From-DIDIDA Novels
When Angela was amazed by the way he cooked in an unfamiliar way, Kaya said, “You know what? He complains he can’t take a rest regardless of whether he has inspiration or not. So, I’m seeing him cooking all the time, even at home.”
“So, do you like him cooking all the time like that?”
“Well, sometimes he looks cool, sometimes he looks like a geek. I’m not so sure.”
While she was talking to Angela, Min-joon’s cooking was getting weirder. He cut the watermelon and put it in a vacuum bag to suck in the air. He then took it out. Those who watched him cooking now could not understand it, but during that short moment, the juice of the watermelon became more compressed and the color became more transparent and bright red.
After he mixed the crab meat with mayonnaise, pepper, and chive leaves, he began to make something with cucumbers. He boiled cucumber juice in the Thermomix then put gelatin gum in the water parsley broth. While watching him closely, Angela finally asked because she was too curious, “Min-joon, what are you making?”
“It’s cucumber ketchup.”
It would have been better for her if she hadn’t heard it. Cucumber ketchup? Angela couldn’t even figure out what it was.
The moment the jelly got hardened was the moment he was done cooking. He spread the watermelon, which had more color and taste through a vacuum bag, on the bottom of the plate, and rolled the crab meat with jelly made from the water parsley and chicken broth on top. Finally, he looked at Angela while sprinkling cucumber ketchup around the watermelon.
“It’s all done.”
“Are you sure it really tastes delicious? Oh, I’m sorry. I’m not asking you about this… I can’t imagine how it will taste. Cucumber, crab, water parsley, watermelon…”
“Well, you can try it now.”
When he said that, Angela looked at the fork in her hand. She couldn’t really believe she was here before him serving her a dish like this. She never expected that he would pay back her favorable articles about him and Kaya a year ago with such a great dish now.
In fact, it was a great privilege for her to be able to have an interview with the couple, something not given to other reporters. In fact, not only French reporters but also American reporters in France were so anxious to interview the two.
“Man, that’s why we should be kind to others!” she muttered quietly.
Feeling elated, Angela lifted the fork. Then, she cut the parsley jelly and watermelon with a knife. She dipped it in cucumber ketchup before putting it in her mouth. And at that very moment, she could understand why Min-joon was trying to prove his ability through his dish, not his words.
‘What the hell is this taste?’
It was delicious. But what surprised her more than that was the harmony of taste. The freshness of cucumber, the scent of water parsley that hid only the fishy smell from the light and subtle sea scent of crab meat, and the sweet and refreshing taste of watermelon. The taste that all of them entangled in the ingredients brought about was something she had never tasted or imagined in her life.
Angela looked up at him blankly. She could not believe how it was possible for him to bring out such a taste.
So, she asked before she knew it, “Will you marry me?”
Min-joon shook his head and said, “No.”
She looked sullen at his firm answer. He was clearly aware of what kind of expression Kaya behind his back was making. Kaya smiled at her impromptu proposal, but her smile was eerily cold.
“Well, if you can fight her and win, let me think about it.”
When he said that, Angela looked back at Kaya and flinched momentarily. Kaya was the same woman she interviewed a little while ago, but she felt overwhelmed by Kaya’s intense look.
Kaya slowly opened her mouth.
“Well, come to think of it, it’s been a while since I swung my fists.”
“I’ll try not to make you throw a punch,” Angela said.
“Oh, you can let me do it, of course. Sometimes I need to warm up before fighting.”
“Oh, no please! By the way, this is so delicious! How can you come up with this kind of fantastic recipe?”
Of course, she didn’t say that just to praise him. She was literally in shock after tasting his dish. In fact, she met lots of chefs while working as a reporter, and on such occasions, they prepared dishes for her in advance. In other words, they didn’t make any impromptu dishes like Min-joon.
So, she spoke to him with a suspicious expression, “Are you sure this is the recipe you just came up with a little while ago?”
He thought her doubt was understandable.
He smiled leisurely and looked at her. When she saw him face to face, she suddenly felt ashamed about the question she just asked.
The moment she was about to cancel the question, he opened his mouth.
“Since you have such doubts, it seems like you have some illusions about the chef coming up with a recipe fast.”
“Just forget it. It’s my mistake that I asked you that question.”
“No, I don’t think it’s bad. I just want to say that no chef comes up with a recipe immediately.”
“But you did it a moment ago, right?”
Min-joon shook his head quietly.
“Well, what I did wasn’t just creating the dish in an instant. I combined the recipe that I knew with my own inspiration.”
He really thought that after all, cooking was impossible to create out of nothing. Of course, the cooking method could be creative, but cooking itself was a question of how to make the dish through the given recipe.
“The more recipes and taste of the dishes you know. the easier you will find cooking, after all. That’s why chefs say the most important thing about cooking is experience, not talent.”
Angela found it very awkward to hear that from Min-joon because it was Min-joon himself who enjoyed the benefits of cooking talent more than anybody else.
He continued, “Anyway what I want to say is that I haven’t made this dish in an instant. I would say it’s been made over the course of my life.”
“Wow, I think I ate a great dish then,” she said.
“Well, that’s the case of every dish. You can’t find any dish that’s not great.”
“Hey, don’t pretend to be a philosopher!” Anderson quipped, cutting in.
His eyes flashed when he put down his dish before her.
“You are not full yet, right?”
That day, Angela had to eat until she was too full to taste any food.
***
International chefs who took part in the Paris International Cooking Competition.
Could they overcome the barrier of the European gourmet world?
Excess supply reduced demand. Now that there were so many cooking competitions, each of the cooking competitions had been marked by much less influence than before.
If there was a culinary competition that kept its status firmly, however, many people would probably pick the Paris International Cooking Competition without any hesitation, which was proved by thousands of participants in the qualifying round of the Paris contest.
It was this competition that always attracted the expectations of many people, but this time, the media paid attention to lots of factors that attracted people’s interest a lot from the beginning. Ironically enough, at the center of it were the participants from the United States, not France.
The teams from Rose Island brought out the results befitting the reputation of Rose Island for which lots of people had great expectations. In particular, the pairs from its main store brought out very impressive results. Of the three pairs, not a single pair did not drop out of the qualifying round. Considering that even the chefs with decades of experience dropped from the qualifying round, their performance was quite impressive.
What was really interesting was the pair of Min-joon and Kaya. To put it precisely, the pair was led by Min-joon. Min-joon, who gained international fame by showing his perfect palate in the American Grand Chef competition, was a talented chef who drew wide popularity around the United States by making the dessert called Cho Reggiano. So much so that he was rumored to be Rachel’s successor only at 22, so there was no further explanation of his cooking talent.
Because of his attendance, even a chef giant in France was forced to take part, who had not appeared at the Paris contest for a long time. His name was Enzo Lipman.
Enzo was defeated by Chef Daniel Rose of Rose Island at this contest several decades ago. When Daniel passed away without competing in the Paris contest again, it seemed that their rivalry was at an end forever, with Daniel the winner and Enzo the loser.
However, Chef Enzo revealed in the media interviews that he was determined to get even with Daniel by having his disciple take part in the contest and win. In an interview, he said he believed that his student and son, Theo Lipman, would beat Min-joon certainly and overwhelmingly. Because of this, all the people and the media were paying great attention to the rivalry between the two.
“It’s really annoying.”
While reading the newspaper, Anderson stopped reading it and frowned. Chloe, who was playing a hamburger flipping game on her smartphone next to him, flinched momentarily and checked his expression.
“Oh, I’m sorry. I played the game for too long. Let me cook. What should I cook?”
“No, I’m not annoyed by that. Look at this article.”
Anderson lifted up his smartphone and showed it to her. She could figure it out even without reading it. In fact, all the newspaper articles about the Paris contest were dominantly devoted to Kaya and Min-joon and Rose Island, such as ‘Rose Island moved to Paris!’ ‘Min-joon and Theo are competing for the honor of his teacher and his father!’
“Why are the former chef giants from the previous contest affecting us today?”
“Hey, Anderson, what you really didn’t like about the story was that it was Min-joon, not you, who formed a rivalry, right?”
“I have no idea,” Anderson replied in a sullen voice then ate the chocolate on the table.
Chloe understood him. Like him, she also wanted to be Min-joon’s partner in this contest.
Although her position was different from his, she could understand how he would have felt when somebody else took away the position of Min-joon’s partner.
“Don’t feel hurt too much. You lost it only here in the Paris contest. I can’t be Min-joon’s rival anyway.”
At that moment, Anderson turned to her.
Grinning at him, she said, “Man, you are getting cold feet because I have mentioned Min-joon? Are you sure?”
“Then, how about you? Are you okay?”
“I don’t care. What’s the big deal of being dumped by a man? For now, I’m going to do what I can do. I’m too busy these days to pay attention to that. But I feel good because I’m busy with cooking, not broadcasting. I’m feeling very good after a long time.”