Chapter 103
Ch 103 -- 100% Wyvern Meat Hamburger
Since we were leaving this city the next day I wanted to prepare a lot of assorted dishes for the trip . I borrowed the inn's courtyard again to carry out all the cooking I'd need to do . What to cook though?
Well, I knew deep-fried food was a sure thing for my two companions (and me too of course) so kaarage it was . I started with Red Serpent, Black Serpent, Rockbird and Giant Dodo each with salt and soy sauce marinades . Pork cutlets and the ever-popular cheese IN chicken cutlets were next up . I dug out the remaining ground-up meat from my Item Box and made mincemeat cutlets before deep-frying them too . I experimented by making some mincemeat cutlets with cheese IN since Sui liked cheese . What next? Hamburger? But I had just used up all the ground meat . . . ah well, I can make more . I fed Orc General meat and Bloody Horn Bull meat into the mincer and started turning the handle round and round . Eventually my arm hurt but I had a large amount of minced meat ready to use .
"Is this enough?" I shrugged . "Fu ~ I'm tired . It'll do for now . " What next? Remembering the taste of the Wyvern meat from yesterday I thought that cooking it shabu-shabu or sukiyaki hotpot style, thinly-sliced and boiled quickly in soup then dunked in sauce might work . The thick steaks of seared Wyvern meat had been delicious, cooking them that way should be good too . I sliced a lot of Wyvern meat ready to cook shabu-shabu later, piling it up on plates, covering it with clingfilm and storing it back in my Item Box . I reckoned that hotpot would be a welcome change along the way as we travelled .
Slicing the Wyvern meat this way I ended up with a lot of cut-offs . Staring at them I had an inspiration -- I'd make some 100% Wyvern meat hamburgers . I had seen a teevee program once where the presenters turned trims and scraps of Wagyu beef left over from preparation of other gourmet dishes into 100% Wagyu hamburger so me doing it with the leftover Wyvern meat should work the same way . As I remembered it the teevee show presenters put nutmeg in their recipe so I'd follow their example . I don't usually put nutmeg in hamburgers, it's not a good idea to just throw everything you might think of into a recipe after all but in this case it was worth a try since I was using such high-quality meat . The presenters had said it improves the flavour after all . I didn't have any nutmeg to hand since I don't normally use it in cooking so I bought some on Net Super .
First I chopped up some onions finely, fried them until they were well-browned and then set them aside to cool . I didn't run the Wyvern meat through the mincer, instead I chopped it up with a sharp knife . If I minced it too finely the fatty marbling in the meat would make it fall apart when it was fried .
I'm a true believer of the 'onions in hamburger' faction so I stirred lots of browned onions into the roughly-chopped Wyvern meat . The chopped meat might seem a little bit lumpy to some hamburger enthusiasts but I reckoned it would add to the taste since you'd be exposed to the texture of the meat a little . I added breadcrumbs and egg for a binder and some nutmeg, salt and pepper to finish and stirred the mixture thoroughly before rolling it into balls and pressing them flat to make patties .
I cooked some of the patties, about a minute at medium heat and then at low heat for about 4 minutes then flipped them and repeated that cooking on the other side . I added some sake and ketchup to the sauce as usual before covering the pan to steam the meat but this time I included some butter too . I figured it would complement the tenderness of the Wyvern meat .
"Right then, where have Fer and Sui got to . . . " I wondered, looking up from the stove as the hamburgers finished cooking . "Ahem . " "Aruji-" . They were both waiting right behind me . What a surprise . Not .
"Here you are . " I dished out some 100% Wyvern meat hamburgers which they immediately started to eat .
"Umu . "
"Wow - it looks delicious-"They both began to eat 100% Wyvern meat hamburger . Watching them I couldn't stop myself from eating some too since I knew from bitter experience there'd be little left for me if this was a success . Memories of three meagre pieces of kaarage between two slices of bread floated through my mind as I took my first bite of the hamburger .
Wow, the juicy hamburger overflowed with gravy . The roughly-chopped texture of the meat felt good in the mouth . It's a pain to chop up meat with a knife rather than mince it but it definitely added to the enjoyable flavour of the hamburger .
"Mmmm, is this Wyvern meat?" Fer inquired .
"Oh, that's right, you can taste the delicious Wyvern meat, we can eat it like this too?" Sui chimed in . "Sure, it's delicious isn't it? Because the meat's chopped up you can feel the firm taste . "
"Yeah yeah, this is delicious~ . Sui wants more . "
"Me too . " said Mister Redundant .
I started cooking more 100% Wyvern meat hamburgers for Fer and Sui (and myself) . In the end all the surplus Wyvern meat cutoffs and trims that I had planned to store in my Item Box for the forthcoming trip had been turned into 100% Wyvern meat hamburgers and stored in the bellies of Fer and Sui (and me too, of course) .
I shrugged, wiping the last of the gravy off my lips . They both ate their fill and the Wyvern meat scraps didn't go to waste, a double bonus .