CH 8

On Saturday night, “Happy Player” was broadcast. Luo Peng brought Yu Siyang, who was doing situational performance exercises, over to watch.

Yu Siyang brought a bunch of snacks from the kitchen. His body was still developing, so he ate too much meat, and always felt hungry. Less than two hours after dinner, he felt hungry again.

“Half-sized child, you are eating poor laozi to death.” Luo Peng opened a bag of potato chips and started eating, he had a good understanding of Yu Siyang’s appetite.

Yu Siyang was holding a braised duck paw in his hand, and when he heard Luo Peng’s words, he couldn’t help glaring at him angrily, “You don’t need to eat this duck paw”

“Aw! Xiaoyu, Ge is wrong.” Luo Pengfei rushed to grab it. , Pointing at the TV to divert Yu Siyang’s attention, “Xiaoyu, look, you are on the stage.”

The duck paws were made with a marinade prepared by Yu Siyang himself. It is spicy and tasty, so chewy and tastes delicious. And if he doesn’t eat it every day, Luo Peng felt that life was not fun anymore.

The program happened to be playing the scene when Yu Siyang and Pang Yujie danced on stage. When Yu Siyang looked over, he was instantly surprised by how stupidly he was dancing.

——Is that guy on TV who thinks he is so handsome really me?[1] 

“You have long hands and legs, so your dancing is pretty good.” Luo Peng gnawed on the duck claws as he commented.

Yu Siyang looked at him incredulously, “Brother Luo, are you serious?”

Luo Peng nodded seriously: “Yes.”

There was no hope for his aesthetics. Yu Siyang took the potato chips with a blank expression on his face.

Luo Peng gnawed on the duck paws making his mouth full of oil, wiped his hands with a paper towel, drank a gulp of beer, and thought that if he could get a few more skewers, it would be even more perfect.

“Xiaoyu, your duck claws are so well done. They taste exactly the same as the ones I ate in the Jade Hotel.”

Yu Siyang was startled, thinking, I made the ones you ate in the Jade Hotel. Of course it tastes the same.

On the TV, it happened to be playing the cooking segment, where he held the soup bowl and shook the bowl of shredded tofu soup.

This chrysanthemum tofu soup was made once before when he signed up for the Bonova competition. At that time, he used more particular ingredients, including matsutake, chanterelles, bamboo fungus and scallops. With this soup, he stood out among thousands of contestants and got the qualification to participate in the international competition with the highest number of votes.

He had always been a well-planned person. He had planned to be a chef within three years, and then to participate in the Bonova International Cooking Competition before the age of 25. He would then open a restaurant by the age of 28 and receive a Michelin rating by the age of 30.

He planned everything well but it was all left half done. It’s just that the perfect plan was broken by a crock.

On the TV, he brought out the prepared chrysanthemum tofu soup. Hearing the exclamation of the audience, Yu Siyang still felt a different kind of satisfaction.

At the same time, in a high-end community in the east of the city.

In the warmly designed living room, a chubby child hugged his beloved stuffed bear and sat on the sofa watching TV.

Seeing the tofu chrysanthemum blooming on TV, the little guy opened his mouth in surprise, “Wow”, and rushed in the direction of the study: “Flower, flower, Dad, come to see the flower.” 

“Mu Mu, what flower?” Xue Chengxiu was called out of the study by his son, but the program on TV had moved to advertisements.

Xue Yunmu looked at his father and then looked at the TV. The chubby kid spread his hands and said with a flat mouth in confusion, “The flower is not showing anymore.”

Xue Chengxiu picked up the remote control and pressed the playback button. The screen on the TV quickly retreated, and Xue Yunmu was happy. He clapped his hands, pointed to the azure bowl that appeared on the TV again, and shouted happily: “Flower, Flower.”

Xue Chengxiu stopped the playback. On the TV, the tofu in the bowl was slowly blooming, and the camera zoomed out from the close view. A teenager with a soup bowl appeared in the picture.

“This person…” Xue Chengxiu’s almost photographic memory made him immediately remember that this was the young man he met in the cemetery who was crying against the tombstone.

Xue Yunmu stood on the sofa, hugged his father’s waist with short, fat arms, raised his head, and looked eager, “Dad, Mu Mu also wants to eat flowers.”

“Today is too late, there are no flowers to buy, tomorrow father will take you to eat, okay.” Xue Chengxiu touched his son’s head and explained gently.

Xue Yunmu thought with a serious look on his face for a while, and nodded reasonably, “Okay, I will eat flowers tomorrow.”

Xue Chengxiu smiled and picked up his son, “Now, you should go to bed.”

The little guy hugged his father’s neck and left the room cheerfully laughing.

**********

Zhao Ang’s popularity is high, with many fans, and he is recognized as a huge box office star. With his participation in TV shows, the ratings have always been ridiculously high, accompanied with a movie queen, Sun Wangshu, the ratings of “Happy Player” being high was almost guaranteed.

After the ratings on Saturday night came out, “Happy Player” undoubtedly reached the top of the ratings championship, and the number of views on the Internet exceeded 100 million in one day.

However, when netizens were watching the “Happy Player” video and licking their screens while seeing their male god Zhao Ang, they gradually found that the style of the barrage became more and more confusing, all of them were “so hungry, ah, ah,” and “poisoned late at night.” , “I’m so depressed, I’m going to eat hot pepper strips and be shocked”, “I have fallen in love with tofu since then”, “The little guy who makes chrysanthemum tofu is so handsome, ah, ah, ah,” and so on.

The netizen dragged the progress bar forward a little bit, and then… found that he was hungry too.

So he did not hesitate to join the barrage army to discuss the chrysanthemum tofu in the show and the boy who made the chrysanthemum tofu.

In less than a day, the barrage of the video was captured by foodies, and the names of various dishes floated across the screen.

It was not enough for the foodies to discuss on the barrage. They also searched Yu Siyang’s Weibo, and organized a group to post various food pictures on his Weibo and ask if he could cook it.

Luo Peng was taking care of Yu Siyang’s Weibo. It had been half a year since registration. There were two updates in total. One was automatically posted when Weibo account is first registered, and the other is the announcement of Yu Siyang participating in the movie “One Sword Allure” It was the movie “One Sword Allure” that led to the hospitalization of Yu Siyang due to injury.

After half a year, Yu Siyang has only a few single-digit fans, and one of them is Luo Peng.

At this moment, while waiting for Yu Siyang’s audition, Luo Peng took out his mobile phone and swiped his Weibo to pass the time, and was surprised by the topic of # HappyPlayer Cook on the hot search.

Clicking on the topic, the whole screen is full of Yu Siyang and his chrysanthemum tofu soup.

Luo Peng hurriedly switched his Weibo account to Yu Siyang’s official account. He saw that the number of fans had changed from single digits to four digits, and was about to break into five digits.

Has Weibo been taken over by aliens after only two days of not using Weibo? !

Weibo was not captured by aliens, but Yu Siyang’s official account was captured by foodies. When he opened the comments to the news that Yu Siyang was participating in “One Sword Allure”, as a supporting cast, he found discussions on food such as- How extensive and profound Chinese food is, and that there are eight major cuisines, about snacks from various places, pastries and desserts, etc.

Seeing this made Luo Peng hungry.

“Brother Luo, your Yu Siyang is really at the level of a five-star chef,” a girl dressed up as a loli sat down beside Luo Peng, “the Q-bomb shrimps he made is really delicious.”

Girl took out the phone and showed him the photo just taken.

There are a lot of photos, including Yu Siyang chopping vegetables, frying something in a pan, and focusing on plating the dish, and of course, the final dish was even more important.

Q-bomb shrimps[2] are made with shrimps, minced chicken and egg whites. The shrimps are split into two slices. They are smoothly cooked in 50% hot cooked lard, and then mixed with egg white and corn flour syrup. They are then wrapped in a layer of minced chicken, then cooked again with a little oil, cooking wine, salt, and clear broth, stir fry it, let it thicken, and then drizzle with chicken fat, then it is ready to be served.

This dish pays attention to crispiness and freshness, and the moistness of the shrimp needed to be maintained. The steps were very simple. The key is to master the heat. It will not taste the same if the shrimp is old.

“He can actually use radishes to carve flowers[3], it’s so amazing!” The girl held her face, with a fanciful look on her face, and patted Luo Peng on the shoulder.

Luo Peng looked confused. Didn’t his Xiaoyu come to audition for a movie? How did he start to cook?

Is the audition not for a movie, but for a food show?

This morning, he received a call from the assistant director of Peng Zhigao, asking Yu Siyang to try for a role of Director Peng’s in new movie. The address given was the address of Director Peng’s studio in Shengjing Building.

Luo Peng hung up the phone, immediately took a taxi to All Star Entertainment, dragged out Yu Siyang who was in the acting class, and went straight to Peng’s studio.

But now, he wasn’t sure if they were in the right place.

Could it be that a section of a gourmet show is recruiting guests, and they are on the wrong floor?!!

The more he thought about it, the more something felt wrong, Luo Peng couldn’t help but get up and sneak into the audition room.

This room was not like an audition room, but more like an exquisite high-end kitchen. Yu Siyang stood behind the kitchen island, smiling as Peng Zhigao took the last bite of Q-bomb shrimp in his mouth.

Luo Peng was so shocked that his eyes were about to fall out of his eyes.

This person is indeed the director of Peng Zhigao, but why did he let his family Xiaoyu cook? Has Peng Zhigao changed his job to a reality show director? 

“Yes, delicious and pleasing to the eye.” Peng Zhigao wiped his mouth with a handkerchief and watched the video that was just shot on the camera in the hands of the deputy director.

“Have you seen the script?” 

“Sorry, I haven’t read the script yet.” Yu Siyang bowed his head in apology.

“It doesn’t matter, you were not ready as we called you here in a hurry.” Peng Zhigao asked the deputy director to show Yu Siyang the script. “Look at it first. Twenty minutes later, try the fourth scene of Act 10. “

“Thank you Director Peng.” Yu Siyang took the script with both hands, and thanked the assistant director who gave him the script: “Thank you, Director Wang.”

Peng Zhigao asked Yu Siyang to read the script in the room, while he and the assistant director went out first.

Luo Peng wanted to ask what was going on now, but watching Yu Siyang carefully read the script and recite the lines, he pressed down the doubts in his heart and decided to talk about everything after the audience was over.

The deputy director followed Peng Zhigao to the pantry and poured a cup of coffee for Peng Zhigao. He couldn’t help asking, “Director Peng, what do you think of that kid?”

“Too young, he is only eighteen years old.” Peng Zhigao took a sip of coffee, thinking of Yu Siyang’s childish face, and hesitated.

Deputy Director nodded, and he poured himself a cup of coffee, and putting the cup to his mouth said:”But that type of beautiful hands are really hard to find. Those with beautiful hands do not cook and chefs do not have pretty hands.”[4]

Peng Zhigao gave an “um”, in order to find a suitable actor, he tried more than a thousand people this month, and none of them could meet the requirements. Competent hand substitutes are harder to find than actors.

If he didn’t watch “Happy Player” last Saturday night and found Yu Siyang, he would have to consider whether to change the script.

However, the script is adapted from a novel that is currently popular, and if the important supporting characters in it are directly changed, the book fans will curse the crew to death.

But Yu Siyang is only eighteen years old. The second male lead in the script is a twenty-five-year-old young man. The gap between a teenager and a young man is not only about age, but also temperament and experience.

This is one of the reasons why Peng Zhigao is hesitant.

Another reason is that Yu Siyang basically has no experience in acting.

The previous experience was all surface roles, some of them didn’t even have a line, and when he finally had a character which could be ranked, he had to quit unexpectedly because of injuries.

“Let’s go and see that kid’s acting.” Peng Zhigao looked at his watch, put the coffee cup in the sink, and beckoned the deputy director to go back.

The deputy director walked behind him and said with a smile: “No matter what else, the kid’s dishes are really delicious.”

Peng Zhigao also smiled: “That is true.”