The Onion-Cutting Ninja's Secret Crush

131 Not Just Pressed for Time But Robbed as Well

The ones he had chosen really couldn't be called complicated. Taken for themselves, the longest might take an hour while some could be made in maybe five. This kind of small dish could easily be made while waiting for something to cook or fry.

The problem was that Si Jin had planned six of them so he needed to hurry or time would run out. After all, he had never made this many dishes at once. Usually, he had focused on exactly one dish while practicing with Si Shi Wu. Sometimes, he might have started the same dish several times while one was still finishing up on the stove but it could hardly be compared to making half a dozen different dishes.

To be honest, he was a bit angry at himself for not insisting that they try something like this. He should have known that it would happen sooner or later. Even if it hadn't come up in the first episode, the second or third wouldn't have been too surprising. Now, he had set a goal for himself but didn't have enough practice to guarantee the outcome. It really made him feel uncomfortable.

Well, Si Jin had never been someone who was afraid of a challenge. Since he had set his goal, he would do everything that was necessary to achieve it. He just needed to stay calm and work his way through the dishes step-by-step.

The first dish he wanted to make was wonton soup. Actually, he lacked several ingredients for this dish but Si Shi Wu had stressed more than once or twice to him that he should be creative when cooking instead of blindly following the rules to the T.

Honestly speaking, this was something that Si Jin still had trouble with. In fact, when it came to the skills he had learned throughout his life, that had been the case more than once.

For example, he could play several instruments since that skill might come in handy. He hadn't mastered the skill to the degree that Si Shi Yi had but he was able to give a rendition of several songs at once. It was definitely enough to get through most social situations or even if he needed to pretend to be a professional musician in a smaller place.

Even though that was the case, he sucked at giving any of these pieces a personal note. He just couldn't understand how. In fact, after these last few days of trying to do things that would make him interesting, Si Jin felt that he had found the root issue of this problem: He lacked a personality. Where would the personal note come from?

With cooking, the problem was the same. He didn't care about food much other than in terms of receiving the necessary nutrition. Even if that wasn't the case, as long as it was something that could keep him alive in dire straits, then everything could be eaten.

As this kind of person, how could he come up with creative ways to cook? He knew better what Xiao Ming liked than he knew what he himself liked. But achieving that taste was something he had learned from Xiao Ming's streams and Si Shi Wu's teachings. Anything original ... he was afraid he wouldn't be able to do it.

Well, at the very least, he had identified his problem. While it wasn't something that could be easily solved, he at least had a guess as to how he could come close for the time being: Being flexible with ingredients.

In today's task, for example, he needed the meat for the other dishes he had planned and wouldn't have enough for the filling of the wontons. As a result, he could only make the wontons and the soup vegetarian.

There were many types of dumplings with a multitude of possible fillings. A vegetarian one wasn't such a rare thing and including cabbage, carrots, and a bit of bell pepper didn't seem too outlandish to him. While he wasn't sure what made a filling a good filling, he figured that the right seasoning should make a big difference. So even if the ingredients themselves weren't perfectly chosen, he could still make this work.