The Game of Life-Chapter 737 - 736: The Show Begins

Chapter 737 -736: The Show Begins

Although there were no lines, no specified action scenes, and not even a dress rehearsal, he could at least improvise. Most importantly, he might witness Peng Changping accepting a closed-door disciple. After thinking it over, Sun Maochai felt that he had still come out ahead.

When going to the teahouse, he casually mentioned this matter to Jiang Weiming and Jiang Weiguo.

Jiang Weiming and Jiang Weiguo didn’t have much of a reaction to this, they had a pretty good impression of Zhou Shi and thought he was a fairly solid employee. As for whether or not he loved to secretly learn things, they didn’t care at all. After all, in Taifeng Building, you could learn most dishes if you wanted to, there was no need to steal them.

Zhou Shi arrived earlier than Jiang Feng had imagined.

Zhou Shi had sent a WeChat message to Jiang Feng, saying she would arrive before the evening service started. Jiang Feng thought he would show up right on time, around 4:30 PM. But Zhou Shi arrived quite early, at 4 PM, and when he arrived, Jiang Feng was still in the kitchen cutting Ten Thousand Fortune Meat, trying to make the best-tasting dish from the least amount of meat.

It was Ji Yue who led Zhou Shi into the kitchen.

Jiang Feng had been preoccupied at noon, thinking about Zhou Shi’s assessment and the wontons, and forgot to tell everyone about Zhou Shi’s expected arrival. So Ji Yue was somewhat surprised to see Zhou Shi.

When it came down to it, Zhou Shi didn’t have much of a relationship with many of Taifeng’s staff. He probably didn’t recognize more than half of the staff in the lobby, and he didn’t have many close relationships among the kitchen staff either. Except for Jiang Feng, he was probably most familiar with Sang Ming, not for any other reason but mainly because Sang Ming talked a lot. He could carry a conversation with anyone and became familiar with everyone.

“Zhou Shi, I let your friend sit outside just now, do you want to offer him a drink?” Ji Yue asked.

“There’s no need to go through the trouble, we’re here to dine in the evening anyway. Just treat him as a guest who arrived early,” Zhou Shi said.

“Your friend seems to have a lot of free time, it’s a workday today, isn’t it? Or did he actually take time off specifically to keep you company for dinner? You seem to have a good relationship. How come you never mentioned him before?” Uncle Zhou arrived earlier than Jiang Feng anticipated, the actors weren’t yet in place, Sun Maochai was still chatting over tea in the teahouse, and at this time, Peng Changping was probably doing the same at Yonghe House with a bunch of old men.

Jiang Feng didn’t know what to say for a moment, so he started the conversation from Zhou Shi’s friend.

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“He’s a chef too, having a day off today. He just happened to be free, so he’s accompanying me for a walk,” Zhou Shi explained, looking around the kitchen. Besides Jiang Feng, there was only Sun Jikai squatting in a corner, painfully practicing whole pigeon deboning.

Zhou Shi hadn’t left Taifeng’s work group, so he knew about Sun Jikai’s return. He had also seen social news and knew that Sun Jikai’s family had some unpleasant events. However, he didn’t realize that Sun Jikai was still a rich second generation, and even one who was richer than before.

“Long time no see.” Zhou Shi took the initiative to greet him.

He was not a warm and outgoing person, but since he had been home starting his own business and needed to deal with others, although he still didn’t talk much, he gave off the vibe of being much easier to get along with than before.

“Long time no see.” Sun Jikai nodded at Zhou Shi and continued processing the pigeon.

He had been very low-key these days. Ever since he realized the huge gap between himself and Jiang Feng, Sun Jikai became extremely low-key and silent. Although he was physically present, his presence felt weaker, and he just followed a routine of working and overtiming day after day, not practicing any extra dishes, only painstakingly practicing whole pigeon deboning over and over again. The most he did was to watch with Qiu Fu when Jiang Feng was thickening the sauce for the Eight Treasures Chestnut Fragrant Pigeon.

This resulted in an excess of deboned pigeons at Taifeng that couldn’t all be used for Eight Treasures Chestnut Fragrant Pigeon alone. But Wang Xiulian didn’t have any complaints as deboned squab could be used for many other dishes such as braised squab, red-cooked squab, steamed squab, sauce-flavored squab, squab pie, and roast squab, and without the bones, it was more convenient for the customers to eat.

Sun Jikai’s silence and modesty stemmed from the fact that he had serious matters at hand: he wanted to improve his culinary skills, to recognize his true level, to start from scratch practicing his knife skills and to lay a foundation anew. He wanted to focus on becoming the kind of pure chef his grandfather had always hoped he would be.

Of course, in others’ eyes, Sun Jikai’s quietness and earnestness translated to a personality change and withdrawal after experiencing a significant blow.

Consequently, many people looked at Sun Jikai with a mix of sympathy.

Zhou Shi’s gaze at Sun Jikai, however, lacked sympathy, mainly because he recognized the brand of the clothes Sun Jikai wore.

Being so poor, he had no place to pity the rich.

After a few awkward exchanges with Sun Jikai, Zhou Shi fell silent and then turned to chat with Jiang Feng instead.

“I hadn’t had the chance to catch up with you yesterday. How have you been doing lately?” Jiang Feng decided to start with some small talk before delving into the topic concerning Sun Maochai.

“Not bad, the new restaurant just opened, so it’s always quite busy. Our place is small and the economy isn’t exactly booming, so we barely have any private dining establishments. I don’t charge much and business has been pretty good. After deducting rent, utilities, and wages every month, I still turn a decent profit. I estimate that I’ll break even and start making a profit this year,” Zhou Shi said with a laugh.

“Running a private restaurant is the most exhausting. When my dad used to run a small stir-fry place in Alan City, he worked from dawn till dusk. Sometimes, to get the best ingredients, my mom wouldn’t sleep at night and would rush to the slaughterhouse in the neighboring city to get stock. Our shop was on the small side too, just a few dozen square meters, and couldn’t fit many tables.”

“Then the business at your family’s original restaurant must have been quite good. If my place were that busy, I’d probably wake up laughing from sleep,” Zhou Shi said with a chuckle.

Jiang Feng thought to himself, rest assured, as long as you perform well in what follows, you’ll soon be waking up laughing from everything, not just from dreams but even from sleepwalking.

“Right, there’s something I want to discuss with you.” Jiang Feng felt the groundwork was sufficiently laid, and it was time to move on to the main subject. “At lunch today, I just happened to be with Sun…”

Speak of the devil, and he shall appear. Before Jiang Feng could finish speaking, Sun Maochai, one of the main players in this scene, made his dramatic entrance.

“Master Sun, this is Zhou Shi, the one I told you about at lunch,” Jiang Feng called out loudly, seemingly acting but in fact facilitating the introduction of the main character to help the actor get familiar with the script.

Sun Maochai paused, then quickly got into character.

“So you’re Zhou Shi! I’ve heard about you from Jiang Feng before and always wanted to meet you. I never expected to have the good fortune to bump into you here,” Sun Maochai said with a smile.

Zhou Shi: ???

Jiang Feng: ???

The script wasn’t written like this, was it? Do actors change the script nowadays without even telling the screenwriter-slash-director?

“He is?” Zhou Shi had a rough idea of who the Master Sun standing with the two Sir Jiangs might be, but he was somewhat incredulous.

Sun Maochai had always wanted to meet him? What kind of fantastical script was this?

Zhou Shi felt that Sun Maochai might have mistaken him for someone else.

“He is Master Sun Maochai.” Despite Sun Maochai’s impromptu script change, Jiang Feng’s act had to go on.

“Hello,” Zhou Shi replied, somewhat confused and reserved.

“When I was discussing his menu with Jiang Feng previously, I asked him who helped him with the Eight Treasures Chestnut Fragrant Pigeon before. He told me that you took care of preparing the pigeons, and I thought at the time that your foundational knife skills must be quite good. It’s a pity that you left your job,” Sun Maochai not only altered the script, but also expanded on it.

“This afternoon when I was having lunch, Jiang Feng told me that you’d come to Beiping. He mentioned before that you had a unique sea cucumber dish which was quite special. I asked him to make it for me to try, but I felt something was missing. I’ve been wanting to taste the original version for a while now, and I’ve been studying sea cucumber dishes lately. I’m wondering if you could do me a favor and prepare that dish for me?” Looking at Sun Maochai’s expression, one would really believe he was telling the truth.

“Ah, of… of course I can. I just don’t know if the ingredients, the stuff…” Zhou Shi said, still bewildered.

“I have it all, it’s in the cabinet; I’ll go get it for you.” Jiang Feng had prepared everything in the morning.

Zhou Shi: ?

Why did he feel like something was not quite right?