Chapter 37: Coffee Connoisseur
"Boss, quickly! I am feeling super hungry right now!" Xiong Da pleaded to Jin as he placed his phone at the credit port. Once the Panda Credits were deducted from his account, Jin proceeded to bring the plates of food in front of him.
One plate of tonkatsu curry rice, one piece of onigiri and a large pizza spatula of Triple Cheese Pizza. Xiong Da could not control himself and chomped the whole piece of onigiri down his throat. "Hmm! the taste of this purple rice…from Yunnan, Mojiang? No, cannot be. I remember the Yunnan tribute rice was less tasty than this. Where is this from Boss?"
"Yunnan." Jin had a reply from Yun. It was indeed the Yunnan tribute rice and it was used to make the onigiri in order to bring out the best properties of the rice.
Its stickiness.
"Are you serious Boss? Matching the sweet rice taste with the pickled plums enhanced the umami flavour of the onigiri. I cannot imagine who your chef is but this onigiri is near perfect."
"Not perfect?" Jin furrowed his brows a little.
"Not perfect, because I only had one of it. Give me another!" Xiong Da smiled as he started eating his tonkatsu curry rice.
"Sorry, the onigiri I picked are at random. You may or may not have the same flavour again." Xiong Da was a little disappointed upon hearing the news, but in a way excited too.
"Does that mean I get to eat something new every time I order it?" Xiong Da eyes began to sparkle.
"Ehhhh, I guess so…enjoy your meal."
"Give me a cup of coffee too. Add some milk into it too." Xiong Da requested as he enjoyed every scoop of his curry rice.
"The condiments are near the coffee machine. Self service." Jin went to the coffee machine and placed the cup, which was painted with a little baby panda on it, at the machine. He pressed the one and only button on the machine and waited for the machine to do its wonders.
Though Xiong Da was eating his curry rice, he got a little suspicious with Boss Jin's coffee. "He is going to use a machine to make the coffee for him? What can be a better coffee than a self brew one?" Xiong Da shaked his thoughts off from his head. If a simple onigiri could surprise him, maybe the machine was calibrated to the strictest of standards of coffee.
There was some grinding sound coming from within the machine and later Jin was able to see the grinded beans being pressed into the french press with hot water subsequently flowing into the press. Once the machine completed the process of the french press, the coffee was dispensed into the cup.
"Your cup of coffee, I suggest you try it without any condiments, else you can add those yourself." Boss Jin presented the painted baby panda bear cup to him.
Xiong Da was still a little skeptical. He was a serious coffee connoisseur and this cup could make him be the happiest man in the world aside from being with Xing Li. Or he could be the nastiest man Boss Jin would ever meet. Maybe, he might give Boss Jin a little slack after all the things he had done and the good food he had eaten so far but he will still be nasty.
Regardless, he cleared his curry rice and quickly requested for a cup of the spring water. "Quickly Boss, or else your coffee 'might' be wasted." Xiong Da hurried him but Boss Jin did not even comply with him. Yet, Jin did not see Xiong Da this serious even in the dungeon instances and he became interested in Xiong Da's sudden change of mood.
First, Xiong Da brought up the cup to have a look. "Hmm, enamelled ceramic cup. Not bad. This cup is able to hold the heat and keep the coffee warm enough for a decent amount of time. The design also suit the subtle atmosphere here. You pass in the cup department. No wonder you took your own sweet time to get me water."
He then took a whiff of the heavy aroma from the coffee and he started to write notes in his handphone with his stylus pen. "A little floral and chocolate in it…could it be?" Xiong Da stared at Jin and immediately sipped a little of the coffee.
His look was so solemn as he continuously wrote notes down with each consecutive sip. "I really underestimate your coffee machine. I did not expect it to do better than a professional." At this point, Jin suddenly saw the two Hungry Hippos emerged from the depths of Xiong Da's cultivation.
"Ah…I guess I levelled up. Ahahha!" Xiong Da suddenly went back to his cheerful demeanor but he immediately got off the chair and gave a deep bow to Jin. "Thank you Boss for providing such excellent coffee."
"Yun, is the coffee that good?" Jin asked quietly and Yun replied. "Hmm, probably just top 10 in the world."
All of a sudden, Xiong Da started blabbering about the goodness of the coffee. "You maintained the flavour of the Black Ivory coffee really well that I really do not need to add those nonsensical condiments as you said."
"What's Black Ivory coffee?" Jin asked once more to Yun since he had to continue the act as if he knew what he was doing towards Xiong Da.
"Black Ivory coffee beans are one of the few…uniquely harvested coffee in the world. Elephants digest the best Arabica coffee beans and shit the beans out…literally. People then harvest the beans from their poo." Jin wanted to puke when he heard it but he controlled himself really well by nodding his head to Xiong Da.
"Of course, our elephants are different than the current 'best' method on earth. In fact, our elephants have to be at least Grade 2 Peak before they can ingest those beans. All of the elephants were extremely well fed, bred wildly and monitored closely."
"From the looks of the coffee and the taste of it, your Black Ivory coffee beans had a medium roast to it before being grinded so the beans will not be too overpowering while bringing its true character out. "
"Manual Grinding is recommended but it seems that your machine did a better job to have the freshly grounded coffee kind of smell. Not to mention I believe your french press had a type of cloth filter which remove the slight oiliness from the coffee making."
"The water was exactly at 93 degrees celsius, not too hot nor cold. I thought this was the only thing your machine could do right since the professionals always had a tough time gauging the temperature but it looked like I was wrong."
"How do you even know that? By the time the coffee cools to roughly 65-70 degrees celsius, you could not have known that." Jin questioned Xiong Da.
"My cultivation allowed me to not just smash monsters Boss. I modified it a little so it can feel and deduce this kind of minute details of food out." Xiong Da laughed loudly.
"This cup of coffee truly brought out the flavour of the Black Ivory Coffee. Mainly the taste of dark chocolate with hint of grass and a little spice of cinnamon and tobacco. The taste was also soft to my cultivated sensitive taste buds without it being too burnt or having too much of a bitter taste. The aftertaste was sweet and no doubt clean."
Once Xiong Da finished his assessment, he bowed towards Jin once more and continued to enjoy his coffee…and pizza.
"No doubt the Hungry Hippo." Jin was glad the coffee managed to train and stir his cultivation up to Grade 2.