Abnormal Gourmet Chronicle
Chapter 130 - 111 Teaching You to Like (Thanks to Guo Qiuqiu for the Alliance Leader’s reward!)

Chapter 130: Chapter 111 Teaching You to Like (Thanks to Guo Qiuqiu for the Alliance Leader’s reward!)

The joyous moments are always fleeting, and soon it was time for Chen Yingjun and the fruit dumplings to say goodbye.

In the following days, Zheng Siyuan made several more kinds of fruit dumplings for Chen Yingjun to try, and Chen Yingjun ate with great enjoyment, eventually settling on apple, date, and peach dumplings.

Two dates were used, symbolizing good fortune in pairs, to bring a good omen to the most upscale gift box.

As Chen Yingjun chewed on the peach dumpling, looking at its pink exterior, with a white and yellow hue inside, and a core in the deepest part, tears almost fell from his eyes.

Such delicious things will not be as easily available in the future.

Chen Yingjun had already signed a contract with Zheng Siyuan, paid all the fees in one go, achieving the feat of being able to be voted as the Best Client of the Year.

However, the promotional activities on the property company’s side needed time, and so did the customization of the gift boxes. Meanwhile, Zheng Siyuan also needed rest.

Of course, rest was just an excuse; primarily, it was because Zheng Siyuan himself was not very fond of making dumplings. Usually, he only needed to make a few while teaching Qin Huai. Once he took orders, there would be a fixed daily output, which would compress his time to make his beloved flaky pastry, Dingsheng Cake, fresh meat mooncakes, and Crispy Cookies.

Zheng Siyuan didn’t feel President Chen’s sadness at all.

"President Chen, since the specific contents of the gift box have been finalized, once the delivery date is set, you only need to send someone over to pick up the goods every day," Zheng Siyuan said. "Do you have any other questions?"

"Can I buy 20 pounds of flaky pastry to take home today?" Chen Yingjun asked sadly.

Zheng Siyuan: ...?

Facing Zheng Siyuan’s puzzled gaze, Chen Yingjun immediately changed his words: "10 pounds will do."

"Ah no, 5 pounds."

"3 pounds, Little Master Zheng, you have to give me 3 pounds at least. We have a whole family of 3 + 2 cats!"

Zheng Siyuan slowly said, "Even if you didn’t talk about cooperation, as a guest, it is your freedom to buy as much as you want, it’s just that today..."

"I didn’t make flaky pastry."

"All the snacks made this morning have been sold out, and now the only thing in the store is Master Chen’s egg cake."

Chen An, who had long returned home from work and was watching TV, sneezed and rubbed his nose.

Chen Yingjun felt as if the sky had fallen.

In the end, Chen Yingjun sadly went home holding a box of packaged dumplings and two pounds of egg cake.

After Chen Yingjun left, Zheng Siyuan didn’t go back directly but stayed in the kitchen chatting with Qin Huai.

Qin Huai was still making animal red bean paste buns.

"Your finger skill is incorrect," Zheng Siyuan reminded, "Your fingers shouldn’t be afraid to use force. Press when you need to press, lift when you need to lift. When you’re shaping the snack, you should have a general image in your mind; typically, you should form it in your mind first before you make it."

Seeing the shapeless dough in Qin Huai’s hands, Zheng Siyuan sighed, "I find you really strange."

"Huh?" Qin Huai looked up blankly, struggling with the dough while chatting with Zheng Siyuan, a bit distracted.

"At first, when you made apple dumplings, I thought you had an extraordinary talent in finger skills, practically at a self-taught level, the likes of which had never been seen."

"But later, when you made grape, date, peach, and longan, I felt your talent was average, like a standard beginner."

"But your pear was quite well made."

"Now..." Zheng Siyuan looked curiously at the unexplainable dough in Qin Huai’s hands, "What are you making?"

"Doraemon," Qin Huai said, "This is for Luoluo. Didn’t you just say to go through it in the mind first? I don’t have any specific animal images in my mind, only Doraemon, Snoopy, Hello Kitty, Garfield, and Black Cat Sheriff, so I thought the blue fat man would be easier to make, so I went through it in my mind and now I’m making it."

Zheng Siyuan: ...

Is it possible that what he said about going through in the mind was meant for basic normal animals?

"Now you look more like a beginner than at any time before," Zheng Siyuan sighed. "You are really strange."

"You can make apple dumplings well, but can’t make basic small rabbits. The feeling I get from you now is not just partiality; you are more like someone good at cloze tests but bad at listening comprehension."

It was obvious that Zheng Siyuan had an aversion to cloze tests.

"I don’t know what’s going on either." Qin Huai continued trying to make the blue fat man, "Before I met you all through Uncle Wang, the best snack maker I knew was Master Qin, who had a chestnut flaky pastry shop at the back door of our neighborhood."

Seeing the puzzled expression on Zheng Siyuan’s face, Qin Huai explained, "Qin is a common surname where I come from. In elementary school, our class had 57 people, and 17 of them were surnamed Qin, more than those with the surname Wang."

"That Master Qin’s chestnut pastry and green bean cake were especially delicious. He taught me how to make green bean cake. But after teaching me, he found that my green bean cake was tastier than his, so he didn’t teach me the chestnut pastry."

Zheng Siyuan: ...

"I’ve never learned any so-called techniques systematically, nor have I systematically studied the ratio of ingredients, or even understood them very well. My mom always bought the usual vegetables; we ate whatever was cost-effective at the market."

"You may think it’s strange that I can make some things well and others like this, but for me, I’ve been making snacks like this my whole life."

"Making Four Happiness Dumplings was very difficult. According to online recipes and the Snack Encyclopedia’s recipes, I couldn’t get it right no matter what. Nobody taught me about the synergy and matching of ingredients. I remembered at that time, for trial recipes, it was simply buying whatever was available at the market, using brute force, trying things one by one."

"Luoluo ate poorly made Four Happiness Dumplings for two months. All my New Year’s money was spent figuring it out."

"But making some snacks was really simple, like fried dough stick, pea cake, Crab Cake, Crab Shell Cake; these snacks were seen in recipes like Four Happiness Dumplings. There weren’t even video tutorials because back then we didn’t have a computer at home."

"But those snacks were made smoothly, learned with just a few tries."

"And kneading dough, although my dough kneading was theoretically taught by Director Qin, even Director Qin himself didn’t understand it. No one taught me how to knead dough for steamed snacks or baked snacks, but I just knew."

"So sometimes even when Master Zheng speaks very abstractly, always saying ’you know that feeling, right? Do you understand that feeling?’ I do understand what Master Zheng is talking about because I’ve always relied on feeling to make snacks."

"So if you ask me why I can only make apple dumplings well, I can only say that it felt really good when I made them."

Qin Huai finished speaking.

Zheng Siyuan fell into deep thought.

During the conversation, he had finished his battle with the dough, shaping the prototype of a big-headed blue fat man.

Zheng Siyuan watched as Qin Huai used tools to add eyes and whiskers to the blue fat man.

"I remember you made Hedgehog Bun really well," Zheng Siyuan said, "How did you learn to make that?"

"That was also from the Snack Encyclopedia." Qin Huai re-added the eyes after the first failed attempt, "My hedgehog bun wasn’t good-looking at first, it was completely honed through practice. Luoluo especially liked eating hedgehog buns when she was young."

Zheng Siyuan fell into deep thought.

Qin Huai took out a small pot to steam the blue fat man alone.

After a while, the blue fat man was done, and Qin Huai made the final touches.

It was ugly.

Adorably ugly.

But the taste shouldn’t be bad; it was made from Qin Huai’s dough and filling, so it would definitely be edible.

"Tsk tsk tsk." Even Qin Huai couldn’t help but click his tongue at his craftsmanship, "It’s really too ugly. Luoluo will be out of school in an hour; I’ll make another one with meat stuffing for her."

"I get it now." Zheng Siyuan said.

"Huh?" Qin Huai was puzzled again.

Why was Zheng Siyuan becoming so unpredictable lately?

"I know how to teach you finger skill now, teach you the ones you like." Zheng Siyuan said.

"The ones I like? What do I like?" Qin Huai still looked puzzled.

He didn’t quite understand finger skills. These past two days, he either made apple dumplings or animal red bean paste buns. One was particularly difficult, the other particularly simple, with the ones of moderate difficulty, like lotus cake, thousand layer cake, Golden Thread Roll, not yet attempted.

"You like what Luoluo likes." Zheng Siyuan said firmly, "If you’re tired, go home and sleep first. I’ll wait here for Luoluo to finish school and ask her what kind of beautiful snacks she likes to eat."

"Whatever she wants to eat, I’ll teach you how to make it."

Qin Huai: ?

For some reason, Qin Huai felt like he was not far from becoming the second brother.

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