Culinary God in Wilderness

"No, no, just getting prepared," Gray said with a wry smile, popping a couple of tortilla chips into his mouth. "You guys know how it is. Lin’s cooking style is completely different from ours. God only knows what kind of food he’ll whip up."

"I have to learn about Panama’s local seafood and plants, and I also need to get up to speed on the culinary culture of Great Xia. If the dishes I replicate don’t taste right, we’ll get complaints and unhappy guests."

Speaking of which, his eyes lit up. "Oh, right! I remember you two used to eat a lot of Chinese food back when you were acting, right?"

"Yeah. We ate Thai and Indian food and stuff too, but the variety and flavors were too limited. Only the Chinese takeout had a wide selection, lots of different flavors, and tasted great. During filming, we’d eat Chinese takeout at least four days a week."

Joseph nodded and immediately pulled out his phone to start scrolling through photos.

Angelica wasn’t idle either, also pulling out her phone. "It’s because the Chinese takeout was just so delicious. Later, in our free time, we made a point of going to a few of the more famous Chinese restaurants in Chinatown to try them out. Even though the style is completely different from Western food, the taste is absolutely impeccable!"

"Look at this. Can you guess what ingredients they used to make it?"

Gray squinted and leaned in. The photo on the phone screen showed a crab dish, buried under a mountain of some unknown, golden-yellow crumbs.

Just looking at it, he felt a powerful visual impact wash over him, giving him an uncontrollable urge to taste it.

"Breadcrumbs?"

’No, that can’t be it. Since it’s Chinese food, I shouldn’t think about it in Western terms. But these bits are so fine, and they look fluffy and dry... could they be deep-fried rice granules?’

"It’s garlic," Angelica said, licking her lips as if recalling the wonderful taste. "They chop the garlic into very fine bits and then deep-fry it. I don’t know the exact process, but the garlic is incredibly fragrant and flavorful."

"They probably stir-fry it with the crab after deep-frying," Joseph chimed in, suddenly interested now that they were on this dish. "I asked the waitress, and that’s what she said. You can’t even imagine how delicious that crab was!"

"All the crispy garlic was piled on top of the shell, but the crab meat itself was infused with this rich garlic flavor, as if it had been marinated in garlic juice. The type of crab they used was different, too. It wasn’t king crab or snow crab; I didn’t recognize the species. All I know is that the meat was thick and plentiful, with a fresh, sweet taste. Eaten together with those crispy garlic bits... I’ll never forget that flavor as long as I live."

GULP.

Gray, who hadn’t eaten dinner, stared intently at the photo, his mouth watering uncontrollably from their descriptions.

But that wasn’t all.

Angelica swiped her finger, and a different crab dish appeared on the screen.

"Black pepper?"

Almost instantly, Gray recognized the sauce.

"That’s right, it’s a black pepper sauce. The Da Xia People are experts at making this stuff. The spiciness of the black pepper is intense, but it’s still very palatable. It’s somewhat similar to the mushroom and black pepper sauces you get with steak at some steakhouses, but also distinctly different." 𝑓𝑟ℯ𝘦𝓌𝘦𝘣𝑛𝑜𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝑐ℴ𝓂

"Oh, right, right! Now that you mention it, I remember. Their black pepper sauce isn’t just for stir-frying crab; they use it for stir-frying beef too. The beef slices were so melt-in-your-mouth tender..."

The husband and wife, one picking up where the other left off, kept scrolling through their collection of photos. These real pictures taken in restaurants were far more credible than anything you could find online.

’Given their former status, they probably wouldn’t go to just any ordinary restaurant. So these photos must have been taken at some rather famous places.’

’At least, the kind that are popular with diners. Otherwise, no matter how high-end, they wouldn’t survive.’

"What’s the restaurant’s name? What style of cuisine is this? I read online that Great Xia has eight officially recognized major cuisines. This must be one of them, right? And it seems to be mainly seafood-based. If I could study this style of cooking, I might find a lot of inspiration for new twists."

"This is Cantonese cuisine. It’s most famous for all kinds of dim sum and seafood congee. Some restaurants have a separate room sectioned off with glass right at the entrance, with lots of roasted ducks hanging there to attract passersby. That stuff tastes amazing too!"

"All this reminiscing is making me hungry. Gray, is there anything left in the kitchen?"

...

"Robert, the numbers are in."

Inside the temporary camp, a production crew member raised his hand. "In the twenty-four hours from last night until now, a total of three hundred grouse were released. Forty-six have been captured by contestants, twenty-one have been caught by wild animals, and two hundred thirty-three remain."

"Hmm, that’s a bit better than I expected."

Robert nodded, his gaze falling on the large screen.

There were many contestants this time, so the screen had been swapped for a larger one, big enough to display the feeds of fifty contestants simultaneously.

The production crew’s camp this time wasn’t built by hand. Instead, they had requisitioned wooden cabins that the Panama forestry department had already built, scattered throughout the forest. They even had generators and a stockpile of kerosene, ready to use on arrival.

"Putting tracking chips in the white tags was a great idea. Not only can we track their location, but we can also count the number captured. It simplifies the count and makes them easy to retrieve afterward."

"Have you decided whether or not these tags should be counted for points?"

Daniel was also staring intently at the small squares on the big screen, focusing his main attention on the contestants who were still active in the wild or were currently eating.

"Why not?"

A strange smile played on Robert’s lips.

"Those two, Lin and Andre. Do they really think getting advance intel comes without a price?"

"After the second wave of releases begins, we’ll announce the points corresponding to different prey and food items. The two of them will have no choice but to return to this area to get points."

"A round trip in a single day is definitely impossible. That way, they’ll need to camp out in the wild, build a temporary shelter, and make hunting tools. And just like that, we’ve got our drama."