After casually dropping a little bombshell, Xu Yanxia went back to focusing on her roast duck.
Taking advantage of the topic she brought up, the host interviewed today's professional judge, Master Chef Chen.
"I'd like to ask Master Chef Chen, when we mention roast duck, everyone knows it is one of Jingbei's most famous geographical landmark delicacies, but it doesn't seem to belong to Shandong cuisine. So why are the two descendants of prominent Shandong cuisine families on stage today, Chef Zhao and Director Xu, both choosing this dish to showcase their skills?"
"Although our Jingbei roast duck doesn't belong to Shandong cuisine, it actually has deep origins with it."
Master Chef Chen immediately explained, "Everyone knows that the original prototype of our Jingbei roast duck was Jinling sliced skin duck. After it was introduced to Jingbei back then, it underwent step-by-step improvements by imperial chefs and Shandong cuisine chefs, eventually forming its current appearance. Not to mention the technical origins like braising and roasting, just the eating method of wrapping it in a pancake with sauce and shredded scallions clearly shows its relationship with Shandong cuisine."
"Moreover, ever since the roast duck dish was finalized, various Shandong cuisine restaurants in Jingbei have treated it as one of their signature dishes, continuing to this day. Of course, each restaurant has its own method, but generally, they are divided into two schools: the hanging oven and the closed oven."
As Master Chef Chen finished speaking, the crowd followed the host's gaze back to the stage, only to see that the two teams, both making roast duck, had already moved on to the next step.
Zhao Yanting was leading his team members to spray crispy skin water onto the ducks with a spray bottle, and then brought over a high-power fan to blow air back and forth over the ducks.
He explained to the camera, "In the traditional production process, the natural air-drying step takes at least 4 to 8 hours. For example, in our restaurant, to achieve perfection, we usually leave it overnight. But time is limited today, so we can only take such measures to accelerate the air-drying process."
After speaking, he quietly glanced at Xu Yanxia's workstation not far away. He saw that after similarly applying sugar water to the duck, they placed the raw duck on a rack, then took out a hairdryer to air-dry the duck's body, occasionally touching the surface of the duck with their hands, looking very careful.
How long is that little gadget going to take to blow-dry it?
Zhao Yanting scoffed secretly in his heart, applied another layer of crispy skin water to his raw duck, and continued to blow it with the high-power fan.
...
After nearly an hour passed, the dryness of the duck's surface had reached his requirements. He placed the duck into the electric oven to hang and roast, and specifically explained to the camera again, "The roast duck you usually eat in our restaurant is roasted in an authentic fruitwood oven. Today, again due to limited conditions, we are using an electric oven. Of course, to make the duck taste like fruitwood, we have also made ample preparations."
Saying that, he asked his apprentice to wrap the prepared applewood and jujube wood chips in tin foil, poke a few small holes in it, place it in the corner of the electric oven, and start baking.
Next, they just had to wait an hour for the roast duck to come out of the oven.
During this time, the apprentice brought over the hawthorn berries that had been cored and boiled to medium-rare.
Zhao Yanting filled a pot with water, turned on the heat, and added white sugar to the pot, preparing to make his second dish, braised red hawthorn.
While waiting for the water to boil, he glanced in Xu Yanxia's direction again, only to see that her roast duck had also gone into the oven. However, she didn't hang it; instead, she laid it flat on the rack in the oven, and specifically put a pan of water inside before turning on the heat.
Master Chef Chen took the initiative to explain for her from the judges' seats, "Obviously, the method Little Xu is adopting today is the closed oven roasting method, which is also the traditional way of making Shandong-style roast duck."
"Yes."
Xu Yanxia nodded and said, "Since we've returned to the home turf of Shandong cuisine today, as a child born into the Shandong cuisine lineage, I still want to use the methods passed down by my elders to interpret the ingredients as much as possible."
Saying that, she also prepared to make other dishes.
Zhao Yanting watched as she took out the ingredients she was going to use, which surprisingly were also hawthorn berries and white sugar, just like him.
And she similarly filled a pot with water, turned on the heat, and put white sugar into the pot.
Zhao Yanting couldn't help but freeze. This girl... was she also going to make braised red hawthorn like him???
Right at that moment, the host went over to Xu Yanxia again for an interview. "I forgot to ask about Director Xu's other dishes just now. It looks like your second dish will also be made with hawthorn berries?"
"That's right,"
Xu Yanxia smiled at the camera and said, "My second dish is also a classic dessert in Shandong cuisine, called Red Braised Three Honey Fruits. It's an upgrade based on the original braised red hawthorn, so it can be considered my own modified dish."
What?
An upgraded dish based on braised red hawthorn???
This made Zhao Yanting frown even more. Was this little girl really going head-to-head with him like this???
The host couldn't help but say in surprise, "Then it seems your second dish overlaps with Chef Zhao's? This is truly unprecedentedly exciting!"
"Yes,"
Xu Yanxia smiled with a hint of provocation and said, "Speaking of which, yesterday my friends and I went to eat at a relatively famous local restaurant, and we found that many chefs nowadays don't really understand the braising technique in Shandong cuisine. So today, I also want to take this opportunity to show everyone the correct way to braise, hoping that chefs who still aren't clear on it can learn a bit."
As soon as these words came out, not only could Zhao Yanting barely maintain his composure, but his several apprentices also visibly paused.
Hah, this little girl surnamed Xu, wasn't she blatantly declaring war on their Decui Restaurant?
Isn't this a bit too arrogant!
However, before they could say anything, they heard Judge Qiao from the judges' seats call out to them urgently, saying, "Chef Zhao, your sugar syrup is boiling over!"
What?
Zhao Yanting and his apprentices hurriedly snapped back to reality and looked into the pot, only to find that the sugar water pot they had turned the heat on for was already rolling and bubbling violently!
This was not good!
He quickly turned down the heat, stirred it a few times, and awkwardly thanked Judge Qiao.
Then, he poured the hawthorn berries in.
...
Seeing that another hour had passed, it was already time to submit their work.
As the dishes from each team came out of the oven, the studio was filled with a rich aroma.
Because Yao Yi'an and Jin Jiexiang's dishes took less time, to prevent their food from getting cold and affecting the taste, today's judging started with them while the other two teams were busy slicing their ducks.
"Teacher Yao's output today is quite good!"
Judge Qiao in the judges' seats was the first to nod after tasting Best Actor Yao's French pan-seared duck breast. "The doneness is just right, it's juicy, and there's no gamey smell. Most importantly, it's very flavorful. It's a huge improvement from the last stop!"
Old friend Dr. Hui also nodded and said, "It really tastes much more flavorful than the dishes from the last stop. I didn't expect our Jingbei force-fed duck to be so delicious when cooked using this method."
"And the pairing with Jingbai pear and millet rice is also very eye-catching,"
Professional judge Master Chef Chen also offered him a few words of praise, "Although the level of difficulty isn't very high, the flavor is still quite good."
Chairman Wang, exuding the aura of a big shot, also nodded and said, "The approach of preparing Chinese food with Western techniques, along with the beautiful plating, makes it quite up to standard."
As soon as the words fell, the four judges revealed their scores together—
Two fours, one three, and one five.
Combined with the sixty-nine points from the public jury, Yao Yi'an ultimately received a final score of eighty-five.
Although it wasn't incredibly high, it wasn't low either. Even if he really had to be eliminated this time, he would at least be able to save some face.
He knew this was all thanks to the advice Xu Yanxia had given him that morning, telling him that his creativity and execution were decent, and as long as he used enough seasoning, his score wouldn't be too bad.
Yao Yi'an bowed and thanked the judges, once again rejoicing in his heart that he had clung to the right person for support that morning.
...
Next, the judges began to review the dishes from Jin Jiexiang's team—
"Hibiscus Duck Slices is considered a Huaiyang dish. In terms of appearance, Teacher Jin's presentation this time is acceptable,"
Master Chef Chen was the first to speak from a professional perspective, "The duck meat is sliced quite thinly, and the color passes muster. However, there is a rather important issue: the gamey smell hasn't been completely removed."
He went on to explain specifically, "Actually, this dish isn't very suitable to be made with Beijing force-fed duck. Because the force-fed duck is quite fatty, and fatty meat tends to hold onto a gamey smell. Therefore, the authentic version should use lake duck from the Jiangnan region, as lake duck is leaner and the smell is easier to eliminate."
"Of course, the other dish, Duck Paste Tofu Soup, is indeed made with force-fed duck, but it has a core element: the aroma of the wine lees must be strong enough. The fragrance of the lees needs to penetrate the duck paste and tofu to bring out the umami of the duck meat."
"But during your first step of marinating the duck, you didn't use enough wine lees and yellow wine, so it lacks aromatic depth when eaten."
After Master Chef Chen finished speaking, the other judges nodded in agreement.
Judge Qiao specifically asked Jin Jiexiang, "Teacher Jin, I'm actually a bit confused. I've eaten at your Yuwei Restaurant, and your roast duck is quite good. I remember last time in Yangzhou, you even specially used the local lake duck to make a hanging oven roast duck, even though you used the wrong duck at the time."
"Now that you're back in Beijing, why aren't you making roast duck, but instead making Huaiyang cuisine? If you had made roast duck, the results would definitely be better than these two dishes."
"Uh..."
This left Jin Jiexiang at a loss for words.
His team members were seen glancing toward Zhao Yanting, who was standing not far away, their faces full of unspeakable bitterness.
That was right, their restaurant's absolute specialty was hanging oven roast duck, and that was originally what they had planned to make this time.
Who would have expected that this morning, Decui Lou stepped in. Under the condition of taking them to the finals and promising them investment and customer traffic, they forcibly made them change their menu.
...
"Thank you for the recognition, Judge Qiao,"
Amidst the silent resentment, Jin Jiexiang could only bite the bullet and explain, "Hanging oven roast duck has indeed always been the signature dish of our Yuwei Restaurant. This time, we mainly considered that we already made it last time. Coming back to Beijing, we wanted to give everyone a bit of a surprise."
...
Seeing this scene, Ye Shu and Xiaozhen, who were offstage, looked at each other and couldn't help but laugh—
Keep pretending, just keep pretending!
That was what they got for blindly clinging to the wrong support. Now that they had messed up so badly, they might not even survive this round.
Serves them right!
