Having been a cook for so many years, Hao Cheng is very picky about food. When she first came, she couldn't be picky. The scholar had eaten simple meals at home for so many years, and his taste was not as picky as hers.
But she had been here for more than a month, and her appetite had become spoiled by herself. She could barely fill her stomach with unpalatable food. She would rather throw away the food cooked by the man in front of her than eat another bite.
It doesn't matter whether the ingredients are expensive or not, cheap ingredients can also make delicious food that people can't stop eating. Hao Cheng has also reached a certain level of attention to food.
For example, for today’s noodles, she bought the flour and rolled the noodles herself. There is no noodle machine here, so she made the thin noodles entirely by hand.
Although flour is not expensive, the noodles cooked with this material are very chewy. When Hao Cheng is busy, he simply makes a bowl of noodles, and the clear soup is also delicious.
She shouldn't have let this stranger cook her noodles because that would have been a waste of food.
Hao Cheng only took a bite and put the bowl down. He had a gloomy face and refused to eat the dark dish.
Jiang Mengzhen didn't think it was a big deal. After all, he usually spent at least a dozen taels of silver on a meal, so he didn't take this kind of noodles, which were worth only a few dollars, seriously. It was his first time cooking, and although he cooked the noodles into lumps, it was just because he had no experience.
Although the noodle lump didn't look good, it was his first time cooking. This pale-faced scholar suddenly looked furious, and Jiang Mengzhen was also very dissatisfied.
But he was under someone's roof, and he was saved by someone else in this shabby house of a scholar. Jiang Mengzhen didn't show his dissatisfaction, but just lowered his head to eat the bowl of noodles he made.
He spit it out subconsciously after taking a bite. It was too disgusting! Some parts of the dough were rotten and some were not cooked. It tasted like raw flour. The noodle soup was so salty and bitter that taking a sip was like swallowing a big piece of salt.
How could there be such a disgusting thing in the world! Jiang Mengzhen subconsciously wanted to scold the cook who made this thing for him, but suddenly he realized that he was no longer the son of the high and mighty Duke, nor was he the legitimate prince married to the daughter of the deceased general.
The bowl of extremely unpalatable noodle dumpling soup in front of him was not made by someone else, but by his own hands.
If he ate, it was too hard for him to swallow. His mind could bear it, but his body couldn't. He would probably throw it up after eating it. If he didn't eat, his stomach would be beating happily. It kept growling.
He had not felt embarrassed for a long time. Perhaps no one had dared to embarrass him for many years, but after falling off the cliff and being in this small, shabby house where no one knew his identity, at this time and place, Jiang Mengzhen actually felt a little embarrassed for a moment.
A well-educated, gentle and virtuous man should also be able to cook well, but obviously, he failed. If he was the fake identity he had just revealed, pretending to be gentle and agreeable, what would he say to make amends at this time
Jiang Mengzhen's brain was working at high speed, but before he could say anything, the young woman opposite him with a gloomy face suddenly stood up and took away her bowl full of noodle dumpling soup from the table.
When he stood up, he heard the clacking sound of the kitchen knife on the chopping board and the sizzling aroma of the oil melting and heating up in the pot.
Where Jiang Mengzhen lives, the kitchen and dining area are far apart. There are more than ten cooks and kitchen helpers, and they never let the masters be stained by any smell of cooking oil.
Unlike this kind of house, the small kitchen can only accommodate a few people, it is filled with tiny things, and it is connected to the dining room, so the smell of whatever you cook fills the whole house.
Out of a strong sense of vigilance, he quickly put aside the embarrassment and stood up hurriedly to watch the strange woman cook, in order to prevent her from putting something that shouldn't be put in a place where he couldn't see.
This was the first time he had cooked in 28 years, and also the first time he had watched someone cook.
Hao Cheng didn't feel anything when being stared at. After all, when she was a chef in her previous life, she had participated in many big and small competitions. Sometimes she had to let apprentices watch her cook when cooking in hotels. It didn't matter to her whether others stared at her or not.
And as long as she touches the spatula and the kitchen knife, she basically enters a state of no one, and doesn't care whether there is anyone watching her.
Jiang Mengzhen made noodles, and Hao Cheng also made noodles, very simple plain noodles. The ingredients were also very simple, mushroom roots for the soup, a handful of soybean sprouts she had grown herself, a small piece of white lard, light green and very thin chives she had grown herself, and freshly cut thin noodles for two people.
Considering that Jiang Mengzhen might have been hungry for a long time, she grabbed a little more noodles.
Hao Cheng covered the ingredients for the broth with cold water, while vegetarian broth and water were boiling on the stove at the same time.
She took two clean wide-mouthed noodle bowls, put half a teaspoon of cooked lard and a little salt into each bowl, then skillfully sharpened the kitchen knife on the whetstone twice. With a flick of the knife, she removed the white part of the chives, and the chives became two-millimeter chopped green onions, which were of extremely uniform length and looked particularly neat and pleasing.
It didn't take her long to wait for a bowl of steaming noodles to be served.
Jiang Mengzhen wanted to help serve the noodles, but Hao Cheng forced her back with an extremely resentful look. He had just broken two of her bowls, so he could forget about wasting her money.
Jiang Mengzhen was sitting at the table, and in front of him was a bowl of Yangchun noodles sprinkled with green onions, emitting an enticing aroma and looking great.
"Eat it." Hao Cheng said and buried his head in eating his portion. Jiang Mengzhen, however, sat upright on the stool without moving. He really didn't see him do anything that shouldn't have happened. He would have been starved to death anyway, and being drugged was better than being starved to death.
He hesitated for a moment, but finally picked up the pair of chopsticks that he had rinsed no less than ten times.
After he swallowed a mouthful of noodles, his brain stopped thinking. Although it was just a bowl of ordinary plain noodles, it was delicious enough for him to swallow his tongue. Although his movements were still graceful, his speed was amazing.