Eternal food paradise

"Since when did my cooking skills start to increase?"

Summer, Tokyo.

In the bar where he heard the chirping of cicadas, Xia Yan looked at a line of words that jumped out in front of him and sighed deeply helplessly.

The proficiency in ‘Spice-Spicy’ has been reached.

Unable to continue improving.

Throwing away the spatula, Xia Yan said that he had given up on the treatment. No matter how much he practiced, his proficiency was concentrated on the branch tree of seasoning. His knife skills and heat were stagnant. Now his cooking skills have reached the extreme and cannot be further crooked.

Having said that, one day two months ago, he woke up the system in a daze. To this day, Xia Yan still has many things that he doesn't understand. The most intuitive thing is his personal panel. The function options in the bottom row are gray in color.

In the past two months, he had not made any extraordinary gains. He just opened a basic skill card from the novice gift pack, and then practiced and tested it out of curiosity.

By the time I realized my cooking skills were a little off and my daily life had changed dramatically, it was already too late to look back.

"Ding."

Today, after the first branch of small skills was filled up, one of the options under the personal panel suddenly changed.

The 5% progress value appears, and the icon begins to glow.

The two square words are in the icon, showing vague handwriting.

Seeing that the progress value was slowly crawling, and it took a long time to fully unlock the function options, Xia Yan was not in a hurry. He took off his apron, cleaned the kitchen, packed the kitchen waste into bags, and took it to the backyard.

This is Shitamachi, Tokyo.

As a classic and old-fashioned 'one-family house', there is open space in front of and behind the house, and the greening is very good. This is the only advantage that can be mentioned about the old house with many rats and cockroaches.

As soon as Xia Yan opened the door, a strange smell hit her face.

Several black and gray birds fluttered their wings not far in front of him, slowly and without panic.

"It's you again... If you don't seek death, you won't die. Don't force me!"

These birds are crows.

From the perspective of viewers outside the island, the overpopulated crows in Tokyo are an example of the peaceful coexistence between humans and animals. It is quite easy for the public to find an angle to promote and write environmentally friendly jokes about neon people and crows.

However, in Xia Yan's opinion, crows, whose habits are no different from those of wild cats and dogs, are absolute troublemakers.

The garbage piled in the corner of the yard has deteriorated and rotted due to the hot weather.

The crows dug around and pecked, the bag had holes, fish bones and bits of meat were scattered on the floor, and the rancid smell permeated the whole house. The scene was not too beautiful. Now Xia Yan was covering her mouth and nose tightly, feeling annoyed that the smell was unbearable. Being able to vent his anger on the troublemaker, he grabbed a broom and struck at it:

"If the fear of death wasn't so earth-shattering, and the animal rights organization blocked the door, I really want you to have no descendants!"

The driven crow still did not panic and flew to the roof at a slow speed. It stood there staring at people with its black eyes.

The problem of crows is not just a talk, it is a headache for the Tokyo government.

"Hey, a clever and vengeful creature."

"I'm used to flying birds flying against the door, but I'm afraid of being remembered. Anyway, just remember to close the doors and windows to prevent crows from stealing things."

Xia Yan sighed, put down the broom, and lowered his head to sort out the garbage.

Bags with holes pecked by crows should be replaced or covered with an extra layer. As for kitchen waste that gives off an unpleasant rancid smell, they should be handled with greater care.

Xia Yan also shouted that enough was enough of Neon's garbage collection system.

Kitchen waste is classified as combustible waste.

But not all kitchen waste can be thrown away in this way. Just pick out those empty bottles, use clean seasoning bottles, and sort them into a pile to wait for the date of recycling the bottles.

So, forget about fixed points, what the hell is timed recycling?

The food waste that was only collected yesterday, Monday, was already emitting a stench in the hot summer weather. However, it will take two more days, that is, until Wednesday, Sunday, before residents are allowed to throw out combustible waste at fixed locations. Garbage time.

Think about the fact that this pile of stench will have to accumulate in the yard for two days, plus the crows will harass you from time to time.

Xia Yan looked at the blue sky in Tokyo, his face full of despair: "What the hell am I going to do about man and nature! Get out of here!"

At this time, a greeting of "Is anyone there" came from the direction of the restaurant. Xia Yan could only glare fiercely at the crowd of crows hovering nearby, and made up his mind to do it again. Jubi would not dare to use Tokyo's crow evacuation policy. The taboo used is, well, the method of annihilating descendants.

Neon people believe that the crow is a divine bird, the incarnation of the Yata bird, but Xia Yan never believes in these gods and ghosts.

…

storefront.

The shop floor of the old house is not spacious, and the bar counter on the inside takes up one-third of the area. With a few tables and chairs, the space becomes quite crowded.

Including a few single dining seats at the bar, there are only a dozen or so people who can dine in the store at the same time. Chinese people call this a fly restaurant, and Neon people should regard it as a restaurant like an izakaya.

"Excuse me, please give me a piece of 'twice-cooked pork'!"

The old man with a scar on his face and wearing blue overalls sat upright at the bar. He looked up at the menu board for a long time and found that it was all Sichuan cuisine.

Spicy chicken, twice-cooked pork and mapo tofu.

They are all marked with the word "set meal", which can be understood as a set meal, and each portion is 850 yen.

One meal, one soup, one dish.

There is usually a small dish of salted things, such as seaweed and pickled radish.

The uncle raised his hand and shook it: "By the way, no soup, give me a large glass of cold beer!"

He took off the work cap on his head and exhaled heavily.

Xia Yan recognized his uniform. He was an employee of a garbage recycling and cleaning company in charge of this street.

Unfortunately, this company has a dark background.

To put it bluntly, it means changing careers from the underworld.

Neon's aging society involves all aspects, and the black society cannot escape the torrent. The clear-headed bosses have long been successfully washed away, transformed into a certain well-known builder, and flowed into some strange industries. For example, there are recent news reports A certain underworld boss opened a milk tea shop, which became an internet celebrity and the business was booming.

When I was served cold beer, I was thinking that the uncle had a story that I couldn't afford to offend, when I heard the uncle suddenly say: "Oh, don't add spicy to the twice-cooked pork, I can't eat spicy food."

Xia Yan said sternly: "There are three standards for spicy food in our store, mild spicy, normal spicy and heavy spicy. If you can't eat spicy food, I suggest you choose mild spicy food."

“Moreover, twice-cooked pork is a Sichuan dish, and spicy or non-spicy twice-cooked pork is a must..."

The uncle banged his beer glass on the bar table, waved his hand and raised his voice: "Wulu Sai, I'm so annoyed. Don't you understand? I told you not to eat spicy food!"

Xia Yan sighed inwardly.

In fact, he encountered many similar conversations when he opened a store.

It’s not that Neon people have a bland taste, but most of them can’t handle spicy food.

At the very least, what is considered ‘mildly spicy’ to Chinese people, a little bit spicy, may be too heavy a mouthful for Neon people to tolerate.

Faced with non-spicy taste requirements, and it is also a Sichuan dish.

Xia Yan spread his hands very simply: "I'm sorry, our store doesn't have non-spicy Sichuan cuisine."

The scar-faced uncle slapped the table angrily: "Just do it!"

"Then you do it."

The non-spicy ‘twice-cooked pork’ is pretty good.

Xia Yan has been asked many times by customers, can this 'Ma Po Tofu' be sweeter? Hey, can’t we use bell peppers for ‘Shredded Green Pepper Pork’?

Other cuisines are fine, but Sichuan cuisine is really not good.

Moreover, skills and proficiency are all added to the "spicy" aspect. If he doesn't cook these dishes and switches to other cuisines, Xia Yan's cooking skills will plummet even though he has not yet mastered them.

"I really can't do it!"

————

(PS: I’m back to writing a book. This one is still a comic book, but it’s not blended into one world like “God of Cooking”. Book friends who are interested in Shiji and Little Master can help save it. Those who don’t know much about these delicacies It doesn’t matter if you’re a classmate, I believe it won’t be dyslexic if you treat it as an ordinary food TVB drama.)