Chapter 65
Chapter 65. O Chicken, My Chicken
Korea is called the Chicken Republic.
However, looking at the chicken market's aspects, the assessment that it's a divided nation in civil war, fragmented into countless pieces, rather than a republic, fits better.
Dozens, hundreds of franchises are at war in rave reviews.
To somehow step on competitors and rise up, they fiercely develop new weapons like fried chicken with green onions, grilled chicken, and seasoning chicken.
Those who couldn't develop were all weeded out, so chicken taste underwent repeated upward standardization.
Even KFC, called a global standard, gets the response 'Ah, that hamburger place?' in the Korean market.
Truly the first division of the chicken world where mediocre ones cannot survive, and a hellscape where foreign brand corpses are piled abundantly.
However, Korean chicken didn't possess this much status from the start.
Originally in Korean cuisine, 'deep frying' was an unfamiliar cooking method.
Since chicken was distributed in the mid-to-late 20th century, history was too short to change that perception.
So people at that time preferred 'whole chicken' fried whole without preparation like brining, or 'rotisserie' called electric-grilled whole chicken.
The Western recipe of cutting chicken into pieces and soaking it thoroughly in oil was greasy for 'food grown and consumed locally' tastes.
Then one menu that changed the world line appeared.
Precisely chicken coated with sauce based on corn syrup and gochujang.
Seasoned Chicken.
A bewitching food that frontally broke through Fried Chicken's greasiness with spicy-sweetness.
Though opinions differ on who started it, the fact that Seasoned Chicken led the K-Chicken renaissance cannot be denied.
In other words, it's a menu that fits the culinary revolution's purpose incredibly well.
"Hmm."
Penelope intently observed the chicken coated with bright red sauce.
But she didn't readily reach out.
"...Incredibly, good smell. Serena, you try it."
"What? Me?"
"You said you're still hungry. I'll yield to you."
"N-no. Lady Penelope, you try it first. I'm full."
The two people bickering 'older sister first,' 'younger sister first' like affectionate real sisters.
Anyone could see they didn't want to eat first.
"From the cook's perspective, this hurts my heart..."
"It's too red... I can't handle spicy food well."
"It's not that spicy."
"Jurgen always says that..."
It couldn't be helped.
Jurgen tended to make food somewhat spicy.
Even this Fried Chicken had intense pungent spiciness.
But this chicken openly mixed in bright red sauce looked to Britannians unfamiliar with red sauce like chicken from the underworld returned from hell.
"Serena, hurry and try it. Jurgen's heart hurts."
"V-Viscount Renoir doesn't yield to unjust oppression! Let's do rock-paper-scissors fairly."
"Rock-paper-scissors? Ha, we're not even kids."
Ultimately it was decided by rock-paper-scissors.
They tied 3 times, and Penelope who threw scissors lost.
"Yes! I won! Now now, hurry and eat. Lady Penelope."
"What are you saying! You threw late! This is invalid!"
"That excuse is too unseemly! A noble lady keeps her word once given, right?"
"Haah..."
Serena laughed triumphantly.
Since Penelope wasn't the type to be unreasonable either, she ultimately placed Seasoned Chicken on her side plate.
Sauce thicker than it looked.
Bright red sauce sparkled like garnet coating the chicken.
"As expected, it looks spicy..."
As Penelope poked at the dangerous-looking chicken with her fork, Serena smiled brightly and teased.
"Mmm~ It looks so delicious~"
"..."
"I'm envious~ The first tasting rights to Jurgen's new menu!"
"..."
"Still, not retracting words once spoken truly shows the spirit befitting the joint representative of Y&P, the prominent food company with annual sales of 45,000 Crowns!"
"..."
Originally Serena wouldn't tease this much.
To Serena, Penelope was a friend-like non-friend, friendly yet scary 'real noble.'
However, the shock of the 'annual 30,000 Crowns' seen moments ago, and the envy originating from there, granted Serena timid aggression.
Right.
Serena could never become like Penelope!
Then she wanted to at least see Penelope shedding trickle tears while eating the prototype made too spicy.
"Um, Miss Serena. How about stopping there?"
"What? Lady Penelope, hurry and eat and give your impression!"
It was good the two became close, but Penelope held grudges long.
Serena's appearance teasing from the side felt to Jurgen's eyes like reckless outrage tap dancing on a landmine.
"..."
Penelope quietly wrote someone's name in red letters in her death note.
Though anger truly boiled, Serena's words about joint representative whatnot weren't fundamentally wrong.
Even if Jurgen brought out terribly awful cooking claiming it as the next product, as Y&P's joint representative she should willingly eat it.
Though that wouldn't become Serena's sentencing reason.
"Haah... nom."
Because it was thoroughly soaked in sauce, the fried coating didn't make a crisp sound like before.
Moreover, the strangely cold temperature and soggy texture seemed to already foresee future suffering.
It comes now.
Though she didn't know well, suffering that would make her tongue tingle would come!
Penelope, frightened in advance, squeezed her eyes shut.
"Hm...?"
But what she felt wasn't spiciness oppressing Penelope.
Instead, what drew saliva like priming water—was it fruit's sourness? Or honey's sweetness?
Sticky, stretching sweetness sensually wrapped around her tongue tip.
Following that, addictive sweet-and-sour fragrance heavily extended to her tongue root.
Spiciness with exquisite balance finally settling on the tongue packaged in sweet-and-sourness.
"Wow..."
Surprised.
No, shocked.
Delicious.
Beyond what she imagined.
When the skin thoroughly soaked in sauce filled her mouth together with chicken meat, indescribable satisfaction and heavy umami spread whoosh.
The richness of sauce added to chicken is lacking 2%, reborn as a completely different food.
"..."
Penelope, possessing a tongue too good for Britannians, could feel it.
This Seasoned Chicken was how to say... the same category as Cola.
A pyramid of taste built by thoroughly measuring all ingredients and delicately stacking them in layers.
A firm purpose felt to captivate as many people as possible through taste.
With this, it was a taste all ages and genders would like.
A taste that perfectly offset Fried Chicken's weakness of 'greasiness.'
Even unlike Cola's time, it was already 'complete.'
"What do you think?"
"This... seems like it'll sell?"
"Lacking points?"
"Lacking points... I don't know. Rather, it's perfect as if trying to fix anything would ruin it. Amazing. Beautiful even."
Penelope answered in a dreamy voice like an artist appreciating a masterpiece of the century.
"It should be."
This much reaction needed to come.
Though Fried Chicken's recipe was currently incomplete, the seasoning sauce was almost 99% complete.
And originally, Seasoned Chicken was about the sauce taste.
Well, the sauce Hanbin made and worked on most was chicken sauce.
Just the Seasoned Chicken sauce he'd made before falling to this world would be several drum barrels' worth.
When even Cola's recreation, that hellish mission, succeeded, something like Seasoned Chicken sauce.
A few days fussing alone was sufficient.
"Is it that delicious?"
At Penelope's reaction, Serena also showed curiosity.
She'd stayed away fearing spiciness, but looking at the reaction, it didn't seem particularly so.
"Will Miss Serena try it too?"
"Hehe, as long as it's not spicy..."
Then Penelope swoosh snatched away the Seasoned Chicken placed before Serena.
"Lady Penelope...?"
"You said you're full."
"What?"
"You gain weight eating when full."
Penelope of lingering grudges.
She hadn't forgotten Serena's cocky provocation moments ago.
"Mmm, delicious. I think it's the most delicious among things you've made."
Penelope savoring Seasoned Chicken in the world's most elegant pose and Serena dripping drip drip saliva.
"Ah... Aah..."
"I told you to stop, didn't I."
Jurgen pat pat tapped the shoulder of dumbfounded Serena.
***
Under the full support of Penelope and Serena, who received one piece of Seasoned Chicken (dry meat) belatedly, Y&P's second bomb was decided.
Fried Chicken, and Seasoned Chicken.
Though Seasoned Chicken firing the bombardment of great upheaval in the Korean chicken market was correct, originally chicken's half-and-half is best.
Also, franchise was adopted as the strategy to deploy this powerful weapon.
Because rapid dissemination was possible, and consistent supply with standardized quality was possible.
Then what does franchise need?
Though there are various things, first is the 'main store.'
In this case, the expression flagship store also serving as antenna shop seemed more fitting, but anyway...
Before receiving franchise business, there was a need to test whether 'Seasoned Chicken' was truly a bomb suitable for the culinary revolution.
Penelope and Serena's rave reviews didn't represent everyone's tastes.
For this test, Y&P Trading Company bought a 3-story building located in Lichfield Square's golden commercial district.
Skillful carpenters were molding the interior into a new appearance, and the Renoir Workshop was installing cooking equipment and ducts to discharge oil vapor.
It didn't even take two days to get here.
"Quite different from Cola's time..."
Goodbye to the shabby past of going around asking night market merchants to please sell Cola.
Now Jurgen had Cola, a massive cash cow.
Penelope had hard power to silence annoying interference.
Even if the ambitiously prepared Seasoned Chicken received public indifference, as if nothing happened, they might cry for about a day, but had the leisure to move on to the next item.
However, the problem arose from a completely unexpected place.
Jurgen, who was going around the wholesale market to bulk purchase Seasoned Chicken ingredients, muttered blankly.
"There are no... peppers?"
This didn't mean Jurgen's gender suddenly changed and he became a beautiful girl.
Literally meaning there were no peppers in Nortaris.
"I can't do without that..."
The Labyrinth Demon Realm was a treasure trove of ingredients.
That was also why he set Nortaris as the starting point for the culinary revolution.
As expected, obtaining tomatoes, corn syrup, mayonnaise, garlic, sugar—major ingredients—had no problems at all.
Same for plums and glutinous rice to substitute for gochujang, difficult to recreate in Britannia.
But the most important red peppers were absent.
He needed to make pepper powder first to mix with plum syrup and glutinous rice to make pseudo-gochujang.
"To have forgotten this."
A fact belatedly recalled—
Though the Labyrinth Demon Realm produced spices in general like black pepper, saffron, and nutmeg, it didn't produce chili peppers.
There was a reason the Peperoncino he bought to make Aglio e Olio before was uniquely expensive.
The complacent thought 'ingredients will be no problem since it's a food treasure trove' hit him in the back of the head only now.
But there was no big problem.
Didn't he bring coca leaves from the Labyrinth Demon Realm where they grew to flourish?
Jurgen looked at the calendar.
Late July when Red Moon ended and hellish heat ran rampant.
No matter how vigorous and diligent an adventurer, by this weather they were bound to pant like stray dogs with dehydration.
"Perfect timing."
For about 2 weeks, Nortaris would enter vacation season.
It was the perfect time to board an airship and return from a resort with cool seas and white sand beaches spread out.