Upstart Pastry Chef - Chapter 101

Chapter 101: The Magic Sweet Made with Durian

Shopping was finished. Our spoils consisted of various items besides the durian and the fruit resembling strawberries.

And so, we ended up at the edge of town, rather than at Duke Lenaril’s detached villa.

It was to make a sweet using durian.

The reason for not using the kitchen was that if I were to prepare a durian inside, the smell would seep into it for several days; in the first place, the odor would leak out of the kitchen and trigger a major disaster.

I could hardly prepare such a thing in someone else's residence.

Fortunately, using my earth magic, I can manipulate stone and soil to fashion impromptu cooking tools, and I won't be making anything overly elaborate this time anyway.

With the ingredients in my pouch and those just acquired during shopping, a splendid sweet can be made.

"Now then, I'm raring to go."

Durian—the smelliest fruit in the world, yet loved so deeply at the same time that it is hailed as the King of Fruits.

Speaking of its tremendous smell, it is banned from being brought onto airplanes and subways; in fact, even entering a hotel within two hours of eating it is forbidden.

Yet, a deliciousness that makes it worth enduring such a stench exists all the same.

If so, a pastry chef's job is to erase that smell and leave only the supreme flavor. Techniques for that purpose exist as well.

"Kurt-sama, are you really, really going to turn a thing like this into a sweet?"

Keeping a subtle distance from me, Tina asked while teary-eyed.

Her fox ears drooped, and the fur on her tail had shriveled up. That is Tina's gesture when she is genuinely terrified.

"It's alright. Once the sweet is complete, the smell will be gone."

Tina remained teary-eyed.

I've started to feel a bit sorry for her, but having spent a lot of money to buy it, it would be a waste not to turn it into a sweet.

"Kurt, if that's a lie, I'll be angry. Or rather, if that villainous smell remains, neither Tina nor I will eat it, and anyone you give it to will hate it."

"Of course. Look forward to the magic of a pastry chef."

First, I peeled off the dirt cover I made with magic to keep the smell from leaking out.

The smell began to seep out. Tina backed away at incredible speed.

Hahaha, how hasty. The main event is just beginning.

I put on leather gloves.

Sensory touch in the fingertips is vital for a pastry chef doing delicate work, and I feel a resistance toward wearing something that dulls that sensation; however, if I touch the inside of a durian with bare hands, that smell will ruthlessly soak in to the end. That, I want to avoid.

"Tina, Chloe, should I give you a warning? I'm going to split this fruit now. When I split this fruit, it will be ten times smellier than before."

Durian is smelly even in its current state. But splitting the meat is the real deal. While protected by the outer skin, the smell is suppressed to about one-tenth.

The warning has been given, so let's split it right away.

Placing it on the cutting board made of earth magic, I cut it with a clack of my knife.

Being able to slice through a five-kilogram class durian with a knife is a technique possible precisely because I possess the sword skill.

An explosive stench spread outward.

"Kyuuuuh!"

Tina let out a cute squeak and fainted. Pinching her nose, Chloe caught her.

It seems to have easily surpassed the limit of Tina, a fox beast-person sensitive to smells.

Chloe was teary-eyed as well.

Truth be told, it's tough on me too. Extremely tough.

After all, there are three main aroma components in durian.

Hydrogen sulfide... said to smell like rotten eggs or raw garbage.

Methanethiol... the distinct odor of utility gas.

Dimethyl sulfide... a fishy, ocean-like smell.

If you smoke rotten, ocean-smelling raw eggs over utility gas and make that scent more than ten times stronger, it becomes the scent of durian.

Whoever first thought of eating this was definitely out of their mind.

"Chloe, plenty of water in this bucket."

"Nn. Got it."

Because Chloe was pinching her nose, her answer came back muffled.

Now then, the main event starts here.

Splitting it cleanly in two, inside lay the seeds and the lump of yellow pulp covering them, set within a white frame.

Taking out the yellow flesh, I removed the large seeds.

Then, putting the yellow pulp into a bowl, I mashed it into a paste.

The texture was that of the finest custard cream. No custard cream made by any famous pastry chef could ever be this smooth. Durian pulp is the world's best cream.

Now, I'll begin erasing the smell.

In the bucket Chloe prepared, the spiky outer rind has been submerged.

The spiky outer rind contains components that eliminate the smell of durian. Washing your hands in water infused with this skin removes the soaked-in odor.

I mixed that water into the durian paste.

Furthermore, plenty of lemon juice, and two types of spices were added. For the spices, I selected ones close to cardamom and turmeric.

Adding fruit liquor and heavy cream as well, I kneaded it together.

Even so, the smell doesn't vanish at this level.

The finishing touch. I shaped the paste—kneaded with liquor, fruit, and spices—into oval patties.

Using thinly stretched bread dough made in parallel, I wrapped the oval durian paste patties.

With this, the prep work was done.

"Chloe, sorry, but could you wake Tina up?"

"...The moment she wakes up, I think she'll faint again."

"Let's put cloth in her nose and wake her."

"Kurt, you really turn into a demon when it comes to sweets, don't you?"

Muttering as if exasperated, Chloe pulled a piece of cloth from her bag, tore it, wetted it, stuffed it into Tina's nose, and patted Tina's cheeks tap-tap.

Tina began to breathe heavily and suddenly woke up.

"Hauh! Where is this?! If I recall, a demon... a demon..."

It seems her memory is slightly hazy.

"Tina, Kurt is calling you. He says he wants you to help make sweets."

"Is that so?! I have to hurry. It's a little hard to breathe. What is this?! Something weird is stuffed in my nose, missing... I'll take it out."

Tina reached her hand toward the nose plugs, but Chloe stopped that hand.

"If you don't want to die, you'd better stop. Guh-haf!"

Chloe collapsed. Trying in a hurry to stop Tina, she let go of the hand pinching her nose and took a direct hit.

Chloe is surprisingly a good person, and occasionally disregards her own safety.

"Chloe!"

"Don't mind me, hurry. Please, if I endure this much and don't get to eat delicious sweets... about Kurt..."

Finally, Chloe fainted as well.

While not as sensitive as a fox beast-person, an elf's five senses are sharper than a human's too.

Tina gently laid Chloe down.

And then, she seemed to finally recall the present situation.

"...Kurt-sama, what should I do?"

"Could you warm up this stone pot?"

With grim determination, Tina came over.

Thanks to the wet cloth guard, she barely managed to maintain her sanity, but even so, it must still be smelly.

"The inside of the pot is filled with plenty of oil, isn't it?"

"Yeah, this sweet is a deep-fried sweet."

The conclusion arrived at to eat durian deliciously was a deep-fried sweet.

"Kurt-sama, the oil has warmed up nicely."

"No, not yet. Raise the heat a bit more."

"Understood. Ei!"

Still not enough. To make it delicious, it is cooked in an instant at an ultra-high temperature.

For that purpose, the dough wrapping the filling has been made extremely thin.

"Alright, now's the time. Tina, watch closely. The magic starts here."

I dropped the durian paste wrapped in bread dough into the oil-filled pot.

The bread dough puffed up, turning a golden fox-brown.

"That's strange. The terrible smell is vanishing more and more, and instead, a sweet, warm, lovely scent..."

Tina timidly removed the cloth stuffed in her nose.

And then, her nose twitched as she sniffed.

"This is the magic of a pastry chef."

"It's amazing. Somehow, it feels as if I'm wrapped in the sunshine."

"This scent is a first for Tina, right? That's right, to express this scent, it's called the fragrance of the southern tropics."

If Tina, who is sensitive to odors, says it's a good scent, then this dish is a success.

Merely baking it won't do any good, but at ultra-high temperatures, the scent of the durian can be transformed.

The ingredients mixed into the durian paste each have a purpose. The spices neutralize the odor, the heavy cream wraps the durian's smelly components in a layer of fat, and the lemon juice adds body to the thoroughly suppressed scent.

After going this far, it can finally be called a good fragrance.

And this cooking method is not only a smell-remover, but also the way to eat durian at its most delicious.

In reality, durian is not very sweet even if eaten raw. Heating it activates its sweetness.

Adding sugar or the like destroys the elegant sweetness unique to durian, so I chose this method of bringing out the sweetness through heat.

This sweet was made by referencing desserts from a high-class hotel in Hong Kong.

Around the time before I was reborn, an unprecedented durian boom arrived in Hong Kong, giving birth to countless durian sweets. Durian pie and lau lin sou would be representative examples.

Once, while traveling to research and eat durian sweets around Hong Kong, the easiest to eat was the fried sweet.

The sweet improved from that fried sweet is this one.

While suppressing the smell of the durian, it is a work of confidence that preserves the texture of the pulp—called the supreme cream—and the elegant sweetness that are the characteristics of durian.

"What kind of sweet is this sweet called?"

"Durian Doughnut."

"What a cute name."

"Doughnuts are delicious. I think Tina will like them, too. Next time, I'll make you doughnuts without durian."

"I'll look forward to it. But before that..."

Tina glided her eyes back and forth, looking at the Durian Doughnuts finished frying and set on the plate.

"Shall we do a taste test? Go wake Chloe up."

"Yes!"

Now then, the smell has been solved, but how about the taste?

It should be finished deliciously.

If it failed, I would cry. Tina and Chloe were having a hard time, but naturally, it was tough on me who was doing the cooking as well.

If a sweet that required this much hardship ended up a failure, all I could do was laugh.

I'll throw away the leather gloves used today. They're no longer usable.

Now then, shall we try eating the Durian Doughnuts, made so deliciously after all that trouble?