NOVEL NEXT Chapter 18: Teacher's Study
The reason for his choice was simple. Flat breads like pita were common in the kingdom and the poor made their own version of tortillas but used the cheapest flour available which made the end product extremely hard and chewy.
As for wheat flour, it was mostly used to make regular bread and not flat breads.
He wished to give his customers a fresh experience instead of simply relying on his stat buffing capabilities.
According to the chefs, they had planned to make stuffed eggs and spicy cheese sticks for starters, roast mutton, stewed rabbit and high quality steak for mains and lastly, some strawberry ice cream and orange cake for dessert.
It was still pretty early in the morning so Lukas knew he had time. The guests would arrive right after noon and would stay until eight at night. This meant that he would have to prepare two special dishes.
'Alicia didn't tell me about that…. I thought I could go back home by four in the afternoon.' he thought feeling bummed as he did not have much to do. In a world where there was no internet, it was easy to get bored.
With a sigh, he began to prepare the tortillas first. Using a mixture of corn flour and all purpose flour, he made a nice soft dough and let it sit for a few minutes. During this time, he silently took out a large onion, some garlic, chillies and a tomato.
On one side, he began to prepare a beef filling for the taco and on the other side, he planned on making a thin gravy that didn't need potatoes.
By the time he was done with both of them, the dough was ready to be worked on. He made multiple small balls with the dough but then, stopped right before the rolling stage.
'Right… I need to practice rolling tortillas. Man I'm so dead.' he quipped internally as he looked around to ask for help.
"Hey, do you know how to roll these flat? They gotta be circular." he said as he approached the chef closest to him.
He was a frail looking middle aged man with a thick grey moustache. He gave Lukas a look before he glanced at the balls of dough.
"Sure, but you'll have to cut these cucumbers for me. They need to be nice and thin." he said as he lifted up a thin circular slice before tossing it into his mouth, "Heh, they want cucumber sandwich. Just bread and cucumbers, can you imagine that? I really don't understand these people."
Lukas chuckled as he took over the chef's station, "I wouldn't be surprised if they start eating grass in the name of refreshment." he joked, making the chef laugh as he looked around.
"Right!" he said loudly as he walked towards the balls of dough and got to work.
Lukas' hands moved quickly, chopping the cucumbers like a machine while he watched the guy roll out his dough in a practised motion. Each one of them were almost perfectly circular. One by one, the tortillas were stacked onto each other with a thin layer of flour in between to keep them from sticking.
Once all the dough was used, the two of them switched placed again.
After another fifteen minutes, Lukas walked out of the kitchen with a plate as he searched for either the baron or his grand daughter. His goal was to figure out a way in which he could get a "feedback" while also making sure they were happy with the dish. After all, this was their party.
As he walked along the corridors, he saw a familiar face that he didn't particularly like. A stern looking man with grey side burns walked towards him slowly. He wore a pure black suit, a white shirt inside and had a deep burgundy rose above his pocket.
Almost instinctively, Lukas made a smooth 180 degree turn and was about to walk away when he heard the man's voice.
"You must greet people you see before doing your work. Ignoring them or looking away symbolises rudeness.", the man said, his voice stern and deep.
Lukas turned to face him with a strained smile, "Good… morning, Sir Alaric."
Alaric nodded, "Good. Practice smiling a little more so you can make it look genuine. Right now, you look like you're trying to push something out."
'Just say that I look like I'm constipating damn it!'
Lukas nodded slowly, his smile turning more natural as he offered the plate to his etiquette tutor, "Please have a bite and tell me what you think of it."
Without saying a word, Alaric grabbed the taco and took a huge bite. His so-called ethics were thrown out he window but right at that moment, one of the servants passed by them.
Alaric's facial expression hardened as he swallowed the whole thing without chewing and then, too a small reserved bite. Seeing this, Lukas couldn't help but feel like socialising with the high class was going to be very tiresome.
Lukas had expected a small bite but Alaric only stopped when there was nothing left on the plate.
He turned to his student and gave out a fake cough, "Ahem, it's very good. The stat increase is…. very good too. I'm sure that the guests will be surprised."
"That's good to hear." Lukas said as he took the empty plate, "There's a gravy to dip this into so the stat increase will be even more balanced."
He then paused for a moment before asking, "Can I borrow a book from your study? I'm done preparing and I wish to kill some time."
Alaric nodded, "Sure. You know where it is. Now if you can excuse me, I must meet our first guest."
Once Alaric was gone, Lukas ran back to the kitchen tossed the plate in the sink and rushed to Alaric's study. He ignored everything inside and went straight to the wooden shelf filled with books and grabbed a familiar looking one.
'History is the most important things to learn.' he thought as he began to search for the page that he had stopped at previously.