How was this possible!

"Tsk, thank you, Asta."

Jiang Yao quipped.

Though he and the rich girl were separated by a sea of stars,

her kindness was always with him.

How wonderful.

Filled with gratitude toward Asta,

Jiang Yao began preparing the Qiongshi Bird Fruit.

Auntie Gao and Gao Tang both watched.

The former watched because this was her stall. Where else was she supposed to be?

The latter was curious about what Jiang Yao intended to do.

He would keep a close eye on Jiang Yao and stop him if any step wasted the ingredients.

If worse came to worst, he would step in and show his skills. He would salvage whatever he could.

As for Phantylia, she cupped her face in her hands, utterly bewildered.

What was going on?

The assignment I received... Pah, the assignment Tingyun received was to entertain you while you bought ingredients.

Would you take a look at what you were doing?!

First, you stuffed yourself silly.

And now, you were cooking yourself?

Even I, Phantylia, had never seen anything like this.

As for Jiang Yao, out of respect for the ingredients,

he got into the zone.

He paid no attention to anything else. All he saw was the Qiongshi Bird Fruit.

Generally speaking, fruit could not be deep-fried.

Just as Gao Tang had explained,

freshness and greasiness were difficult to reconcile.

But did difficulty mean he should give up?

Jiang Yao did not think so.

The Qiongshi Bird Fruit gave him that confidence.

In Jiang Yao's eyes, Qiongshi Bird Fruit was not purely a fruit.

Its texture was not crisp like other fruit.

That was because Qiongshi Bird Fruit contained a substance similar to starch.

Perhaps long, long ago, that starch-like substance had made up a larger proportion of the Qiongshi Bird Fruit.

That was why it could be fried.

But as time passed, through biological change and evolution,

Qiongshi Bird Fruit had become more like ordinary fruit.

Naturally, frying it with the old method would produce a less-than-satisfactory flavor and texture.

But could that stump Jiang Yao?

Not a chance~

With a little simple preparation, he could restore its original flavor.

And thanks to the changes in the Qiongshi Bird Fruit, it would have a distinctive flavor of its own, offering a feast for both the eyes and the palate.

That was the charm of cooking!

Qiongshi Bird Fruit was slightly larger than the hawthorn berries used in candied fruit skewers.

Moreover, it contained pits of varying sizes.

So it needed to be cut open, pitted, and then cut again.

He could shape it however he liked~

That completed the basic preparation.

Gao Tang and Auntie Gao both nodded at this step.

They could understand what Jiang Yao was doing.

But his next step left them puzzled.

When making dishes like sugar-coated sweet potatoes or bananas in Jiang Yao's previous life,

they could go straight into the oil once cut.

The hot oil would fry the starch in the sweet potatoes and bananas, sending up sizzling steam and fragrance.

But Qiongshi Bird Fruit clearly could not be treated that way.

It did not contain much starch, only just enough.

If it went straight into the oil, it could easily lose its crisp, firm outer layer.

That would be no different from throwing it into a cauldron of oil in hell. Pure torture.

So before frying it, he had to blanch it.

But blanching required care, too.

He could not overdo it!

Otherwise, excess moisture would not only affect the texture but also make the frying difficult to control.

A little too long would affect the overall texture.

A little too short would not be enough.

Therefore,

all of this required precise control.

Did they understand the worth of a master of precision?!

But to Auntie Gao and Gao Tang, weren't these techniques downright heretical?

Blanching it before frying?

Was he serious?

"Young man, would you like me to find you an apron?"

Auntie Gao offered a tactful reminder.

Qiongshi Bird Fruit was very difficult to drain dry.

Even a little water clinging to it,

especially in hot oil...

Hopefully, he would be all right!

Gao Tang had just been about to tell Jiang Yao to leave it to him.

But seeing how focused Jiang Yao was, he patiently continued watching without interrupting.

Still, he said, "You'd better not make this wait a waste of time."

Jiang Yao continued concentrating on the ingredients in his hands.

He had already scooped out the blanched Qiongshi Bird Fruit.

At the same time, he held his hand above the oil to gauge its temperature.

Auntie Gao had heated this pot of oil.

The oil could not be too hot, either.

To make good Qiongshi Bird Skewers, he had to make perfect use of the starch-like substance inside.

Of course, Jiang Yao also took a tiny shortcut.

He dried the Qiongshi Bird Fruit.

Using Path Power.

No one noticed.

Once the moisture was gone,

Jiang Yao took some starch from the stall and sprinkled a little over it.

Neither too much nor too little.

This only deepened the confusion in Auntie Gao's and Gao Tang's eyes.

Now they understood even less of what Jiang Yao was trying to do.

Chicken wings and drumsticks tasted delicious when coated in starch and fried.

But come on, you were using Qiongshi Bird Fruit. Fruit!

Qiongshi Bird Fruit already had a worse texture than other fruit.

Wouldn't doing this bury it for good?

Gao Tang kept shaking his head as he watched.

Great. He had gotten his hopes up for nothing again.

He had wanted to leave outright.

But then he thought, I was already here, and I had already watched this much. I might as well stay until all hope was gone.

So he stayed.

Meanwhile, Jiang Yao was intensely focused.

Once the oil had cooled to a moderately warm temperature,

Jiang Yao arranged the Qiongshi Bird Fruit in a mesh skimmer and lowered it into the pot.

At once, a faint sizzling rose from the warm oil.

But it was not caused by water. It was the starch!

Almost immediately, the fresh fragrance of the Qiongshi Bird Fruit was released.

Distinct from the smell of oil!

"How was this possible?!"

Gao Tang's eyes widened.

As a chef,

especially one who considered his culinary skills unrivaled on the Luofu,

he had tremendous confidence in his nose and tongue.

He was certain that the Qiongshi Bird Fruit Jiang Yao was frying carried the fresh fragrance of fruit!

But how was that possible?!

"Yes! That's the smell! That's exactly the smell I remember!"

Auntie Gao was even more excited.

She still remembered her childhood, nearly one or two hundred years ago.

The smell when her elders made Qiongshi Bird Skewers for her.

She had thought that after her elders succumbed to mara and were taken away by the Ten-Lords Commission,

their craft had been taken away with them.

She had never imagined it would be recreated by an outworlder!

Even if it was only the fragrance for now, it was still hope!

"Impossible, impossible. How can fruit coated in flour and deep-fried still give off a fresh fruity fragrance?"

"How can the smell of oil and the fruit's fragrance not interfere with each other? The former should overpower the latter!"

Gao Tang's brow furrowed tightly. He clearly could not understand how, after Jiang Yao's series of steps,

something so unpromising could miraculously turn into something wonderful.

Once a slight crust formed on the Qiongshi Bird Fruit,

Jiang Yao gently shook the fruit.

This effectively prevented the coating from falling off.

And as he began shaking it, the warm oil stimulated another release of fruity fragrance.

Jiang Yao patiently waited for the right moment. Once the Qiongshi Bird Fruit was cooked through,

he quickly lifted it out and drained the oil.

Of course, he now began heating the oil in the pot again.

Once the oil reached a high frying temperature,

he returned the cooked fruit for a second fry.

That would give it an even better texture!

The fruit's hard crust rubbed and scraped against the metal mesh.

It made a scratch, scratch sound, like little claws.

Like a kitten's paws scratching at someone's heart.

It instantly awakened anyone's appetite.

Or...

A dragon's appetite~

Near the stall,

the current High Elder—a small girl with long blue twin tails, conspicuous dragon horns on her head, and a gourd at her waist—

Bailu.

She was staring at the Qiongshi Bird Fruit Jiang Yao had fried golden brown, frantically swallowing her saliva.

By the time you dear readers reached this point,

it meant there were three more chapters in today's update.

In other words, four chapters today!

Ahem, I believed you all knew what I wanted to say.

Anyway, please keep supporting me! Thank you!