Chapter 216: Spiced Egg
Translator: Xiong Guoqi Editor: DesTheSloth
People in the street started to suffer again as the system didn’t keep the taste from leaking while it wasn’t business time; thus, the fragrance filled in the street.
"Boss Yuan is again preparing delicious dishes now?" Boss Tong, whose store was closest to him, stretched out the head and looked at the open door of Yuan Zhou’s restaurant.
"Boss Tong, what flavor is that?" A short-haired girl, who was taking the clothes out for dry cleaning, asked curiously.
"The neighboring store is a famous restaurant. The young boss’s craftsmanship is definitely marvelous," Boss Tong turned the head and said to the girl with a smile.
"Oh, a restaurant. I must go and have a try," the short-haired girl said affirmatively while smelling the taste.
"The dishes cooked by Boss Yuan are not cheap and can even be compared with those of grand hotels. However, they deserve the price," Boss Tong introduced to the girl while clearing the clothes up.
"I got it. Is it Yuan Zhou’s restaurant?" The girl suddenly reacted.
"You know it as well?" Boss Tong was a little surprise.
The short-haired girl was a regular customer of Boss Tong. However, she came only once every month. During normal times, she was always away for business travel, thus Boss Tong seldom saw her. Now that even she knew about Yuan Zhou’s restaurant, Boss Tong got slightly curious.
"Yes, of course. Boss Yuan is a very famous person in our company. The HR supervisor of our company often comes here for meals. Occasionally, she shares with us some photos of the dishes, which appear as similar as the fake ones. Nonetheless, they are indeed beautiful," the girl said animatedly.
"That’s right. His dishes are not only tasty, but also beautiful." Boss Tong recalled the plate of tofu and revealed a smile on the face.
While the two of them were complimenting Yuan Zhou continuously, the entrance of Yuan Zhou’s restaurant had disappeared among the mass of customers who waited in line. It just happened in only dozens of minutes.
Fortunately, the four guys that had beaten Yuan Zhou were maintaining the order.
"Please, keep in a straight line. No one can eat well with the mess. Please, everybody," the tall guy said while walking along the line.
People all cared more about their image now. They might do petty actions when there was nobody monitoring. But if there was someone to monitor them at the side, they were reluctant to lose face in public. Therefore, all of them went back to the line and kept a straight line.
"Jesus. My stomach is singing even before the usual lunch time." Some people that couldn’t bear hunger for long were awating time to go faster.
"Don’t mention it. I have just eaten a piece of bread. But as soon as I smelled the fragrance, I become hungry again," the people behind him followed.
"That’s right. Boss Yuan shows no mercy to our stomachs. He doesn’t even close the door. The taste is really really appetizing," the person took a deep breath and then said.
"Does the fragrance smell like Spiced Beans?" This senior foodie had started to analyze what Yuan Zhou was cooking.
"Well, so it is. Is he cooking the Spiced Beans again?" The sound of discussion followed from the front to the back. Since nobody could eat now and it was so boring to wait in line, they began to talk with other.
"I feel it’s a new thing. It smells a little different from the Spiced Beans that I have eaten before." This is a customer who had eaten the Spiced Beans.
"I have no interest in that. I left my phone at home, so I just want to know how long it will need before commencing business." In a word, eating mattered most.
Yuan Zhou had already seen the bustling scene outside the restaurant, but he always focused his full attention on cooking. Even if there was a particular mission or reward, he would still receive it first and check it after business time ended.
Therefore, he concentrated on doing his own matters.
Spiced Egg was a totally different thing from the Tea Egg. Of course, the Spiced Egg could also be called the Spiced Tea Egg, but this time Yuan Zhou was cooking a completely different egg dish.
Besides, the system specifically prepared exclusive eggs for this dish. It could then be judged that the Spiced Egg was totally different from the Tea Egg.
"It’s again the green-shell egg?" Yuan Zhou opened the cabinet, took out an egg and then asked softly.
The system displayed, "This is the Five-Black Egg, a different breed."
"What kind of egg is it this time? I know it’s surely superior to the eggs that I have eaten in my past 24 years again," Yuan Zhou took out several light green eggs and asked jokingly.
The system displayed, "The chicken is indeed extremely difficult to rear. It requires careful feeding."
Not knowing why, Yuan Zhou unexpectedly managed to hear from the short sentence that the chicken was very easy to rear and just required little care.
"It must be an illusion." Yuan Zhou suppressed those weird thoughts dumbly.
Having disregarded Yuan Zhou’s mood, the system turned on the explanation mode in the next second.
The system displayed, "Nancheng Five-Black Chicken originates from the Xunxi Town of Nancheng County with a breeding history of more than 1300 years. The characteristics it has are black pea comb, black feathers, black skin, black flesh and black bones, therefore its eggs are called Five-Black Egg with the green egg shell."
"Five-Black Chicken is an example of the most excellent local breed that has preserved until now. Ever since ancient times, it has been regarded as the ‘Treasure of Chickens’ and ‘Chinese Black Treasure’, which has extremely high nutrition and medical value."
"What’s more, the Five-Black Chicken is also called medicinal chicken, with very high medical value. The chicken itself can be used as the guiding drug. As the source of the eggs, the Five-Black Chicken was selected carefully and specially. The incubation requires the breeding eggs laid by the chicken that has no medical history in the past 60 years."
"No medical history in the past 60 years? Ho Ho, I feel I’m quite healthy, too," Yuan Zhou couldn’t help grumbling.
Then, he was disregarded by the system unsurprisingly.
The system displayed, "With the chickens reared that way, the Five-Black Egg has 17 amino acids and various multiple vitamins and trace elements. The content of the fat and cholesterol is very low (as low as about 1/4 of the ordinary chickens). Meanwhile, the skin is thin and the flesh tender while the fragrance is delicate and the taste yummy. In one word, it’s a kind of splendid tonic food."
"I feel I’m just in need of a tonic food," Yuan Zhou directly picked up an egg and started to eat after peeling the eggshell off immodestly.
During the process, he blew upon the egg to cool it down while eating. Of course, it happened after the egg had just been boiled.
After the eggshell was peeled off, the thick egg white emitted a much fainter scent and had no underlying bad smell. With a simple bite, Yuan Zhou bit half of the egg off. The egg yolk took on a dry yellow color, appearing awfully beautiful."
"It truly has a wonderful texture," Yuan Zhou ate it up quickly and said with a sigh.
Only after eating an egg did Yuan Zhou become satisfied. After that, he continued to prepare the ingredients of the Spiced Egg.
He took out a cloth bag and began to add ingredients into the bag.
As for the origin of the cloth bag, Yuan Zhou indicated that he had barely been comforted and now he didn’t need to be shocked again, hence didn’t even try to ask. Judging from the flaxen color, however, it surely wasn’t dyed.
"4 spoons of well salt, 3 spoons of white sugar, a handful of wild pepper, some star anises, a little cinnamons, cooking wine, aniseed, Qiu You, some dried orange peel and cloves whole…." While reading silently, Yuan Zhou added these flavorings into the cloth bag.
After all the ingredients were prepared ready, the eggs soaked in the glacier water were also available to be peeled.
Yuan Zhou picked up an egg with the chopsticks and then knocked on both ends of the egg with the taste-free spoon, making a sound of "Peng Peng". After that, the egg shell fractured along the direction of the force from top down. So did the other side of the egg.
The method and strength of every knock was slightly different, as if he were creating a very delicate painting.
All the eggs were put into the earthen jar after being knocked that way. Then Yuan Zhou placed the prepared cloth bag and Qiu You into the jar to boil them all together.
What the customers outside smelled was exactly this fragrance emitted therein…