AGN -Chapter 325 Pei Xing Was Completely Shocked

After finishing cutting the radish, Qin Huai went to taste the crab roe sauce that Zheng Siyuan had further refined. He selected two portions that he felt would work best for crab roe mixed noodles—and might also be suitable for double-crab buns.

Rarely, Zheng Siyuan and Qin Huai found themselves in disagreement.

Qin Huai was now leaning toward a lighter seasoning profile for the crab roe sauce. However, Zheng Siyuan firmly believed that since they were using crab roe sauce, it should clearly taste different from fresh crab roe. It should be obvious that it had been processed.

This was one of the rare occasions where their disagreement was so fundamental—about direction and philosophy—that neither could convince the other. Each relied on his own intuition and approach.

After five or six minutes of discussion, Qin Huai and Zheng Siyuan finally reached a consensus of sorts: both directions were worth exploring.

After all, the double-crab bun itself had already evolved from the original version. If Chef Jing could create new formulas, there was no reason Qin Huai and Zheng Siyuan couldn’t do the same. They were, in essence, trying to modify the original recipe anyway.

Since they had already gone against tradition, they might as well go all the way. Who said there could only be two versions of a double-crab bun?

What if a third version turned out to be even better?

In the end, they did not agree on taste or direction—but they were completely aligned in their rebellious attitude.

Zheng Siyuan decided to process the crab roe sauce in both directions simultaneously. Following Qin Huai’s idea, they would first use it to make crab roe mixed noodles. Only after identifying the most suitable version would they attempt the double-crab bun again.

Naturally, one might ask: why not make the double-crab bun directly? Were they unable to?

Yes—they were not able to.

Zheng Siyuan’s previous failure with the double-crab bun had left a significant psychological shadow. Although he never said it out loud, the fact that he insisted on constantly stir-frying large amounts of crab roe sauce every day—while never mentioning the words “double-crab bun”—made it obvious to Qin Huai:

He would not attempt it again until he was satisfied with the crab roe sauce.

As for Qin Huai, he simply could not make it yet.

He was still studying sea cucumber. He needed time—at least enough time to fully understand that ingredient before moving on to the double-crab bun.

Because Zheng Siyuan had prepared a large batch of crab roe sauce, Qin Huai spent most of the afternoon making hand-pulled noodles.

From 5:00 p.m. to 6:30 p.m., crab roe mixed noodles were sold continuously, and many office workers managed to catch the timing.

These office workers ate a bite of cheap mung bean cake, then a bite of expensive crab roe noodles.

The mung bean cake was light, sweet, and refreshing, with a clean green-bean fragrance. The crab roe noodles, on the other hand, were rich, savory, and heavy with thickened starch and concentrated crab aroma.

The combination didn’t match at all—but that didn’t matter.

What mattered was that the mung bean cake was cheap. After buying the noodles, most people found it hard to justify spending more money on additional expensive snacks.

Why not buy radish cake instead, since it was cheaper?

Perhaps because they weren’t that broke yet. Or perhaps because people still had taste buds—and simply felt mung bean cake tasted better than radish cake.

Now the promotional price for crab roe noodles was 138 yuan per bowl.

Hand-pulled noodles coated in rich crab roe—this was about satisfaction and texture. Eating it felt like getting a deal.

Regular customers of Yunzhong Cafeteria all knew one thing: their “discounts” were genuine discounts.

These discounted items only appeared when Xiao Qin was practicing large-scale production. Once he finished practicing and production dropped, both quantity and price would go up.

Miss it, and it was gone.

Now that they had the chance, even though 138 yuan was not cheap, people still felt it was worth it. After all, it was crab roe noodles—made with sauce personally stir-fried by Xiao Zheng and noodles hand-pulled by Xiao Qin.

At that price, it felt almost miraculous.

Some even joked that if they only had 130 yuan left in their pocket, they would borrow 8 yuan from a friend just to eat the bowl first—future consequences be damned.

Of course, this kind of behavior was irresponsible overspending and not recommended. Otherwise, one might discover at the end of the month that their Engel coefficient had skyrocketed.

After finishing the crab roe noodles—and even eating two extra portions—Qin Huai began discussing exchange arrangements with Boss Su over WeChat.

How many people came from Zhiwei, or who specifically came, didn’t matter much. As Zheng Siyuan said, anyone from Zhiwei was capable enough; they would be more than sufficient as assistants.

Two or three would not be too few, eight or nine would not be too many.

Yunzhong Cafeteria, as a community canteen, had a sufficiently large kitchen—comparable even to Huang Ji. Meanwhile, their own staff was far fewer than Huang Ji’s.

So if Boss Su really sent more people, Qin Huai would simply need to arrange extra workstations.

Since the other side was sending people to help for free, he was quite willing to bear that cost.

The main topic of discussion was when Qin Huai would go to Zhiwei for exchange.

According to Boss Su, sooner was better—ideally May or June, staying until August or September. Meanwhile, Yunzhong Cafeteria would not need to worry about staffing, since Zhiwei had plenty of pastry chefs. Boss Su could even send two capable assistants over to help, achieving a true mutual exchange.

From Boss Su’s tone, Zhiwei almost seemed ready to welcome Qin Huai with open arms. Apprentices and master chefs alike were all looking forward to his arrival.

Even their top expert, the undisputed number one pastry chef Master Zhou, admired Qin Huai greatly. He felt Qin Huai had been wasting his talent under Zheng Da, and questioned what he could possibly learn there. That Zheng fellow was busy running factories and businesses, hardly focused on cooking, and didn’t even understand proper pastry communication.

Huang Shengli was decent, but Huang Ji was still primarily a savory-dish restaurant—lacking true insight into pastry craftsmanship.

For pastry chefs, real exchange had to come from Zhiwei. They were the true leading force in the field—the “Whampoa Military Academy” of pastry chefs, full of masters and proven talent.

By the end of the conversation, Boss Su even sent over detailed resumes of their chefs, practically ready to turn it into an advertisement slogan: “For learning and exchange, Zhiwei is the right choice.”

Qin Huai’s reaction to all of this was: …

He wasn’t particularly interested in the resumes or the sales pitch. In fact, he didn’t even need Boss Su’s introduction—when he was at Huang Ji earlier, Tan Weian had already done similar promotion work, constantly introducing Zhiwei’s chefs and specialties.

What truly surprised Qin Huai was the deep animosity between Boss Su and Zheng Da.

So much so that even when promoting their own restaurant, they still took every opportunity to criticize Zheng Da.

Based on Tan Weian’s description of Master Zhou, Qin Huai suspected those words were not actually from Master Zhou himself.

Master Zhou probably thought that way—but would never say it out loud.

Given Boss Su’s habit of posting sarcastic remarks about Zheng Da on social media, Qin Huai concluded:

Those words were likely just Boss Su’s inner monologue, spoken aloud in spirit.

In the end, Qin Huai still did not finalize the exact exchange schedule with Boss Su. But he personally leaned toward July to September.

That period would be convenient for Qin Luo’s summer break, and her tutoring teachers were based in Suzhou, while Zhiwei was in Hangzhou. The distance between Suzhou and Hangzhou was relatively short, making it easy to take her along for tutoring.

Otherwise, asking teachers to travel all the way from Suzhou to Shanshi might be inconvenient for them.

Moreover, by September, crabs would be in season—fat and rich in roe. That would be the perfect time to put the original double-crab buns and crab roe shumai on the menu.

Qin Huai could seamlessly transition from Zhiwei to Huang Ji afterward, giving their customers a big surprise.

Just thinking about it made Qin Huai feel very thoughtful.

Yes, he truly was a considerate older brother.

After everything was settled, Boss Su immediately said he would assign personnel the next day. The day after that, the exchange team would depart. By the third day, they would arrive and begin work.

That was how efficient things were.

That evening, Qin Huai posted a brief announcement in the staff group chat, informing everyone that Zhiwei exchange staff would arrive the day after tomorrow, and asking them to prepare to welcome the new colleagues.

As the boss, Qin Huai rarely spoke in the employee group chat, and he had muted it for years. After sending the message, he stopped paying attention to the group. He played on his phone for a while and chatted a bit with Tan Weian, asking whether Gu Li would also come to the exchange event later.

Qin Huai quite liked Gu Li’s personality—quiet, focused on getting things done. If talent isn’t enough, hard work makes up for it. In Zhiwei, where overachievers were everywhere, Gu Li was an overachiever among overachievers. No boss wouldn’t like someone like that.

Tan Weian replied that if Qin Huai specifically requested it, Gu Li would definitely come. After all, Gu Li’s position in Zhiwei was rather awkward. His master had already passed away, yet he was indeed a direct disciple. Other senior chefs would occasionally guide him out of respect for the late Master Tan, but that was all.

After all, he wasn’t their own disciple, and formally teaching him as a personal apprentice would be improper. Not to mention Gu Li’s talent wasn’t particularly outstanding, so many senior chefs were not very willing to teach him.

While chatting with Tan Weian, Qin Huai finally understood why Cao Guixiang had said that not having a master actually made Qin Huai more suitable for exchanges. Disciples of famous masters carry a “brand effect,” but they are also bound by it. Randomly giving guidance to someone else’s direct disciple could sometimes bring unnecessary trouble, so many people simply avoided doing so altogether.

After gossiping with Tan Weian for a while, Qin Huai thought about having to get up early the next day to make crab roe noodles, so he put down his phone and fell into a deep sleep, continuing to study sea cucumbers in his dreams.

What Qin Huai didn’t know was that while he slept, someone else couldn’t sleep at all.

That person was Pei Xing.

When Pei Xing saw Qin Huai’s message, he felt like the sky had fallen.

Coming from Zhiwei’s apprentice system, Pei Xing deeply understood that apprentices were not supposed to pry into a senior chef’s private life, especially when it involved culinary exchanges and techniques. So every time Qin Huai held online video lessons, Pei Xing and Li Hua would stand far away.

Of course, even standing far away, they could occasionally hear bits and pieces.

Pei Xing swore he wasn’t intentionally eavesdropping.

Well… maybe just a little.

But his eavesdropping skills were poor, and he couldn’t read lips, so he only ever caught fragments of words.

That afternoon, Pei Xing had vaguely felt Qin Huai mention something about Zhiwei, but he didn’t pay attention.

In the white-dish chef industry, it’s hard not to be connected to Zhiwei. “Zhiwei has a new dish,” “Zhiwei has produced another genius apprentice,” “a senior chef from Zhiwei has made another breakthrough”—it was always the center of gossip.

For white-dish chefs, Zhiwei was eternal gossip central. Moreover, Pei Xing himself had been unable to survive the competition there and had voluntarily left to find a job. He still kept up with his old school’s news from time to time.

But he hadn’t expected this kind of connection.

In all his years at Zhiwei, he had only ever heard of outsiders going there for exchange. When had Zhiwei ever sent apprentices out for exchanges?

Was that reasonable? Was that right?? Was that even supposed to happen???

One An Youyou was already hard enough to deal with—she wasn’t very competitive, but she was excellent at flattery. If a few more Zhiwei people came…

How were they supposed to compete? What could they even use to compete?!

The reason Pei Xing left in the first place was because he couldn’t compete with those Zhiwei monsters. And now they were coming after him again?

He felt like the sky had completely collapsed.

Pei Xing immediately contacted Li Hua to ask what to do.

As a chef from Zhiwei, Pei Xing knew these former colleagues too well.

For the sake of leaving a good impression on senior chefs, they would do anything—making tea, serving tea, rubbing shoulders, massaging—these were basic skills. Their speech patterns were also identical:

“Chef XX, I have a question I’d like to ask you…”

“Thank you so much, I’ve learned so much, I understand now.”

Interspersed with admiring expressions, surprised remarks, humble bows, and eager, learning eyes. The specifics depended on acting skills, but the general pattern was the same.

More advanced ones came early, left late, cleaned, helped everywhere, and took care of every little detail. They would even ask about the senior chef’s preferences—what tea they liked, their hobbies, their favorite snacks, what kind of chair they preferred.

Enthusiastic, but with boundaries.

Extremely, intensely competitive.

If work started at 7 a.m., these overachievers would make you feel like arriving at 6:30 meant you were late.

Previously, Pei Xing thought An Youyou was the number one threat. Now he felt she was nothing.

True, Chef Qin valued An Youyou and treated her specially—but she was bad at cooking. Not threatening.

Sometimes, if Pei Xing wanted fewer questions going to Qin Huai and more opportunities for himself, he could just go teach An Youyou directly.

But now it was different. Now there were many competitors, even Tan Weian had come.

Heaven help him—what exactly was happening at Zhiwei? Why were even direct disciples coming out to compete?!

Pei Xing almost desperately messaged Li Hua asking what to do tomorrow.

Li Hua replied instantly.

Li Hua: Just do your job well. Chef Qin isn’t that kind of person.

It was comforting—but not fully comforting.

So Pei Xing could only set his alarm one hour earlier and secretly go to work ahead of time, determined to out-compete Li Hua before the Zhiwei overachievers arrived.

The next morning, 6 a.m.—

Pei Xing walked into Yunzhong canteen with the determination to “outwork Li Hua,” only to find Li Hua already in the kitchen, having finished kneading two rounds of dough.

“You’re here? Morning,” Li Hua greeted with a smile. “Perfect timing. I’m frying dough sticks for Chen An. Luo Luo wants some today.”

Pei Xing: ???

He thought he was on level 2—but Li Hua was already in the stratosphere.

Damn it—so even things like strategic “indirect effort,” making fried dough sticks for Qin Luo so that Qin Huai would hear about how early he came to work—Li Hua was doing THAT too?!

How did he not think of that?!

Pei Xing was filled with regret and gritted his teeth in frustration.

He was too naive. Last night he had only been thinking about the incoming Zhiwei overachievers—and forgot that Li Hua himself was also from Zhiwei, and an even more intense overachiever.

At least he himself was somewhat of a connected insider. Li Hua was a full-on trained apprentice from the most competitive track.

Pei Xing: QAQ