The Cooking Princess - Chapter 65

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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The Princess Who Cooks

 

Episode 65

 

A commotion broke out in the competition hall. The participants near Vance each fell into confusion and panic.

 

Someone threw down what they were cooking and ran toward Vance, someone called loudly for an attendant, and someone moved their cooking hands busily while looking at Vance with worried eyes.

 

Daniel, who had already anticipated this situation, focused only on his own cooking without being shaken.

 

‘The master has a habit of always drinking a glass of wine before cooking when there’s an important event.’

 

The Empress had given Daniel a poison that would take effect with a time delay.

 

‘About half a day after taking it, terrible pain that causes fainting will come.’

 

‘Is there no risk of detection?’

 

‘That’s the miraculous thing about this poison. It doesn’t threaten life except for stomach pain, can’t be detected even with examination, and what’s on the dishes disappears over time.’

 

The fact that it wouldn’t threaten life was good news for Daniel, who didn’t truly want to harm Vance.

 

Daniel had secretly applied the poison to Vance’s wine glass on the morning of the competition.

 

He knew where Vance usually kept his belongings, and it wasn’t strange for the Imperial Palace Sous Chef to check or take care of the Chef’s belongings, so no one paid attention, making it possible.

 

And now, six hours later.

 

“Urgh… Huk…”

 

“I say, are you conscious?”

 

“Chef, please come to your senses.”

 

The attendants called to Vance while shaking his body, and finally tried to make him regain consciousness by lightly slapping his cheeks.

 

But Vance ended up rolling his eyes back and fainting.

 

‘…This doesn’t feel good.’

 

Daniel shamelessly thought this while continuing his cooking.

 

After all, it wasn’t a matter of losing his life, and once he briefly fainted like that and woke up, everything would be over.

 

The attendants shook their heads looking at the unconscious Vance.

 

“He’s completely unconscious. There’s no choice.”

 

“Let’s disqualify him for now and move him to an empty rest room.”

 

Without the consent of the unconscious party, Vance was disqualified.

 

Regardless of the results of the previous two competitions, he would not receive any points.

 

***

 

And Chloe, who watched all of this, bit her lips tightly and continued cooking.

 

When Vance collapsed, she almost ran over without realizing it, but she was able to stop her steps when she saw Daniel calmly cooking.

 

‘There’s nothing I can do here.’

 

She saw the attendants quickly running over to handle the situation. She also saw Vance being disqualified.

 

‘To use such despicable methods because he lacks confidence to win fairly. And in the kitchen, no less.’

 

She couldn’t believe how someone who makes food could do such a thing.

 

‘The person who tampered with my sugar must be him too. At least he’s involved.’

 

Chloe absolutely didn’t want to lose to humans who played so dirty.

 

To do that, she had to make the best dessert here that anyone would have to acknowledge.

 

‘A refreshment that everyone from elderly to children can enjoy deliciously.’

 

It shouldn’t be too sweet or too hard, and she had to avoid flavors or ingredients that would cause strong preferences.

 

So Chloe chose the ingredient that Empire people eat the most.

 

‘Cheese.’

 

The menu Chloe decided on was cheesecake.

 

A dessert that even her parents from her previous life, who disliked overly sweet things, enjoyed, and young Chloe also ate well.

 

Her family ate their favorite cakes on birthdays (mom liked sweet potato cake, dad liked carrot cake, and Chloe liked chocolate cake), but on Christmas, they would buy a big cheesecake that everyone liked and eat it together.

 

Chloe recalled memories of year-end from her previous life and reviewed the cheesecake recipe.

 

‘Originally heavy cream goes in, but I don’t have time to make heavy cream now.’

 

Time was tight and it was too risky a challenge.

 

This was a competition with strictly defined ingredients and cooking methods. There was no need to take the risk of rashly presenting a new recipe in such a place.

 

‘I can just add some milk, butter, and sugar and mix them.’

 

Mixing cream cheese with lizard egg yolks, milk, butter, and sugar completed the cheesecake batter.

 

Though it wasn’t exactly the same texture and taste as what she ate in her previous life, it would be enough to convince the people here.

 

She put the batter that had been strained once into a mold and baked it in the oven.

 

‘Done.’

 

The fully baked cheesecake gave off a savory and delicious smell.

 

She could feel Daniel’s sharp gaze from over there, but Chloe paid no attention and tasted it.

 

‘Delicious!’

 

She could feel the rich taste of cheese as it was. The subtle sweetness that wasn’t too sweet pleasantly lingered in her mouth.

 

“The final competition is over! Everyone stop your hands and step back from the cooking stations!”

 

This time it was completed just barely. Making dessert in just one hour was really not an easy task. Even more so because she was flustered by the incident with the sugar.

 

But Chloe was confident this time too. The fact that she wasn’t someone who would crumble from this level of attack.

 

***

 

“We will present the desserts from the final competition.”

 

Attendants came into the banquet hall in a line, carrying desserts loaded on trolleys.

 

“Oh, perhaps because the theme is dessert, they’re beautiful.”

 

“They used a lot of fruit.”

 

“Hmm, that dessert looks like ground strawberries… I wonder if that will be recognized as ‘without moisture.'”

 

“Oh my, what is that?”

 

Among the desserts of various kinds and colors, there was a plate that caught people’s attention.

 

“Doesn’t it contrast too much with the other menus?”

 

“It looks rather shabby. Did they run out of time?”

 

It was Chloe’s cheesecake.

 

The shape was also a simple circle, and the color was a uniform yellow.

 

“The top part is darker in color, surely it’s not burnt?”

 

“Hmm, it just looks more baked. I don’t know how it tastes though.”

 

It was a cheesecake that was baked smoothly and well, but to people seeing it for the first time, it looked much more crude and ordinary compared to other desserts.

 

Especially since the theme was refreshments that both ‘elderly’ and ‘children’ could enjoy, participants used ingredients like fruits to create as many colorful colors as possible to catch children’s attention.

 

Compared to that, the cheesecake looked bland in color.

 

“It looks like bread baked in a circle.”

 

“Why would they present something like that in the final competition?”

 

“Obviously that will be last place in this competition.”

 

The observing nobles gossiped about the cheesecake.

 

While other beautifully decorated desserts received praise and compliments, no one had good words to say about the cheesecake.

 

The attendants presented the final dishes to the judges in order.

 

Having eaten the food of twenty participants twice.

 

The priests let out tired sighs, their stomachs full and eyes drooping from fatigue.

 

The Emperor and Empress hid their tired expressions as much as possible, but their hands reaching for food had noticeably slowed.

 

Moreover, the final competition theme was desserts that each maximized sweetness.

 

The glasses of carbonated water and teacups placed to rinse their mouths quickly emptied.

 

“This is less sweet than what we had earlier.”

 

“Ugh, this one is too sweet to eat.”

 

And as time passed, participants in later order became disadvantaged.

 

If the sweetness was less than what they had eaten before, it felt bland, but if the sweetness was excessive, it became too much stimulation for already tired tongues and instead caused discomfort.

 

‘This time that girl couldn’t do anything special either.’

 

The Empress held tea water in her stuffy mouth and hid a bitter smile with her teacup.

 

The discoloration of Chloe’s sugar and Vance’s disqualification were also reported to the Empress. Even the fact that Vance had shared sugar with Chloe.

 

Since sharing ingredients among participants wasn’t prohibited, she didn’t intervene. It was also because it didn’t matter anyway.

 

‘What could she do with half the sugar.’

 

If Vance had given all his sugar to Chloe, the story would have been different.

 

‘Anyway, he also suffered because of his greed.’

 

The Empress blamed Vance without even thinking about her own scheming.

 

Hadn’t she participated in the competition because she didn’t want to lose to Daniel, and despite feeling guilty toward Chloe, hadn’t she withheld some of the sugar due to her greed to face Daniel herself?

 

‘If only she hadn’t participated in the competition and rebelled against me in the first place. No, if she had just obeyed my words from the very beginning, this wouldn’t have happened.’

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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