The first thing I did was to find out

Chapter 76 Soup (Extra chapter for leader Canglang Fengya!)

After confirming that the ingredients were available in the store, Qin Huai rushed to the store and started cooking the soup.

Chicken soup is one of the important components of chicken noodle soup.

As the name suggests, chicken soup accounts for 2/3 of the chicken noodle soup.

Whether a bowl of chicken noodle soup is delicious or not, the soup is the base and the noodles are the icing on the cake. If the base is not well laid, no matter how good the noodles are, they can only reach a certain degree. But if the soup is a bowl of delicious chicken soup, the chicken noodle soup will definitely make Qin Luo break through himself and eat five bowls in a row.

How to cook an excellent pot of chicken soup requires a lot of attention.

When Zheng Da was still working as a randomly assigned pastry chef in the cafeteria, he once mentioned to Qin Huai that even if Qin Huai was unwilling to be his disciple, he still hoped that Qin Huai could systematically learn the basic skills that a pastry chef should have.

As a pastry chef, kneading dough is naturally an indispensable basic skill.

Most white dim sum are made of noodles. Different dim sum and different cooking techniques have different requirements for noodles. It is very important for white-case chefs to know how to knead the noodles specifically for different foods, knead the noodles well, and even change the softness, ductility, and elasticity of the noodles according to different preferences of different people.

In addition to kneading the dough, seasoning the filling is equally important.

The texture of dim sum is determined by the dough, and the flavor is determined by the fillings. Only when the two are combined can truly delicious dim sum be made. Basically, as long as there are no problems with the dough and fillings, the dim sum will not taste bad even if there are slight mistakes in the steaming, boiling and baking process.

Therefore, it cannot be said that the temperature is unimportant, but it can be said that it does not play a decisive role.

Of course, if the food is overcooked to a certain extent, it can have a decisive effect in destroying the dim sum.

As for knife skills, most plain-food chefs are not particularly proficient at it.

Zheng Da's knife skills are very good among white-casserole chefs. The main reason for his excellence is that he practiced basic skills well when he was young. His master, Master Jing, is an excellent chef in both white-casserole and red-casserole. When he taught his apprentices, he taught them both white-casserole and red-casserole, and practiced all basic skills. He would only train them in a targeted manner when the apprentices showed obvious talents in certain areas.

It can be said that Zheng Da is a standard professional white-case chef. He has an excellent master who knows how to teach. He has been practicing basic skills since he was a child, and has a good foundation. He is not only very solid in kneading dough and mixing stuffing, but also has extremely good knife skills and heat control. His techniques are not bad either. He is a standard pentagonal warrior.

As for Qin Huai, Zheng Da's evaluation of him was that his academic imbalance was a bit too serious.

There is basically no knife skills.

This is normal. Knife skills are acquired through practice, and you can’t be lazy. Qin Huai doesn’t have a master. He makes dim sum purely based on his talent and self-study. The most important thing is that he doesn’t have to cut vegetables at home.

When he was a child in the orphanage, Director Qin and other staff members of the orphanage just didn't cook well, but that didn't mean they didn't know how to cut vegetables. Although the orphanage was poor, Director Qin was not a child abuser who was so cruel as to let a few-year-old child cut vegetables. Qin Huai basically never touched a knife when he was in the orphanage.

Later, she was adopted by Qin Congwen and his wife. There was a very clear division of labor in the Qin's breakfast shop. Cutting vegetables and chopping meat, which did not require any technical skills and were considered physical work in selling breakfast, were all done by Qin Congwen and Zhao Rong.

Therefore, Qin Huai never touched a kitchen knife when he was helping out at the breakfast shop.

After graduating from university, he returned home to sell breakfast. Qin Congwen and Zhao Rong felt sorry for their son, and Qin Huai himself was not very fond of getting up early. Every morning, Qin Congwen and Zhao Rong would prepare the ingredients and everything before Qin Huai got up and started working.

It can be said that Qin Huai has never practiced knife skills since he was a child, and the word "knife skills" does not exist in his culinary dictionary.

The heat is about the same, a little better than the knife skills. After all, when steaming the buns, you still have to pay attention to the heat when simmering the fillings of the Wu Ding Bao over low heat.

Before the game system was activated, Qin Huai always felt that he had a good control over the temperature.

When the system was first activated, he even felt that the system's evaluation of both knife skills and heat control as elementary was biased. He admitted that knife skills were elementary, and he really couldn't do it.

But he disagreed with the basic heat. Qin Huai thought the heat was OK, no problem. Look at the buns, they are big and white.

It was during this period of time that he realized that it was not because his cooking skills were good enough, but that the game system's lowest evaluation of skills was elementary, and there was no room for further improvement in knife skills.

The dishes made during this period were a bit beyond the scope of a breakfast shop. They were more difficult, and the skills required increased. Only then did Qin Huai realize that his cooking control was indeed not good enough.

Longevity noodles require chicken soup, and dream-fulfilling sesame cakes require fried minced meat. Once the dim sum requirements are more and involve Qinhuai’s shortcomings, his shortcomings will become extremely obvious.

It can be seen from the time when Luo Jun ate the sesame seed bun at noon that he did not put any meat in it at the end and just ate the sesame seed bun.

This behavior is no different from eating only the bun when eating roujiamo.

Things that Qin Huai could easily handle before with his talent for feeling, he can no longer do now.

Before, it only depended on the performance of individual subjects, but now it depends on the total score. Qin Huai, who was not good at all subjects, was having trouble keeping up with the progress.

Master Qin, who had always thought he had graduated, decided to go back to school to catch up on his lessons and practice his skills.

As for the sword skills...

Zheng Da said that plain-food chefs generally don’t have very good knife skills, he’s just particularly bad at it, so he should practice it when he has a chance.

If the filling is chopped well, it can add three points to the dessert.

Three points out of a hundred.

The energetic Master Qin started his first serious chicken soup making.

After seeing how Zheng Da made the broth, Qin Huai realized that what he had cooked before was pork broth and chicken broth, which were not broth at all.

In the morning, Qin Huai sent a message to Zheng Da asking for advice on how to make soup stock. Zheng Da did not directly reply with the technique. It may be because the technique of making soup stock is a bit complicated and it is difficult to explain it clearly in WeChat, but Zheng Da sent Qin Huai the recipe of making soup stock he made some time ago.

When Zheng Da was performing Gao Tang, he did not avoid Qin Huai. He even wanted to show off his skills to open Qin Huai's eyes and then be amazed and immediately become his disciple. The first time he performed Gao Tang, he almost taught Qin Huai step by step.

Qin Huai was indeed watching from the side at that time.

Zheng Da asked Qin Huai to try it a few times by himself and then ask him if he found any problems.

Qin Huai thought this method was good, but it was a bit time-consuming.

Fortunately, he is now running a canteen instead of a breakfast shop. He can sell old hen soup directly at noon and in the evening without worrying about waste. According to the recipe given by Zheng Da, the broth of chicken soup should be made of old hens as the main ingredient, and the older the hen, the better. It should also be matched with lean pork, ham, duck feet, pig skin, and large pieces of pig spine.

These ingredients don't need to be chopped, just simply process the large pieces and put them into the pot whole.

Put cold water into the pot, bring to a boil and skim off the foam.

After Qin Huai processed the ingredients, he took a photo and sent it to Zheng Da. Seeing that Qin Huai really wanted to practice making soup stock, Zheng Da sent a few voice messages to remind him of several problems that are easy to occur when making soup stock.

Qinhuai soup is for longevity noodles, so the soup is clear. The fire for cooking clear soup should be high at first and then low. After the soup boils, turn down the fire quickly to keep it boiling slightly with small bubbles. There is also a very vivid professional term for small bubbles - chrysanthemum heart bubbles.

Zheng Da told Qin Huai that when cooking soup in a large pot, it is very challenging for the chef to control the heat in order to maintain the beautiful bubbles of chrysanthemum heart. Not to mention that the clear soup takes more than 4 hours to cook. It is impossible to open the lid of the pot to observe the boiling situation and see if the bubbles are chrysanthemum heart bubbles.

The whole process of slowly simmering over low heat with the lid on the pot is the whole process of the chef controlling the heat.

Zheng Da didn't expect Qin Huai to be able to reach this level.

If Qin Huai could make the clear soup to this level, he would not only be the future top white-course chef, he would be proficient in both red-course and white-course cuisine. All he needed was knife skills to become a future master.

Moreover, this level of clear soup is not required for cooking chicken noodle soup. This level of clear soup has many other and wider uses.

For example, boiled cabbage, chicken tofu, or any other dish, just scoop a spoonful of this level of clear soup into it and the dish will immediately become delicious.

Zheng Da suggested that Qin Huai should start with a smaller portion.

Find a small pot and it won’t take that long. If you are not confident about the heat, you can occasionally lift the lid to check.

Qin Huai listened to the above opinions.

He did all of that.

Then it rolled over very smoothly.

Boiling a pot of it to cook longevity noodles will lower the quality of the noodles, but if it is put in the cafeteria as a single-serve chicken soup, it will definitely be a family-grade soup that sells well.

If this pot of soup were to be rated, Qinhuai would probably be a D.

Qinhuai uses Zheng Da Diao’s broth to cook longevity noodles, and the highest grade that can be made is C+.

If you use your own broth to cook longevity noodles...

It would be a blessing to have a C-grade.

Very good, Huihui is one step closer to eating grade A longevity noodles.

Qin Huai drank the broth that he had made himself and had a video call with Zheng Da.

"It tastes like chicken soup. It feels like a slightly richer chicken soup." Qin Huai smacked his lips. "It's about the same as the chicken soup my mom used to cook at home. My mom usually uses old hens from the countryside to cook chicken soup. It's delicious."

Zheng Da on the other end of the video closed his eyes in pain.

"Master Zheng, is my soup really that bad?" Qin Huai was made to lose confidence by Zheng Da.

"It's just average." Zheng Da said, "This soup is actually cooked at your level. I'm just..."

"I was just thinking, what if you actually have an excellent talent in red case but you just haven't discovered it before. Now you want to practice it yourself, and after I remotely guide you, you can immediately get amazing results. Then I can be considered your enlightenment master."

Qin Huai:......

Master Zheng, are you writing novels?
He is an expert in both the red and white cases, but the male protagonist in novels doesn't even have this treatment. Usually, the male protagonist in novels is only proficient in one of them.

"Then do I still need to practice?" Qin Huai took another sip of soup. "Is it okay to practice according to this pattern?"

"Your progress will be too slow if you practice on your own without anyone watching you. Making soup stock is not that simple. It's impossible to learn it like you did before, by just looking up a recipe online and tinkering with it for a month or two." Zheng Da poured cold water on Qin Huai, "I can see that I can't accept you as my apprentice."

"I'm not good at teaching apprentices. It would be easier if you were in Gusu, but today I found out that I really don't know how to teach remotely."

"Xiao Qin, I'll give you my senior brother's WeChat. He opened a restaurant and is quite famous in Gusu. His skill in making broth is better than mine. He is good at both Suzhou cuisine and Huaiyang cuisine. The best thing about Huaiyang cuisine is the broth."

"Besides, he has many apprentices and has experience."

"I'll call him later and tell him that his waist has not been very good in recent years, and he seems to have not cooked since the beginning of this year. Now he just hangs around the restaurant every day, teaches his apprentices, and keeps an eye on the place. Maybe he has more free time than me."

"Thank you then." Qin Huai put down the bowl, "What's your senior brother's name?"

"His last name is Huang, and his name is Huang Shengli. You can just call him Master Huang."

"Okay, thank you."

Zheng Da hung up the WeChat call.

After hanging up the phone, Zheng Da sighed sadly: "My good disciple."

"Alas, Cheap Yellow wins."

It’s a new month, and I’m begging for monthly votes at the beginning of the month~ Monthly votes for new books are still very important!

By the way, I would like to recommend Pudding’s new book, “Top Academic Master”. If you like daily writings about academic masters, you can go and have a look.

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(End of this chapter)