Chapter 50: Lunch Date
Modern classes don’t require students to bury their heads in taking notes; if needed, they can just use the terminal’s recording function to record it, so everyone listens with full attention. Xiang Chuan, who has some interest in modern historical development, listens entranced and can’t help regretting missing the homeroom teacher’s classes yesterday and the day before! Speaking of which, she also missed the second day’s physics class… Maybe after class, ask Yating or Liang Gong for the video notes?
Listening to an interesting class always makes time fly by. Just as Zhu Bingwen starts explaining the revival plan implemented by the government in Tianyuan 5500 to the students, the bell rings.
“Liang Gong, Yating, do you have the classroom recordings from the history classes the past two days? I happened to miss history class both days.”
Xiang Chuan asked Liang Gong.
“Yes, but I can’t tell Xiang Chuan you are so interested in modern history.”
Liang Gong opened the terminal light screen, copied the two video files, and tossed them to Xiang Chuan.
“I’m not just studying ancient history, and my knowledge of ancient history is mostly about diet.” Xiang Chuan grinned as she received the two files, thinking to herself, can fifteen thousand years count as modern? But thinking carefully about modern people’s average lifespan of eight hundred years… Is this a historical timeline from the perspective of a long-lived race? Although she herself will become one of the long-lived people in the future.
“Xiang Chuan.”
Just as she was entangled about humans’ average lifespan and modern history, Ouyang Yating on her left suddenly spoke up.
“Hm? Ah, Yating, Liang Gong just gave me the video material, you don’t need to send it to me again.”
Xiang Chuan quickly said.
“I’m not talking about that. I’m sitting right next to you; don’t I know if you got the files or not?” Ouyang Yating glared at her, though helplessness was more prominent on her face. “Take a look at this table.”
With that, she flung a table onto Xiang Chuan’s light screen. Xiang Chuan scrolled up and down for a bit and couldn’t help exclaiming “Wow,” drawing Liang Gong over to look too. Although it wasn’t that exaggerated, he nodded as he looked.
The table organized all the messy kitchen supplies and ingredients from Xiang Chuan’s original table into categories one by one. Even Xiang Chuan, this old corporate slave, had to let out a “Wow” of admiration.
“Yating, did you make this? During class just now?”
Xiang Chuan subconsciously lowered her voice and glanced toward the podium. Fortunately, the homeroom teacher left the classroom immediately after the bell rang.
“Your table was too messy; it hurt my eyes to look at.” Ouyang Yating mercilessly criticized her club president’s document handling ability, then added after thinking: “Don’t worry about my history grades. My relative is a professor in the field of modern history; I already studied modern history with her before school started.”
With such low employment pressure, why be so intense! Just hearing about extra lessons triggered Xiang Chuan’s PTSD.
“But your list is a bit strange.” Ouyang Yating scrolled to the lower part of the list. “Why include medicinal materials? If it’s to prevent accidents during taste-testing, these medicinal materials aren’t needed, right?”
Xiang Chuan looked closely; it was none other than the yam and pepper whose usage had skyrocketed at home recently. Thinking that her two club members really don’t watch her sister’s live streams, she began describing some recent recipes she’d made, occasionally pulling up some food photos taken by Xiang Xue from the family chat group to show them.
Xiang Xue’s photography talent was as high as in her previous life. When Xiang Chuan cooks or directs the kitchen AI to cook, she only cares about “as long as it doesn’t spill out of the plate/bowl/pot.” Xiang Xue adds some fresh vegetables or fruit dim sum on the side, changes the angle, and the photos surprisingly have that feel of the petty bourgeoisie influencer gourmet food staging from her previous life’s little X book.
Ouyang Yating and Liang Gong looked at the gourmet food in the photos. Although Xiang Chuan thought the quantity was just so-so, for Ouyang Yating and Liang Gong, who had only seen buns and fruit milk, it was truly a bit too dazzlingly chaotic, leaving them stunned.
“Medicinal materials can also be used to make food?” Liang Gong zoomed in on the photos taken by Xiang Xue and observed carefully. “Ancient people are truly amazing. Won’t ingesting too much of the body’s required nutrients harm health?”
Ouyang Yating silently agreed with Liang Gong’s view in her heart.
To modern people, taking in necessary nutrition each day counts as finishing meals. Using medicinal materials to give the body excessive nutrients like this goes against common sense.
“Didn’t you say it yourself? Ingesting too much will harm health, but the amount needed for dishes isn’t excessive, like pepper.”
Xiang Chuan opened photos of pan-fried chicken cutlet and pan-fried fish fillet. She sighed again at how Xiang Xue’s photos were so “newsworthy.” Xiang Chuan, who had wolfed down a big bowl of dough drops and three flatbreads that morning, had to swallow her saliva before continuing.
“Both these dishes are sprinkled with pepper powder, but the amount of pepper used in one dish might just be black pepper. What impact could that have on the body? Moreover, in ancient times, appropriately adding pepper to dishes helps with metabolism and solving loss of appetite. Adding just a small spoonful to meat soup… even just two or three grams of pepper can change the entire soup’s flavor… Hiss.”
Xiang Chuan wiped the saliva about to drip from her mouth. She especially missed lamb noodles sprinkled with pepper and raw scallion right now! But they hadn’t even gotten pork yet, no scallions found, and lamb… still far off.
But Xiang Chuan’s explanation only made the two feel even more confused.
Pepper and loss of appetite?
Meat soup changing flavor?
Is pepper that magical? Isn’t this just ordinary medicinal material?
Seeing Liang Gong’s polite but puzzled smile and Ouyang Yating’s furrowed brows, Xiang Chuan knew that for current modern people, verbal description was far less convincing than actual experience.
“If you’re so curious, come to my dormitory at noon. I brought yam chicken meatball soup today. You can taste the difference between with pepper and without, and you’ll understand.” With that, Xiang Chuan looked at Ouyang Yating. “We’re neighbors anyway.”
Ouyang Yating thought about it; this was the only way. After all, ancient food had too many unknowns for her; she could only form her own opinion by actually experiencing it like with the buns and fruit milk before.
But Liang Gong was in a bind—he was a boy!
“I… I’ll pass. I can’t go to your dormitory side.” Liang Gong hurriedly refused, his face red.
“Hm? Ah…” Xiang Chuan was a beat slow to realize the issue, laughed twice to cover her embarrassment, and said: “Then I’ll have the servant deliver it downstairs to you?”
“Okay.” Liang Gong nodded; this was the best way.
