Capítulo 42: Training as a Slime (39)
Cori turned to the chef, whose eyes gleamed with eagerness and a hint of madness. Although he felt slightly apprehensive, he could not help but normalised her fanatical behavior in this fantasy world. After all, having being conditioned upon arrival in this world, he hardly felt surprised at how crazy things could get. Clearing his throat, he prepared to divulge even the minutest details about the dish.
His skill transported him back in time, buried in the deep recesses of his memories. Familiar figures popped into his mind, reliving their life in the small rented apartment. The treasured moment unfolded with three rowdy, hungry children imploring a familiar rosy-faced lady in her mid-40s for food. Cori teared up in front of Jamie as he recounted his experience of a family culinary masterpiece—the beloved chicken satay.
Jamie silently penned every detail without interrupting.
Cori sighed and smiled as images surfaced in his mind. His granny would habitually bundle up her beautiful ash-brown hair before crafting this particular dish from scratch.
The pervasive sense of familial pride in the air flooded his memory when his grandmother recounted how their parents cherished this specific recipe, and how her son-in-law and daughter could never resist sampling the dish before it was finished. "They especially love the homemade tamarind sauce (a mixture of soy sauce, brown sugar, ginger and chili) and often requested for its recipe," she said. With his perfect recall, he could now see the tiny drop of tear hiding in the corner of her eyes when she mentioned it. But she would dive into work, not giving a hint of her emotions.
A melody of toasted coriander, fennel, and cumin gracefully danced through the air, accompanied by the rhythmic hum of herbs being individually blended. He fondly recalled an instance when red onions made her cry, leading to an emotional embrace with her consoling them- the wailing trio. After settling them, she continued with the delicate blend of garlic, ginger, galangal, lemongrass, and onions. Cori observed the three musketeers as she assigned them the task of crushing fried monkey nuts. He smiled at the memories that brought him back to the time when they would fight for the stone mortar, often for the chance to steal a bite of the coarsely crushed crunchy nuts. Focusing on her own tasks, his grandma elevated the blended ingredients with red sugar, salt, and the fragrant additions of coriander, fennel, and cumin. The resulting paste found its home in a large and a small bowl.
The memory shifted to the scene where the three children admired in "wahs and wows" as granny masterfully deskinned the chicken thighs, slicing them into tender finger-size strips, and then marinating the meat in the big bowl. Their granny continued to perform under their intent admiration and scrutiny, cooking the small bowl of paste with chili powder, oil, a large spoonful of white sugar, and tamarind juice in the saucepan until an aromatic scent filled the air. Lastly, Cori's younger self handed Granny the crushed nuts.
She added the nuts and water with practiced grace, transforming the unassuming paste into a nuanced sauce—a sensory masterpiece where each droplet cradled the echoes of sweetness, tanginess, spiciness, and nuttiness. Cori fondly recollected how they would then collectively step into the roles of imaginary judges, playfully engaging in a charade of savoring the sauce's essence before presenting the whimsical award at the dining table. In her endeavor to captivate these esteemed little judges, the lady would elaborate on the reasons behind soaking the skewers before threading the meat over the charcoal flames. Subsequently, she would enchant them with a mesmerizing performance involving the dance of meat skewers and flickering fire, delicately brushing the meat with a dash of butter at regular intervals.
Jamie's eyes softened as she noted down his story, along with several question marks on some ingredients.
Cori licked his mouth, "And we finished every bit of the sauce and chicken satay at the table. It was sweet, slightly tangy, juicy, and savory. The sauce was fragrant, oily but smooth, crunchy and sweet like caramel, a bit spicy but not overwhelmingly invasive to the tongue. It was not much but it was everything back then."
At this juncture, Jamie found herself already salivating, yet a tinge of melancholy set in. The realization dawned on her about the formidable challenge of replicating this particular dish.
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