Chapter 11
Feeding one person a 150-gold meal and feeding two people a 300-gold meal are completely different matters.
Someone unfamiliar with the situation might say, “Can't you just prepare roughly twice as much?” But anyone who said that would lose their faith in humanity after spending just one hour in a kitchen.
When one plate becomes two, the ingredients don't simply double. The timing gets twice as tangled, the workflow gets three times as tangled, and people's minds generally wear out about four times faster.
Tonight's guests were the Marquis and Marchioness of Reinfeld.
Apparently, the Marchioness had shown interest first, and the Marquis had decided to accompany her.
A noble couple coming together was both good news and fucking awful news.
We could charge more money.
But now the preferences and relationship of two people, along with their awareness of each other's reactions, would all be placed on the same table.
If one of them enjoyed the food, the other might become needlessly more demanding, and if one was moved, the other might take being less moved as a matter of dignity.
Simply put, two guests meant two mouths and two egos.
“Marie.”
“Yeah?”
“From today onward, don't even think about carrying two plates at once.”
“Why? There are two guests.”
“If you carry two plates and even one of them tilts, we all die together that instant.”
“Isn't that a little harsh?”
“It isn't harsh. That's a 300-gold plate.”
Marie immediately shut her mouth.
Money persuades people.
Especially when someone realizes that a single plate costs several years of their wages, they start cradling it politely with both hands.
I rode the servants hard from morning onward.
That wording might sound a little rough, but that's exactly what I did.
I went over everything again, from the angle at which they placed the plates and the timing of entering from the guest's right, to the length of the breath they took before beginning an explanation and whether their elbows rose too high when filling water glasses.
“You made your footsteps too quiet just now.”
“Huh?”
“Even an assassin on his way to cut off a count's head would walk more loudly than you. Again.”
“Kyle, I'm a servant. Not an assassin.”
“Today, you're a 300-gold servant. Again.”
The servant walked again with an aggrieved expression.
I shook my head.
“You're too scared. If you shrink in front of nobles, you'll look like a cheap establishment. Quiet but confident. Think of it as not carrying food to the guests, but delivering the value of their money.”
“That makes it even more stressful.”
“It's supposed to be stressful.”
In the kitchen, stock was simmering.
The focus of this course was the soup.
I drew a little on my memories from my previous life and made something resembling yukgaejang.
If prepared properly, it was the sort of food whose meat, scallions, chili oil, garlic, and pepper aromas all rose at once, awakening you from deep inside.
It was good the morning after drinking, good at dawn in winter, and good on days when life or the world had beaten someone senseless.
'Or maybe it's a funeral, and since the concept is a funeral home anyway, let's just call it good!'
Of course, I couldn't make actual yukgaejang here.
There was no chili powder, the scallions were different, and there was no soy sauce.
But I could carry over the essence.
I built a clear stock from bones and game birds, then carefully toasted a spice made from dried red berries to draw out its fragrance.
The heat wasn't as clean as that of Korean chili peppers, but it had enough force to prick the tip of the tongue.
I added root vegetables, thinly shredded game-bird meat, and strongly fragrant herb stems to give the broth its backbone.
The important thing was that it couldn't be nothing but spicy.
Nobles weren't accustomed to spicy flavors.
If I suddenly set their mouths on fire, they might take it not as a fresh experience but as an assassination attempt.
So the first aroma had to be clear and elegant, with the heat slowly rising from below the throat after they swallowed.
The guest had to open their eyes a beat late, wearing an expression that said, What did I just eat?
I ladled out some broth with a spoon and tasted it.
“……Not bad.”
Marie peered into the pot beside me.
“It's red.”
“Yeah.”
“It looks like poison.”
“Watch your tongue. This is the centerpiece of today's course.”
“What if the guests get angry because it's spicy?”
“Then make it deliciously spicy.”
“That sounds strange, too.”
“Spiciness is pain, and delicious spiciness is pain the guest pays to experience again.”
Marie looked at me with a weary expression.
“What kind of person were you before you came here?”
“A kitchen slave.”
“You're joking, right?”
“Half joking.”
Elysia and I had planned the story for this course together.
The Marchioness of Reinfeld had said that she wanted to witness Monbel's resurrection.
Then we couldn't simply sell them downfall.
If what we had fed Count Klever yesterday was the final greeting of a dying house, today we had to show the heat remaining in those ashes.
Elysia liked that expression.
“Heat remaining in the ashes. I like it. It feels like a hand bursting out of the coffin after the funeral.”
“My lady, please don't pull the mood in only that direction.”
“But it's intense.”
“Intensity and appetite are two different things.”
“Then what about a red shoot rising again from the roots of a rose everyone thought was dead?”
“That's a little better.”
“But the shoot is as red as blood.”
“Why do you keep trying to add blood?”
“Nobles like blood.”
I couldn't deny it.
In the end, we set the course's flow like this.
The first bite would bring out the fragrance of dawn with thinly sliced fruit and herbs.
The appetizer would be goat's-milk cream topped with a little caviar, served with thin bread, accompanied by the story of the black seeds that still remained.
And the soup at the center would be heat in the ashes.
It would look clear and restrained, but after being swallowed, red energy would bloom inside the body.
Next would come a main course made with game birds.
We would finish with a dessert of honey, cheese, and fruit reduced to a small amount.
Just because it was resurrection didn't mean we could suddenly end on something sweet. That would be tacky.
Sweetness should be brief, and the aftertaste should be long.
As afternoon approached, the kitchen became a battlefield.
“Marie, the fruit is too thick. Again.”
“Do you have any idea how thin this is?”
“When you hold it up to the light, I should be able to see your finger through it.”
“Why are you doing that to the fruit?”
“To sell it at a higher price.”
One servant left a smudge while polishing a plate, and I saw it and called him over immediately.
“Come here.”
“Yes?”
“Would you want to pay 300 gold to eat off a plate with a smudge on it?”
“No, sir.”
“Then polish it. Make it feel as though even your soul is reflected in it.”
He polished the plate again with a face that looked ready to cry.
Uncle Bernard watched me for a while before speaking quietly.
“Kyle, aren't you pushing them a little too hard?”
“If we fail tonight, we'll all fail together.”
“That is true, but……”
“And, Uncle.”
“Yes.”
“Those people are doing better than expected right now. If I think someone is hopeless, I don't even curse at them.”
Uncle Bernard was silent for a moment, then gave a very small laugh.
“That's a very unusual way to praise someone.”
“It's the kitchen way.”
It was true.
In a kitchen, you don't get angry at people who genuinely can't do the job.
They aren't worth getting angry at.
Chewing someone out means they can still be used.
Of course, from the listener's perspective, it was bullshit, but kitchens ran on that kind of bullshit in the first place.
As evening approached, preparations in the parlor were complete.
This time, it was much better than yesterday.
The tablecloth wasn't new, but it had been perfectly ironed, the bundles of herbs were more neatly arranged, and two candlesticks had been placed by the window.
Elysia had decided to take responsibility for the story behind the meal herself again.
She spent quite some time choosing the dress she would wear today, then settled on a dark blue dress that wasn't overly extravagant.
“We're talking about resurrection. Wearing black would make it look too much like a funeral, wouldn't it?”
“Yes.”
“What about red?”
“I know you like blood, but please restrain yourself.”
“What a shame.”
“Once we make some money, I'll prepare a blood-themed course for you later.”
“Really?”
“As if.”
Elysia pouted, but she still put on the blue dress.
It was calm, didn't make her look poor, and didn't make her seem too successful, either.
Today, she had to look not like a fallen young lady, but like the owner standing atop the ashes of a ruined house.
As the sun began to sink, the carriage of the Marquis and Marchioness of Reinfeld arrived.
This time, even the sound of the carriage wheels was different.
If Count Klever's carriage had made the cold sound of someone coming to collect a debt, this one sounded like curiosity and luxury rolling toward us.
There were more attendants, too.
Uncle Bernard greeted them at the main gate, while Marie stood by the kitchen door with her hands clenched tightly.
“Kyle.”
“What?”
“I think I'm going to throw up.”
“Hold it. You can't throw up before the guests.”
“Is that a rule, too?”
“I just made it up.”
The Marquis of Reinfeld was a middle-aged man with a mild expression, while the Marchioness held a fan in her white-gloved hand.
Her eyes were gentle, but they moved quickly as she surveyed her surroundings.
She had come both to eat today's meal and to verify whether the rumor was true.
The more difficult one would be the Marchioness.
I finished the first plate.
Thinly sliced fruit, dawn herbs, and a single drop of raspberry vinegar.
Two plates were placed side by side.
At last, our first two-person table.
I looked at Marie.
“Ready?”
Marie inhaled.
“I'm not, but I have to go, right?”
“Correct.”
I sent the plates out.
The parlor door opened, and the first plates went out.
What we were selling today was Monbel's resurrection.
But resurrection itself presupposed that something had died once before.
I warmed the bowls that would hold the peppery soup and muttered inwardly,
'Good. Today, let's warm up the nobles' insides a little.'