Chapter Nine: The Famous Pretentious Cuisine

“Um, do you need any ingredients prepared?” Li, the kitchen assistant, stood awkwardly to the side, watching as Xiao Yuan Zhuang scrutinized the stove with a serious expression, checking the utensils and the nearby ingredients before finally asking.

“Is there any rice? The cold kind,” she replied abruptly, ignoring Li’s question until she’d finished her inspection. She set down the last spatula she’d checked and suddenly spoke.

“Ah, oh. Yes, yes, we do. Chef Sun specializes in Chinese cuisine, so he sometimes prepares dishes like Yangzhou fried rice. He always keeps cold rice ready,” Li stammered, startled by the sudden question from Xiao Yuan Zhuang, whom he’d assumed wasn’t much of a conversationalist. He answered while sneaking glances at her immaculate chef’s uniform, secretly wondering about her true identity—could she be a senior chef from some hotel?

“Good, bring me a bowl. Today, I’ll show you what real Golden Fried Rice is.” With a flourish of her hand, Xiao Yuan Zhuang commanded, turning to select a few fresh eggs from the ingredients.

The culinary girl Xiao Yuan Zhuang became after her divine transformation differed from Erina Nakiri in the original Food Wars manga. Though she possessed the same appearance and the legendary “God Tongue,” their specialties diverged.

In the manga, Erina Nakiri, despite her all-round culinary prowess, was more adept at elegant Western cuisine.

But the transformed Xiao Yuan Zhuang, though equally skilled, favored Chinese cooking, owing to both her past and present lives as a Chinese woman. While her culinary skills had not been remarkable before, she’d experienced many varieties of Chinese dishes and had a basic understanding of the eight major cuisines—even if she hadn’t tasted them, she’d seen their forms thanks to the Internet. After her transformation, she gained top-tier chef abilities, enabling her to recreate dishes from mere images in her mind.

That meant, even if her past and present selves had only seen a photo of a dish online, she could now reproduce it based on its color, shape, and appearance. Of course, the taste couldn’t be perfectly restored, but she could achieve seventy or eighty percent similarity—and thanks to the “God Tongue” glitch, the recreated dish would never be unpleasant, at least on par with a three or four-star hotel.

So, with the combined experiences of her past and present lives, her current transformed self as Erina Nakiri was now more adept at Chinese cuisine. Even more impressive, she could reproduce dishes from anime she’d watched in her previous life—such as those from Cooking Master Boy and Food Wars—fantastical creations from those worlds.

“Golden Fried Rice, huh? Such a grand name. Don’t just serve me a simple egg fried rice,” scoffed Guoqing Feng, finding a stool and sitting down as he listened to Xiao Yuan Zhuang. His anticipation was tinged with teasing. At this moment, his earlier anxiety had vanished.

Having known the girl for years, Guoqing Feng understood her temperament. If she stepped forward in such circumstances, she must be confident—especially since this matter involved many people, and a misstep could mean layoffs or even loss of military status.

Faced with such stakes, Xiao Yuan Zhuang dared to shoulder the responsibility. That could only mean one thing: she would accept nothing less than success. No, it was more accurate to say she would succeed, without the possibility of failure.

His trust in her dispelled his worries. The doubts he’d felt were just a reflex, and once he’d reasoned it out, he no longer feared for tonight’s elite dinner. Now, he could only wonder how delicious her promised dish would be.

Unlike Guoqing Feng’s composure, the surrounding kitchen workers and the two assistants demonstrated their skepticism about Xiao Yuan Zhuang’s abilities. Though Li was helping her by scooping rice, he was simply dazzled by her looks—a young man, after all.

Especially when the others saw her select only a few eggs and nothing else, their doubts grew stronger. It was clear to them that her so-called Golden Fried Rice was merely egg fried rice—a gimmick, surely; any kitchen worker could whip up egg fried rice.

Ignoring the skeptical whispers around her, Xiao Yuan Zhuang accepted the plate of cold rice brought by Li, examined it carefully, confirmed it had been properly stored and was thoroughly dried, then lit the stove and heated the pan.

She paid no attention to the surrounding gazes and focused entirely on her cooking. Golden Fried Rice might seem a simple egg fried rice, but this was no ordinary version—for hers… would shine.

With a subtle smile, she placed two empty bowls before her. Crack—she struck the edge of a bowl with an egg, opening a small notch, and the transparent, viscous egg white flowed into the bowl on her right. When the egg white was gone, she split the shell and dropped the yolk into the bowl on her left.

Crack, crack—her hands moved steadily and swiftly. Before the leftover moisture in the iron wok could evaporate, the whites and yolks of five or six eggs were already separated into their respective bowls. Picking up the bowl of yolks with her left hand, she grabbed a pair of chopsticks in her right, and, with circular motions, whipped the yolks briskly. Lacking an egg beater nearby, she resorted to manual mixing.

As the water in the wok fully evaporated and the pan reached the desired temperature, the yolks in her bowl had blended completely, indistinguishable as coming from different eggs. Setting the yolks aside, she poured a suitable amount of cooking oil into the dry pan.

During the brief heating of the oil, she poured the beaten yolks directly into the cold rice, then plunged her chopsticks into the rice and stirred rapidly. With physical dexterity surpassing the ordinary, her right hand moved as if powered by an electric motor, so fast it seemed to multiply, and even as she tossed the rice, she managed to add several spoonfuls of fine salt. Her speed was evident.

Once the rice grains were evenly coated with yolk, she stopped her rapid stirring and set the chopsticks aside. By then, the oil in the pan had reached the temperature she needed.