“If you make an Asian-style dinner, are you going to make all of the side dishes Asian?”
“Well, sticking to the Asian style means giving up Western recipes, so it’s not an advantage, but a disadvantage. I want to prepare a full meal on one table without losing an Asian taste. My first goal is to use all kinds of cooking methods, but let me first think about the recipe.”
Actually, Min-joon had some recipe ideas. For example, there were lots of different cooking methods of Korean dishes. Thanks to his frequent exchanges with Mansik Hong, the Korean master chef, he knew lots of Korean dishes that he could not even imagine without him. So, he borrowed Mansiks’ recipes, it would not be difficult for him to survive today’s competition.
‘But I can’t.’
What he could borrow from Mansik was his cooking know-how. Even if he won by using Mansik’s recipes, his victory today would not be worth it because it was not his, but Mansik’s. In good conscience, he would rather be a loser with integrity than a winner with an unwarranted victory.
Theo asked as if he was curious, “But if you choose Asian dinner, I can understand Min-joon who is from Japan, but how about you, Kaya? Isn’t it difficult for you? It wouldn’t be easy to even come up with an idea.”
“I’m not from Japan, but from Korea. And Kaya’s specialty is not western food.”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I’m confused. Western food is not her specialty?”
“Well, it’s safe to say that all cuisines in the world are Kaya’s specialty.”
To be more honest, it might be more appropriate to call her cooking methods complex. She was familiar with all kinds of cuisine, but she didn’t delve deeply into any particular country.
Because of that, she had been reading many books about cooking, but she was not good at studying, so she lagged behind Min-joon as far as cooking theory was concerned.
But Min-joon wasn’t worried at all.
He said in a confident voice, “Whatever idea I come up with, Kaya can analyze and evaluate it perfectly. Since I trust her, I can challenge an Asian dinner like this.”
“Well, I have nothing to say if you think so. I think I have to be on the alert then.”
“Please relax, so that I can win when you let down your guard. Hahaha.”
Theo smiled gently at his joking.
They were done eating in a more amicable atmosphere than he expected. Considering that they had 3 days left, they didn’t know that they would be having a few more meals like this.
Min-joon looked at the clock. About 30 minutes passed while he was eating with them, but he didn’t feel nervous. There were lots of recipes that came to his mind. However, it was his homework to think about how best to put various recipes together.
“I’m thinking of making bamboo with rice.”
“Bamboo with rice?”
“Yes. I put some soaked rice, jujubes, and chestnuts in a bamboo trunk and steam them.
And I’m thinking about putting some lotus leaves on top of rice. If you want to put other herbs other than lotus leaves, that’s not bad either.”
This was the charm of fusion cuisine. A typical Korean chef usually used other Korean ingredients, such as lotus leaves, when making changes to bamboo with rice. But various herbs such as basil and sage could be used instead of lotus leaves, of course.
“Is there something like a bamboo trunk in the pantry?”
“I have to ask the organizers for it. This isn’t something they have to prepare for a long time. As long as they can bring it on the very day when we start, there would be no problem.”
“But if the rice itself has such a strong scent, can it really match with other ingredients? You told me there was even a difference between white rice and black rice. You also said you had to use white rice to be able to enjoy the taste of other ingredients properly.”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“But if you use bamboo trunk, lotus leaves, jujube, and chestnuts, I’m afraid the scent of rice itself will be too strong. Can you make it match with other dishes?”
“Hey, we’ve always been confident, as you know. We can try this time,” he said confidently.
Kaya put her hand on her chest then breathed out as if she was nervous.
“Man, I’m nervous this time. To be honest with you, I honestly don’t care if I lose. Just thinking about how the judges will react, my heart is pounding.”
“It matters if we lose! Do you know how much the winner’s prize money is?”
“Shut up! I’m talking about that.”
“Don’t be nervous. We won’t lose this time.”
“Can you guarantee it?”
“Well, I’m not supposed to stand confident for you even if you are close to me… Ooops!”
“Don’t make a rod for your own back.”
“You already hit me,” said Min-joon, touching his side as if it hurt.
She snorted at him, gently tapping the countertop.
“Just shut up and devise a recipe. Let’s assume we’re using a sous vide. So, how do you use it?”
“Definitely sous vide is for chicken. Personally, I don’t think I’ve ever enjoyed more delicious chicken breasts than those baked in the sous vide way.”
“It tastes better than Popeyes chicken?”
“Well, both chickens are different…”
“Shut up. So, we’re making a chicken with the sous vide method. How about the sauce? I guess it can smell bad because of jujube and ginkgo in rice…”
“Yeah, how to get rid of that smell is the key.”
Min-joon wouldn’t have thought of this in Korea because he was so used to it, but the judges were not Korean. So, he had to come up with a method that best suited their tastes.
‘What would be the best way?’
There were two ways of getting rid of the smell of meat and the fishy smell of seafood. One of them was to remove it with sauce or lemon juice, and the other one was to bring out the taste properly so that customers could take it pleasantly.
Min-joon had to choose between the two, but he already decided which way to choose.
“You can’t give up on the unique smell of the ingredients.”
“It could be pretty exotic in this case.”
“If you are so scared about it, you should not have recommended it to me from the beginning.”
“Hey, you got cold feet until a little while ago, but you are playing aggressively now. Well, you look manly now.”
When she teased him with a smile, he blushed as if he was shy. He was almost 30, but he found himself a bit embarrassed to hear her saying that.
She liked his aggressive attitude like that.
‘Yeah, you have to keep running until you achieve your goal.’
She decided she would not stop running with him. She wanted to find her place on the windows shining in the sunlight on the tall building downtown which she always looked up at when she was in the dark Harlem alley. She intended to find it. So, Min-joon had to be there as well. He was Rachel’s tacit successor and the next candidate for Rose Island’s next representative.
He was also a genius chef with a perfect palate unprecedented in history, who developed Cho Reggiano which opened a new history of American desserts.
Perhaps, there were not many who hold as many titles as Min-joon at his age. As far as Kaya knew, there were not many in America. Sometimes there were some who won Michelin stars in their early twenties after working in a restaurant without even graduating from middle school, but even they did not attain the same reputation and prestige as Min-joon.
Considering that Min-joon didn’t have the opportunity to fully show his skills because he hadn’t opened his restaurant yet, it was not difficult to imagine he would show the best of his abilities when he actually opened his own restaurant. But Kaya wasn’t nervous.
Glaring at him, she opened her mouth.
“It’s good for you to choose to make our dish exotic, but you know you have to think about the balance. Choosing exotic dishes while giving up local dishes is completely different.”
“I guess so. So, I’m not going to make all dishes taste like vegetables. That’s enough with rice and chicken. Beef tastes different, depending on which part you use, but I’m thinking of mixing beef bourguignon with steamed ribs properly.”
“If you think about it, the two have quite a lot in common. It’s probably the most comfortable way to introduce Korean cuisine to the French.”
“The problem is the fish dish. In the case of chicken, if he can boil some back garlic juice or onion juice and add sauce to it, it will have a subtle sweetness, but with a good taste, not to mention the sweet ribs. If even the fish tastes sweet …”
“Well, it’s rather complicated. I think it would be okay to make it salty but moderately spicy.”
“But the problem is that the fish dish might have a pretty sweet taste.”
“By the way, aren’t you thinking about any pork dish?” she asked as if she was curious.
He said, shrugging, “Actually, it doesn’t matter if you include pork, but the reason why I thought of making one dish each from fowls, fish, and the meat was because that’s the basic composition in France. I wanted to make the French judges feel something French in this Asian dish.”
“Anyway, you’re rather unique.”
Perhaps, that was why he was different from other chefs. Trying to reflect one’s own philosophy or ideas on the dishes was not something that ordinary chefs would try. It didn’t mean that reflecting a chef’s philosophy was better than not doing it. It could be worse because it could mean he was making something like a norm that would trap him in cooking.
But what if he could make a perfect dish despite such a norm?
‘I wonder if people can view such a norm favorably,’ she thought to herself.
In fact, some people tended to attach some meaning to whatever Min-joon did. She thought it was because of his perfect palate that people tended to think his perfect palate meant he had a perfect talent in cooking. Nobody thought he was just an ordinary chef. Their prejudice that he was a genius chef had the power to make him get good scores no matter what he cooked.
“How about making the sauce separately while taking a cue from the sauce of the braised short ribs?”
“Making the sauce separately?”
“What I mean is…”
Kaya wasn’t scared about how they thought of Min-joon because he recognized her as a partner. A partner didn’t look up at another partner. She didn’t hesitate at all to speak out or express her opinion. While they were talking, they came up with lots of recipe ideas, which would have taken them several weeks or months if they had done it alone.
Almost five hours passed. They kept talking and exchanging opinions with each other while they were preparing the recipes. They even got wet with sweat as if they were exhausted from talking and talking.
‘There is a reason why they call him a genius chef.’
At his young age, Min-joon advanced to the semi-finals of the Paris International Cooking Contest. Even that fact alone was amazing to those who watched them talking and preparing the recipes. Anyway, the Min-joon pair finally finished talking and discussing the recipe ideas, which made them happy all along.
“Alright. Let’s be satisfied with this. We can take care of other stuff while making the dishes.”
“Yes, it sounds like a plan.”
At a glance, she seemed to feel something was lacking.
However, the composition score in his eyes was 10 points.
