Chapter 184: Dinner Ingredients Preparation
Xiang Chuan didn’t care about the thoughts of the surrounding adult corporate slaves. She was no longer a corporate slave, so she had no intention of continuing to live as constrained and stifled as she had been during the daily 996 or occasional 007 routine back then.
Now she was just a first-year high school minor. What was wrong with a high school student complaining a bit about the little tricks corporate slaves used to slack off?
Hmph hmph.
Xiang Chuan walked briskly toward the kitchen, followed closely by Ouyang Yating and the three others and the Class Eight Grade One crowd.
The Staple Food Department employees who were lining up to get their meals spotted Xiang Chuan and immediately got excited: This was the information turbulence contactee who was about to bring revolutionary change to modern staple food crops!
Yes, Manager Wu had informed everyone in advance in the employee discussion group right after finishing lunch today.
As a manager-level cadre, Manager Wu had learned of Xiang Chuan’s identity right away along with the other department managers when they received the list of this year’s students from Nongda Affiliated High School sent down by the captain.
The fact that Yue Xiang Group President Xiang Weiguo’s daughter was an information turbulence contactee was considered an open secret among government higher-ups.
Even Xiang Chuan herself couldn’t be bothered to take any information control measures. She would occasionally pull out some early 21st century old TV dramas or classic novels for Xiang Xue or her classmates to enjoy. Of course, this also caused a sudden spike in workload for the Information Turbulence Processing Office.
This was also why even the department manager of the Second Production Escort Ship had the nerve to join the Nongda Affiliated High School teaching visit activity under the pretext of seeing his son.
When the captains of the other five production escort ships learned that Nongda Affiliated High School had assigned first-year high school students to the Second Production Escort Ship, they all turned green with envy. The captain of the Second Production Escort Ship even directly sent his own department manager over, forcefully squeezing the Head of Animal Husbandry from the Fourth Production Escort Ship into the deputy position.
If they just wanted data and information, they didn’t need to be in such a hurry, because data involving raw material planting and production would be shared by Xiang Chuan through her father Xiang Weiguo’s channels with government departments.
The reason they were so eager to get close to Xiang Chuan was to be the first to see her turn ordinary crops into something magical, transforming these unremarkable staple food crops of many years into dishes of gourmet food never tasted before using ancient civilization cooking techniques.
The employees of other departments had gotten this news from their own superiors and were still skeptical about it before lunch. But the moment the white rice came out of the pot, they were instantly convinced.
At this moment, when employees lining up at other windows saw a figure heading straight for the kitchen, their eyes lit up, and they thought about going up to greet her and get friendly, but they were all stopped one by one by the team leaders who had sneaked out before the end of work.
The team leaders wiped the cold sweat from their foreheads: That was close. If their own little rascals went up and disturbed this young lady, affecting tomorrow’s and the day after’s visit activities, then the managers and the captain would probably fly into a rage.
What would they do if they got punished by not being allowed to eat at the canteen!
Xiang Chuan, who was single-mindedly thinking about dinner, naturally had no idea about all the twists and turns in the minds of the workers eating their dry rice in the canteen. She quickly ran into the check-in area, underwent sterilization, and then directed the kitchen AI to work.
“Unfamiliar little chef, please help me get the rice that was put in the warehouse freezer this noon from the cold storage cabinet, and also take out these ingredients for me.”
As Xiang Chuan spoke, she opened her terminal and sent a list to the receiving port on the kitchen AI mechanical arm.
[Beep—Roger, please wait.]
The kitchen AI’s command execution actions were always very fast, so Xiang Chuan hurriedly started some preparation work.
She directed other mechanical arms to fetch a pot about the same thickness as a frying pan, placed it on the heating plate, and then instructed Ouyang Yating and the three others:
“Once the little chef brings over the ingredients later, you should try to dice the ingredients, and chop the meat into minced meat. If you’ve finished all the preparation work, you can try making some soup, like the tomato egg yolk gnocchi soup or radish beef brisket from noon… beef works too! In any case, make sure the soup has at least as much vegetables and egg white as meat or more. Don’t consider chicken soup; we had a big meal of fish and meat at noon, and eating too much isn’t good for the body.”
Ouyang Yating and the three others had now put away their usual attitude of Xiang Chuan being “outrageously disrespectful” and were very obediently opening their personal terminals to record Xiang Chuan’s instructions.
Seeing this scene, Class Eight Grade One still found it very novel. During rest time in the afternoon at school, when they ran to the A Bite of China Club Small Restaurant to slack off and mooch food, the four members of the A Bite of China Club would occasionally have these role-reversed conversations. Only when watching such scenes did they get a sense of reality that “Xiang Chuan is really the club president.”
There was no helping it; the usual interaction mode of these four was completely “three guardians and their family’s silly daughter.” Xiang Chuan showed no dignity or intimidation and was often reined in by Ouyang Yating and Ainuo to stop her potential rampages.
If not for the various instances during field training where she turned the ordinary into the magical, and Xiang Chuan occasionally running off to the A Bite of China Club Small Restaurant kitchen to cook for herself, people would really suspect whether the A Bite of China Club, this “ancient food research club,” was just an irregular group coasting by under a fake name.
After Xiang Chuan assigned tasks to the three, the kitchen AI happened to bring over the rice that had been stored in the warehouse for cold storage after lunch time.
She poked it with the shovel in her hand. Hmm, hard enough.
However, Xiang Chuan didn’t rush to put the rice in the pot. Instead, she took a large spoon and stirred the cold, hard rice to disperse it as much as possible.
After scooping out about two bowls’ worth of rice, Xiang Chuan stopped.
At this point, the ingredients being handled by Ouyang Yating and the three others weren’t finished yet, so Xiang Chuan first cracked two eggs into a bowl and beat them, measured out oil and salt based on the rice amount, and then sat to the side in a daze.
The Class Eight Grade One crowd wasn’t idle either. They discussed division of labor with Ouyang Yating and the three others to handle some ingredients, occasionally asking Xiang Chuan how to process certain ingredients.
Before long, the entire kitchen except for Xiang Chuan was bustling.
Xiang Chuan looked at the busy crowd in front of her, somewhat baffled: Why did it feel like she had opened a New Oriental Chef School?
If one day she authorized these recipes for private non-commercial use, wouldn’t this group of gluttons in her class whip up a Manchu-Han Imperial Feast for modern people in minutes?
Imagining that scene, Xiang Chuan felt both gratified and speechless.
The matter of private non-commercial use authorization had come up once when Xiang Chuan submitted new recipes to the Information Turbulence Processing Office and heard them mention it. Xiang Chuan didn’t have much resistance to it. After all, being able to eat freshly made rice at home was a joy, and sharing the joy was better than enjoying it alone.
But unfortunately, the family business was in the food processing industry, and Yue Xiang Restaurant urgently needed to solidify its consumer group and brand impression. Xiang Weiguo probably couldn’t publicly authorize private non-commercial use in the short term.
This made Xiang Chuan feel quite regretful.
