Chapter 986: Death Ingredient——Tiger Pufferfish

"Your cooking?"

Nakiri Erina raised her beautiful eyebrows, revealing undisguised disdain.

"Your cooking, without imitating others, tastes simply terrible. Do you intend to use that kind of cooking to embarrass yourself in front of others?"

"Although it's a bit lacking, it's not to the point of embarrassment, right——"

Broly quietly defended himself with a sentence.

"If it were an ordinary person, that would indeed not be embarrassing, but the problem is, this is a top-tier culinary academy, and you are a student here. The cooking you present here represents your own professional level.

When everyone else presents delicious cooking, you serve a plate of beginner-level cooking. If this isn't embarrassing, do you still hope to win face for yourself?"

Nakiri Erina put on a stern face and questioned.

"Uh——"

Broly could not refute, because the words of the girl before him actually had some truth to them. In the past, when he studied swordsmanship at the Sword God Style Holy Ground and the Water God Style Dojo, apprentices who came to become disciples, if they displayed clumsy swordsmanship, would indeed be mocked by those with higher swordsmanship.

"Of course, it doesn't matter if you embarrass yourself, but don't drag me, the Tenth Seat of the Totsuki Ten, and the entire Sixth Cooking Building down with you to embarrass us together."

"What do you mean by that?"

"You are currently taking remedial lessons here, counting as half a person of the Sixth Cooking Building. If the cooking you make tastes bad, it will also affect the Outside World's evaluation of me and the Sixth Cooking Building. I hope you can clearly recognize the relationship between you and me right now."

"Uh, are we in a community of fate relationship?"

"Haha, not to that extent. Excluding your kneading technique and knife skills, your other cooking abilities are unsightly. With that, you still want to have a community of fate relationship with me?

This is simply a joke. If I weren't worried I might receive negative evaluation because of you, I wouldn't say so much to this guy~"

Nakiri Erina immediately retorted, puffing up her cheeks and glaring at Broly angrily. Her words were clearly sharp and mean, but combined with her cute appearance, it gave the feeling of an unworldly small girl who got angry after being provoked.

"I'm sorry, but I don't want to use someone else's cooking to entertain people who entertain me with their own cooking. So, Miss Nakiri, that's why I want to get some advice from you."

If cooking were replaced with swordsmanship, then this behavior of mutually entertaining and tasting each other's cooking would be a kind of swordsmanship exchange behavior.

And using something he only half-understood to exchange, Broly felt it was like exchanging true heart for true heart with others, but he himself was acting fraudulently.

"Advice, what other advice can I give you? Besides your dough kneading technique and knife skills being not bad, hmm, wait——"

Speaking to this point, Nakiri Erina stopped, hand resting on her chin revealing a contemplative look. Gradually, the corners of this blonde girl's mouth curved up slightly.

【Erina-sama, did you think of some bad idea?】

At the side, Arato Hisako looked at her own Big Sister's expression. As a childhood attendant who grew up together with Nakiri Erina since childhood, her mind had this premonition the first instant.

As expected, she soon heard Nakiri Erina say: "Advice, for an all-rounder culinary genius player like me, naturally exists.

Hmm, Hisako, go, get me a few live Tiger Pufferfish."

"Ah, Erina-sama, the cooking you want to recommend Broly make, couldn't it be Pufferfish Sashimi?"

Hearing this, Arato Hisako widened her eyes and looked at her to ask.

"It's obvious. Pufferfish Sashimi is the cooking that tests knife skills the most. It's very suitable for this guy who only has achievements in knife skills to make."

Nakiri Erina nodded, directly admitting it.

"But Pufferfish Sashimi is a death cooking. Although it indeed tests knife skills, knife skills are merely one of the conditions needed to make this cooking well.

The other more important conditions are how to handle this ingredient, the pufferfish, which is full of fatal toxins. Once handled improperly, letting someone eat it, the fatal toxins carried by the pufferfish will, in a short time, make the taster directly ascend to see their great-grandmother."

Arato Hisako said worriedly. Broly, this kind of cooking beginner, one look shows he cannot possibly have handled pufferfish. Her own Big Sister recommending the other party to make this kind of Pufferfish Sashimi cooking is simply no different from harming a life.

You must know, chefs who can truly handle pufferfish all must pass certification exams before they can be certified to slaughter pufferfish. Otherwise, ordinary chefs do not have this qualification to make this kind of cooking.

"I naturally know this. So, isn't this why I'm about to teach him how to correctly handle the toxic parts on the pufferfish's body? As long as it's handled cleanly enough, there's no problem.

Just right, I can use this dangerous fatal ingredient, the pufferfish, to scare a certain hateful guy——"

【Even if you really want to scare someone, there's no need to joke with someone else's life, right?】

Arato Hisako thought in her heart.

"Rest assured. If this guy can't learn it later, I also won't force him to make this cooking."

Nakiri Erina seemed to know what her own little secretary was thinking in her heart, and spoke again to dispel Arato Hisako's worries.

"Uh, then should we switch to artificially farmed pufferfish? That one has weak toxins. Even if handled improperly and accidentally eaten, basically nothing will happen."

Arato Hisako thought for a bit and asked.

"Haha, how can artificially farmed pufferfish be scary? If we're going to use it, we must use wild, strongest-toxin Tiger Pufferfish. That kind of pufferfish also has the most firm meat and the most umami. Used for sashimi, it's absolutely a top-tier delicacy."

Nakiri Erina waved her hand, directly vetoing the proposal to switch pufferfish types.

"Go quickly. Remember to bring back a few more Tiger Pufferfish. I can't wait to teach this guy the skill of correctly handling pufferfish."

Seeing her own Big Sister's mind was made up, Arato Hisako couldn't help but sigh. After replying with a yes, she left the Cooking Room and went to the Academy Logistics Department to find Tiger Pufferfish.

Hmm, this kind of fatal cooking is not common. The Sixth Cooking Building's fresh breeding tanks also don't regularly stock this kind of toxic dangerous fish ingredient.

"Broly, have you eaten pufferfish before?"

After Arato Hisako left, Nakiri Erina directly asked Broly.

"What does that thing look like?"

Broly had eaten many things. Some he didn't know the names of, so he asked back a sentence.

"A kind of fish that, when provoked, will directly puff up its belly, puffing itself into a balloon-like shape, with some spines on its body, and carrying deadly poison."

"Uh, then I probably haven't eaten it."

Broly carefully recalled the toxic foods he had eaten before, which included Poison Dragons, Highly Toxic Swamp Frogs, Fiercely Poisonous Lizards, and other things that were either Danger Beasts or Magic Beasts. Not finding any that could match the balloon fish in the girl's mouth, he replied.

"Then you don't understand it either?"

Erina pursued the question.

"Indeed I don't understand."

Broly nodded and admitted.

"Very good."

The girl said happily.

"Hmm?"

Meeting Broly's puzzled gaze, Nakiri Erina gave a light cough and said, "Not having eaten pufferfish, and not understanding pufferfish — none of that matters, as long as you can seriously learn from me how to handle pufferfish afterwards ——————"

In less than ten minutes, Hisako Arato returned, followed by two Logistics Department staff members wearing blue work uniforms, carrying two oxygenated water tanks containing several fish that looked somewhat dull and foolish.

"This thing looks kind of dumb; eating it won't affect IQ, will it?"

At first glance, Broly subconsciously asked Nakiri Erina beside him.

"Don't judge a fish by its appearance; these guys just look a bit dull, but their temper is not dull at all."

As Nakiri Erina spoke, she put on protective gloves.

"These guys have extremely strong bite force; if you are deceived by their silly-cute appearance and put your hand in front of them, your fingers might be directly bitten off."

To prove this point, Nakiri Erina specially brought over a pair of bamboo chopsticks and placed them in front of the somewhat round-headed tiger pufferfish in the water tank to tease them.

In a few seconds, with a crack sound, the pair of bamboo chopsticks in her hand was directly bitten into two pieces.

"Look ——————"

Nakiri Erina picked up the broken chopsticks and placed them before Broly, her face showing a "See, I told you so" expression.

Although Broly didn't feel this thing could bite him, he still nodded in serious agreement with Nakiri Erina's words: "The bite force is indeed not bad."

"So, to catch this kind of fish, you need to be careful; grab from the tail, this thing has a short body and cannot turn around."

As Nakiri Erina spoke, she nimbly grabbed a tiger pufferfish by the tail and lifted it out of the water tank, and the fish she grabbed rapidly inflated.

"Of course, for the first time catching it, you can also let this thing inflate in the water first; this way its agility will decrease, and grabbing from behind will be easier.

However, remember, still do not put your hand in front of it, because an inflated pufferfish will still bite."

As Nakiri Erina explained the precautions for grabbing pufferfish, she placed the pufferfish in her hand on the cutting board.

"Pufferfish toxin is not synthesized by itself, but accumulated through the exogenous food chain.

Simply put, wild pufferfish during their growth process will consume algae, shellfish, starfish and other foods containing pufferfish toxin (TTX) from their growth environment, and after absorption through the digestive tract, accumulate these toxins in their bodies.

And there is currently no specific antidote for this toxin; once it takes effect it will rapidly cause death, however, corresponding to this death risk, this fish has an extremely delicious taste.

However, to taste this deliciousness, you must completely clean all toxic organ parts on its body.

But first, we need a sufficiently sharp short knife, to prevent cutting open some of its toxic organs while handling the pufferfish ——————"

Nakiri Erina picked up a deba knife.

"Away from water, its bite force still exists; to prevent possibly being bitten during handling, we need to cut off its mouth first, but remember, do not cut its eyes, because its eyes contain toxins ——————"

"After cutting off the mouth, start skinning; pufferfish skin is thick enough to peel easily, and generally pufferfish skin is toxic, only tiger pufferfish is one of the few species whose skin can be eaten, but it requires extensive rinsing with clear water ——————"

"The gutting step must be extremely careful; once you cut the toxic organs inside, the whole fish is ruined.

TTX toxin is very stable, heat-resistant, acid-alkali resistant; even boiled in 100℃ boiling water for several hours, it remains toxic ——————"

Nakiri Erina demonstrated the handling method, and Hisako Arato gradually took over the explanatory work, telling Broly the reasons for such handling.

"If it is a female fish, we need to remove its ovaries; this organ has the highest toxin content, especially during breeding season.

Next is the liver, the main site where toxins gather; then the spleen, and finally the blood ——————"

Nakiri Erina carefully handled the tiger pufferfish, quickly breaking down a pufferfish and placing the parts in two different basins.

"The left side is toxic parts that cannot be eaten; the right side is non-toxic or mildly toxic parts that can be eaten after processing ——————"

"Such a big fish, and only this little bit is edible?"

"Right, tiger pufferfish is still a pufferfish with relatively more edible parts, but its yield is still under 30%; this one is relatively fat, yield about 25%."

Hisako Arato said.

"Not 25%; blood is also toxic, after the edible parts are separated they still need to be rinsed under running water until all blood is washed clean, then kitchen paper used to absorb surface moisture, the weight will further decrease, finally only about 23% of the live fish weight ——————"

Nakiri Erina rinsed the fish meat while speaking.

"Then what about these?"

Broly pointed at the parts cut away, two-thirds of the fish, and asked.

"According to food safety regulations, these must be collected in leak-proof sealed bags and sent to a specialized pufferfish waste disposal institution for incineration and harmless treatment.

Hmm, even the water used to rinse blood must be collected and treated; however, the Sixth Cooking Building has a specialized sedimentation tank underneath, so this is not needed, but the cutting board and washing sink used for slaughtering must be soaked and cleaned thoroughly with soda water afterwards.

Otherwise, when handling other ingredients later, it may cause ingredient contamination, thereby leading to accidental poisoning situations.

Besides that, after cleaning all edible parts, you still need to wash hands with soapy water, wash them, then change to a new cutting board and kitchen knife ——————"

Nakiri Erina operated very professionally, and Hisako Arato also explained very professionally beside her.

"Although it is sashimi cuisine, this small section of tail meat is more suitable for making that kind of deep-fried tempura cuisine ——————"

Nakiri Erina washed her hands, changed the cutting board, changed the knife, then took the skinned tiger pufferfish with surface moisture absorbed by kitchen paper, and cut off a small section of the tail.

Then, slicing down the large meat pieces on both left and right sides, she further trimmed the large meat: "This part is called the skin-body; it has many tendons and membranes, not suitable for sashimi; of course it won't be wasted, later it will be stewed into soup together with fish bones and fish head."

Two catties of fish, only half a catty of edible parts came out; finally the head and bones went for soup, the tail small section for frying, the meat that could be made into sashimi was only a tiny bit; Broly felt he could finish it in two bites, but Nakiri Erina sliced it into thin slices and arranged a large plate.

Cut scallion segments, add half a lime, grate wasabi, pour soy sauce, arrange salt dish and orange vinegar dish; clearly just a sashimi cuisine not even half a catty of meat, yet there was a pile of dipping sauces, each able to bring a different delicious taste experience.

"How is it, the first taste experience of pufferfish cuisine?"

Nakiri Erina watched Broly finish the fish soup, then asked.

Nakiri Erina watched Broly finish the fish soup, then asked.