174: Stolen
I looked back at the two meals, trying to see if I could spot something I had forgotten, but everything was there. I remembered to season everything. Perhaps I could have tried the sauce a couple of times during cooking to make sure the seasoning was right, but that’s all I could think of.
Crisplet just sent me a feeling of confusion.
Turning back to Auguste, I had only one suspicion. “Is it because I didn’t use the correct stock in the sauce?”
A small smile broke across the man’s face. “No, that’s fine. It’s important to use up leftovers, although it is rather unconventional. What you failed to do, and what should always be done with steaks, especially with fillet, is to rest them.”
I don’t think I had rested a single piece of meat since I started cooking. Actually, for that matter, no one had even mentioned it to me until now…
Auguste laughed. “Okay, your confused look says all I need to know. Let’s start from the top. I think you have an over-reliance on using Crisplet to do your actual cooking, and it’s fine to have your companion assist you, amazing even. I would love to have my own personal fire elemental chef. However, it’s still important that you know the basics and how to cook yourself as well.”
“We should try the food before it goes cold. I am curious to see what he can do,” Julia said.
The others nodded as they stepped forward to try it.
I was confident that the meal would taste good. This was one I had done several times before, and the sauce, although it was a recent addition, was still fresh in my mind, so I waited as all three tried the steak. Crisplet was hovering close by, clearly eager for their instruction as well.
Auguste was the first to speak. “It’s good; the steak is cooked perfectly, not as juicy as it could be. The sauce has a nice rounded flavour to it, the wine has been properly cooked off, and the onions add a sweetness. Your mash is smooth, but you’ve not worked the starch too much, so Crisplet, excellent job with cooking. Trevor, excellent job with the sau…”
“Woah! Shit, sorry Chef,” Torrel said, quickly going silent when he realised he interrupted his mentor.
However, Auguste just looked at him oddly for a moment. “What is it?”
“The buffs, Chef. I got a bunch of buffs from that meal,” Torrel added.
I had completely forgotten that the soup would add buffs to the food. I intentionally didn’t infuse the meal. I wasn’t going to hide it anymore, but I didn’t want to distract from learning about cooking with the buffs, but I still messed it up.
Julia’s eyes went wide as she clearly inspected them.
“Interesting, but we’re not here for the buffs. We’re here to teach you cooking, and before we can teach you any of the more advanced recipes, I think we need to teach you some basics. Crisplet, your cooking is perfect, so we’ll get you forming and using tools. Trevor, you’ve clearly practised your prepping skills, so we’ll have you practising your cooking,” he said.
While he explained, Auguste began pulling ingredients out onto the table, and what really surprised me was that he even had a metal chopping board for Crisplet so he didn’t have to worry about burning a wooden one.
“By lunch, I want you both to have powered through the aspects you’re lacking. Trevor, I noticed you using a storage ring, but the one on your finger doesn’t appear to be of good enough quality to halt time entirely, but bear that in mind when timing for meals,” Auguste explained.
“I don’t use the ring. I have an ability which is a full freeze on all kitchen and cooking-related items,” I said.
Deciding to follow up the demonstration, I brought out a barrel of salt.
“That’s useful and good to kno…” Auguste froze in his tracks as a familiar pressure fell on the kitchen.
“That’s Lily,” I explained, seeing her appear behind me, looking over the three chefs.
“I… I see. Well, working under pressure is certainly a challenge. This may be good practice for my apprentice as well,” he said with a chuckle.
Auguste and Julia were both handling the pressure of Lily fairly well. After faltering a small amount at the start, they went back to business as usual. Torrel, on the other hand, was not finding it so easy, as you could see the beads of sweat on his brow and he was struggling to function.
“Do you have to deal with high pressure like this often?” I asked curiously. While I did that, I passed what was left of both meals over to Lily, and they quickly vanished.
“No, it’s very rare. However, we occasionally get strong visitors from other continents, or have to deal with an angry royal who was in a bad mood, and in those situations the pressure can be heavy. So it’s quite the boon to be able to train under it constantly,” he explained, passing Crisplet a stack of vegetables.
Taken from NovelFire, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
What I found especially amusing were the unconventional ways Crisplet found to prepare his vegetables. Rather than peel anything, I watched as the outer layer of the onion was just burnt away while the inside seemed untouched.
The knife Crisplet was using was clearly made out of charcoal, but it was so compacted, especially on the tip, it almost had a shine to it.
I, however, got to work on cooking items. Preparing several fillets, a roast, and decided to make a stock finally, so I pulled out yet more bones and started to roast them.
It was far more difficult than I had expected. While I cooked, Auguste was calling out how he’d like the steak cooked, and out of the nine I made, only two were cooked properly. The bones I had not fared much better, as I completely forgot about them while working on the steaks. When I came back to it, the fat had burnt away, and the bottom of the pot was unusable.
Lily, however, had no issues with a pile of fillet steaks that I quickly infused, remembering the conversation about how she eats mana. Lily ate all the meat I had cooked. However, I needed to be careful about my mana, noticing I was dipping below one hundred.
Crisplet was doing better than I was, but you could clearly tell that cutting uniformly was not something Crisplet did well. I feel like he got too excited at the idea of cutting something and would go overboard, turning the items into mush.
But by lunchtime, we got a ‘better’ from Auguste, but were both told we needed to practice more.
We were then given one hour to come up with a new dish to prepare. Crisplet would be in charge of prepping, and I would be in charge of cooking it. While that was going on, we’d be competing against Torrel, who was still struggling to perform under the pressure of Lily sleeping at our feet. He’d also need to cook something completely new, and to make it fair, since he had longer training, we had double the time to cook.
We moved to the side, and I wanted to impress, so not thinking much about it, I pulled out the copy of the royal cookbook I had and flipped through the pages. I needed to find something that we could make with the ingredients we had. There were a lot of things in here—stuffed eel, boar belly rolled around a herb filling then wrapped in boar bacon, fish pie.
When I flipped to the next page, I had my answer.
Minced Buvul pastries with a mushroom and white wine cream sauce. Crisplet gave me a burst of sparks in agreement. There were enough vegetables in it that he could help me, and we’d need to finely cut the buvul.
Crisplet’s sparks, however, caught the attention of Auguste, who had been in conversation with Julia, raising an eyebrow as he seemed to be locked onto the cookbook.
“Trevor, where did you get that book?” he said.
“I bought it in Farnox,” I said.
“That looks remarkably similar to the royal cookbook we have back in our kitchen,” he said, making his way over.
That comment had caught Torrel and Julia’s attention as well. Auguste came alongside us, looking down at it where his brow furrowed again, reaching down to pick it up.
“How do you have this? It looks and feels like the original,” he commented, flipping through the pages.
“This is not possible. I saw this just this morning when I locked it away,” he muttered.
“I was told it was a copy when I purchased it,” I tried to explain.
Auguste kept flicking through pages before he seemed to find something that really caught his attention. “How?”
He pointed at the page, lowering it so I could see.
“This page, this recipe, I only wrote this a month ago. This is my handwriting. How do you have this book, Trevor?” he asked sternly.
I didn’t know what to say. I already told the truth. There was nothing else to it.
“Like I said, I purchased it from a bookstore in Farnox. I was told it was a copy by the owner,” I explained again.
“But it’s not a copy. How could it be? It’s handwritten in my handwriting. Julia, please run back to the palace and check that the book is still there. Trevor, you must know, if this is from the palace, it’s a very serious crime for someone to steal it, even if someone has done it on your behalf.” he said, now sounding angry, but clearly conflicted with not wanting to directly accuse me.
Truthfully, I didn’t like the accusation. I didn’t steal anything, I could feel my heart racing as the anger built inside of me. Taking a deep breath, I muttered, “I am no thief. I told you the truth.”
Not bothering to voice my concerns, knowing they would find out shortly, but I would not let them take my book away. I didn’t care what they said. I would go directly to Marcus if I needed to. So with courage I didn’t know I had, I reached out, took the book from Auguste’s hand, placing it back on the counter.
“While you find out that this is a copy, we’re going to continue with our meal,” I said, finding the page again.
I could see that he was conflicted on how to respond to this, but I wouldn’t be treated like a thief in my own home.
Lily had noticed my annoyance and was now staring at Auguste as well, which seemed to have made him not want to push the issue further. Poor Crisplet, however, just looked between us confused before a brief conversation with Lily seemed to have made him angry, as he turned deep red and black with jagged embers coming out of his head in the crown.
“It’s okay, Crisplet. He’ll see it’s just a copy soon. It’s understandable to get upset if he thinks we took the original. Let’s get on with the food, okay?” I whispered.
I pulled out several chunks of Buvul, noting the recipe didn’t mention using two different kinds of meat. However, I remembered when we made the pie using the two different cuts gave a great flavour, so I made the executive decision to change the recipe myself, getting Crisplet’s approval in a burst of sparks.
Crisplet got to work preparing the Buvul, while I started on the pastry. I was glad I had the cool room as well; it would make things a lot easier, all while I had Auguste staring a hole in my back—well, except when Lily was looking at him. Apparently, having a staring contest with Lily didn’t go well.
Auguste let out a sigh. “Torrel, if you don’t get started, you’ll not be ready when it’s time to present your food.”
The apprentice, who had just been watching wide-eyed from a distance, jumped at being addressed and began pulling out ingredients.
“Torrel, make something new. I don’t want you to make a different version of stuffed poultry again. You do it every time.”
Torrel put most of the items away before pulling out a fish of some kind.
Book aside, this was going to be fun.