All of a sudden, the kitchen became very lively.
Mi Dou ran over, grinning brightly. “Hmm, there seems to be quite a lot in this basin. It looks like you won’t have to eat anything else for the rest of the day.”
Even the usually reticent Hong Dou walked past, dropping a comment in a neutral voice, “I’m really looking forward to watching you eat it.”
“Mi Dou, Hong Dou, you’re both looking forward to it this much?” Yun Dai had a strange smile on her face as she said, “Yun Dou, so what are you waiting for? Hurry up and eat all the entrails so we can all get back to work.”
Yun Dou’s expression had become livid, and steam was coming out of her ears as she rolled her eyes at them and said, “You think I’m going to eat all these entrails just because you want me to? You’re not my employer, so you can’t order me around like that.”
With that, she hurried out with the huge basin of chicken entrails.
Of course she couldn’t possibly eat those.
The palace servants were not allowed to eat anything with a strong animal smell. That was to prevent their bodies from exuding any pungent smells that might irritate or offend the royals.
Everyone had just been taking the occasion to tease and laugh at Yun Dou.
Even if she’d really wanted to eat it, Mo Chun would never have allowed it.
“All right now, everyone get back to work.” Mo Chun started giving everyone their instructions for the day.
Yun Dou was put in charge of preparing Consort Chen’s food, while Yun Dai was in charge of preparing food for the Crown Prince and the Filial Lady Guo of Excellence. And, in particular, she was the person who had to prepare all those pig intestines for Lady Lin of Decorous Service.
Yun Dai started with the Crown Prince’s meal.
She’d realized that Zhao Yuanjing preferred strong-tasting food. She decided to make a steamed fish head covered with diced chilies.
This dish looked extreme, but anybody who loved eating spicy food wouldn’t be able to resist it.
After she’d seasoned the fish head well, she left it to cook inside the steamer.
Yun Dai called Hong Dou over to help her watch the fire while she went to relieve herself.
Hong Dou looked at her coldly and snapped, “What’s wrong with you? Do you think that everyone is free to help you?”
However, Hong Dou still stayed and watched the fire seriously.
Yun Dai laughed as she left the kitchen.
She had already noticed that there was a small stable not too far from the kitchen. There were two beautiful horses inside, and she could tell at a glance that they were expensive horses, which she was sure were definitely well-loved by Zhao Yuanjing.
Since there wasn’t anybody around, Yun Dai took the chance to stop there and catch a few drops of horse urine in a small cup.
She hid the cup in her sleeve and took it back to the kitchen.
Hong Dou seemed rather surprised and said, “That was pretty fast.”
Yun Dai smiled and replied, “I wouldn’t dare make Sister Hong Dou wait for too long.”
Hong Dou quickly went back to what she had been doing.
Her work was more random. She had to feed all the ducks and chickens, and she also had to take care of the vegetable patch and the fruit trees.
Everyone was very busy, and steam filled the entire kitchen.
Yun Dai opened the lid of the steamer, placed the diced chilies on the fish head, and poured some horse urine onto the plate…
She didn’t pour too much. It was just a few drops.
Yun Dai watched as the horse urine disappeared into the thick stock made from the steamed fish head and the diced chilies, and a demonic-looking smile appeared on her face.
“I’m a woman of my word, okay? I said I was going to make you drink horse urine, so I’ll definitely follow through,” she murmured to herself before gently replacing the lid of the steamer.
Besides the steamed fish head with diced chilies, she also made two more dishes that weren’t as spicy: stir-fried asparagus and a plate of prawns.
Then she made a soup, which was the real highlight of the meal.
She made a herbal soup with Chinese herbs that was one of her specialties.
Herbal soups were great for conditioning the body, but the right herbs had to be matched to the right problem. If someone ate herbs that were supposed to have a good effect, but didn’t have the body type that matched those particular herbs, the effects of the herbs could be reversed.
In order to make sure that she could serve the Crown Prince better, Mo Chun had already told her about Zhao Yuanjing’s constitution, which food that he could not eat, and which food that he liked even before she’d started working in the kitchen.
So the soup that Yun Dai prepared for the Crown Prince was a ten-herb nutritional soup that she had specially concocted for Zhao Yuanjing.
She was going to make sure that his body would become stronger and that he would enjoy the taste.
There was also a tiny side effect: he would slowly lose interest in having sex.