The Game of Life

Chapter 97 - 96 Stirring Sugar Color

The next morning, they ate dumplings, leftovers from the night before, which weren’t enough. Everyone seemed to enjoy this, eating less to save room for a bigger lunch with the pork dishes for the New Year.

After breakfast, Sir busied himself in the kitchen, while Mrs. Jiang orchestrated the household, ensuring everyone had a task to keep them spinning in action.

Jiang Feng was assigned to handle the front shoulder pork—simple enough, just washing and cutting it into pieces. Sir had to personally manage the cooking part. During the New Year, not even Jiang Jiankang could intervene in cooking the dishes, let alone Jiang Feng. Being allowed to cut the meat was considered quite an honor among the grandchildren, the others not even permitted to touch the knives and relegated to washing vegetables or cleaning.

Throughout the morning, Jiang Feng pondered how to approach Sir about wanting to learn how to make Sweet and Sour Yam. In the end, all his thoughts condensed into one sentence.

“Grandpa, I want to learn how to fry sugar and make sweet and sour coating!”

“Stand aside,” Sir replied, too busy braising pork offal to pay him much attention.

It was Jiang Weiming, who was marinating meat nearby, that responded with encouragement, “Feng fancies making sweet and sour sweet potatoes?” “Sweet and Sour Yam,” corrected Jiang Feng.

“Brother, don’t listen to his nonsense. He’s full of fleeting whims—just the day before yesterday he wanted to learn how to cook garlic shrimp. He’s always dreaming about overnight success,” scoffed Jiang Weiguo, his attention focused on the pot.

“It’s a bit early for him to cook seafood, but Feng’s fire control is good enough now. He can start learning to fry sugar and make sweet and sour,” said Jiang Weiming, massaging the meat in the basin for a moment.

Jiang Weiguo fell silent and then conceded, “It is about time indeed, you can learn if you wish. Granduncle Weiming is better at making sweet and sour than I am, go ahead and use the gas stove.”

“Come here, Granduncle Weiming will teach you,” Jiang Weiming said with a smile, “Little brother, come check on the meat in ten minutes.”

“Jiankang, come over here and watch this meat. Once it’s marinated, slice it into strips and put it on the steamer,” Sir instructed, handing the meat over to Jiang Jiankang.

Frying sugar is all about experience, a skill that comes with practice. There’s technique to it, but not many surprises tend to occur if you can seize the right moment, and the quality of the final product won’t be too bad.

You can use white sugar or rock sugar, it’s really just a matter of texture.

Jiang Feng had learned the process by heart from watching video tutorials, but watching was one thing; actually doing it himself was quite another.

Frying sugar without pulling threads, and if aiming for a caramel colour, involves constant stirring as the sugar water gradually shifts from light yellow to golden and finally to a jujube hue. At that precise moment, hot water should be added, then simmered gently to even out. The resulting caramel, slightly less sweet but rich in flavor, can be used to color and enhance meat and fish dishes, a rather ancient culinary technique for seasoning and coloring meat dishes.

Jiang Weiming simply explained the technique without demonstrating, and Jiang Feng, following his instructions, produced a dish.

The color was deep, a jujube red tinged with a hint of black, emitting a rich caramel scent. It seemed like a success, but Jiang Feng felt something was off.

“You added water at the wrong time,” Jiang Weiming observed calmly, examining the product. “You were a bit late, but that’s a minor issue. You didn’t get the feel for it, and you didn’t reduce it properly at the end. The caramel colour is essential for rod -cooked fish and braised pork knuckles—your color is clearly too deep.”

“Try again.”

Jiang Feng made one batch after another, yet Jiang Weiming found faults in each one. Frying sugar chiefly involves three stages: pulling threads, soft syrup, and caramel color. If Jiang Feng wanted to learn, he would have to master all three stages, not just pulling threads.

He made seven batches that morning, all with similar issues, indicating almost no progress. However, Jiang Weiming remained patient, pointing out his mistakes only after Jiang Feng had finished all attempts.

This was completely opposite to the way Jiang Weiguo taught. If Jiang Feng had made seven mistakes in the seven dishes, that could have been excusable, but he was repeating the same few mistakes over and over without showing any sign of remorse. If it had been Jiang Weiguo standing by Jiang Feng’s side, he probably would have knocked him on the head with the wash basin by now.

“No worries, you’ve already made a lot of progress, let’s doit again,” Jiang Weiming said.

He had taught Jiang Weisheng, whose talent was ten to a hundred times less than Jiang Feng’s, for over a decade, so patience had become second nature to him. To put it another way, even if he had to teach Pan Ling how to simmer lamb soup, he could remain calm and composed.

Moreover, Jiang Weiming truly felt that Jiang Feng was improving.

Making candy required time, and having the right feel was crucial. It was obviously Jiang Feng’s first attempt, and his untrained hands managed to produce a quite decent outcome, which only someone with a solid grasp of fire control could have achieved.

But Jiang Feng was unaware of the subtle complexities involved; although Jiang Weiming was gentle, the pressure he felt from him was far greater than that from the always irritable Jiang Weiguo in the kitchen. He could sense the heavy expectations and the sliver of hidden anxiety in Jiang Weiming’s perpetually kind smile and gentle tone.

The expectation and love from an elder always weigh heavily.

Jiang Feng was getting anxious.

On the eighth attempt, it was a complete disaster, the final product even turned a bit black.

Jiang Weiguo had just finished his work and came over to have a look, mercilessly scolding, “What the hell have you been cooking? It’s almost burnt. Even pigs wouldn’ t eat it if you used it to color their food.”

To his surprise, Jiang Feng found that being scolded by the old man actually lessened the pressure on him considerably.

“Feng did quite well for the first few times. It’s just that it’s hard to maintain concentration over a longer period. Lunch is almost ready; take a break. You don’t have to make caramel this afternoon, just simmer it until it’s a soft sauce,” Jiang Weiming comforted him, “Tonight, your grandfather is going to make Nine Turns Intestine, so you can simmer the soft sauce for him.”

Jiang Weiguo looked at the products Jiang Feng had made before, which hadn’t been tossed yet. This time he refrained from criticizing, “Didn’t your dad ever teach you this?”

“No,” Jiang Feng honestly replied.

“Never thought you’d have some talent in this area. Granduncle Weiming teaches better than I do,” Sir actually praised Jiang Feng a couple of times, “Alright, listen to Granduncle Weiming. Go keep an eye on Mrs. Jiang and don’t let her work. Her rheumatism has been acting up these past two days, and she can’t be near water. Tell her to rest.”

Mrs. Jiang did have some rheumatism, but it wasn’t serious.

Having received instructions from the old man, Jiang Feng took off his apron to take on the role of the overseer.

To supervise and prevent Mrs. Jiang from working.

Because of this, Jiang Feng ended up being nagged by Mrs. Jiang for a long while.

Jiang Feng: q (‘- ‘ )_r

*1, devoid of emotion and drafts, the lifeless recluse Alliance Hierarch, owe an additional update for two days, which I will make up as soon as I write it out.

I, devoid of culture and common knowledge, somehow made Taifeng Building one of the famed Eight Buildings in the capital v(°fl°)

I apologize to the founder from Shandong Haiyin Sun; this is a parallel universe, with no Ten Halls, Eight Buildings, Eight Houses, or Eight Springs. Yes, that’s how it is(o>m<*o)