Chapter 15

Chapter 15: Are They Really Here to Eat His Lion’s Head...

Chen Shuzheng threw a huge tantrum. After smashing his own phone, he grabbed Chen Yijin’s phone and angrily went to watch Zhu Nan’s video.

Chen Yijin trembled a little; his father’s temper was always bad.

But his phone was a newly bought iPhone!

“Dad, don’t smash it...”

Hearing this, Chen Shuzheng was so angry his heart nearly gave out: “At a time like this, the thing you’re most afraid of is me breaking your phone? This video got released by him—where does that leave the Chen family’s reputation? What about our restaurant’s business?”

Holding his son’s phone, he was about to like some comments when suddenly a call came in.

The name on the phone showed “Chen Boduan.”

Chen Shuzheng’s hand trembled, almost dropping the phone. Flustered, he handed the phone to his son: “You answer it! Ask your uncle what’s going on!”

Chen Yijin took the phone with a worried face.

Chen Boduan was the head of the Chen family’s current generation—a prodigy from childhood, with a temper as sharp as his cooking skills. He cursed at the sky, the earth, and the air. His father feared him, and so did Chen Shuzheng!

Carefully, Chen Yijin answered the call, listening to his uncle’s sarcastic voice on the other end.

“Your father broke his phone again? Can’t make lion’s head meatballs better than a useless kid who hasn’t even formally started cooking, so he throws a tantrum at home? Tell him to stuff his head into the pot and stew for two hours, see if the chopsticks can still stick in.”

“What are you standing there for? Give the phone back to your father!”

Chen Yijin carefully handed the phone to his father, watching as his father instinctively bent down and smiled at the phone.

“Yes, yes… I’ll post a video apology right away…”

“Right… our kitchen is in the basement… no no, big brother, I’m not talking back, yes, I’ll set up a temporary kitchen and make lion’s head meatballs in front of customers every day…”

“Yes yes, I’m also planning to find another reviewer, huh? Go do a face-to-face cook-off with her? That’d be too humiliating…”

“No, I… yes, I’m useless. Useless people competing with useless people isn’t humiliating…”

“Okay, okay, big brother, I’ll handle it, yes…”

Chen Shuzheng listened to the call suddenly cut off, saw his son happily watching on the side, and kicked angrily.

He wouldn’t dare disobey a single word from his elder brother. Chen Boduan had ordered him to find two judges and have another competition, and the judges had to be genuinely authoritative...

Chen Yijin cautiously asked on the side, “Dad, are you really going to compete against Chen Ran?”

“Your uncle already gave the order… he said the news is temporarily suppressed, so it won’t reach the old master. Otherwise, this restaurant might have to be run by someone else.”

Chen Yijin watched his father rummage through a cardholder and couldn’t help but ask, “Do you really think you can win?”

No sooner had he spoken than he got kicked.

“What nonsense! How old is Chen Ran? She hasn’t even formally started cooking in the Chen family yet. How could she make lion’s head meatballs? The recipe might even be stolen. Your father was personally taught by the old master!”

Whether he could win wasn’t even a question for Chen Shuzheng. He kicked his son again, pulled out a business card, and made a call.

Although the culinary rating system supported by the Chen family was the foreign Michelin, that side was already well fed by the Chen family, and its recognition among the domestic public wasn’t very high.

If they wanted authority, they had to turn to the famous chefs roster under Tán Chī magazine.He was now calling Wang Zhaoshan, the deputy food critic in charge of the regional famous chefs roster at Tán Chī magazine.

If it weren’t for the Chen family’s influence, he wouldn’t even have gotten this business card.

“Is this Senior Wang Zhaoshan? This is Junior Chen, Chen Shuzheng!”

Wang Zhaoshan didn’t immediately remember who this was.

He was sitting in his office. Today, an intern reporter reported that they had found a new chef worthy of the famous chefs roster.

Even more rare, the new chef was very young.

But it was a bit tricky—the chef worked in a kindergarten and was about to leave the job. According to the intern reporter Qiu Xian, the chef had no plans to work in a restaurant.

How could he go to a kindergarten cafeteria? He was already forty-three!

Wang Zhaoshan put the phone on speaker. When Qiu Xian heard Chen Shuzheng’s name, she quickly came over.

She used the rapid typing skills she had trained to secure tickets and quickly typed a line on the phone for Wang Zhaoshan to see.

“Chen Shuzheng is the head chef of Chen’s Restaurant. Their lion’s head meatballs were compared to the chef I mentioned, and they lost miserably!”

Wang Zhaoshan nodded, gestured for Qiu Xian to sit back down, and continued listening carefully to Chen Shuzheng’s cautious self-introduction on the other end.

“Oh, I remember now. Go ahead.”

Chen Shuzheng’s voice carried a bit of flattery: “Recently, our restaurant was attacked by hired online trolls… I was thinking of having a lion’s head competition with that chef who smeared us, but I’m afraid of getting trashed again, so I want to find a fair judge. That’s why I thought of you.”

“If we talk about fairness and justice, our famous chefs roster is absolutely that! No one dares to argue!”

Wang Zhaoshan sneered slightly: “Isn’t your Chen family cozying up with Michelin? Isn’t it claimed that Chinese cuisine should go global and accept international standards? Even abandon the Eight Great Cuisines and create new Chinese cuisine? Why not get judges from there?”

Chen Shuzheng was momentarily at a loss and silently cursed the old-fashioned man. Then he continued, “But for our own country, aren’t you still the most authoritative? Haha.”

Wang Zhaoshan took the hint and stopped pressing. The Chen family was thriving in all industries, and Chen Shuzheng wasn’t even in the core decision-making circle—there was no use saying more.

Changing topic, Wang Zhaoshan spoke about the lion’s head: “I haven’t eaten your lion’s head, but I have eaten your big brother’s. It really is the best taste on earth. If you want to compete, I’d be lucky to try.”

“I’ll definitely go, even if just to taste your lion’s head.”

“Alright, let me know the time then.”

Qiu Xian was anxiously listening on the side. She pressed her hands on Wang Zhaoshan’s desk, almost leaning in.

Only when Wang Zhaoshan hung up and set the time with Chen Shuzheng did she anxiously say, “How could you agree to help him? Chen Ran’s cooking is really excellent! She’s definitely better than him. You can’t support him…”

“When did I agree to help him?”

Wang Zhaoshan slowly pressed the girl’s head back down: “If I don’t give him some courage to go challenge that Chen Ran you mentioned, tell me—how else can we sneak into a kindergarten to eat lion’s head? You want to be in the full daycare class?”

Qiu Xian couldn’t help but laugh and awkwardly scratched her head.

“You’re right. Should we bring more people then? That lion’s head really is great! To get on the famous chefs roster, shouldn’t the director taste it? Should we invite her to come?”

Wang Zhaoshan rolled his eyes at the silly smiling girl: “I haven’t even tasted it myself yet. How can I invite the director? I’ll try it first. If it’s no good, you can stop your internship and get lost.”

He was really going all out flattering Chen Shuzheng just to try that kindergarten lion’s head!

“Absolutely won’t happen!”Qiu Xian had great trust in Chen Ran’s lion’s head.

However…

“What if you try it and it’s good, but later when the director comes, she can’t be found?”

Wang Zhaoshan waved his hand: “How is that possible? A chef can’t just keep working in a place like that forever. Sooner or later, she’ll go to a restaurant. No matter what restaurant she goes to, do you think they’d kick me out when I go to eat?”

On the other side, Chen Shuzheng, who had just hung up the phone, was completely unaware of this conversation. After being flattered a few times by Wang Zhaoshan, he felt even more reassured.

In the past, any culinary competition would never have him, the third son of the Chen family, participate. Above him was his big brother Chen Boduan, below him were several ambitious nephews and nieces, and even cousins from other branches.

Now, although competing against his own niece was a bit like a big bully beating a smaller kid, at least it was an official competition, right?

After hanging up, he looked at Chen Yijin, pulled out his son’s SIM card from the phone, and put in his own.

“I’ll give you three thousand yuan later. Go buy a new phone, and at the same time, arrange with Chen Ran to have a lion’s head competition.”

Chen Yijin felt heartbroken—it would take way more than three thousand to buy that phone!

But when his father spoke, he could only accept the loss.

Chen Shuzheng swapped phones, looked around, slumped into the chair, and said proudly, “Still worried your old man can’t win? When your old man says there’s a competition, even Wang Zhaoshan will come running just to taste one bite of your old man’s lion’s head!”