Ch25.1 - The Biggest Winner (Part One)

Who has not heard of previous delegation teams that want to eat luxurious food, or delegation teams that want to eat seafood—but who on earth has heard of a team that wants to eat from a school canteen?!

Even though President Cui knew how famous the first canteen was, he still found it difficult to understand. He finally knew why the secretary’s expression seemed so complicated when he came in, “Then… go arrange it?”

The secretary’s face grimaced and he said, “There is a problem. They specifically mentioned eating at the first canteen, and while we can seat them at the top, should we serve the dishes? The staff from the City Investment Promotion Bureau weren’t very clear in their instructions—all they said was to prepare classic dishes from the first canteen… but those are dishes cooked in massive proportions…”

“Our chefs don’t have experience working in restaurants and preparing meals fit for just a few people. At most, we should use a stir-fry cook. Do you think you can talk to Boss Cui about asking a stir-fry cook to help out?” 

President Cui: “……”

The President’s secretary thought it would be too much to ask Cui QiChao to personally cook the dishes, and he dared not even think about it. He could only scheme to get a cook to stir-fry dishes on the spot for them.

President Cui also knew the secretary was worried about Cui QiChao’s reaction. Who doesn’t yet know that the boss of the first canteen is extremely domineering in the school? He planted and sowed crops wherever he wanted and never gave anybody face…

“I’ll talk to QiChao about it. We will need his support for this matter.” The relationship between the school and municipal government still needed to be taken into account. At his age, President Cui knew how to be considerate of others—even if he didn’t particularly care for the feelings of the delegation team, he should take care of the fellows from the City Investment Promotion Bureau.

While it wasn’t easy to hold a reception, it wasn’t like they were going against the law nor doing obscene things, so it wouldn’t be too much of a problem for them to find a stir-fry cook to help them out, right?

Cui QiChao was in the middle of combing XiaoBai’s hair by the time President Cui went to find him. Recently, the animal hospital recommended a massage comb for cats, which was said to be highly acclaimed.

XiaoBai lay paralyzed on the table, allowing Cui QiChao to turn it over like a cat cake. It had no resistance to his actions at all.

President Cui looked at him for a long time and thought that his nephew really possessed a heart of gold. Then he told Cui QiChao what he came for. 

While Cui QiChao could be rude to others, he still gave President Cui some face. After all, it was President Cui who gave him the authority to grow vegetable fields on campus.

But after hearing what President Cui had to say, he said, “Uncle, didn’t they say they wanted to try food renowned locally?”

President Cui: “Ah, yes.”

We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.

Cui QiChao: “I’m fine with having a reception, but the unique characteristic of our place is food cooked in bulk. If the food was stir-fried upon request, wouldn’t we disrespect their wishes?” 

Ugfrlvfca Jel: “……”

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“For the dishes, I think we can serve them according to how many people they have on that day. Isn’t that one of the characteristics of the first canteen?” Cui QiChao remarked mildly. “But since it’s you asking me, Uncle, I could also provide you with a very special treatment.”

President Cui couldn’t help but become curious. He knew Cui QiChao also planted ginseng in the back hill, and while he also knew it wouldn’t be able to ripen that fast, he wanted to know what other special ingredients Cui QiChao had that could raise the level of his dishes in an instant. 

Cui QiChao said, “I can kill a duck.”

President Cui: “……”

President Cui only had to circle the school once to know how rare a duck was by how many students stared at it. The number of duck eggs provided everyday was limited, and only the lucky ones could eat them—and that wasn’t even mentioning the duck meat.

The fact that Cui QiChao was willing to kill a duck showed that he truly gave face to President Cui. It was as if it was a New Year’s celebration for President Cui. 

When people from the City Investment Promotion Bureau listened to the school’s replies, they couldn’t respond for a long time from disbelief. After negotiating, and after a special discussion when they were having a meeting, they finally decided to bow to CU’s plans.

With great difficulty, the school had finally managed to win over this wave of investors. The inspection tour was very important, and the Bureau also attached great importance to it. If the tour was successfully completed, not only would they complete the goals they set for this year, they would easily blow past them. So, President Cui racked his brains thinking about the reception. Who knows what the people from the delegation team would suggest they eat at the canteen.

After the group of people deliberated about it for a long time, they thought that, perhaps, those people wanted to return to enjoy the basic food.

On the day of the delegation’s arrival, the group of staff responsible for the reception took them to the canteen. At this time, the students were still having dinner. The delegation group were brought up the stairs next to them—yes, there was only one elevator in the canteen—to the top floor and entered a room. 

No one was waiting there for them, not even a server. They heard footsteps and saw several aunties from the first floor carrying in trays laden with dishes. They placed them in a neat row on the table and, before they left, turned to tell the group, “Ah, Boss Cui said that if you don’t have enough to eat, just shout out for us and we’ll come give you more.”

The roomful of people: “……”

After the aunties responsible for scooping dishes left, one of the investors raised their cups, “Hehe, the dishes are very basic, very good.”

“Yes, yes, filled with sincerity and warmth! For the sake of all of you, we specially prepared a dish cooked by the first canteen, which is this flavorful duck dish. The ducks were personally raised by us.” Wang Jing, who was in charge of receiving the guests from the City Investment Promotion Bureau, wiped his sweat off his face and tried his best to boast about the duck meat, as if he was describing abalone. He still couldn’t help but feel embarrassed to say that this duck was specially killed by the first canteen. 

While he knew that CU’s canteens have become very famous, in his mind, no matter how delicious it was, in the end it was still only food prepared by a canteen. He felt their standard of food would be different from the investors, but reasoned that the investors might have gotten tired of eating gourmet food all the time and wanted to have simple, local dishes now.

“Oh?” The investor nodded and their face was full of smiles, “This dish is truly hard to come by. I’ve heard about the CU’s canteen food for a long time. My son told me that he wanted to take the CU university entrance examination (everyone suddenly understood why he specifically mentioned that he wanted to eat in CU’s canteen), but most of what I have heard about is how CU grew their own vegetables, and raised their own ducks. I’m still ignorant of their taste. Come, let’s eat!”

The investor was the first to pick up some food with his chopsticks, and other people subsequently began to follow suit. And because Wang Jing just boasted that the duck dish was a dish specially made for them, everyone went to get some duck.

Within the duck dish, a lot of ingredients have been added to it, such as star anise, garlic, ginger, and dried chili pepper, which is essentially the famed dried CX-7. The large plate of duck was fried with soy sauce, mixed with the red dried chili pepper and the yellow ginger. 

To be honest, just based on its appearance, the dish looked rather ordinary. The first canteen did not specially plate it or garnish it—there was absolutely no décor at all. This was in stark contrast to the high-end restaurants, where the tableware was pure gold, and each dish was beautifully cooked.

But once the duck meat entered their mouths, they could taste the difference immediately. There was no fishy smell of the duck meat, but it was stir-fried until it was very fragrant. The meat was deliciously fat, and even the skin of the meat was cooked with the right amount of heat. It had the right softness, was not chewy to the extent where one would not be able to bite through the meat and the meat itself was slightly dry but not too tough, and it was pleasantly oily.

The amount of dried chili peppers inside the dish had allowed it to reach the perfect spiciness. When the taste was mixed with the fresh flavor of duck meat, it allowed one’s taste buds to be stimulated, causing one to salivate.

The investor grabbed the duck wing with their chopstick. The meat that was wrapped around the bones tasted even more delicious. After taking a few bites of the meat, he even gnawed on the tendons of the meat, which tasted very crispy. The skin of the meat was smooth, tender and fragrant. It was much more seasoned than the meat, and the taste of it would satiate one’s appetite. Eating the duck meat caused one to crave rice. 

The investor usually didn’t have a large appetite, but now he couldn’t help but to fill up his bowls with rice and pour a little meat juice on it. This way, the rice would be extremely fragrant.

For the first three minutes, surprisingly, no one spoke. Everyone was too focused on chewing the duck meat.

The investor took a short time out and sighed with emotion: “It seems that I haven’t had such a good meal for a long time. Is this chili pepper the famous one? It’s very suitable to be stir-fried together with duck.”

Though there was nothing fancy about this dish, just a plate of stir-fried flavorful duck, the moment it touched his tongue, which was used to tasting the most fancy dishes, it was like it revived his bored taste buds. There was a feeling of admiration for a delicious dish that finally surfaced in his heart once again. 

“Yes, it’s called CX-7 because it’s bred in CU, and it’s already in the process of obtaining a patent. It’s still a new breed that hasn’t been listed. This ginger is also self-grown—every ingredient in these dishes is kept at its original taste.” Wang Jing knew they were interested in the first canteen and made sure to specially prepare a speech for this meeting.

Despite his prior thoughts, he felt like he had been slapped in the face. Now he himself became fascinated by the first canteen’s dishes. After a few minutes, there was only half of the duck remaining, so Wang Jing took the initiative to stand up and say, “I’ll ask the canteen to serve another plate of duck for us.”

“Oh, good, good!” No one would disagree.

He went out and called the auntie, asking them to serve another plate of duck. He specifically requested for the ducks that the canteen raised themselves, and not the one bought in the market. 

“What? Our Boss Cui said to only kill one duck. There’s no more.” The auntie said.

Wang Jing: “…..But, we don’t have enough duck meat here.”

Aunt: “But we have no solutions to that. Besides, the ducks all went out now. They’ve gone to the pond to take a dip. We wouldn’t be able to catch them if we tried.”

Wang Jing: “……” 

Wang Jing knew who the boss here was. Yet, he had no alternatives since he already promised the investors. He gritted his teeth and said, “Then ordinary ducks would do.”

After returning, everyone was already tasting other dishes, and he felt too embarrassed to say that he had been flatly rejected.

Because the investors also mentioned wanting to eat vegetables, the vegetable dishes were also served. Before, they were all focused on the duck meat, but now they were eating the vegetables. There was mashed garlic and spinach, preserved bean curd and water spinach, leeks and eggs and so on. The main raw materials were all self-planted by the first canteen.

In addition to oil and salt, the spinach dish only contained minced garlic, and yet the taste was very delicious. The fresh spinach leaves were very fragrant and smooth, and it seemed like the vegetables would slip into their mouths and snap after a few bites. It tasted sweet and crisp. 

None of them had any idea how the first canteen managed to grow their vegetables like this—it didn’t smell earthy at all, and it was neither dry nor astringent. From the stem to the leaf of the spinach, it was tender and sweet. They also added some garlic and salt and stir-fried it quickly. With a glance, one would be able to tell that it had taken no more than ten minutes to cook this dish, but the raw ingredients tasted so good that the simple cooking method only highlighted the tastiness. This was simply because the advantages of the ingredients had been magnified ten times, and the disadvantages have all been removed from the finished product.

Nowadays, green vegetables have become a trendy thing, however, when you compare normal vegetables with this spinach dish, they become less of vegetables and more just like plain grass. Almost everyone who ate the self-grown vegetables from the first canteen could vouch for them—those vegetables really toppled their initial opinions and were simply too delicious to go back from.

Wang Jing pretended to know the inner workings of the first canteen’s harvesting and introduced the dishes while eating. “These were all planted in the hill at the back of the school, using a very scientific planting method—we even test the relative humidity everyday…”

Everyone felt very impressed listening to Wang Jing’s spiel and felt that it really wasn’t a mistake to have their meal here. 

The investors couldn’t help themselves and said, “Would the first canteen’s boss ever have the intention to open a restaurant? I heard that he usually does not serve people who are not part of the university, and these dishes are all only sold for three to five yuan—would he not feel that it’s not worth doing this business?”

Wang Jing thought balefully to himself. The boss here wouldn’t even let us kill two ducks, don’t even mention outside guests. He mustered up a smile and said, “I know a bit about his situation. Mr. Cui, the boss, is the nephew of CU’s President Cui. The President’s full name is Cui JieQing.”

The investors suddenly realized that President Cui’s family are all incredibly capable people. His brother was also a businessman, and although the investor has yet to come into contact with President Cui’s brother, he still knew of him. With all this, the attitude of the boss here wouldn’t be strange if he was a child of that Cui family.

He pondered for a moment, and said: “Then we should cherish this meal more. We might never be able to taste it again in the future.” 

In his own formed conclusion, this type of business was probably only the young Mr. Cui’s hobby, so he naturally wouldn’t care about the profits that could be made, or about opening it up to the business world. In addition, it also wasn’t known when he would leave after he had enough fun.

He originally wanted to call the boss to talk about subsidizing the opening of a restaurant, but now he knew better than to try. It wasn’t appropriate to call Cui QiChao over to thank him for the meal, because it would make it seem as if he had been asking Cui QiChao to personally serve him.

After thinking it over again more thoroughly, the investor decided to go and ask a middleman to introduce him to Cui QiChao’s parents; he could use this incident to pull their ties closer together. After all, if they were friends, it wouldn’t matter if Cui QiChao didn’t open his canteen to outsiders, he would probably open it to family friends, right?

For the first time, the investor used all his scheming on food as he happily rubbed his stomach and continued to eat. 

Ch25.2 - The Biggest Winner (Part Two)

All the investors drank little alcohol after the meal, but they ate a lot, and everyone had a round stomach. They nearly forgot that if they wanted to live a healthy lifestyle, they shouldn’t overeat.

There was nothing left on the platter. Only the second platter of ducks remained. Everyone agreed that while this meal tasted delicious, because they had all eaten the pearl dish first, the second plate of duck dish tasted inferior in comparison.

Looking at the aftermath of the dishes, the investor couldn’t help taking out his mobile phone to photograph a photo and share it in his WeChat moments.

[The price of this meal would be beyond your imagination. The host and the guest are happy, and the plates are all swept clean.] 

Wang Jing was immensely pleased. Even if this investor did not post it on his WeChat moments, everyone had verified with their gestures that they were quite impressed with the reception dinner.

This meal was the most cost-effective reception meal since Wang Jing’s employment as a staff in charge of receiving guests!

This investor was also a relatively well-known Chinese businessman. On WeChat, he had a lot of friends so normally everyone liked his post. They asked where this place was in the comments, and some gave some intriguing guesses. Some people guessed the cost of the dishes. As the number of comments grew, so did the price they estimated. And some were speculating as to which restaurant it was. As the number of comments increased, so did the quality of the restaurant they guessed. Although there were all sorts of comments, the comment section was merely lacking in a comment that said he went to eat dragon meat.

It was estimated that someone took a screenshot of his post to discuss it with their friends. As the screenshot spread, it soon spread to the public network.

[A nouveau riche shared this picture of a meal they had in their Moments. How much do you think a meal of “unimaginable price”, as he dubbed it, cost?]

The comments below his post weren’t cropped out. The price mentioned in the comment section was very high. The investor even responded, “the price difference is as far apart as your answer.” This prompted several netizens to exclaim, “Poverty restricts my imagination!”

[My mother, what exactly did you eat? Even 200000 is a long way off?]

[They’re exaggerating way too much. This is definitely not food……] 

[I have a question. What’s the most expensive dish? The tablecloth used in the restaurant is so ugly. It’s the same design as the tablecloth in my grandmother’s house.]

We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.

[Is this the time to focus on the tablecloth? Although this tablecloth looked like the one in your grandmother’s home, maybe it’s a high-grade customization!]

[There’s one thing I’m afraid of. The rich are also people with status. If they even clean their plates after having a meal here, one can tell that the meal would be so expensive that even he cherishes it.]

[This is a reasonable explanation. But this made me more curious. Exactly how much did it cost?!] 

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Right now, public opinion was about to explode. 

If you spend your own money to eat, no matter how expensive it was, it was also your money. Everyone might just join in in discussing, sighing about the life of local tyrants.

However, if that was the City Investment Promotion Bureau’s welcoming meal, the connotation of this article would be completely different. How could they have used public funds to cater for such an expensive welcome meal? How much did the banquet cost to impress the local tyrants? What sort of cuisine did they offer? There wouldn’t be any national first-class protected animals served, would there?

Everyone started looking for hints. They dug up Wang Jing’s name and vehemently condemned him. They also used the whistleblower phone line to request that the appropriate authorities conduct a comprehensive investigation to correct the adverse atmosphere of the Nanhai City Investment Promotion Bureau.

[Don’t try to fool us all. For each day the truth is not revealed, we’ll pay attention to it for each day! So many eyes are staring at this matter!] 

Fortunately, the results of the investigation came out very quickly.

When Wang Jing found out, he spilled the tea all over the place and went in search of witnesses and tangible proof.

This incident had a devastating effect. This topic received a lot of attention online, and his superiors didn’t dare to ignore it. They posted the investigative procedure on their official Weibo after rigorous examination.

[Following an inquiry into the event reported by netizens, the delegation group dined on the fifth floor of Cx University‘s first canteen in Nanhai City. There were seven diners, and 10 meals were provided, including spinach and mashed garlic (cooked in bulk), water spinach and fermented bean curd (cooked in bulk), two plates of delicious duck (stir-fried upon request), leek with eggs (cooked in bulk), and so on. The lunch cost a total of 271 yuan, which was paid for by the Nanhai City Investment Promotion Bureau.] 

On the back, they attached the photos of the room, the photos of the investors dining, and the price of the dishes in CU’s canteen, as evidence.

There was also a note from Wang Jing attached, thanking everyone for supervising his work. Although the banquet was proposed by the investors and arranged by them, the meals were absolutely not extravagant in ordinary times and so on.

As soon as the truth was revealed, all the netizens were stunned.

It’s a mountain of hard evidence. They absolutely did not try to muddle over this issue. It was impossible for everyone to believe it. 

[…I’m speechless. Was 271 and 200000 far apart? It’s absolutely extremely far apart!]

[If I was the one who had a high net worth and had a meal of about 200 yuan for a reception meal, I would also have shared it in my Moments.]

[I have misunderstood, misunderstood (= = | I) I apologize for what I said before! Oh, my God, I feel so embarrassed now and I hope I did not affect their daily work……]

[I apologize, I apologize, and I would even post this several times. But I’m really speechless. I really……made a mistake……] 

[My heart can’t seem to calm down. No wonder I said the tablecloth looked like my grandmother’s. Now it seems that it may be the same design.]

[271 yuan for seven diners? It’s less than 40 yuan per person, right? Looking at my 5000 yuan monthly salary and 68 yuan takeout, I fell into a deep thought.]

[……Am I swelling with pride? The meal I had was more expensive than a local tyrant’s meal.]

[orz, didn’t you guys read into the details of the post? This meal was specifically requested by the tyrant. Exactly how delicious would the food of CU’s canteen be?] 

[The funniest thing is that when the local tyrant visited CU, the last nine dishes served were all dishes cooked in a big pot. There’s only one dish that’s stir-fried on request, so the bill was very cheap. ROFL]

[CU’s canteen is probably poisonous. How could they make that investor be so crazy over them? I would never say that CU was marketing CU’s canteen. I thought it was a conspiracy of the CU admissions office previously, but given their enrollment funds, they should not be able to attract the local tyrant to promote the canteen for them.]

[Er, now that I reinterpreted the implication behind the local tyrant’s words, should it be: such delicious food is only over 200 yuan, you can never imagine this, right?]

There was no * *, no costly meals. On the contrary, they only had a simple meal. Everything was a big misunderstanding. 

After everyone recovered from their shock, the focus shifted to the food. In fact, in the beginning, people had also paid attention to where exactly they were eating.

Now, everyone knew that they were eating at CU’s canteen.

Previously when everyone was discussing what they ate in Nanhai City, everyone didn’t think about it. Now they came to a realization: fuck, it’s CU again, it’s CU’s first canteen again!

Was the evil wind blowing from the students to the netizens and the local tyrants? They went all the way to Nanhai to review the city and took the initiative to mention that they wanted the meal to be hosted in the first canteen! And the food they ate was still dishes cooked in bulk! 

When the first canteen was previously trending crazily, a small number of people said that no matter how delicious the food was, it was because the contrast in taste between what the students ate previously, and what they ate now was very big. The students also probably didn’t eat anything delicious before.

Now in front of the empty plates that the investors were sharing, who could say this in their faces? Would the investors not have eaten anything good?

[?? My alma mater was suddenly cued. It seemed that I saw a local tyrant showing off that day, but I didn’t recognize that he was eating there at that time.]

[I’m shocked!! I mentioned that these dishes look so familiar. That day I also ate spinach and mashed garlic in the first canteen! What should I do? Now I suddenly feel that my net worth has doubled!] 

[So I’m also a person who’s had shared a pot of food with the local tyrant. Basically, we had lunch together! Hehe!]

[What! The ducky that was missing was eaten by the local tyrant?!!]

[I’m filled with regret. I missed the golden opportunity, that day I went to the third canteen to eat.]

All kinds of replies by the CU students were shared by the netizens, and the netizens almost died laughing from their ridiculous remarks. 

In addition, the reversal of this “disaster” was reported in the local press. CU’s canteens had made a great first impression. Along with the 271 yuan issue, it had become a meme that had been circulating all year. Everyone was roasting everyone else.

[Who said that the food in the first canteen was not good enough, and that no matter how delicious it was, it wouldn’t be up to standard?]

[After my salary increase, should I also consider eating a celebratory meal that does not exceed 271 yuan?]

. 

[This vigorous online anti-corruption campaign that happened at the end of the year ended with a face slap, and CU’s first canteen may become the biggest winner of them all.]