Steak Showdown (3)
Restaurant Ayeon.
“Hello. I have a reservation for two under Kim Su-cheol.”
“Yes. Welcome. Let me show you to your seat first.”
When lunchtime came, customers began coming into the restaurant, and the server skillfully guided them to their tables. It was a window seat where sunlight came in softly.
“Can I order Do Eun-seong's steak, by any chance? I wanted it so badly that I came right after the show.”
The moment the customer was seated, the question came, with an expectant look.
“Yes. Today, we've specially prepared both our restaurant's signature steak and Do Eun-seong's rotten wine doenjang steak.”
The server smiled at the customer and answered politely.
“Really?”
“Yes. However, after you've eaten both steaks, we ask that you vote for the one you think is more delicious.”
“Ah, so that means I can try both steaks in one course?”
“Yes. That's right.”
At the server's words, the customer's face brightened.
“That's great!”
The reactions of the customers who came into Ayeon were all similar. As soon as they heard about the steak vote from the server, they smiled brightly as if they'd unexpectedly won the lottery.
In the kitchen, too, full-scale preparations for lunch service began. Head Chef Yang Geon-ung took the order ticket and called out loudly.
“Two courses!”
At Yang Geon-ung's call, Kim Jun-ho began moving mechanically. His hands were precise, and his eyes looked only at the steak. As always, he grilled the meat at the perfect temperature, and as always, he plated the steak at the precise time.
Compared to him, I... to be honest, was a little nervous.
On ‘Banquet of Chefs’ and when making the tasting steaks, I'd only had to make one plate at a time, but now was different. At lunch, usually 50 customers came per seating. Two seatings in total. So I had to grill over 100 plates of steak. All at the same quality, at that.
First, I finished the sauce for 100 portions. Honestly, this sauce was very tricky. The time to oxidize the wine, the time to smoke the paprika, the time to blend it with the doenjang... all of it had to be precise. Every ingredient in this sauce had a strong personality, so even the slightest mistake easily threw off the sauce's balance.
After several attempts, I completed the sauce for 100 portions.
Sizzzzzle.
Then I placed the first piece of meat on the griddle. Just as Kim Jun-ho did, I matched every time and temperature precisely.
And so I completed my first steak. I brought it to Yang Geon-ung right away. He looked closely at my steak, then-
“Pass.”
That was all he said.
What a relief.
Orders kept pouring in. At first, just standing in this meat section, at the griddle no less, felt awkward, but at some point, I completely found my rhythm.
The smoke from the griddle and the Maillard reaction. And even the timing for pouring the sauce. Everything began coming naturally. I kept completing my steaks at the same quality.
When I'd grilled about thirty steaks like that.
“Chef, there's a customer who says the steak has too much fat and is uncomfortable to eat.”
The server who'd taken steaks to the hall came back again.
“The signature steak? Or Do Eun-seong's steak?”
Yang Geon-ung asked the server calmly.
“Both.”
It was the first complaint.
Yang Geon-ung came to the meat section and asked, looking from me to Kim Jun-ho and back.
“Can you fix it right away?”
“Yes, Chef.”
Kim Jun-ho and I answered without hesitation.
“Then grill the steaks again.”
Saying only that, Yang Geon-ung went back to the chef's table.
Too much fat? This was usually a problem easily solved by changing the cut. So, as expected, Kim Jun-ho had already taken out tenderloin instead of the steak's original cut, sirloin.
But with my steak, it was a little different. My steak needed the thick fat layer of the sirloin so that the acidity of the oxidized wine wouldn't stick out and the flavor would have balance.
So if I carelessly used tenderloin, which had too little fat, it could completely wreck the balance of flavor. So I had no choice but to keep using sirloin.
However, to reduce the greasiness of the fat as much as possible, I decided to try a few techniques I'd only ever seen in cookbooks.
***
After the steak showdown between Do Eun-seong and Kim Jun-ho began, Head Chef Yang Geon-ung quietly watched them from the chef's table.
“It's not your menu, Chef, nor a menu that officially came up through the new menu test, so why are you suddenly adding it?”
Owner Yu Jeong-su had asked Yang Geon-ung that.
Well, why had he?
At first, he'd done it because it was fun.
But the more Yang Geon-ung worked with Do Eun-seong, the more he wanted to grasp his ability precisely. Just how far could Do Eun-seong go? He was so curious about that. So he'd bent his own stubbornness and made the radical move of adding a menu. Solely to test Do Eun-seong.
Of course, someone might ask if pitting a menu from a TV show against an existing menu wasn't unfair. But if anything, Do Eun-seong was the one at a disadvantage. Satisfying customers who'd watched the show and come with sky-high expectations? That was close to impossible for a novice cook.
‘But using smoked paprika.’
Honestly, he was surprised.
To make up for the weaknesses of the forcibly oxidized wine, he'd once again designed his sauce precisely. As a result, it was more delicious than the sauce he'd eaten on ‘Banquet of Chefs.’ At this level, he thought it was an overwhelming taste that could easily exceed the expectations of the customers who'd come expecting a lot.
After full service began, Yang Geon-ung could no longer help but acknowledge him. He could have predicted that Do Eun-seong would put out 100 plates of steak at the same quality. Given the skill and diligence he'd shown in the cold section, it seemed entirely possible.
But what surprised Yang Geon-ung was something else.
“Chef, there's a customer who says the steak has too much fat and is uncomfortable to eat.”
The first complaint about the steak came in. Unexpected situations like this were the hardest part for a novice cook.
But Do Eun-seong handled it like a veteran.
‘He'll switch to the leaner tenderloin cut.’
Yang Geon-ung had assumed he'd naturally swap the cut. Kim Jun-ho was already grilling tenderloin, not sirloin.
But Do Eun-seong was different. He still used sirloin. But he began adding a few techniques to it.
First, he started golden trimming. This technique was a way of trimming that removed the fat visible to the naked eye while preserving the savory flavor the sirloin had. It was a hard technique for a novice, but Do Eun-seong, who was exceptionally good with a knife, did it quickly and perfectly.
It didn't end there. Do Eun-seong grilled the steak briefly at high heat to keep it as crispy as possible. In doing so, he removed the greasiness of the fat while keeping the sirloin's strengths intact.
The final kick was his sauce, as expected. A sauce in which the wine's acidity, the paprika's smoky aroma, and the doenjang's deep flavor came together in complex harmony. To that, he added a little orange zest to raise the acidity a bit more.
By doing so, he perfectly cut through the heavy greasiness sirloin could easily have. He solved the problem so skillfully and quickly that it was hard to believe he was a novice.
“Why did you use this method instead of just switching to tenderloin?”
Yang Geon-ung asked Do Eun-seong, who'd brought over the steak plate.
“My sauce is naturally high in acidity, so I thought if I switched to tenderloin, I might not be able to rein in that acidity. So I tried my best to keep the sirloin's strengths while cutting the greasiness of the fat as much as possible.”
It was a perfect answer.
Yang Geon-ung handed Do Eun-seong's plate to the server without a word. Then he asked the server, who'd come back after serving it.
“What did the customer say?”
“The guest said the signature steak was too dry and didn't taste good.”
“And Do Eun-seong's steak?”
“The guest said that one was so delicious, and asked how it could be so tender without being greasy, and what on earth this cut was.”
As expected, he's no ordinary guy.
Do Eun-seong had exceeded Yang Geon-ung's expectations this time too.
The result of the showdown no longer mattered to Yang Geon-ung. Where in this kitchen would Do Eun-seong be most effective? His head was completely filled with that thought.
***
The first day of service ended without any major problems. And because of that, Kim Jun-ho of the meat section, on the contrary, began to grow uneasy.
Truth was, Kim Jun-ho had assumed he'd naturally win once full steak service began.
With meat, experience was skill. In other words, the person who'd grilled meat the longest grilled it best. That was Kim Jun-ho. He'd grilled meat longer than anyone, and had held the meat section, the most popular spot in Ayeon's kitchen, for five whole years. Until now, he'd never lost to anyone.
But not this time.
Do Eun-seong was strange. He was a kid who'd never once grilled meat in the kitchen. And yet that kid had completed over 100 plates of steak all at the same quality, and hadn't been shaken by unexpected situations. On top of that, he'd even handled a customer complaint very skillfully.
Above all, the customers' reactions were overwhelming. The customers who'd eaten his steak today posted rave reviews on social media, and those reviews kept spreading to online communities. The popularity of Do Eun-seong's steak, which he'd thought would cool down quickly, was only getting hotter.
“Senior, they say tomorrow's reservations are already full too.”
The overseas-faction junior who'd graduated from Le Cordon said to Kim Jun-ho.
“Senior, what are you going to do? If the menu changes to Do Eun-seong's steak, then the meat section spot too.......”
He could tell without hearing Le Cordon's words to the end. The spot he'd held for five years was shaking.
This was ridiculous. Kim Jun-ho could never accept having his spot stolen by a kitchen assistant, a high school graduate at that.
“Shut up. That'll never happen.”
That could never happen.
“Then what do we do, Senior.”
Then a certain scene came to Kim Jun-ho's mind. The wine Do Eun-seong had left submerged in hot water to oxidize overnight. That was a bit... irritating. So in the end, he decided to make a move.
Eleven at night, when everyone had gone home. Kim Jun-ho opened the kitchen door slightly. He'd been sure no one would be there. But-
Sizzzzzle.
He was there.
Do Eun-seong, grilling steak alone.
“Ah, shit.”
Kim Jun-ho cursed under his breath and quietly closed the kitchen door.
Why does he work so hard? Some high school grad, neither overseas faction nor domestic faction. For two years, he'd worked hard without taking a single day off.
He hated that so much. On days when Kim Jun-ho left even a little late, Do Eun-seong would always be like that, practicing cooking alone. That sight, that sight of him ignorantly killing himself with nothing but effort, looked pathetic.
Was that why? For some reason, Kim Jun-ho wanted to show Do Eun-seong that there were things in the world effort alone couldn't achieve.
Two hours later, Kim Jun-ho, who'd been waiting in his car, came back to the kitchen again. Fortunately, this time the kitchen lights were completely off. Do Eun-seong was gone too.
Kim Jun-ho went straight to where the wine Do Eun-seong had left submerged in hot water to oxidize overnight was. But then.
Thunk.
An old notebook fell from the shelf.
‘What's this?’
A notebook in the kitchen, he'd naturally thought it was Baek Seon-woo's, but when he opened it, it was Do Eun-seong's. Scrawled in shabby, hasty handwriting. It looked like he'd secretly written down Ayeon's recipes while working as an assistant.
‘Madman.’
Unlike the roughly scribbled handwriting, the recipes were quite accurate. No, honestly, they were perfect. The portions of the ingredients that went in. Not just the timing, but even each cook's unique habits and principles of action.
It looked like Do Eun-seong had watched and studied every section on his own during his two years as a kitchen assistant. Truly, everything about every section cook was recorded.
And when he turned to the last page-
“......”
Kim Jun-ho couldn't do anything.
-Meat section, Senior Kim Jun-ho.
On the last page was he himself, written down exactly as he was, in two years' worth of painstaking notes.
Kim Jun-ho stood there for a long time like that, reading Do Eun-seong's old notebook, then put it back in its place. Then he quietly left the kitchen.