AGN -Chapter 316 Crab Roe Sauce

Listening to An Youyou’s exaggerated praise, Qin Huai waited until the buns had cooled slightly before picking one up and taking a bite.

Hmm, just a normal vegetable bun.

He would bring two to Zheng Siyuan later.

Zheng Siyuan had just landed by plane that morning. After resting at noon, he came to Yunzhong Cafeteria in the afternoon to work, helping Qin Huai make the three-delicacy buns and fermented rice buns before heading back to rest. He didn’t work any overtime.

He wasn’t interested in Qin Huai making ordinary vegetable buns.

If Qin Huai had made double-crab buns, Zheng Siyuan might have been willing to stay and study them together. He was already very used to Qin Huai’s random bursts of ideas—one moment this, the next moment that, jumping all over the place.

Let alone Qin Huai suddenly deciding after going to the bathroom that he wanted to make vegetable buns—if he came back from the bathroom and said he didn’t want to be a pastry chef anymore and instead wanted to seriously learn cooking, specializing in stir-fried cabbage and pork, Zheng Siyuan would only think it was just another weird side quest assigned by Qin Huai’s imaginary system.

That was just how tolerant Little Zheng Chef was.

Qin Huai took a big bite. The first thing his teeth touched was the bun skin.

With his current advanced dough-making skills, making something as ordinary as a vegetable bun was effortless—like dimensional reduction. With a casual move, he could crush breakfast shops within a ten-mile radius, forcing their owners to wave white flags in surrender while cursing under their breath, all while secretly sneaking off to Yunzhong Cafeteria to buy buns.

It was very delicious—chewy yet soft, with the aroma of wheat and the faint, carb-sweet scent of steamed dough.

The first chew was the skin. The second brought out the filling.

A very ordinary cabbage filling.

Cabbage absorbed oil but had a bland taste. The so-called “cabbage detox soup” was said to be a weight-loss miracle: cabbage boiled in plain water with no oil or salt, only ginger and peppercorns. The first bite made people reflect on their past life, the second made them think about their future, the third made them feel hopeless, and the fourth made them contemplate the meaning of life. If someone could finish an entire pot and continue eating it for days, they would probably succeed at anything in life.

This was something Qin Huai had seen in a friend’s social media post while scrolling through “case reviews”—a post from an unnamed shop owner who made hand-squeezed lemon tea and, after getting fat from tasting their own products, decided to diet.

From that post, it was clear: cabbage without oil and seasoning was as unappetizing as it got.

And Qin Huai’s bun was only just enough to give the cabbage oil and basic seasoning.

Without buffs, it was just a slightly better-than-average vegetable bun—no matter how tasty, it was still ordinary, rated only C+.

Yes, C+.

Qin Huai felt that when he got home tonight, he should really watch some tutorial videos. Jiang Weiguo’s buns only reached C-grade due to his weaker pastry skills. Qin Huai’s skills were much better, yet his buns were only C+. Apart from slight differences in knife work that didn’t affect the bun itself, there must be something else he was missing.

Of course, it might also be because he didn’t make vegetable buns often enough. With more practice, they might reach B-grade.

A C+ bun, when enhanced with buffs, could already reach the eating experience of a B-grade pastry.

If it were B-grade… even B-…

He didn’t even dare to imagine.

Not to mention this bun only cost three yuan each.

Before the three-delicacy buns were upgraded to A-grade, the vegetable bun would be the strongest item in Yunzhong Cafeteria.

Qin Huai squinted slightly, chewing happily.

The buff on this bun was truly excellent—double happiness and satisfaction. Eating carbohydrates naturally triggers a sense of pleasure, and this bun’s buff doubled it. It was a wonderful feeling.

A wonderful feeling of eating something delicious when starving after dieting almost to the point of collapse.

Others who bought the buns felt the same joy.

The first buyer, Aunt Liu, originally planned to take all ten buns home to share with her family for dinner.

But she was too hungry. She couldn’t resist and took a bite right after receiving them.

Just that one bite, and she immediately had a rebellious thought that violated the residential community rules of Yunzhong Community. Despite the risk of “enforcement of justice,” she queued up again to buy twenty more buns.

After hesitating, she called her husband and told him to come downstairs quickly to buy buns, while she hurried home.

If asked later, she would just say she didn’t know her husband was also buying them—that they just happened to receive the news at the same time and rushed out without informing each other. Innocent ignorance, no wrongdoing.

Twenty buns—five people in their family could finish them, no waste.

Thinking this, Aunt Liu happily took another bite, filled with satisfaction.

Oh, Chef Xiao Qin’s vegetable buns were truly amazing!

Inside Yunzhong Cafeteria, Chen Huihong, as a special insider, didn’t have to follow community rules and bought twenty buns in one go—eighteen for Luo Jun and two for herself, five for eating on-site and fifteen to take away.

“You bought so many buns?” Luo Jun couldn’t help glancing at them, saying sarcastically, “What, never had enough vegetable buns in your past lives?”

Chen Huihong stuffed a bun into her mouth. “Vegetable buns are actually quite rare. When I was in Beijing, big restaurants never served ordinary vegetable buns. It was always beef buns, lamb buns, or all kinds of fancy ones stuffed with wild game and seafood—deer meat, bear meat, whatever. The taste was all over the place. Even plain pork buns were hard to find.”

“But even though the flavors were messy, Tai Feng Tower’s buns were always the best. Have you ever been there?”

Luo Jun silently took another bite and said one word: “Get lost.”

“Did you all learn speech patterns from Chen Gong or something?”

Chen Huihong chuckled. “Not really, just a bit of casual communication.”

“Assistant Chen is actually quite interesting—he has unique insights.”

Luo Jun took another bite. Since the bun was pretty good and improved his mood slightly, he didn’t respond.

After finishing the bun, he finally said slowly, “Can you finish eighteen buns? Give me three—I want them for a late-night snack.”

Chen Huihong: “???”

After dinner, Qin Huai took a bag containing vegetable buns, meat buns, mung bean cakes, and pan-fried radish cakes and headed to Zheng Siyuan’s house.

Because the real estate agent Zheng Da had hired was unreliable, Zheng Siyuan hadn’t rented a place in Yunzhong Community. Instead, he only managed to rent a furnished one-bedroom apartment in the neighboring community.

Later, Qin Huai learned about this and offered to help Zheng Siyuan find housing in Yunzhong Community. However, Zheng Siyuan declined.

He didn’t have high requirements for where he lived, and he didn’t want to move. To him, it was all close enough anyway—just a few more steps or a few fewer steps.

When Qin Huai delivered the pastries to Zheng Siyuan’s doorstep, Zheng Siyuan was in the middle of making crab roe sauce.

Seeing Qin Huai arrive, Zheng Siyuan said directly, “Perfect timing. I was going to tell you about this tomorrow.”

“The double-crab bun with crab roe sauce version should ideally use fresh crab roe. But it’s not crab season right now. If we had fresh crab roe, there’d be no need to make a crab roe sauce version at all—we could just make the normal one.”

“These are all new batches of crab roe sauce I further processed from existing crab roe sauce, but something still feels off. Since you’re here, help me taste it.”

The method for making crab roe sauce was actually quite simple: simmer fresh crab roe in lard, then add seasonings like scallion, ginger, and garlic depending on preference. If one wanted a richer flavor and more appealing color, shrimp-head oil could be used, which would make the final product even better.

If no special enhancement was needed, simple seasoning—light soy sauce, cooking wine, and salt—would be enough.

Zheng Siyuan had likely started cooking immediately after getting off work. The rich aroma of crab roe filled the entire room. Since it was already made using crab roe sauce as a base, the fishy smell was relatively mild, mixed with other subtle aromas that didn’t originally belong to crab roe.

“Really?” Qin Huai hadn’t expected Zheng Siyuan to take the double-crab bun more seriously than he did. Qin Huai himself hadn’t even started practicing it yet, while Zheng Siyuan had already begun preparing crab roe sauce.

Qin Huai placed the pastries at the entrance, changed shoes, and went straight to the kitchen.

Zheng Siyuan had already finished simmering three types of crab roe sauce.

A fourth was still gently frying over low heat, re-extracting crab roe oil.

Looking at the bottles and jars on the counter, and the crab roe inside that clearly wasn’t pure—obviously mixed with various fillers from different brands—Qin Huai picked up a spoon.

He tasted each of Zheng Siyuan’s crab roe sauces in turn. However, since he had never made or eaten a double-crab bun before, and had no idea what kind of crab roe sauce it required or what it should taste like, he couldn’t really come to a conclusion and could only comment on the flavor itself.

Qin Huai pointed at the first one: “This one tastes the most normal.”

“It’s basically what crab roe sauce should taste like, just with a bit too much cooking wine. The other two have too many extra ingredients. The third one feels like it has more starch than crab roe. I know thickening improves texture, but this is a bit too much, isn’t it?”

“It’s a problem with the sauce,” Zheng Siyuan explained. “The first batch came directly from a supplier. It’s the most expensive and highest quality, but maybe because it’s already processed into crab roe sauce, after I reprocessed it, it actually didn’t feel suitable for double-crab buns anymore.”

“If we want to use crab roe sauce for double-crab buns, it actually can’t be too authentic.”

Qin Huai: ?

There was such a thing?

This was the first time he had ever heard that a pastry shouldn’t be made too authentically.

Seeing Qin Huai’s shock, Zheng Siyuan explained, “The original idea from my master’s master when he developed the crab roe sauce double-crab bun recipe was to let people enjoy a similar crab flavor even when crabs weren’t in season.”

“So flavor wasn’t the main focus—what mattered was whether the sauce could be preserved for a long time. To extend shelf life, a lot of spices and seasonings had to be added. In those conditions back then, it was impossible to preserve maximum flavor.”

“So I’ve been thinking before coming here… does the master’s recipe still apply today?”

“Now we have better crab roe sauces available. Even if they aren’t fully authentic, the taste difference isn’t that big. In my opinion, those sauces are actually more suitable for making double-crab buns. The original recipe is somewhat outdated.”

Qin Huai was a little surprised.

Not because Zheng Siyuan was stubborn or old-fashioned—on the contrary, he had always deeply respected and even admired his master. This was the first time Qin Huai had heard him say that his master’s recipe might be outdated.

“You… have you discussed this with Chef Zheng?” Qin Huai asked.

“I did. I called my dad. I originally thought he’d scold me, but he didn’t. Instead, he laughed for at least three minutes straight—I was worried he might choke.”

“My dad said that before, I was just learning how to make pastries. Now I’ve finally learned how to be a chef.”

“The beginning of a good apprentice surpassing their master is questioning whether the master was always right. My dad questioned him since he was young and was often punished by my master, but my master actually liked that personality and believed my dad would become an outstanding pastry chef.”

“Honestly, my dad is great in every way—just a bit lazy.”

“After he made money, he stopped wanting to work hard.”

Qin Huai: …

That’s quite a statement. Who would want to work hard after making money?

Go ask An Youyou—she’d probably just want to lie on a beach all day after getting rich.

“So…” Qin Huai seemed to understand the first problem they would need to solve before studying the double-crab bun. “Before we start researching the bun, what we actually need to figure out is how to make crab roe sauce that’s more suitable for modern double-crab buns.”

He tasted the three sauces again, still unable to form a conclusion.

His palate wasn’t bad, but without a reference point—having never eaten a double-crab bun before—he couldn’t tell what was truly appropriate.

Zheng Siyuan shook his head. “No, that’s my job.”

“Before you study the bun, what you need most is to actually taste what a double-crab bun tastes like.”

With that, Zheng Siyuan took out a jar from the fridge. It was clearly homemade crab roe sauce.

“This was made by my dad last year using my master’s recipe. It wasn’t made for buns, but for mixing with noodles.”

“Tomorrow I’ll make you a batch of double-crab buns so you can get a sense of the taste. Then we can start researching the crab roe sauce.”

“Considering we’ll inevitably produce a lot of unusable crab roe sauce during experimentation, I think Yunzhong Cafeteria should start selling crab roe mixed noodles tomorrow.”

“The hand-pulled noodles you make are pretty good.”

Qin Huai nodded, understanding the implication.

“Got it. The chicken broth you were simmering this afternoon is still on the stove.”

“Tomorrow morning, I’ll make sure you get chicken noodle soup.”