NOVPUBChapter 709: Chapter 708 Revenge
About how to weme Sun Jikai and let him feel the warmth of society, experiencing Taifeng Building’s care for employees firsthand, Jiang Feng has had many discussions with Ji Yue and others these past few days.
Ji Yue feels that there’s nothing a barbecue can’t solve. Once Sun Jikai gets off the plane and drops his luggage, everyone should head straight to a barbecue stall. After two beers, Sun Jikai will be his most genuine self.
Jiang Feng thinks that won’t do.
Ji Xia believes everyone can treat Sun Jikai to a big meal—roast duck, pig’s trotters, braised pork, lamb chops, all in full array, plus various desserts like chlate ice cream and iceldla. Sun Jikai would definitely forget all his troubles.
Jiang Feng thinks that Ji Xia must have sneaked some junk food again.
Wu Minqi thinks theyuld charge Sun Jikai the same price for his stir-fried beef ho fun as they do for Ji Xue.
Wang Xiulian thinks that won’t do.
Zhang Guanghang believes everyoneuld go to ancert together to cultivate their taste and relax their bodies and minds.
Including Ji Yue, everyone thinks that won’t do.
After several days of intense debate, Jiang Feng finally persuaded Wang Xiulian to cut the price of Ji Xue’s stir-fried beef ho fun by 4 yuan, and raise Sun Jikai’s by 4 yuan, making Sun Jikai’s stir-fried beef ho fun reach an unprecedented equivalent to Ji Xue’s. This time, the three new arrivals were all authentic Cantonese cuisine chefs. Jiang Feng thought that if Qiu Fu was willing to make stir-fried beef ho fun, both Sun Jikai and Ji Xue’s dishesuld be taken off the menu.
Besides these trivial preparations, the Jiang Family Members made some very useful ones as well.
For instance, they immediately agreed to provide the “five insurances and one housing fund”, including meals and ammodation. Jiang Jiandangntacted the housing agency and rented all two-bedroom apartments on the 19th, 18th, and 16th floors of their building that met the employee dormitory standards, with the room with the best lighting and fine dration being given to Sun Maochai. Sun Jikai and Qiu Fu were left to choose whichever they preferred.
Considering that Sun Jikai had just gone through a brutal inheritance dispute and might be penniless and down and out, Jiang Jianshe thoughtfully prepared all the items he might need for daily life. Naturally, things like toothbrushes, towels, dishwashing liquid, and laundry detergent were provided, and he even bought hundreds of rolls of trash bags and stored them in the cabinet, not knowing if Sun Jikai would ever use up all these trash bags in his lifetime.
The interview was set for August 2nd. In order not to delay, Sun Maochai and the other two arrived the night before on August 1st, their plane landing at 10 PM. As always, the pick-up ace Jiang Feng went to the airport.
To emphasize Taifeng Building’s importance on Sun Maochai, this time the pickup was not only carried out by the skillful Jiang Feng but also by the face of Taifeng Building, Zhang Guanghang. Because Zhang Guanghang was there, for the first time, Jiang Feng didn’t take the subway for the airport pick-up but rode in Zhang Guanghang’s Mercedes, finally having a bit of a capitalist’s pomp.
“Zhang, do you know when Manager Fan and the others have set the Midsummer Banquet?” Jiang Feng asked while sitting in the passenger seat, checking his phone again for the flight details of Sun Maochai and his group.
“Orchid said they have to wait for the results of tomorrow’s tasting before they can set a date, but the invitations are ready. Once the menu isnfirmed, they’ll set the date. The earliest would be next week. There’s no need to rush these things,” Zhang Guanghang replied, focusing on the road.
The top-floor restaurant had made a precise strike in May by offering a chef’s tasting menu through a lottery, snatching away many of Taifeng Building’s premium customers. This had caused a significant slump in Taifeng’s business, which only began to ease recently. Now that they were rivals, Taifeng had to retaliate in kind, so Fan Mei proposed leveraging Sun Maochai’s fame to invite those past and potential premium customers of the top-floor restaurant to the Midsummer Banquet at Taifeng.
The name was easy tome by, just say Taifeng Building’s new top Cantonese chef Sun Maochai has launched a new menu, and we’ve specially invited a select group of diners to taste the new menu and provide feedback. Jiang Feng believed that the majority of guests wouldn’t refuse such an invitation.
The name Xiulian has chosen was also ready, “The Banquet of August,” naturally called the Grand Summer Feast.
Jiang Feng was messaging Ji Yue. Although Ji Yue’s suggestion to treat Sun Jikai to barbecue was vetoed by Jiang Feng, she still felt that only barbecueuld soothe Sun Jikai’s wounded heart these past days. So she was still persistent, asking Jiang Feng to inquire whether Sun Jikai wanted to eat barbecue when picking him up from the airport. After all, work was almost over, and if he wanted, she would treat everyone to a barbecue downstairs; if not, theyuld just go to sleep directly at home, ready for the holiday tomorrow.
Jiang Feng replied to Ji Yue with an “okay.”
After sending the message, Jiang Feng remembered that Zhang Guanghang seemed to have learned some skills from Sun Maochai. He must be quite familiar with Sun Maochai.
“Right, Zhang, I remember you said that you’ve learned a few dishes from Master Sun Maochai. You must be quite familiar with him,” Jiang Feng said.
Zhang Guanghang, still focused on the road, didn’t even turn his head: “We’ve had some interactions. To say I learnedoking from him, it was really just a few days of his guidance. To say we are familiar, we’re not particularly close.”
“Did you go to Hong Kong City specifically to ask for his advice?” Jiang Feng asked curiously.
“No, I met him during a culinarympetition,” Zhang Guanghang said, “In fact, if we really talk about it, Master Sun and Chef Arno should be quite close.”
“Ah?” Jiang Feng was surprised.
Zhang Guanghang began to explain to Jiang Feng.
Because domestic culinarympetitions are seldom held, the culinarymmunity generally acknowledges that the more prestigious culinarympetitions are overseas. Domestic culinarympetitions are mostlymmercial in nature and localized. The fact that the Good Taste culinarympetition expanded its venue to the national level was alreadynsidered to be a huge scale, or else it wouldn’t have attracted so many capable young chefs, making the snd Good Taste culinarympetition the chef selectionntest for Taifeng Building.
Because of the different culinary styles, few domestic chefs participate in overseasmpetitions. Even if they do, they mostly can’t achieve good results due to the disadvantages ofmpeting away from home and different judges’ tastes. In recent years, only Sun Maochai from the domestic chefs enjoyed participating in thesempetitions.
It was not so much enjoyment, as his frequency of participating inmpetitions was not high—once or twice a year. And he participated mostly to interact and exchange skills with other chefs, not so driven by the desire to win. But with his skills and ranking in the famous chefs’ list, even if he participated casually, heuld still achieve notable results, either first or snd place. If Chef Arno participated, he would be first; if Chef Arno didn’t, he would be snd. The two of them would always meet at a culinarympetition once a year, so Zhang Guanghang felt they must have some kind of relationship, although probably not a particularly good one.
At this point, Zhang Guanghang also took pains to mention a non-noteworthy hobby of Chef Arno as the villainous big boss—tormenting dishes.
Chef Arno, as a nationally famous chef in America who had made a name for himself with his sharp and poisonous tongue on reality shows, took great pleasure in tormenting dishes, and he did so by participating in culinarympetitions. Other chefs of his stature participated inmpetitions as aurtesy to the organizers, but he participated out of passion. Even inmpetitions where he was clearly supposed to be part of the judging panel, if he felt like it and happened to be free—for instance, when he had just fired his old boss and hadn’t found a new one—he insisted onmpeting as antestant.
After defeating hismpetitors, Chef Arno didn’t follow the usual path. Not only did he not offer euragement, not bothering tonsole them with a show of sympathy, but he would also mock thempetitors. He would say things like, “Ten more years of practice won’t be enough for you. To be called a genius like this, the younger generation is truly going downhill,” a standard villainous sort of talk.
Why did Zhang Guanghang remember it so clearly? Because these were the words Chef Arno had said to him during a previous culinarympetition.
Yes, even a genius like Zhang Guanghang had a tough time under Chef Arno’s hammering.
After hearing all this, Jiang Feng: …
Well, he suddenly felt that the last time he ran into Chef Arno at the market and got sarcastically mocked, it wasn’t so hard to understand anymore.
After all, this was the man’s hobby.
Chef Arno’s favorite pastimes were tormenting food and mocking others.
“Zhang, do you tg boldly speculated.
“That’s unlikely; Chef Arno would probably scheme to win the customers back and then give us a very harsh mocking,” said Zhang Guanghang. “He’s a principled man, he respects those stronger than him and disdains the weaker.”
“So, who does he respect?”
Zhang Guanghang thought for a moment: “Probably only Master Peng.”
“After all, more than once he has claimed there’s a problem with the celebrity chef rankings, and he should be snd. I remember he also said that Master Black, ranked snd, only got his spot because of his old age,” said Zhang Guanghang helplessly, “Master Black has been in a wheelchair for three or four years now and is 96 years old.”
“Actually, many people do feel the same way, but Chef Arno is the only one brazen enough to say it out loud.”
Jiang Feng: …
“Zhang, just park the car later, and I’ll go pick up our guest. Send me the location afterward so that I don’t struggle to find the car,” Jiang Feng decisively changed the subject.
What is the villain, Chef Arno, doing at this very moment?
He’s on a video call with Rolan, both looking extremely impatient, talking with his boss who, apart from giving a lot of money, is absolutely useless in his opinion.
Chef Arno had already zoned out, while on the tablet, his boss kept on blabbering about the top-floor restaurant’s future strategic plans.
“Arding to our big dad capture not only the elite clientele but also the upper-middle class. We are ready on our end and expect to open three more Michelin three-star Western restaurants in Beiping this year. Once we take over the Beiping market, we’ll advance southward. By then, we’ll need Mr. Arno to…”
Impatiently, Arno cut his useless boss off mid-sentence: “You chase down your markets, what does that have to do with me?”
The video call’s boss: ?
“Mr. Arno, I remember when we initially agreed, you were to this time…”
“I only came to Beiping this time to help you beat the local Chinese restaurants and help this trashy restaurant stand firm. The rest isn’t my business. What’s the deal with your so-called alliance of noobs? Did I sign anyntract?”
Boss: …
“In fact, we…”
“Don’t call me for these useless meetings in the future, wasting my time without overtime pay.” Chef Arno walked away, hanging up the video call without looking back.
Rolan: …
After ending the call, Chef Arno was in a much better mood, his expression softened, and he took out his recent study material, “My Chinese Classroom Volumes 1 to 3.” While reading, he asked, “Have you figured out why Taifeng Building is closed tomorrow?”
He said the words “Taifeng Building” in Chinese, which made the whole sentence sound rather odd.
Rolan: …
To think that hemply intolerable!
Never mind, just tolerate it. If it weren’t for getting scammed last year in his investments, losing all his money and almost going bankrupt, he wouldn’t have left a perfectly good job as a chef to travel all the way to Beiping tompete with strangers. Now, he doesn’t even have his position as a head chef anymore.
“I’ve found out. It seems Taifeng has somehow managed to poach Sun Maochai. He’s starting tomorrow,” Rolan reported.
Arno nodded, not showing much interest: “What about their Jiang Feng? Has he been to Yonghe House recently?”
“No,” Rolan said.
Arno lookedntemplative.
Seeing Arno’s expression, Rolanuldn’t help but bme a bit curious. He cautiously inquired, “Chef Arno, may I ask why you came here too?”
To Rolan, it seemed unlikely that Chef Arno, who was far wealthier than himself, hadme for the money—he wouldn’t have talked back to the boss if it was just for the money.
Arno’s face darkened instantly, and he let out ald and slightly malicious sneer that looked terrifying.
“Revenge.”
