Chapter 180

[Chicken Jelly Spaghetti]

Freshness: 99%

Origin: (Too many ingredients for an accurate calculation)

Quality: High

Cooking Score: 7/10

‘7 points with just noodles.’

Cho Min Joon put the finished jelly spaghetti in his mouth. He felt the texture of jelly, but it was soft in a way that was similar to that of noodles. In terms of texture, it was hard to differentiate whether it was noodle or jelly.

Just by tasting the noodles, he could sense the completion. It was inevitable. Inside the noodles were chicken broth, basil, pepper, salt, and more. Janet, who was right next to Cho Min Joon, put the spaghetti in her mouth and opened her eyes wide. Cho Min Joon grinned and asked, “What do you think? Is it good?”

“… It is.”

Janet looked at the spaghetti as if something was wrong. Cho Min Joon knew what that meant.

“Something’s missing, right?”

“I think you should garnish it with something crunchy. Sprinkle a little olive oil, and since the ingredients inside the noodles taste strong, you shouldn’t add any extra herbs.”

They almost never talked about anything personal, but when it came to cooking, Janet was talkative. The only other time she talked was under one circumstance. Janet turned her head and opened her mouth.

“Ella, do you want to try this?”

“Yes!”

“You heard her.”

She looked at him as if she was urging him, and Cho Min Joon laughed. Ella put her chin on top of the cooking station and looked at the plate with sparkling eyes. When she saw the light green noodles, Ella dropped her jaw in awe.

“It looks like jelly!”

“It’s spaghetti made of jelly.”

“You can do that? Then do you add tomato sauce, too?”

“You could… But it wouldn’t taste good.”

Cho Min Joon spoke as if he didn’t really know. Janet brought some tomato paste and said, “This isn’t tomato sauce, but try it. It might be good.”

“Oh, thanks.”

It was not good. Cho Min Joon shook his head and opened his mouth.

“It might be better to serve this cold or make it with vegetable broth instead of chicken and add some seafood on the side.”

“If you’re done thinking, you should taste mine, too.”

“Yours?”

“You have the perfect palate, right? You should use it when you can. But forget it if you don’t want to.”

“Give it to me.”

Cho Min Joon took the plate from Janet’s hands. Janet’s dish was ravioli. But what was different about it was that the ravioli noodles were as thin as plastic and transparent. It was a molecular dish that used starch and lecithin, and it was called film.

It almost looked like the peel of Vietnam spring rolls, but it was so thin and melty that it couldn’t be compared. And inside of it was diced peanuts and cold vegetable broth.

‘The score is 8 points.’

When it came to molecular cooking, without the perfect proportions, it easily failed. That meant that molecular cooking without any mistakes was bound to hit high scores, but Cho Min Joon looked uncertain after tasting Janet’s ravioli.

‘It’s not good compared to the score.’

“… Why? Is it bad?”

“No… It’s just a little machinic.”

Janet’s eyes wavered at his words. Cho Min Joon quickly waved his hands and opened his mouth.

“I’m not talking about you. What I’m saying is… it tastes like it’s been made too perfectly. Good cooking and delicious cooking are different. You know what I mean, right?”

“Yeah.”

“But that doesn’t mean it’s not good. Don’t worry.”

“If it were you…”

Janet smacked her lips. She looked like she wanted to say something, but it wasn’t easy. So Cho Min Joon didn’t press her. He was used to waiting. He was used to listening to other people’s silence. He was that kind of person.

And Janet soon opened her mouth.

“How would you have made it?”

As soon as Cho Min Joon heard that, he understood why Janet hesitated. She had a stiff nature. She was even worse than Kaya. That meant that her personality and pride normally wouldn’t have let her ask that question.

Cho Min Joon answered with a serious face. Since Janet made a difficult decision, he couldn’t answer so easily. Cho Min Joon thought of different recipes in his head. During that process, what he focused on wasn’t the score but the flavor.

The flavors in his mind probably weren’t perfectly accurate, but they were becoming more and more precise. The proof was how the recipes he thought of turned out pretty much the same. That meant his intuition for flavor was becoming better.

“If it was me, I wouldn’t have used potato starch but corn instead. It would be less transparent, but it wouldn’t be as sticky to the tongue. And as for the broth… vegetable broth doesn’t stand a chance against peanut broth’s flavor. Wouldn’t fish broth be better?”

“… You thought about a lot in that short span of time.”

“This is my job. That’s the least I can do, but I can see you want to win now.”

“I still want to do appetizer. But even if 2nd place is the best scenario… I still don’t want to lose.”

Cho Min Joon laughed.

“I feel the same way.”

***

10 days wasn’t a long time. It was a short span of time to learn enough to be able to come up with a molecular cooking recipe as beginners.

And the same went for the cooks. They had to follow the recipes given by Rachel every single day, and that applied to both molecular and traditional cooking. And for them, there was something that was more important than nailing the menu. That was…

“Who sharpened my knife?”

Anderson shouted in an annoyed voice. The cooks all looked at each other. The one who stepped up was Maya, who was a young Hispanic woman with baby fat on her cheeks. She cautiously opened her mouth.

“I did. It seemed a little dull…”

“I heard you’re from Great Cuisine, but do they mess with other people’s knives over there? Don’t do what I don’t ask you to do! I hate people touching my knives.”

“Yes, Chef! I apologize!”

She wanted to win some extra points, but all she got was scolding. Her fellow cook, Gerrick, clicked his tongue and said, “If you were going to do that, you should’ve done it to Havier or Min Joon. They would’ve thanked you for it.”

“… I don’t know. I’m done for.”

Maya mumbled with a sad face. Fred, who was a black man from Kenya, spoke in a quiet voice that contrasted his large stature, “She probably didn’t care about them because she knew they’d be nice to her later anyway. If you’re unlucky, you’ll end up with Anderson. He’ll be so mean to you.”

The cooks were already considering the two of them as escapees. Anderson was already showing off his strict side. Of course, being that strict forced them to pay better attention, but everybody was scared about just how scary he would get once the restaurant was open.

Janet wasn’t the type to raise her voice like Anderson, but when you made a mistake, she gave a scary glare. Maya sighed and said, “When I become a demi chef, I won’t turn out like them. I’ll be friendly.”

“I want to work for Min Joon.”

“Min Joon can be strict, too. Of course, he’s better than the other two, but I like how friendly Havier is.”

“That’s because you’ve never experienced them before. Chefs like them turn out to be even scarier when you start working. You’d prefer getting cussed out by Anderson.”

The one who answered was Antonio, who dreamed of working at Rose Island while living in Italy. Maya looked at Antonio and asked, “So are you saying you like Anderson?”

“Yeah.”

“The only person none of us want to work with is Janet.”

“Janet… is really scary. Just standing next to her makes it hard to breathe.”

In response to Antonio’s remark, Gerrick sighed.

“What’s the use in talking about it? The demi chefs will be the ones to choose.”

And that was how it went. Rachel announced that the demi chefs would pick the cooks depending on how they placed in the molecular cooking mission. Maya groaned and opened her mouth.

“I think Min Joon will win. That jelly spaghetti of his is hard to copy. It’s hard to get the right mixture, and it’s hard to push it out of a tube with a syringe…”

“If you think about it, the chefs are no better at molecular cooking than us. So why are they better?”

“Because they have better basics. Anyway, other chefs are older, but Min Joon is seriously impressive. How can a 20-year-old be that talented…? It’s not like he even has any kitchen experience.”

“He probably practiced on his own.”

Cho Min Joon’s abilities became a hot topic of conversation because he was either the same age or younger than the cooks. Anderson was a little older than Cho Min Joon, and since his parents are chefs, it made sense that he was good.

But Cho Min Joon was younger than Anderson, and he had less experience as well. But in terms of skill, they weren’t that much different, so the cooks couldn’t help but envy his gift.

“… Do they know how loudly they’re talking?”

Cho Min Joon asked Anderson in a low voice. The four cooks forgot to control their volume and talked about them loudly behind their backs. Anderson scoffed and said, “You must be happy to get their respect.”

“Why do you have to act so mean…?”

“I can’t help being born like the villain in Disney films.”

He answered in a grumbling yet joking way, but there was tension between them. It couldn’t be helped. 10 days had passed. That meant they had to face off soon.

The battle that Rachel described was simple. They had to go around in food trucks and show off their molecular dishes, but they weren’t competing in terms of sales. They would let civilians taste their food, and they would receive votes as a result.

Cho Min Joon took out the matured jelly pasta from the fridge, but spaghetti wasn’t the only one he took out. There were blue ravioli with fruits inside as well as red lasagna. The solution to what Janet said about something missing was simple.

He had to increase the number of kinds. What was missing was that everything was contained in one dish. But that didn’t mean he wanted to give up on what was inside either. So he had to increase the number of types. Anderson looked at him with an iffy face.

“… Should I have made different kinds, too?”

“They might look different, but they’re all jelly pasta.”

“That’s true…”

“I thought you wanted 2nd place. Then wouldn’t it be better if I just claimed 1st place?”

“You’re talking like you have 1st place in the bag.”

“Kaya told me not to lose.”

“… Listen to you. Do you like Kaya that much?”

Anderson couldn’t understand him, but Cho Min Joon opened his mouth as if that was an obvious question.

“Why wouldn’t I like her? She’s nice, cute, pretty, and good at cooking. Wow. Now that I think about it, it’s impressive. What can my girlfriend not do?”

Anderson grabbed his forehead with a sour look on his face. He then closed his eyes and mumbled to himself, ‘God, please forgive my friend. He might sound crazy, but he’s not.’

“Seeing how you have nothing to say, you agree with me. See? Kaya’s the perfect girlfriend.”

Cho Min Joon said. Anderson closed his eyes again.

‘… I apologize. I lied. He is crazy.’