"Mm... I'm not really fond of dishes with big chunks of meat," Airmid said while looking at the menu.
Rayleigh understood immediately.
The main customers of the Hostess of Fertility were adventurers.
And whether male or female, adventurers were generally bold and hearty people, so the food here was also very rough and heroic in style.
Large portions, thick cuts of meat, maximum satisfaction—that was part of the restaurant's whole business strategy.
It gave people the feeling that every Valis was well spent.
But for a reserved girl like Airmid, those dishes were a little too "manly."
"I didn't expect you to be into spicy food."
"My tolerance... isn't very high."
So she couldn't really handle spicy food, but still liked the stimulation of it.
That was probably what she meant.
Rayleigh understood and he suddenly thought of something.
"If it's hot pot, you might actually like it."
"Hm? A pot?"
The girl had heard his muttering, so Rayleigh simply explained it to her.
"It's a very popular dish from my hometown. You slice the meat into very thin rolls, then just swish them in the broth for a few seconds and you get this fresh, tender, spicy flavor... and there's also shrimp paste, tripe, and—"
Airmid listened with complete focus.
Even the catgirl beside them had the same reaction. It was as if she were actively imagining what kind of thing Rayleigh was describing.
"What's going on here?"
Suddenly, the tavern's final boss, Mama Mia, walked over.
She had probably seen that Anya still hadn't finished taking the order and got worried.
To the waitresses in this tavern, she was basically like a parent.
She looked fierce, but in reality she was very gentle.
"Mama Mia, the black-haired one is talking about food from his homeland, nya."
"Oh?" Mia looked at Rayleigh. "So it's you, boy. Is what you're talking about Far Eastern cuisine?"
Seeing that even she was interested, Rayleigh suddenly realized something and glanced around the tavern.
So business wasn't doing too well right now.
Including him, there were only three groups of customers in the whole place at the moment.
Days like that did happen sometimes.
In that case...
"It's not Far Eastern cuisine, but if you don't mind opening up your kitchen to me, I can try making it."
"You?"
Mia looked doubtful for a moment.
To the people of this world, whether male or female, young or old, knowing how to cook wasn't really anything unusual.
Cooking over fire was a basic survival skill.
Everyone had to know at least a little, because this world hadn't developed into a civilization with clear divisions like men farming and women weaving.
If adventurers couldn't cook, it was also hard for them to survive in the wild.
It was just that, for the overwhelming majority of people, what they mastered was truly only at the "barely enough to survive" level.
As for taste... one shouldn't have any good expectations.
"Fine, give it a try. I was already thinking about how to update the menu anyway. Hopefully you can give me a surprise."
Rayleigh smiled confidently.
He entered the kitchen and first began selecting the ingredients needed to make a hot pot base.
The most important thing was beef tallow.
Rayleigh went through every chili pepper in the kitchen, then selected four kinds whose aroma and flavor were suitable, and tossed them all into a pot.
To save time, he used Kidō to speed up the rendering of the tallow.
Watching him throw around the kitchen's spices as if they were free, Mia's blood pressure immediately began to rise.
"Hey! Do you actually know how to cook, brat?! If you waste all these ingredients of mine and the result turns out to be garbage, I'm not going to let you off lightly!"
Rayleigh laughed dryly, but didn't argue.
At one point in time, the process of making hot pot base had once pulled in an absurd amount of viewership precisely because the process itself was so eye-catching.
With the help of various "magic," the tallow base that should originally have taken a long time to make was finished by Rayleigh in just twenty minutes.
During that time, he used ice-type Kidō to freeze the fresh meat, making Mia's teeth itch in irritation once again.
After the base was ready, he showed off almost unbelievable knife skills.
Seeing how the frozen meat became easier to cut, and how it could be sliced into beautiful thin meat rolls, Mia finally realized that the brat in front of her actually did have some real skill.
In less than forty minutes total, Rayleigh had already finished all the preparation work.
The stove and charcoal were already available in the kitchen.
But then the biggest problem appeared.
There was no pot.
The shop didn't have a single pot suited for hot pot.
But that was no problem for Rayleigh. In just two minutes, a lump of copper ore was hammered by him into a copper hot pot, all impurities removed as well.
That was something only a smith who had acquired the Development Ability: Blacksmith could do.
"L-looks amazing, nya!" Anya saw the table covered with dish after dish of prepared ingredients.
Since it was her first time seeing such a setup, her tail wagged non-stop with excitement.
"D-did Rayleigh-san really make all of this?" Airmid found it hard to believe.
In such a short time, he had actually prepared so many different steps.
That was simply too amazing.
Looking at the red broth bubbling in the copper pot, everyone present unconsciously began producing a great deal of saliva.
"Uwaa... it's practically like lava..." Anya looked at the red soup in the pot with some fear.
At that moment, Rayleigh brought out the dipping sauce he had mixed.
Using a fork, he picked up a slice of rolled meat and lowered it into the pot, waiting about five seconds.
When he lifted the fork again, the meat roll had unfurled, and the grain made by the fat was clearly visible.
"Wah!" The catgirl let out a sound of amazement.
Rayleigh dipped the meat once into the sauce, then put it into his mouth.
The people around him were immediately stirred by the expression on his face, unable to suppress their curiosity any longer.
Airmid, Anya, and Mia all copied what he did.
They swished the meat a few times in the "lava," dipped it once into the sauce, then nervously tasted it.
After chewing just twice, the three of them instantly showed delighted expressions.
Airmid covered her mouth a little as she chewed, her eyes widening.
Spiciness! Fragrance! And many layered flavors on top of that! And this meat—so soft, so tender!
"Delicious, nya! Too delicious, nya!" The catgirl had already completely lost control and turned into a machine that could only say "delicious."
After the initial surprise, Mia began trying the other ingredients.
Then she discovered that every single one of them was delicious!
"Hey! Boy! You've really got skill. This is called hot pot, right? I've seen a lot in my life, but this is the first time I've ever eaten a dish like this."
Rayleigh smiled.
Seeing the food of his homeland be recognized made him very happy.
"The base I made in the kitchen just now should still be enough for around twenty more uses. Since I used your ingredients, it all belongs to you."
Mia froze for a moment, then burst out laughing.
One huge smack after another landed on Rayleigh's back.
Cough, cough—
!!!
The slap of a Level 6 powerhouse is sooo heavy!
Even Airmid's usually cool-looking face had turned red from the hot pot.
Seeing how much she liked it, a thought suddenly appeared in Rayleigh's mind.
'Could it be that beneath this ice-beauty exterior... there was actually a hidden fiery side?'
The aroma of the hot pot drifted out into the street.
It even spread more than a 500 meters away, drawing adventurers on the road over one after another.
Before long, the tavern, which had originally had poor business, became so crowded it looked like it was about to burst open, with the line stretching all the way to the end of the street.
Looking at the scene, Rayleigh almost felt as if he had returned to his previous world.