It was noon. When Ye Chui and Lin Wei arrived at the Lin family villa, the vegetarian chef invited by Zhang Ying had already prepared lunch for the old Buddha. The old Buddha, Lin Zhengdao, Wu Haimei and Zhang Ying were sitting at the dining table to eat. The chef stood aside with a rosary in his hand and chanted Buddhist scriptures. The whole scene was filled with a strange atmosphere...
Seeing Ye Chui and Lin Wei coming back, Wu Haimei immediately stood up from the dining table to greet them. She looked depressed, holding Ye Chui and Lin Wei's hands and whispered, "I don't know where this monk came from. Mom finally became less obsessed with vegetarianism these past few days, but she messed it up and immediately returned to her original state."
Lin Wei looked at the dishes on the table next to her and asked Wu Haimei curiously, "Mom, are his dishes delicious?"
"It's not even close to Ye Chui's food." Wu Haimei curled her lips, "It's as bland as water, with only a tiny bit of oil and no seasonings like onion, ginger, and garlic. It's impossible to swallow it."
"Then why is he called the master of vegetarian dishes?" Lin Wei asked in confusion, "My father said on the phone that he is very famous."
"Didn't you see he was chanting beside them?" Wu Haimei pointed at the monk and Lin Wei and continued, "He said that as long as you listen to him chanting and recite the Buddha's name with sincerity, the food will naturally become delicious. Whoever says the food is not delicious is not pious to the Buddha."
Lin Wei: “…”
Ye Chui: “…”
So this is how the vegetarian chef got his name...
"Old charlatan." Wu Haimei complained in a low voice.
Ye Cui looked at the old charlatan carefully, oh no, the Buddhist master, he was a middle-aged monk who looked to be in his forties or fifties, wearing a shiny white and yellow cassock, with a very peaceful expression on his face. As Ye Cui came in, he was looking at Ye Cui with curiosity.
Buddhists abstain from meat and do not eat any fish or fish. Meat is fishy, while non-vegetarian foods include condiments with strong flavors such as onions, ginger, and garlic. In some sects, even ingredients like celery are prohibited.
Using vegetarian dishes as ingredients, without onions, ginger, garlic, and little oil, the resulting dish will definitely not taste good no matter how many words you use. But it doesn’t matter. Chanting sutras and reciting Buddhist scriptures while eating, as long as your heart is sincere, the taste of the food will naturally become delicious…
"Ye Chui, what did you bring?" Wu Haimei suddenly saw Ye Chui holding a bag and asked immediately.
"These are some ingredients I prepared at home, and I happened to bring them here today." Ye Chui replied. After hearing from Lin Wei that a Buddhist vegetarian master would come to the Lin family villa today, Ye Chui was bound to have a dispute with the other party, so he specially prepared some ingredients, all of which were "vegetarian meat" that Ye Chui had carefully made in the past two days.
Wu Haimei's eyes lit up when she heard Ye Chui's words, and she immediately said, "That's great. I really can't eat this monk's food at all. Please go to the kitchen and help me make something edible."
Having said that, Wu Haimei walked over and said to the old Buddha, "Mom, I really can't enjoy this master's vegetarian dishes. Maybe I haven't reached that level yet, so I'd better eat the food made by Ye Chui. I like his dishes better."
The old Buddha looked at Ye Chui, then at the vegetarian dishes on the table in front of her, and subconsciously showed a trace of regret on her face - these vegetarian dishes were indeed hard to eat, but the master beside her linked the deliciousness of vegetarian dishes with Buddhist principles. The deeper one's belief in Buddhism, the more delicious these meals would be. The old Buddha had been a Buddhist for a long time, and even if she felt that the meals were not very good, she had to say against her will that the meals were good after tasting them. If she said that the meals were unpalatable, wouldn't that mean that her belief in Buddhism was not sincere enough
"Xiao Ye, you're here." The old Buddha smiled and greeted Ye Chui. During this period of time, her impression of Ye Chui had increased sharply. After greeting him, she immediately introduced the monk next to him to Ye Chui, "This is Master Mingjing. He has profound knowledge of Buddhism. The vegetarian dishes he cooks are very famous."
"Mr. Ye." Zhang Ying stepped forward and said, "Your cooking skills are also very superb. I took great pains to invite Master Mingjing here. In addition to wanting him to prepare a table of vegetarian dishes for the old Buddha and talk about Buddhist principles, I also wanted you, Mr. Ye, to have a chance to learn from this master chef. How about you try these vegetarian dishes?"
These vegetarian dishes were bland. For example, one of them was boiled cabbage. This boiled cabbage was completely different from the boiled cabbage made by Ye Chui. It was the cabbage boiled in water and then a little salt was added...
If Ye Chui said that the dishes were delicious, he would definitely leave a hypocritical impression in the mind of the old Buddha. He did not believe in Buddhism, so how could he say that the dishes were delicious
But if Ye Chui said that the dish was unpalatable, it would naturally cause dissatisfaction to the old Buddha, who would think that Ye Chui was disrespectful to Master Mingjing.
Zhang Ying wanted to put Ye Chui in a dilemma.
However, it was obvious that Ye Chui was going to disappoint him, because Ye Chui had no intention of tasting the dish directly. He just smiled and said to Master Mingjing: "It is impolite not to reciprocate. Since I want to taste the master's dish, I naturally have to make a dish for the master to taste first."
Ming Jing laughed, looking like a high-level monk: "I have heard that Master Ye is an excellent cook. It would be my honor to see your cooking skills today."
"Then please wait for a moment, Master." Ye Chui said with a smile, and then walked into the kitchen. Less than a minute later, he came out again with a plate in his hand.
Ye Chui had made preparations before he came and brought over some ingredients he had recently prepared. These ingredients only needed to be simply served on a plate. Looking closely at the plate in Ye Chui's hand, the sliced ingredients were golden in color, fresh and oily. At first glance, it was impossible to tell what they were, but they had a kind of mouth-watering charm.
Wu Haimei was a foodie after all. She stared at the plate in Ye Chui's hand, frowned and thought for a while, then suddenly thought of something: "Ye Chui, this isn't a roast duck, is it? You made me a crispy roast duck some time ago, and it seems to be very similar to this..."
Indeed, when he suddenly saw the thing on Ye Chui's plate, the golden color and the burnt surface were almost exactly the same as the roast duck cut into pieces!
Master Mingjing became furious when he heard Wu Haimei's words. Zhang Ying beside him also deliberately showed an angry expression and asked Ye Chui, "Mr. Ye, you are going too far. You know that Master Mingjing is a master of Buddhism, but you still served him a meat dish. Isn't this asking too much?"
Ming Jing hurriedly clasped his hands together and said, "Amitabha."
"This is a vegetarian dish." Ye Chui said with a faint smile, "This is a dish made with winter bamboo shoots and tofu as the main ingredients. It does not contain any strong-flavored condiments such as onions, ginger, and garlic. I think this dish does not violate the Buddhist rules, right?"
The dish presented by Ye Chui is called vegetarian duck, which is a lifelike vegetarian meat dish made with all vegetarian ingredients. This is the magic of Chinese food culture. The winter bamboo shoots are steamed and shredded, the dried shiitake mushrooms are soaked in water, washed and shredded, put into the heated oil pan and then add MSG, soy sauce, cooking wine and other condiments, stir-fry and mix until the unique aroma of duck meat is imitated, and then wrapped in tofu skin and fried. With superb skills, the appearance of roast duck can be imitated vividly.
Ye Chui had prepared this vegetarian duck a long time ago, intending to give it to the old lady to taste so that she could gradually accept meat food. Now he just brought it out.
Zhang Ying let Ye Chui taste Ming Jing's dish, which was a trap that put Ye Chui in a dilemma, and Ye Chui let Ming Jing taste the vegetarian duck, which was also a trap that put Ming Jing in a dilemma - if Ming Jing tasted the vegetarian duck, although the dish was vegetarian, Ming Jing would still violate the precepts. Although what he ate was vegetarian, what he was thinking in his heart was eating meat, which was breaking the precepts.
In the eyes of Buddhist monks, what you do is not important, what is important is what you think in your heart. It is as if Ye Cui had seen a Buddhist monk in his previous life criticizing online games, claiming that the sin of killing a person in the game is the same as killing a real person, and that one would go to hell after death.
(It’s true, you can search it and see~)
Ye Chui could use this to accuse Ming Jing of not being well versed in Buddhism.
Of course, if Mingjing refused to eat his vegetarian duck, Ye Chui would also have a lot of Buddhist theories to blame Mingjing.
After taking a look at the vegetarian duck, Mingjing chose not to eat it.
He showed a look of pity, bowed his head and chanted: "Pure bhikkhus and bodhisattvas, when walking on a forked road, do not step on the grass, let alone pull it with their hands? How can you be so compassionate as to take the flesh and blood of living beings to eat?"
Hearing these words, Lin Wei couldn't help but move closer to Ye Chui and whispered, "Ye Chui, what did he mean?"
Zhang Ying sneered and said, "Master, of course what you are talking about is Buddhist principles. How could Mr. Ye possibly understand it?"
Ye Chui smiled and glanced at Zhang Ying, then explained to Lin Wei: "This is a quote from the Shurangama Sutra. It means that monks who observe the precepts and are pure will never step on the grass on the road when they walk, let alone pull it out. If they cherish plants like this, they will naturally cherish animals even more."
Hearing Ye Chui's words, Lin Wei opened her mouth wide. She had just asked casually, but she didn't expect Ye Chui to actually understand the meaning of these words. Wu Haimei, Lin Zhengdao, Lao Foye, and Zhang Ying were also shocked and looked at Ye Chui in amazement.
Master Mingjing couldn't help but stop reciting and looked at Ye Chui with wide eyes.
Ye Chui looked at Master Ming Jing with a smile and continued, "Master, isn't the Buddhist scripture you are reciting a little inappropriate at this time? Although my dish is called vegetarian duck, it is actually completely vegetarian, and your words are blaming meat eaters - don't think you can fool people by picking a few sentences from the Buddhist scriptures."
"… "
The shock on Master Mingjing's face soon subsided. He looked at Ye Chui with some seriousness and said in a calm and pretentious manner, "Eating meat as a vegetarian is already a sin. You don't eat meat with your mouth, but you eat meat in your heart. This is a sin. We Buddhists will never eat these things."
What this means is that although Ye Chui's dish is a vegetarian dish, it is prepared to look like a meat dish, and one will commit a sin after eating it. One may not be eating meat with one's mouth, but one is eating meat in one's heart - this is the same as what the master said who accused people of going to hell for playing online games.
Ye Chui chuckled and continued, "Master, you said that Buddhists would not eat these vegetarian meats, but in fact, vegetarian meat, also known as temple food, originated from monks. It was invented by monks and has a long history in China, dating back to the Liang Dynasty in the Southern Dynasties."
"This..." Master Mingjing suddenly became anxious and said hastily, "Those monks are all monks who have broken their precepts. After all, they are only a minority..."
"Master, you are wrong." Lin Zhengdao suddenly interrupted at this time, "Last year, I took my mother to the Fahua Temple in Yanjing to burn incense and worship Buddha. At that time, I ate the vegetarian food prepared by the temple. I didn't think about it at that time, but now I feel that those vegetarian foods are actually vegetarian meat. It's just that because of the vegetarian movement, the method of making vegetarian meat is not very authentic and has lost its original charm. However, these methods are still passed down. Fahua Temple is a famous temple in China. It is said that various famous temples across the country will have similar vegetarian banquets to entertain pilgrims. According to what you said, are these famous temples also owned by a small number of monks who have cracked the rules?"
Lin Zhengdao was naturally on Ye Chui's side at this moment, and his words were naturally said in support of Ye Chui's argument.
Temple cuisine has this characteristic and is a very famous Chinese cuisine. Although it is vegetarian, it imitates meat dishes. This kind of cuisine is often more expensive than meat dishes, and ordinary people simply cannot afford authentic vegetarian banquets.
"This..." Ming Jing obviously didn't know how to refute, because these were also facts. A hint of doubt appeared on his originally peaceful face. On weekdays, he went around performing and preaching Buddhism. Because of his title as a master, that person was respectful to him. This was the first time someone dared to refute him like this.
The old Buddha also had some doubts about Master Mingjing's attainments in Buddhism, and looked at Mingjing with some confusion.
Zhang Ying showed an anxious look. Ming Jing was hired by Zhang Hantao at a high price, but she didn't expect that he would be stumped by Ye Chui's question.
And that’s not all, because Ye Chui smiled faintly, and then said to Ming Jing: “Master, I actually have my own opinion on the vegetarianism of Buddhism.”
It is almost natural for monks to be vegetarian, but at this time Ye Chui raised doubts!
Ming Jing already knew that the young man in front of him was not someone to be trifled with. He asked coldly, "What do you think?"
"Buddhism allows humans to eat flowers and plants, because after humans die, they return to dust and flowers and plants will grow again. But if humans eat animals, they will also return to dust after death and flowers and plants will grow again. Animals eat flowers and plants, so what is the difference between humans eating flowers and plants and eating animals? On the contrary, we eat flowers and plants, and animals also eat flowers and plants. Doesn't this make us compete with animals for food?"
Ye Chui asked with a smile. (~^~)