Solo Sunberth Cooking I

[Moritz Craven]

60 Fall 522

Heading down from the kitchen, Moritz made his way out of the Drunken Fish. One of the slaves Father Manowar had come to tell Moritz said proprietor wanted him, and so he was now heading outside to meet him. He was unsure what he wanted, but so far from having met him the man seemed nice enough and good... At least by Sunberthian standards. Since Moritz both lived and worked at the Drunken Fish the man made sure to look out for Moritz, though admittedly he did make sure to work the Kelvic hard and get his moneys worth.

Once he was outside he found Manowar talking to a man who was hauling a deceased deer body along across his shoulders. "A, Moritz, there you are. If your going to be cooking here, you need to meet this fellow here. You'll be taking his deliveries sometimes to. Only way to get food around here that is decent is to have a source, and to buy in bulk. So I tend to buy a whole animal from this fellow who hunts outside the city. Why don't you check it over, inspect the wares, since you'll need to learn to do that as well."

Moritz nodded, stepping closer and inspecting the dead animal. Using his hands he looked it over and moved it around to get a good view, and to try and take in the details that were of import. The first thing he noticed were the wounds, one in the side where a arrow had hit, and another wound in the head were clearly another arrow or something had struck and likely killed the beast... He could also see its neck was slit, but he supposed that was to drain the blood. Lifting it up a bit he could see the man had lightened his load by draining all of the blood before coming into the city, which explained that wound...

Looking now at the deer as a whole he tried to focus on more specific details. It seemed to be a buck, based on the horns, though one was missing partially... Also while it was a sizeable buck he would not exactly call it heavy... It was not scrawny, not skin and bones, but he had certainly seen more filled out ones.

"Seems decent enough. Not too cut up. Bit on a skinny size for a buck though... Otherwise seems healthy enough."

Father Manowar nodded along in response, eying the man. "My thoughts exactly. Can't be expecting full pay for a light buck now can we?"

With that said Father Manowar and the hunter traded words back and force, before in the end some coins were exchanged and a gesture was made to Moritz. "Go ahead and bring it up to the kitchen Moritz, I'll show you how to prep it now that I've bought it. And you, get me a nice and fat one next time alright? And maybe that will make up for this skinny thing. I won't give full pay for this sorta stuff."

With that the hunter nodded and passed the carcasses off to Moritz, who hefted the beast over his own shoulders as the other man had and moved off to carry the weight across his body more easily. As the other man let go Moritz felt the weight drop on him, but after a moment he pushed through and was able to carry it well enough.

WC: 573

[Moritz Craven]

After getting into the kitchen Moritz waited for a few moments, before Father Manowar arrived. Quick to get started the man cleared off a table where work was often done, and motioned for Moritz to set the deer there. "Alright, lets get started. Have you butchered a deer before? No? Alright then... For now, get out some knives and buckets. You'll be cutting this one up. But make sure you learn quick, I don't want you ruining a bunch of good bodies while you figure stuff out. First things first, since its been drained, we need to skin it. Usually I sell it to someone to make leather, but I get more if the skin is more intact. So you'll want to make the cut as clean as you can."

With a nod Moritz moved along, grabbing several buckets along with several different knives he thought he might need. Father Manowar for his part gave Moritz only a few moments before he began barking out orders. "Alright, so to skin it... Easiest way is to start at the neck, since its generally cut anyways to drain the animal. Go ahead and remove the head, and then begin with... This knife. Now you want to keep it close, or you'll waste material, but not so close you chop up the skin and ruin the leather to be made. You want a nice intact pelt."

Nodding again Moritz tried to figure out what was needed, happy he had butchered a few animals before though not as this level. And not, he reminded himself, deer. He had helped butcher a pig, but its pelt wasn't in as much demand as a deerskin from a buck... And plus in Syka such things were less needed just by its nature, where people were not so poor and food was relatively plentiful. Scaling and prepping fish and butchering a pig in Syka were one thing... Butchering with care a deer in Sunberth was a whole other thing.

Using a larger knife for chopping Moritz cut at the deers neck, making a cut in the flesh all around before finally chopping through the bone. This bigger knife was made for hacking and chopping, which included parting bones. With that done he set the deers head aside, and took out the knife Father Manowar had mentioned earlier to use for the skinning. In some ways he was reminded of peeling vegetables, but not quite in the same way... Slipping the knife in tot he flesh he tried to start slicing off the outer layer that made up the hide. All the while Father Manowar made comments behind him while watching. "Good, good. Ah try going more this way... Not so close to the surface, you'll ruin in! Better... Not to deep either, your gonna get fat and stuff..."

Taking his advice into account Moritz tried to make the moves as cleanly as he could, though it was not long before he mis moved his knife and cut through the hide. His instructor simply told him to keep going and to be more careful, while noting what he had done wrong and how to avoid it again. "You see... This way, not that way... And when you get to this bit... Try it like... This, yeah, like that there."

WC: 550

[Moritz Craven]

Having gotten a good start, Moritz kept at the task at hand, continuing skinning the animal. While he still himself did not eat animal products, particularly meat, he understood others doing so. The biggest change had been his own death and reliving of the same day, his first time he could recall killing. In some ways the day had been bad, but once he had come to accept it he found he had less issue with dealing with dead things. For a few moments he thought back to hunting that animal at the beginning of that experience, his utter failure the first time and the partial success after... He thought the animal that day had been a deer as well, but he had trouble recalling that early detail as the later ones seemed to weigh more heavily and prominently in his mind.

Following Father Manowar's directions Moritz began cutting an incision, working from behind it just above its butt, and cutting upward along the spine. This was a little different than how Moritz had seen before, but he supposed it was just how this man liked to skin things and perhaps did not mean one way or another was better.

After slitting it open along the spine to the head he began skinning some more, working his knife under each side of the cut and peeling off one solid sheet of skin on either side. Working on it more Moritz found that the further along he got the easier it was to continue, but when he first began and was making the initial incisions and cuts that was much harder. Of course it helped that he had a general idea how to do things, and had a more skilled person giving him instructions the entire time and helping him correct. At the same time he tried to learn as well as he could, since he would need to do this on his own most likely on the next occasion some animal corpse came in for processing. "Yep... Now on that bit move that way... A bit closer... Not that close! Oh, try that way..."

His first issue was the wound in the side, where the deer had been struck most likely by the first arrow. But as usual Father Manowar was quick to give him advice. "Just cut a bit around that, to get a nice even and straight hole, since you cannot really save those scraps on the edges... Cut right... There... Yeah cut it that way, around to make the hole. Not too far to waste additional excess, but the impact site is going to be wasted if it gets hit. Can't always take out an animal with a head shot."

Moritz nodded along at his words, and continued his skinning, getting past that spot and moving on to other places. The torso being one long section seemed easier, while the legs being narrow were harder. "If you can't get the legs perfect, its fine. The main issue is the biggest part, the torso, alright? Get that good, and I'm less worried about the legs. Chances are that'll be cut a bit anyways... But the big piece of the flanks and torso, that you want intact."

Nodding along the Kelvic kept at his work, making cuts and slicing and skinning all over. Here. There. Everywhere. Until he had more or less the entire thing cut off in one mostly intact piece with an opening along the spine of the animal.

WC: 582

[Moritz Craven]

Now that the part Moritz was least familiar with, namely skinning the animal, was over Moritz was able to move a bit more quickly. At least, relatively speaking. Still Father Manowar continued to make comments and corrections as he worked. This was also where the messier bits were about to begin, however first the man had some more comments about the skinning as he held up the final product. "Now this isn't quite ready to be sold. You see here... And here... And here... Before we can sell it, you need to scrub the hide, and not just to get it clean and to remove the blood. You also need to scrub it to get off the leftover bits of flesh and stuff. Like here... You went too deep skinning it... And here you went too shallow, that will likely be scrapped. You basically cut through here... So still needs work, but lets get the rest of the deer processed and you can come back to do that later."

With a nod Moritz dove in, getting buckets of clean water and buckets for tossing things inside, and pulling out another new knife. Before he had used one for skinning, and another for chopping through thick areas and bone. Now though he needed to gut the animal and remove the organs, most of which would be tossed out... And that required an entirely different sort of knife. Luckily The Fish's kitchen was well stocked with such blades, in varying sizes and types and for varying tasks. Diving in right away Moritz began cutting open the guts of the deer, opening a slit down its underbelly. He worked to go between the ribs, not wanting to hit any bones right now as those would be dealt with later.

Once he had that open he widened the whole, and began to reach inside with another small knife. This one he used on the organs to cut them free, pulling them out one by one. He was particularly careful with the intestines, going at them first and removing them very carefully as he did not want any fecal matter sliding out and contaminating the rest of the deer. This part was not too different from the pig he had cut before, though not exactly the same.

Several times he had to wash out the blood all over his arms and inside the animal making it hard to see, the resulting messy slop being rinsed out and poured into another bucket to be tossed as waste. After the intestines he went for other large things. Lungs. Heart. Liver. Father Manowar named each of these as Moritz pulled them out, and the Kelvic did his best to commit them to memory both in regards to their size, shape, and positioning.

Then there was more washing and rinsing, with some of the animals organs Father Manowar considered safe set aside, with others like the intestines tossed in another bucket. These were more trouble than they were worth, and would use too much clean water to prepare them if wanted. All the same Moritz kept at it, emptying out the deer bit by bit and washing and rinsing in between each step.

WC: 534

[Moritz Craven]

With the internal parts done, along with the external skinning down, Moritz was nearing the finishing parts of processing the deer. And while all of the rest of the steps produced a skin and other things, now he was getting to the part where he would actually be readying the meat. Father Manowar continued as he had before, pointing at parts and places and giving directions. "Alright, lets get started by evening it all out. Take off the legs, and clean up the top part where you removed the head before. "

Nodding again Moritz took another knife out and began chopping, four motions total at each leg to cleave them off. Once he had done that he could further process the legs, but for now he settled for just cutting off the hooves on each removed leg. That left him with the single largest piece, the torso of the buck. That was also where the most meat was kept, and where a good bit of work would be needed.

Here Moritz vaguely knew what he was doing, but as deer and pigs were not the same thing and had different shapes so his prior cutting was of less use. "Right, so start along here, cut down this bit.... We want to get the flanks first, cut off those and get the bigger cuts of meat there... And there on the other side... Right... And then we move on from there."

Using his knife Moritz cut some more, being careful to move along the lines Father Manowar was tracing and cutting there. Just one cut did not do it though, as several lines of flesh had to be cut through before a hunk of meat could be removed, and then the Kelvic had to continue on with the next bit. Rather than rolling it all from side to side Moritz focused on one side of the deer first, and only once it was all cut up and the meaty bits to be further cut down set on a somewhat clean tray did he roll it over and repeat the process with the same mirrored parts opposite it. Flank cuts, meat along the ribs, and various other parts Father Manowar named but Moritz did not entirely understand the distinction of. In the end the entire deer would be processed down into a pile of refuse and usable parts which included the edible meat.

Unlike before though when he had been in Syka Father Manowar had his own system for things, and that included tiers to the meat which he explained... "These parts here consider this tier one. Stuff I'll eat, or if a captain or someone with some Mizas will want comes in. Nice clean cut pieces, and stuff. This stuff here is tier two, stuff you can eat for your meals, and the decent paying patrons. And then this bit here... I guess that would be tier three. Stuff the cheap people will take. Odd cuts, leftover bits, and stuff. Stuff we can just kind of throw together from the other bits, but still edible. Most people here will eat that. Maybe the slaves as well. Or we might just chop it up and make something from that. Ah and tier four, thats the stuff that is only sort of edible, that we won't get much out of but someone might eat. So we can't just toss it, or else we'll get people rooting through our stuff. Don't worry, I'll deal with that. Anyways, decent job, just be ready for next time and I'll have someone assist you. Hope you paid attention!"

WC: 601