright eyes, and most of the time, the chicken eyes is open or half opened. If the chicken died of an illness, the eyes will sink in, and there is no light in its eyes, and the chicken eyes are closed.
After that, you should look at the skin of the chicken. Blah blah blah….”
As Ye Chiu finished talking, the boss was standing there with his mouth half opened in astonishment. He had not considered that there are so many things to watch out for when choosing a chicken. He immediately replied, “Today I have learned a lot from you. But brother, you can see that my chickens are not the ill type, and all of them are freshly butchered.”
“Of course I am happy with the quality of your chickens. I will definitely return and purchase from you again.” Ye Chui picked up the packet of chicken, smiled and made his way to his tricycle.
The chicken stall owner memorized the words that Ye Chui had said. Each time he had a potential customer who browsed his chickens, he would repeat what Ye Chui had said, as to demonstrate that the chicken he sold was of good quality.
At approximately noon, a fatty who was furiously perspiring rush towards the stall. This fatty was about 30 years of age, and with a large head and big hears, and very fair and white. The sweat continuously poured out from his head, and his shirt was soaked with his perspiration. He looked like he was in a rush, or had a very pressing matter of great urgency.
He stood in front of the chicken vendor, and immediately begin to choose the chicken.
The boss immediately begins to harp on his newfound knowledge, “My chickens are the freshest and the best chicken. Look, when choosing chicken you need to look at 4 factors. These 4 factors are….”
Hearing the explanation of the chicken vendor, the fatty was astounded. He was impressed with the knowledge of this boss, and asked, “You are very familiar with chicken meat? Do you know how to cook chicken?”
“Cook chicken?”
The boss immediately shook his head. “I just sell chicken meat, and am not very good at cooking. Usually, I just boil the chicken and make chicken soup, and this does not require any skills.”
The fatty looked very disappointed, “Oh, I heard your lecture and thought that you are an expert in cooking.”
“Hehe, frankly speaking, I have only heard the methods for choosing great chicken from a kid this morning. That kid really knows a lot, and should be a great cook.” The chicken vendor smiled as he revealed his secret.
“Heard a kid mentioned these?” The fatty eyes immediately lit up. “What does that kid do?”
“This…. actually I am not too sure. You should go and ask the boss of the mutton store. He is very familiar with that kid.”
After listening to the chicken vender, the fatty immediately rushed towards the mutton vendor and inquire more information from him. The mutton vendor did not know where Ye Chui was living in, but he knows the general area. The fatty thanked the mutton vendor and immediately rushed out towards the area where Ye Chui lives.
A short while later, the fatty finally reached the area. He wiped off the beats of perspiration on his head, and panted. Suddenly he caught of a whiff of something, and his nose twitched.
“What a wonderful fragrance…. This is chicken meat! But, how did he cooked it to make it smell so good?”
……
^_^
Translated by Prosperous Food dot Com
Rehosted by Gumihou from kitchennovel dot com.
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