Lu Xinyi was thankful that during her short training under Chef Kawashima’s wing, she was able to learn the basics of making sushi. As for Ye Xieren’s familiarity with the Japanese Cuisine, it put her at a disadvantage. However, three days of training with Chef Kawashima had given her a good foundation to understand foreign cuisine.
In making sushi, the first one needed to master perfectly seasoned sushi rice. Sushi rice was plain short-grain rice that had been steamed and flavored with vinegar, salt, and sugar. It should remain tender at room temperature.
Sushi could feature all different types of fish and vegetables, but it always contained sticky, chewy sushi rice. The subtle sourness of seasoned sushi rice typically came from rice vinegar.
During her first attempt to make sushi, Lu Xinyi mistakenly used mirin instead of rice vinegar, ruining the flavor of her dish. The mistakes she made had greatly improved the quality of her sushi in the succeeding attempts she made.
From Chef Kawashima, she learned that only rice vinegar should be used on making sushi for the other types of vinegar would taste bad.
To produce properly-cooked sushi rice, Lu Xinyi made sure to wash and rinse the rice a few times until no more starch came out from the water. She then let the rice soak for a few minutes before cooking for this would allow the rice grains to yield a better texture.
Once she was done cutting her vegetables, Lu Xinyi took the container with the salmon and put one fillet on her cutting board. Taking the new set of knives she received from her husband, Lu Xinyi took out the customized sashimi knife and an extremely sharp knife from it. It was the kind of knives that Lu Xinyi thought were sharp enough to cut the fish without ruining its meat.
Across her, Ye Xieren had already finished cutting his fish fillets and had started cooking his sushi rice.
A few meters away from the stage, Surya Rathore—together with the Tang twins and Yan Chen—stood, watching the cooking battle between Ye Xieren and Lu Xinyi.
“Brother Ye is already ahead of Sister Lu. I think he’ll finish his bento box first,” he commented.
“That’s already expected, Brother Rathore,” Yan Chen answered him, “He must be really frustrated that Miss Lu is already ahead of him in the ranking.”
Tang Liang nodded and cupped his chin.
“During our entrance examination, Ye Xieren was the crowd’s favorite. It was already expected that he’ll dominate the ranking because of his professional experience, but Xin Jie easily snatched the top spot from him.”
“Ah, that’s because y’all underestimated Xin Jie and other examinees.” His twin sister yawned and rubbed her eyes. “I heard Xin Jie isn’t interested in participating in the Interschool Culinary Competition. Maybe Brother Ye thought he wouldn’t have another chance to challenge Xin Jie because of it.”
Yan Chen frown deepened upon hearing what Tang Lilou said. The sole reason he didn’t issue a challenge against Lu Xinyi was that he thought she’ll aim to earn a nomination for Interschool Culinary Student. In the next two weeks, all the students from Junior and Senior division would compete against each other until two students win the entries.
“Why wouldn’t she?” he asked. ρꪖꪕᦔꪖꪕꪫꪣꫀꪶ
Tang Lilou, knowing her Xin Jie’s character, suspected that it had something to do with Tian Lingyu. If her brother succeeded to earn a spot to represent Silver Leaf Academy at Interschool Culinary Challenge, his career would advance further.
“No idea,” she replied, “but Xin Jie will most likely withdraw her chances.”
“Well, she’s supposed to represent the academy, too, at the World Patisserie Challenge with Han Yixin. Headmistress Han has already told them to start their training. Joining another competition will greatly affect her performance,” her twin brother added.
Back to Lu Xinyi’s kitchen counter, her knife skills had once again left the audience in awe. Compared to Ye Xieren’s swiftness, her precision in terms of cutting and balancing the flavor was her edge against her challenger.
Deciding how thick the fish should be might be a challenge. If the fish was cut too thin, Lu Xinyi would lose the flavor of the fish. Then, at the same time, she didn’t want her fish to be too thick since that would be a hassle later on.
Cutting her fillets into even, uniform slabs; Lu Xinyi examined each fish piece and—in one even motion—trimmed away any uneven sides. To keep her cuts even and fish neat, she wiped her fingers and knife blade on a damp kitchen towel between each cut.
In one swift motion, she sliced off the top 1/8-inch of the filet to remove uneven flesh and skin and trimmed off any dark-colored area of fish. Lu Xinyi repeated these steps to trim and square off her other fillets until all her fish was ready to be cut into sushi-sized portions.
Her performance shocked her challenger. Ye Xieren hadn’t expected that Lu Xinyi would work on her sushi with such familiarity as if she’d been doing the same thing for a long time. When did she learn it? How come that everytime he thought he had surpassed her, he always found her one step ahead of him?
Clenching his fist to his side, Ye Xieren looked away and poured all his attention to his bento box.
Meanwhile, Lu Xinyi continued working on her fish fillets. Now that she had her blocks, she’d have to cut the fish into even thinner slices—which was about a quarter of an inch—in a direction that was against the grain and at a thirty-degree angle.
Positioning her blade at a thirty-degree angle to the filet, Lu Xinyi cut on the bias across the grain, slicing off slabs. Just before she’d cut all the way through the filet, she straightened her knife and sliced down to detach the slab from the filet.
Once she’d sliced all her fillets into slabs, she was ready to proceed with her sushi rice. Taking into account all the reminders Chef Kawashima gave her, Lu Xinyi kept in mind what she learned from him.
Taking the rice out of the electric rice cooker, she used a wooden spoon to handle the cooked rice. From what Chef Kawashima told her, a metal spoon would damage the rice and could also react with the vinegar she’d add later.
Next, Chef Kawashima told her not to scrape the rice out from the bottom of the pot. If it came out easily, good; if not, she’d have to leave it be. The rice at the bottom was dry and burned so it wouldn’t taste so good. Like Ye Xieren, Lu Xinyi opted to use a huge wooden bowl and transferred the cooked rice into it.
He Haotian had kept his silence once Lu Xinyi started seasoning her sushi rice. This one simple dish was critical for her to beat Ye Xieren.
“Xieren is already halfway finished with his bento box. What’s wrong with Lu Xinyi?” Qin Jiahao asked him.
“Nothing’s wrong with her. Unlike your apprentice, Lu Xinyi would rather work slower to minimize her mistakes. Her confidence is backed up by her competence.”
Lu Xinyi might be lacking experience, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t as hardworking as Ye Xieren. He Haotian had forgotten how many times his apprentice attempted to perfect the seasoning until she reached the perfect balance of flavors for the umpteenth time.
“There’s only half an hour left to complete their bento box. She must start working, or else Ye Xieren will win this time,” Han Zhiling said beside He Haotian.
