[Flashback] Stirring Up Soy Sauce (Solo)

[Orin Fenix]

6th of Summer, 513 AV

Orin had been shocked that morning by the arrival of Farmer Driscoll, essentially the leader of Mithryn Outpost’s farmers and the civilians in general. Orin had never seen the man up close before, since Orin only saw Farmer Driscoll at a distance. At those events they both attended Orin more often than not was skulking about the outskirts, trying to to draw attention to himself while Farmer Driscoll usually was at the center of the proceedings. Orin had immediately invited the man into the cottage where Orin was currently staying but Farmer Driscoll hadn’t been able to stay, mentioning off-handedly and not at all surprisingly that he was needed in the fields . All he’d come to do was deliver a recipe and some strange new and exotic foods into Orin’s hands.

Apparently Orin’s forays into culinary endeavors had not gone unnoticed amongst the members of Mithryn Outpost, even though Orin had been trying to keep the news from getting out. Unfortunately, it looked like he hadn’t been very successful at that aspect of it. Still, if it got new ingredients delivered into his hands and permission from one of the leaders Mithryn to continue on with his experiments, Orin would accept it and gladly so. Farmer Driscoll had stated that these mysterious items were called soy beans. Farmer Driscoll had quite a bit of success in getting them to grow in Syliras. However, the merchant they had come from had also sold Farmer Driscoll a recipe for a sauce that could be made from the beans. Which is exactly where Orin came in, seeing as Farmer Driscoll couldn’t make heads or tails of the instructions.

Shutting the door absently, Orin skimmed over the ingredients and took a mental inventory of all the cooking implements he owned. He thought he’d be able to handle the demands of this recipe. The family he was staying with wisely chose to simply slip out to their work without bothering Orin. Orin waved at them half-heartedly, far too excited about his new task to be distracted. He set the beans down on the counter and got out a pot. The first step was relatively easy, boil the beans from ten to fifteen chimes. It was a bit strange that it called for salt water but Orin had used salt before in boiled or cooked goods that way.. Usually it was simply to enhance the flavor, but it never paid to deviate from a recipe.

Putting the pot to boil, Orin tossed half of the beans in. If he messed up, he wanted something to fall back on. Although Farmer Driscoll had basically told Orin flat out that Orin could use as many as he needed to figure this sauce out, Orin didn’t want to admit failure to the self-assured man. So Orin would just have to get it right the first time. Halfway through his five chime hourglasses’ third cycle, Orin took the pot off of fire and scooped out the beans onto the counter. First, Orin removed the beans from their pods and set the pods to one side. He didn't know if they would be called for later. Taking up his cutting knife, Orin sliced them as finely as he could. He was a bit surprised when they became paste-like but he continued on gamely. Pleased with his success, Orin threw the remaining beans into the still hot pot and repeated the process with them.

[Orin Fenix]

Once all of the beans had been cut, Orin transferred them into his mortar and pestle. Since they were already falling apart, Orin figured he’d simply help them along the rest of the way. It would make it easier to mix them in with the flour most likely. In fact, though the recipe didn’t specifically call for this, Orin was almost certain that it was simply known to be necessary and probably got lumped together in the cooking the beans instruction. Orin was fascinated by the beans themselves. They had quite a unique scent and texture and Orin had to constantly refrain from reaching out and tasting it. Seeing as Orin didn’t even know if it was edible in its unprocessed form that would probably be a poor decision all around.

Once Orin judged the beans to have been sufficiently ground, he scraped the paste into a bowl. Orin began adding minute amounts of flour. While the recipe listed an exact measurement Orin didn't have the scales or the tools to determine how much paste he had produced so he'd simply have to do this based on his own judgement. He poured, and mixed, poured and mixed. Eventually, the two items blended together nicely to Orin's eyes. They had reached a dough like consistency which Orin took as a good sign considering the next instruction that was listed.

Taking his blended paste and flour out, Orin laid it on the table in a limp. He began kneading it rolling his knuckles deep into the ingredients. Slowly, but surely, it began spreading out smoothly. Orin's hands were leaving small impressions behind, like a trail showing where he'd and indicating where he was going. Some people found kneading tedious but Orin had never minded. It was relaxing for him, letting his fingers do all the work while his mind moved on to bigger and better things. So Orin let his mind drift, a faint smiles teaming from the feeling of the material he was shaping on his face.

Finally though, Orin had gotten all he possibly could out of kneading, and he glances over at the wrinkled paper with the recipe written in spidery handwriting upon it. Luckily, Orin had some experience puzzling out nearly illegible words, both from perusing a few family cookbooks which were usually written by farmers who simply put down a recipe haphazardly, not imagining someone else would ever read it. At least whoever had scribed this one had listed all the steps in a clear order instead of something that more closely resembled an i breakable code.

Orin rolled the dough-like substance into a tube. Taking out a serrated carving knife Orin began sawing discs off the end. The jagged edge helped Orin complete the motion with ease. The recipe called for each piece to be about a quarter of an inch long so Orin estimated it by using a little less than half the width of his index finger. It was probably only a rough guess and the disc sizes were far from uniform but hopefully it would be close enough for the recipe's purposes. That done, Orin paused for a moment so he could examine the rest of the recipe.

[Orin Fenix]

What he saw confused him. Orin had never really performed anything like what he was about to do before and honestly he was more than a bit worried about the results. But as long as he followed it faithfully, if something went wrong Orin could truthfully say that the recipe itself was faulty and there was nothing wrong with Orin's personal abilities. Orin went to the pile of cloths he normally used to clean and dry his hands and his instruments before and after his meals. Thankfully Orin had quite a pile of them lying around at this point, having accumulated them over the seasons. Taking a handful of the cleanest and newest ones, Orin soaked them thoroughly.

He laid one flat on the table and placed a disc on it. Orin folded the cloth over the disc until it was fully covered. He out another disc on the stack, and got one more fold out of the cloth. When he laid the next disc on, he took a new cloth and draped it over, then folded it over the next disc in the quickly forming tower. When Orin ran out of discs, he made sure the top was covered by a cloth and tucked the edges of the cloths in until there was very little of the soybean mixture showing. Taking his construction in his hands carefully, Orin transferred it to the back of a shelf where it would be out of the way. The recipe stated that Orin would now have to wait for seven days of so, or until the discs were completely covered in mold. That was the part that had made Orin hesitate. Most times, mold on the food you were cooking or consuming was consider very bad, but apparently not in all cases.

That finished, Orin couldn't do anything more for now. He should probably be getting down to the fields for work but in this rare moment of freedom Orin decided to practice something that had been bothering him. He would just run to the fields before his absence was noted which would have the added benefit of making Orin look very dutiful. Taking up his serrated knife from earlier, Orin transferred it to his left hand.

He'd been getting pretty good at using his right hand to attack, at least in theory. Orin had never actually fought anyone for real so he didn't know how well his skill from practice would transfer over. His left hand was giving him significantly more trouble which made sense seeing as it was his non-dominant one. Orin gripped the knife firmly, and lunged into a stab. However, his feet went all awry and the stab went off to one side. Orin groaned. He simply could not get his body to cooperate with him on this. He needed to focus all the power into the blade or else in an actual combat situation it wouldn't be able to pierce or penetrate anything. Resetting Orin lunged again and again. He felt a little bit of an improvement, but he'd spent enough time with this. Throwing open the door, Orin broke into a sprint, steeling himself for the significantly less interesting part of his day.

[Katelyn Marks]

Due Rewards

“After nourishment, shelter, and companionship, stories are the thing we need most in the world.”

― Philip Pullman

 

Orin

Skills
➢ Organization +1
➢ Planning +1
➢ Cooking +2
➢ Observation +2
➢ Research +3
➢ Dagger +1
➢ Tactics +1

Lores
➢ Cooking: Soy Sauce Recipe
➢ Cooking: Shelling Beans
➢ Cooking: Misunderstood Mold
➢ Research: Deciphering a Recipe

Comments: Well done! A nice short, easy read.

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