The Game Of Life

After knowing Liu Qian for quite some time, Jiang Feng finally understood what it meant by the expression "to have a black hole as a belly". Even though Liu Qian couldn"t eat as much as those who took part in eating compet.i.tions, she could keep on eating as long as there was food.

She even ate baked sunflower seed non-stop for three hours when they had a club meeting one time. In just that three hours, she had devoured more than 2kg of seeds.

There weren"t any fresh vegetables in the kitchen since Jiang Jiankang was a firm believer in not using ingredients from the day before. There were a lot of dry ingredients and some leftover rice to fry though.

"The meat will take about half an hour. Why don"t I make some fried rice for you first?" Jiang Feng asked.

"No problem!" Liu Qian nodded as she looked around the kitchen.

It was her first time coming in, and she was curious about it.

After she finished looking around, the Egg Fried Rice was almost done.

"Oh, right! Minqi said there"s a volunteer event next week, and each club has to send a few representatives over. Are you going?" Liu Qian asked.

"You mean the one that the Student Union is hosting? I"m going as the representative. Do you want to come too?" Jiang Feng asked as he tossed the rice in the wok. "It"s quite a tiring event, though. We"re basically volunteering as primary school teachers or helpers at an orphanage."

The Student Union of A University would host such an event every year, and every club has to send out members to partic.i.p.ate. The number of members that would have to join was decided by the total members each club had. Since the Chinese chess club was on the verge of dismantling for the past two years, only one member was required to join. Jiang Feng was the representative the year before too.

"Minqi and I want to join too," Liu Qian smiled. Since they were still freshmen, they were always looking forward to events that were held by the university. Jiang Feng was the same as them the year before and cleaned the floor of an orphanage for a whole day.

"Okay," Jiang Feng nodded. There was no way he would refuse someone who wanted to go voluntarily.

As they talked, the fried rice finished cooking.

Liu Qian hopped out of the kitchen happily with the plate of fried rice in her hands.

As for the braised pork, it needed time to slowly braise, or else the grease inside the pork belly would be too overwhelming. As the pork slowly braised in the pot on low heat, Jiang Feng began to make the Cornmeal Dumplings with Stuffed Vegetables.

Since Jiang Weiguo loved to eat Chinese Cornbread, a sack of cornmeal was always available ever since he arrived in A City.

The only problem was that Jiang Feng could not add thick congee to make the dough. Auntie Li added the congee and bran because her recipe was made for people that were running away from war. Plus, there was the benefit that adding those ingredients would make the dumpling more filling. With their lives getting better, there was no way for Jiang Feng to get his hands on the thick congee that was made like Auntie Li"s or bran.

There were some preserved vegetables that w.a.n.g Xiulian had prepared. Whether it was pickling radishes or chilis, her preserving technique was far better than Jiang Jiankangs and way better than those pickled vegetables that were sold on the market. The only problem was that w.a.n.g Xiulian did not like to go through the tiring process. She would only pickle a few jars of vegetables a year, just enough for her family to eat. That was why the customers of the restaurant never had a taste of it.

Jiang Feng slowly kneaded the pickled vegetables into the dough while checking on the braising meat from time to time. Jiang Feng"s kneading technique wasn"t as good as Auntie Li"s since he had spent the last six months mastering the technique of cutting. Jiang Weiguo had never taught Jiang Feng anything about kneading, and the only practice he got was from making a few dumplings.

And for the past few days since the old master had arrived, Jiang Weiguo hadn"t started teaching Jiang Feng how to control the flame yet. Instead, Jiang Feng was taught how to master each ingredient.

There was a saying that went by "Good handling of a knife is the basis of a chef, and the ingredients are the soul of a dish."

Just as the Shredded Tofu in Broth was a hard dish to master, Egg Fried Rice wasn"t something easy to make either.

Jiang Feng wasn"t a chef that had a good comprehensive skill in cooking. If not for the game and its quests, he would never have begun his practice in cooking again. He would"ve followed his cousins" footsteps, graduating from university and worked in a job that had nothing to do with cooking.

But Jiang Feng had an advantage that most lacked. He was a hardworking person.

When he was studying, he could ignore cooking and focused on it. And now, he was putting all of his focus on cooking.

The dumplings were ready before the braised meat.

Jiang Feng checked the meat and estimated that another 20 minutes was needed.

When Jiang Feng came out with the freshly made dumplings, Liu Qian had already finished her plate of fried rice and was chatting with her viewers.

Not even a grain of rice was left on her plate as the light reflected off the oil that was in it.

"What"s that?" Liu Qian asked when she smelled the dumplings. "Cornmeal… dumplings?"

Jiang Feng was confident that the dumplings he had made looked great. They were soft and silky on the outside. The shredded vegetables could be seen in every corner of the dumplings as if they were stars in the sky. If Jiang Feng were to add some chocolate sauce onto them, he could market them.

"Yup. Cornmeal Dumplings with Preserved Vegetables," Jiang Feng nodded. "Fill your stomach with these first. The meat still needs another 20 minutes or so."

Jiang Feng took one of the dumplings for himself. Each and every one of the dumplings were huge and weighed around 120 grams. When Jiang Feng bit into the dumpling, sweetness instantly filled his mouth. The unique aroma from the cornmeal and the saltiness from the preserved vegetables came together perfectly.

Since cornmeal was very coa.r.s.e, there was no way people would market it as it was. Most cornmeal on the market nowadays had lots of plain flour in it.

Liu Qian pointed her camera at the dumplings and boasted to her viewers. "Look! My president made some dumplings for me! What"s stuffed inside though?"

"Nothing," Jiang Feng shrugged.

The comment section was instantly filled with laughter.

Jiang Feng went back to the kitchen to check on the meat and think about a way to get some alternative incomes.

The meat was out of the pot 20 minutes later.

When Jiang Feng came out of the kitchen once again, the dumplings were already gone.

"You finished all of them?" Jiang Feng asked in awe.

The five dumplings that Jiang Feng left for Liu Qian totaled at around 800 grams worth of food. What was more was that they were made with unrisen dough, which meant that they were denser than usual dumplings.

"Come on, it"s just five dumplings," Liu Qian laughed, unable to tell the difference between risen and unrisen dough. "I got to admit they were a little on the heavy side, but it"s not a big deal."

As soon as Liu Qian finished talking, she reached towards the meat with her chopsticks.

It seemed to Jiang Feng that it really wasn"t a big deal to Liu Qian.

But their optimism didn"t last longer than two minutes as something happened.

"P… president… I think I have a stomachache…" Liu Qian cried in pain as her smile disappeared, and her face turned pale. "It feels like my belly is bursting…"

Jiang Feng instantly knew that Liu Qian had eaten too much food.

"Can you walk? We have to go to the hospital," Jiang Feng said.

There was a private hospital just outside the university. It would only take twenty minutes to get there on foot from the restaurant.

"I don"t think I can…"

Liu Qian tried to get up but couldn"t stand still and had to grab the table to balance herself.

Without any choice, Jiang Feng quickly opened the door first and asked the shopkeeper across the street to help look over the shop. He then carried Liu Qian on his back and walked towards the hospital.

What they didn"t know was that comments were pouring into Liu Qian"s live-stream.