The Game of Life

In the blink of an eye, Jiang Feng once again appeared in the kitchen of Yonghe House.

Manager Yin’s bootlicking had reached its final act, and Cao Guixiang was staring intently at the bag brought by Manager Yin, as if she wanted to emblazon the words “I want to try this” on her face.

Jiang Feng focused all his attention on the stoves beside Master Peng, remembering that Master Peng had steamed the crabs on the stove next to him, and there were only two stoves beside Master Peng.

As a stand-alone restaurant, Yonghe House occupied a larger area than Taifeng Building; correspondingly, its kitchen was somewhat larger than that of Taifeng Building, and it had more staff. When it was busy, everyone was busy together; when it was idle, everyone slacked off together. Previously, when Jiang Feng was looking at memories, he had focused all his attention on Master Peng, Qin Guisheng, and Cao Guixiang, and hardly paid any attention to Peng Changping, let alone the others, whom he outright ignored as background scenery.

Jiang Feng went behind the stoves to check inside and found that no fire had been started in this one, so he waited beside it.

Making crab stuffed oranges required steaming crabs.

Sure enough, no sooner had Manager Yin left than Master Peng asked Cao Guixiang to steam the crabs.

Upon receiving Master Peng’s instructions, Cao Guixiang went to scrub the crabs, and an apprentice whom Jiang Feng had barely remembered upon hearing Master Peng’s words hastily ran to start the fire.

A few logs and a handful of dry grass, and in the blink of an eye, a roaring fire was blazing in the stove.

Blasting heat for steaming crabs, nothing wrong with that.

As Master Peng began processing the oranges, Jiang Feng moved closer to watch his technique.

Cao Guixiang’s method of preparing the crab stuffed oranges was a direct imitation of Master Peng’s, with basically no difference, except that Master Peng was more skilled and faster, effortlessly navigating the complex structure and crisscrossing membranes inside the oranges.

In less than 20 minutes, three oranges had been hollowed out and cleaned neatly, with even the remaining juice inside the oranges being about the same level.

“Guixiang, go take out the crabs and pick out the crab meat,” Master Peng instructed.

Jiang Feng kept a close eye on the stoves, and as Cao Guixiang went to the steamer to take out the crabs, the apprentice who had lit the fire also hurriedly ran to the stove opening to pull out the unburned wood and extinguish it with charcoal ash.

Seeing the apprentice’s action, Master Peng said, “Leave a small piece.”

Leave a small piece?

Jiang Feng paused, every word spoken by Master Peng could be key to solving the case, but what did “leave a small piece” mean?

Jiang Feng didn’t understand, but the apprentice did and knocked off a small unburned section of wood with iron tongs. The wood that had been burning in the stove for over 20 minutes was very fragile, easily breaking into several pieces with a light tap. The apprentice chose a medium-sized piece to leave inside, allowing the small section covered in charcoal ash, white and frail, to lie solitary atop the pile of ash, glowing intermittently with a faint red light.

Jiang Feng felt like he knew how Master Peng steamed the crab stuffed oranges.

This method of leaving a small piece of wood burning in the stove at the end of cooking was all too familiar to him; Mrs. Jiang loved to do this when simmering rice.

Back in the countryside, when Sir cooked, it was Mrs. Jiang who managed the fire. Mrs. Jiang was extremely frugal with firewood; for her, the amount of firewood needed for each meal was calculated precisely, and not even half a stick was allowed to be wasted.

In the Jiang Family, if meals were cooked on a wood-burning stove, the rice would definitely be the last to be cooked. They had to wait until all the dishes were stir-fried, and when there was just a little firewood left or none at all, they used the remaining heat in the stove to steam the rice to perfection.

The airtightness and insulation of a clay stove are generally very good; even after the wood inside has burned away, the high temperature in the stove can remain for a long time, enough to fully cook the rice.

This method of cooking rice had the advantage of saving firewood. Mrs. Jiang grew up in a household with six children, but only one was a boy, so there was a serious shortage of labor. Firewood, which the children had to go to the mountains to collect, was a precious asset and had to be used sparingly. This habit, formed due to a severe lack of labor, didn’t change even after Mrs. Jiang had given birth to five robust boys, and it continued to this day.

If the crab-filled oranges that Master Peng was preparing were to be steamed, it would indeed retain the sweetness and freshness of the oranges to the utmost degree.

Jiang Feng remembered reading a short article in a newspaper when he was in high school; for years, Germans who were determined to measure seasoning to the gram, time to the second, and even fantasized about replacing chefs with robots, discovered many years ago that eggs didn’t actually need to be boiled for that long. Boiling them for only two-thirds of the usual time would suffice, after which they could turn off the heat, and the residual temperature and energy were enough to fully cook the eggs.

This was a discovery that seemed very practical but that 99% of people wouldn’t do.

However, Jiang Feng felt he might have to practice this egg-boiling technique in the future.

To steam food properly, controlling the remaining heat is crucial.

Jiang Feng continued to focus on the stove, paying no attention to Master Peng and Cao Guixiang’s actions.

Jiang Feng just watched as the small chunk of firewood in the stove shrank smaller and smaller, slowly merging with the ash beneath it. Even the red glow of the flames grew dimmer and more sporadic, like faint stars twinkling stubbornly in the night sky with barely noticeable light. After watching for a while, Jiang Feng became somewhat dazed, and he started to doubt whether the firewood in the stove had completely burned out.

Jiang Feng couldn’t help but look up at Master Peng, who had finished dealing with the oranges and was watching Cao Guixiang remove crab meat, talking to her about something, clearly not concerned with what was going on in the stove.

Could it be that Master Peng also followed the Let-it-be Cooking Method?

Jiang Feng was puzzled, wondering how such a high-level technique of steaming crab-filled oranges could seem less important to Master Peng’s teaching of his apprentice.

Was he overthinking it? Could it be that Master Peng didn’t plan to steam the crab-filled oranges at all and that leaving a piece of wood in the stove at the end was just a practice of Yonghe House to show off their wealth by demonstrating they didn’t care about the cost of firewood?

Jiang Feng watched Master Peng, whose attention was entirely on Cao Guixiang, pointing to a part of the crab and telling her how to quickly remove the meat from there.

Not even a glance was given to the stove area.

Dozens of seconds later, Master Peng looked at the crab meat Cao Guixiang had prepared, nodded, and said to her, “There are two more oranges in the bag, you can practice with the remaining crab meat later.”

After that, Master Peng walked to the side of the stove, circled behind the stove area, and stood behind Jiang Feng.

This was a movement so ordinary that Jiang Feng suddenly became tense, staring into Master Peng’s eyes.

Master Peng glanced into the stove.

It might have been for two seconds, or possibly three, like a casual glance, and he quickly shifted his gaze away, turning to Cao Guixiang and saying, “Guixiang, bring the crab-filled orange over and put it in the steamer.”

With just one look, he determined that the temperature was right.

Jiang Feng stood rooted to the spot.

This was the first time he had witnessed what a master’s level really meant.

He had seen many memories, but none had been as shocking as Master Peng’s with just one look, whether it was Cao Guixiang, Sun Zheran, Jiang Chengde, or Jiang Hengzhong.

What Jiang Feng felt needed careful pondering, gradual research, and serious consideration, Master Peng could discern with just one glance.

To Jiang Feng, mastering the timing of when the orange stuffed with crab was fully stewed was a major affair that required squatting by the stove and closely monitoring the process, much like cooking porridge, unmoving and undistracted.

But for Master Peng, judging the perfect moment when the orange stuffed with crab was done was merely a simple, everyday occurrence, not even requiring a fuss, just a casual glance at the stove as if he were simply walking by.

In a match between experts, one move can settle the victory.

Suddenly, Jiang Feng realized that on the mountain range of culinary arts, he might have only just climbed a small hill, with countless higher peaks still ahead.

After Master Peng instructed Cao Guixiang to steam the orange stuffed with crab, he went on to deal with a sunflower duck, leaving Jiang Feng somewhat reluctantly squatting by the stove, trying to discern the secrets of the craft.

But other than straining his eyes slightly, he gleaned nothing.

Master Peng, who had been cooking with a clay stove his whole life, knew exactly when to burn what kind of wood, how much wood to use, how intense the fire should be, and when to draw the wood out. This understanding, this measuring stick in Master Peng’s mind, was beyond the grasp of young ones like Jiang Feng who were accustomed to gas stoves.

Seeing nothing enlightening in the stove, Jiang Feng turned his attention to the outside, wondering if the other stoves might also hide great secrets.

Indeed, he noticed something fascinating.

The woodpile at Yonghe House was arranged with great care.

Different woods, varying in length and thickness, whether whole or split, whether previously used or not, were all meticulously separated.

Jiang Feng also noticed that Yonghe House actually employed two apprentices exclusively for managing the firewood, and they were very professional.

From the outside, Yonghe House seemed like just another overcrowded state-owned restaurant, but in reality, each person had their specific job, and the division of labor was finely detailed, with everyone fulfilling their role proficiently.

Crouching tigers, hidden dragons.

By the time Jiang Feng came back to his senses, Master Peng’s orange stuffed with crab was already out of the steamer, with Cao Guixiang carefully transferring them onto a tray. Jiang Feng hurried over to take a look.

Without lifting the cover, Jiang Feng could tell just by the smell that the three oranges stuffed with crab in front of him were definitely of A-grade quality.

Fragrant.

Not just ordinarily fragrant, but a rich blend of fruit aroma with the scent of Xiangxue Wine, already exceedingly strong without even lifting the lid. The unique stewing process allowed the wine to evaporate fully, infusing every corner of the orange including the peel, marrying the fruit’s fragrance in a strikingly delightful way.

It was not mere novelty, but rather allure.

Such an orange stuffed with crab was indeed worthy of being called a delicacy.

After Cao Guixiang left with the dish, Jiang Feng didn’t follow her this time but stayed in the kitchen.

During his first encounter with this memory, he hadn’t realized that the back kitchen of Yonghe House was a treasure trove. Not only was there a successor to the Tan Family Cuisine like Master Peng, but all the other chefs, and even the seemingly ordinary assistants, were all extraordinarily competent entities.

Once Cao Guixiang was gone, the initially quiet kitchen suddenly came alive.

“Old Peng, isn’t it a bit improper to have Guixiang bring the dish over? Master Jin’s apprentice is famously handsome. Be careful, or Guixiang might be charmed and have her soul hooked,” teased Master Wang with a laugh.

“Nonsense, there are young ones here. Don’t talk recklessly, or it might spread and tarnish Guixiang’s reputation,” Master Peng responded indifferently.

Master Wang simply smiled without a word.

Qin Guisheng, hearing Master Wang’s jest, was somewhat puzzled and sought clarification, ending up leaning closer to Peng Changping.

“Eldest senior brother, what did Master Wang mean by that?” asked Qin Guisheng curiously.

“Take it at face value,” responded Peng Changping while calmly wiping his cleaver. Now with no tasks at hand, all he could do was clean his knife.

“You don’t think our junior sister really fell for that apprentice of Master Jin, do you? Have you ever seen Master Jin’s apprentice? Is he really as handsome as they say? I don’t believe there is anyone in the world that handsome, someone who could make young girls want to climb through windows. No girls have ever climbed through my windows,” Qin Guisheng seemed to be asking Peng Changping, but was really just talking to himself.

“What if Master Jin’s apprentice really is that handsome? What are we going to do? Our junior sister is rather superficial and likes to hang around good-looking people like me. Oh no, what if she really falls for him? He’s just an apprentice without an official position or even a salary. How could someone like that…” Qin Guisheng turned into a chatterbox, casting predictions.

Peng Changping continued to wipe his knife indifferently, not even bothering to engage with him.

Jiang Feng roamed around the back kitchen of Yonghe House once more, focusing his study on the kitchen’s firewood and stoves, and the time quickly passed.

Even Jiang Feng himself hadn’t realized that while he was intently observing the stove and enjoying himself, he was kicked out of the memory, returning to the back kitchen of Taifeng Building.

The first thing Jiang Feng did after leaving the memory was to light a fire to boil a pot of water.

He wanted to know how much residual heat remained in the water after it was boiled and the fire was turned off.

Clay stoves were different from gas stoves, and Jiang Feng couldn’t just build a clay stove in the Taifeng Building’s kitchen exclusively for making orange stuffed with crab.

Clay stoves have their ways, and gas stoves have their methods. Jiang Feng already had the key to open the door; now all he needed was the strength to push it.

Since he was on the right path, reaching the destination was only a matter of time.

Jiang Feng watched the water in the pot; the surface was calm, far from boiling.

He too, had a long way to go.