Culinary God in Wilderness

"It sounds like you’ve all only had milk tea?"

Lin Chen watched the stream comments for a moment and found it a little strange.

"In Great Xia, ’milk tea’ is a general term. Originally, it really was just milk tea, like some of you mentioned—brown sugar milk tea, milk green tea, and so on, all collectively called bubble tea."

"But as the milk tea industry developed, many different varieties emerged, which can be broken down into two main categories."

"One is the milk-and-tea-based type you’re all familiar with, and the other is fruit tea, made with various fresh fruits and tea." 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

"Milk tea has a rich, smooth, and mellow flavor, while fruit tea is refreshing and crisp. They have completely different textures and tastes."

"There are also drinks similar to Frappuccinos, as well as savory cheese foam as a topping. Besides tapioca pearls, there are tons of other toppings too, like nata de coco, popping boba, egg pudding, tea jelly, and more. There are definitely at least ten or twenty different kinds."

"If you’re interested, you can look up brands like CoCo or Heytea. They should be pretty well-known in North America."

After briefly introducing the drinks from his homeland, he didn’t have time to chat idly with the audience. Famished, he eagerly grabbed a pitch-black plantain.

He tore off the completely charred skin, sending up puffs of white steam accompanied by a rich, sweet banana aroma that wafted straight into his nose.

This bunch of plantains was already on the verge of ripening. The bottom two rows had already turned yellow, and while the green ones at the top hadn’t fully matured yet, they wouldn’t have the bitter taste of a raw banana.

He took a tentative bite. The hot plantain was soft and glutinous with a slight chewiness, giving a distinct feeling of substance when chewed. If it had been raw, the texture would have been crisp.

"Honestly, it’s not bad. It was probably because it was already close to being ripe, so there’s no astringent taste. After roasting, the sweetness is also very pronounced. You could eat this as a staple food."

Plantains are similar to bananas; both are nutritious fruits that can quickly replenish the body’s energy. They’re also one of the most common snacks for athletes during training.

In the wild, it could almost be called a life-saving treasure.

Wild plantains aren’t large; a single one is only a bit longer than a finger. You could devour a whole one in two bites.

After quickly finishing the hot roasted plantain, he began to pull the bubbling oysters from the fire one by one, doing the same with the crabs.

The razor clams underneath were still some distance from the fire above, so the heat wasn’t as intense. They probably weren’t cooked yet, so he planned to let them steam a while longer.

A fully cooked oyster shell could be pried open with a gentle twist, but because they were still scalding hot, he couldn’t handle them. He had no choice but to start with the roasted crab.

The edges of the flame-grilled blue crab’s legs were a faint, charred brown. At some point, a bit of an egg-white-like paste had accumulated on the edges of its carapace.

"See this white stuff? This is actually what cooked crab blood looks like. When it’s raw, crab blood is transparent. If you poke it from the tail with a chopstick or a toothpick, it’ll flow out. Most people mistake it for seawater or crab urine."

He didn’t even need to use force. With just a gentle twist, four crab legs fell from the body.

Strands of tender white crabmeat were exposed at the joint openings, a testament to how plump it was.

"CRUNCH"

He chewed it, shell and all, and it was surprisingly crispier than he had imagined.

The excess moisture in the shell had completely evaporated, creating a texture like a crab-flavored potato chip. It also had a flavor somewhat like shrimp, and with the faint saltiness of a sea crab, the taste was quite good overall.

"Crab shells are a good source of calcium, so eating a little is good for your bones. But don’t eat too much, or you’ll get constipated, and it’ll put a strain on your digestive system."

He only ate half a leg to taste it, shell included. He didn’t plan on swallowing the rest shell and all.

The method for extracting the crabmeat was also simple. He had demonstrated it before back in Alaska. It was just a matter of biting off the joints at both ends of the upper leg segment, then inserting the tip of the lower leg segment to easily push out the whole piece of meat.

But before that, he had to prepare the crab’s body to have a place to put the leg meat.

He removed the tail flap from the bottom of the carapace, lifted the top shell, and pressed inward on the mouth area with his thumb. After removing the mouthparts, he scraped off the attached crab roe, then scraped the inside of the carapace as well.

He cut off the gills from the sides of the body, sliced it in half horizontally, and used the tip of his knife to pick out all the plump, white meat and place it into the carapace.

It seemed like a lot of steps, but his series of precise and clean movements made the process look not chaotic, but instead quite captivating to watch.

Soon, a small mountain of crabmeat was piled high inside the carapace. On top was a row of whole leg segments, arranged neatly within the shell.

After he finished with the first crab, the oyster shells had cooled down enough to be handled.

He unhesitatingly abandoned the task of picking crabmeat and instead began prying open the oyster shells one by one, revealing the plump, succulent oyster meat.

The huge pieces of oyster meat hadn’t shrunk much from being cooked. This was because they were so fresh. If they had been frozen, they would have shrunk significantly after cooking.

"SLURP~"

First, he slurped up a mouthful of the slightly salty liquor. This was seawater that had been purified by the oyster, which not only filtered out harmful excess minerals but also reduced the salinity, making the taste much smoother.

Drinking it not only replenished his hydration but also his salt levels—in other words, his electrolytes.