Cooking in the Real World [Solo/Crafting]

[Ragnarok]

First time cooking in this world. First comes the set-up.

    Cooking was an essence of life. The idea itself was passed down from generation to generation; however, this doesn't mean that cooking was always taught by the elders to the children. Sometimes, those that received the hard end of the deal had to learn on their own, and it was through that perseverance that Oswald himself ended up becoming better at this hobby of his. Back in the real world, all he had was either take-out or instant food, and usually, it was the same thing over and over. Instant noodles, fried chicken, et cetera, et cetera. At one point, he had to make the choice to start eating new things, and the only way to solve this, other than buying different food to eat, was to start cooking with the ingredients themselves. At the beginning, it was hard, just as it would be for anyone else. All Oswald had to go off of was the internet and old cooking books, but as if it was a miracle, he came through in the end. His skills began small, but as time passed by, he became better and better. As a result, he started sharing his food with his friends, and they as well took a liking to it. Oswald felt happy with them. They were the most supportive of his life, and to him, his friends mattered more than his parents; nonetheless, the feeling of his family still lingered within him, even within the game.

    "Mother...Father...You never did treat me well did you? I guess that's partially my fault, but there's no changing the past. We just have to look on towards the future and present. Now, how does one do this?"

    Standing over a burning flame made from a few sticks and firewood, Ragnarok was about to attempt his first actual cooking session in the world of Elder Tale. He was sitting down with his ingredients beside him: a single fish, a bowl of rice, and a package of seaweed. These were placed on his right, while on his left were the equipment he needed to battle this venture: a knife. Well, he didn't have the full set, but in the end, he'd have to do his best to make his favorite food, and his first creating in Elder Tale, sushi. With a light fire before him, and a metal board supported by its own posts, his set-up was ready. The other chefs had given him tips on cooking in this world, and basically it was the same in real life. All the principles applied, but still, Ragnarok was quivering. Maybe, it was just a new environment he was working in. He didn't know, but what he did know was that this was going to be his first meal out of many.

    "Alright. Let's do this Ragna. It's all the same, just...focus..."

WC: 483

[Ragnarok]

Well...It's been a while, but it's a success so far.

    Now, it was time to just go with the flow and start it off...Simple as that. Opening the paper wrapping to the salmon wasn't any problem, just seeing the dead thing was sad in a way; nevertheless, Ragnarok needed food to sate his hunger, but also to test out if this kind of food really was...flavorful. Gently setting the free fish back on its wrapping on the ground, he took up his knife, breathing ever so slowly as he hoped he wouldn't accidentally cut the salmon in the wrong spot.

    First off, Ragnarok started with cutting off the head, wanting to get it out of the way first. With a quick slam of his cutlery, he brought the knife down upon the dead fish, effectively cutting to the mid-section of the head before pulling out and restarting again. For a person of his own stature, a task such as this wasn't always succeeded on the first strike, and now, it wasn't. Trying again, he brought the blade down and found him cutting deeper, but on the second strike, Oswald had always found him just pushing it further down until the head fell off. Ragnarok did the same as he found himself always doing, noticing that it was far easier than in the past; perhaps, it was all due to the game? Possible, but he didn't stay on the thought too long as he retrieved the head and threw it away in the trash.

    Returning to the headless salmon on its wrapping, Ragnarok thought for a second on what to do next, trying to remember as much as he could when he wasn't either helping out others or training on his own, finding out more about the fighting mechanics as an Assassin.

    "Okay...I got rid of the head...Then I work on dealing with the body next, opening it up...Alright, let's get to that then."

    Bending over slightly and pushing the paper slightly away for space, Ragnarok's left hand went to the top of the fish on its left side, while his right held the hilt of the knife, drawing it into the salmon's neck and slicing through the mid-section to the edge of the tail before stopping. He didn't want to cut through to the very end just yet, or else he could possibly mess up on the other end when equality of the meat was important. Flipping the fish onto its left side, Ragnarok did the same as before; however, this time, after he finished the slice at the edge, his hand lifted part of the meat up, allowing his knife to cut deeper inside. Two reps of slices were all it needed, and on the second one, the bone and meat were weak enough to allow Ragnarok to push his knife through, dragging it to the tail and pulling it out, finally separating the fish into two pieces. With a sigh of relief in Ragnarok's voice, he set the two pieces down onto the wrapping, one above the other.

    "Ahh...Thank goodness...Well, now I just have to cut out anything unnecessary and start pulling out scales...Fun..."

WC: 526

[Ragnarok]

It took quite a bit of time, but the meal's finally done.

    Only a few more steps closer, until Ragnarok could finally finish the product that he hadn't tasted in so long. With the two halves of the fish, he took the step further to eliminate another pesky problem: the inside bones connected to the tail. Taking his knife in hand once more, Ragnarok's hand held the fish's scaly-half down, and drew the blade beneath the bone, cutting it from the neck to the tail which effectively removed the bones as well as the tail, leaving just two slabs of meat in the wrapping. Throwing it away in the waste just as he did with the salmon's head, Ragnarok found himself slicing off the sides of the fish; any white texture on the salmon that remained near the sides was immediately cut off, allowing the true orange with white-striped meat to take into full effect.

    "Agh...Why does it always take so long for this...Well, no complaining now...I got to pull scales out now...Great..."

    A sigh of annoyance with a taint of relief left the Chef's mouth as the unused pieces were disposed of and he took his place in the center of his cooking. Positioning the meat side-by-side, left-to-right, he placed his knife away on the side next to the bowl of rice and package of seaweed, and ran his left palm down one of the slab's center, feeling out the embedded scales. Whenever, he would pass one by, his other hand would reach out to it, place his index finger and his thumb onto the scale's location and pull it out in a swift motion. Usually, back in the real world, doing such a feat was easy with forceps, but doing it with the hands just left a mess in parts of the meat, but it was better than nothing.

    Once each half of the salmon meat was examined and removed of its scales, thirty-nine for this one, Ragnarok rid himself of the sight of these and continued on with the main task; every step he took to preparing the salmon was a step he took to finally being able to share with others his common food as well as tasting the one thing he had not had in forever. With knife in hand, each chunk set one above the other once more, Ragnarok took the first piece there was, flipped it so that the scaly-skin was showing, and gently started cutting at a line centimeter down from the skin, making sure that no skin still existed throughout the meat as he cut through. The process was done for both, throwing the unused, yet edible coat of the salmon away in the trash as he had done with the rest.

"Okay, okay, okay, okay...Now, all I have to do is...Cut the meat into pieces, throw away the head's meat, prepare the pieces, cooking them to a well-done state, and I'm done!"

    With a slightly motivated face and a small smile, Ragnarok started chopping the slabs of meat into four pieces: one for the head, two for the mid-section, and one at the end. In total, at the end of quick strikes, the Chef found himself with eight lumps of salmon meat, throwing away the two head-pieces in favor of the blockey six. With the case in hand, all Ragnarok had to do from there was to split the six pieces of meat into half from there, totaling twelve at the very end. From there, he cut each smaller chunk into twelve pieces of similar size. Ultimately, Ragnarok found himself with over a hundred pieces of salmon, most of it was going to be unused anyways, but still, he had to cook each piece for total serving. His eyes turned to the metal board above the fire, waiting to serve as a heated oven for his prepared food.

WC: 648

[Ragnarok]

Well, the food's done, but...I forgot the sauce...Maybe, next time.

Every step was finally finished for the start of cooking. Any unused salmon parts were tossed in the trash, and all that was left was the delicious, yet most likely, worm-infested meat...Although that could just be an entire superstition of itself, but Oswald himself was always one to make sure to cook his sushi before eating it. Taking piece by piece until the center of the board was filled, Ragnarok waited for about half a minute, continuing to repeat the process over and over until finally each piece of salmon meat was a darker orange, but still retained its white stripes and orange hue. From there, the final parts of sushi creation began: the attachment of the rice as well as the wrapping of the seaweed; however, without any help at his side, doing every single step with the piece of salmon in hand, gathering a small wet ball of rice, and finally wrapping the seaweed around the salmon and the rice was going to be a painful task for him, but nonetheless, Ragnarok had to do it...Or else what was he doing with all this time on his hands?

    Cleaning off the paper wrapping where the whole salmon lied, Ragnarok had placed all the pieces of salmon there, side by side, waiting to be combined with their two cousins: rice and seaweed. First off, he opened up the package that contained the green wrapping, then moving on to check on the rice, making sure that just a small amount of it was sticky, considering that all of it had been contained in water, mixing in with the small pieces that rested in it. After all checks were completed, only then did the Chef move on to mixing the three together. Taking the first salmon piece, starting on the right of the pile, he held it in his left hand as he took a small lining of rice with his right, forming it into a small oval ball along the bottom of the salmon. Once it stuck in an admirable manner, he made his way towards the third addition, the wrapping and with that, a small rectangular piece of seaweed made itself around the salmon and rice, applying itself to the other end in succession and finally, in relief and happiness did Ragnarok have his first handmade sushi piece in his hand.

    "Finally! It's been a while, but I've done it. Now then, I just have to try it out and...Oh..."

    Sadly enough, Ragnarok forgot the one thing that was impertinent to all Sushi restaurants: soy sauce, both light and heavy. Well, the best he could do now was pick it up at a later time if the markets sold any or just eat it like how it was, and without it, even though it didn't have the additional flavoring as well as the wasabi, the taste of the salmon, rice, and seaweed did leave an enjoyable memory on the tongue of the Chef. With the first piece gone, and so many salmon left to evolve, Ragnarok let out a simple sigh and set out to work on the rest, knowing that even though that he didn't have any sauce to complete the entire taste, even though he clearly had too many pieces to finish on his own, he had to finish the job.

    At the end, with all Ragnarok's knowledge of Oswald's life and his hunger here, he left himself with at least twenty pieces less and everything in its completed Sushi form, leaving the rice depleted, and the seaweed all gone. The happiness for the food had left Ragnarok's heart for now, knowing that the stale taste was not enough to win his heart; however, he would one day finish the entire ensemble, and share with his companions if he ever found any. For now, off to storage the pieces went and with that, the set-up was cleaned and Ragnarok set off on another adventure, now with food at his side.

WC: 673