Chapter 8: Sweet Smelling Baked Apple

Isecai’s Important Notes:

Since I’m going to start using pronouns, obligatory guide for you who doesn’t know:

• Nii-san: Brother, but with less respect (without O- prefix)
• Oji-san: Uncle, or how you call the adult male in the neighborhood
• Bouzu: Boy/Lad, but I’m translating this one since it has a proper counterpart.

Editor: King of the End

After finishing the talk with Marquis Fernandes, his servant soon led us towards our room.

Faruno, who was gone due to attending some noble’s wedding ceremony, will be back after three days. There’s a part of me who feels lonely somewhere.

I look around the room. It’s a nice one. Most likely, it’s prepared for privileged guests. Since it’s divided for a married pair, I can be here alone with Tina. I have to thank Marquis Fernandes.

I’m planning to bake the pastry for the duchess’ present the day after tomorrow, then appear at the engagement’s announcement party with Faruno three days later. The announcement of my betrothal to Faruno is related to a large assembly of nobles. I can’t afford to be sloppy. From now on, I have to enter my serious mode.

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“Tina, let’s go to the market tomorrow. Before baking the pastries, I want to look around and see various things. I’ve decided on the recipe, but if I find a new ingredient at the marketplace, I may gain a flash of insight. ……Moreover, there are heaps of new food before us. I can barely hold back.”

I smirk. If my heart doesn’t dance here, I can’t call myself a pâtissier.

“Yes, Kurt-sama, let’s go. Eclaba’s market. I’m looking forward to it. There seems to be a lot of wonderful things!”

“I know, right? Even if the ingredient isn’t necessary for the next pastry, let’s buy the good things. We don’t get this kind of chance too often.”

A port town, now, what kind of thing will I get to see this time……?

☘

Tina and I have set off to the market in the morning. The early activeness startles me. It seems that there are almost 50 thousand people populating this port town. Even if I gather all the villagers, the population of the Arnold fief will barely reach 500 people. They’re truly incomparable.

People and goods are overflowing. I feel jealous, really.

“Uwaa, that shop’s display looks like a line of seafood. They look so much bigger than the fish from the rivers.” Tina, looking at the fish that resembles sea bream, is shocked. Her fox ears are twitching cheerfully. “Ah, that shop has many fruits I haven’t seen before! Red and round, I wonder how it tastes. It smells sweet.” This time, her eyes sparkles from finding apples.

Excited at everything in her sight, Tina is really in high spirits. While wryly smiling, I chase after her and her antics.

“Let’s leave the fish alone, they’ll get spoiled before we can reach Arnold, and if we try to prepare them to eat in Marquis Fernandes’ territory, I’ll get distracted.”

“……Really? It’s such a shame.” Tina’s fox ears collapse flat to her head. Seafood is something that she will never have the chance to eat in Arnold’s mountainous area, so I understand that she really wants to have a taste.

“We can’t buy them raw, but I want to eat them too. Let’s have lunch at that shop. I’m sure they have this fish in their menu.”

“Ah, that’s a good idea. Let’s eat by all means!” Tina clings to my arm. There’s nothing better than making her happy.

“Let’s try the fruit by buying a few. If it tastes good, we can buy lots of them to share with the people back home.”

After saying that, We go to the fruit shop, pass the money, and buy two apples. One of the two are cut in halves by the cake knife I take from my coat, then I give Tina her share.

“Try it, it’s your half.”

“Is it really okay?”

“That’s what we bought them for, right?”

After I say that, Tina smiles and bites into the apple. I can slightly hear her mouth chomping with delight.

“It’s sweet and sour, juicy, and really tasty. Kurt-sama, this is really good. Let’s grow them in our fief too!” She’s greatly impressed, because her tail has been swaying side to side in excitement.

I nibble the apple too. Compared to the apples I’m familiar with, this is more sour and less sweet. But that’s fine. It’s really suitable to be added into pastries. I’ll definitely buy them before we go back home.

“I want to grow them too, but it’s kind of impossible. Even when treated well, apples are difficult to grow, they won’t be good before we can harvest the fruit. Even if everything goes well, it takes about three years to reach that point. The hurdle is high for this one.”

Until it can grow up into a tree, it’ll need time, no matter how you see it. Moreover, it’s weak to sickness and weather, we’re going to need a huge investment in time and manpower if we want to do it seriously.

“That means, it’s impossible in Arnold? I see. I thought if we could collect a lot of this fruit, everyone will be happy.”

Tina looks down. I rub her head while smiling gently.

“Growing them is hopeless, but we can buy them, you know? If our honey sales are on track, we can ask the peddlers to have them stock it for us. Right now, we’re just working hard for our livelihood, but anyhow, we’ll definitely be able to buy them later.”

Hearing my words, Tina’s smile blooms widely as she nods. “Yes!”

“Also, Tina. If you’re that happy with the raw ingredient, you’re going to hurt a pâtissier’s pride.”

“Kurt-sama, you mean?”

“Why do you think I bought two apples? Of course it’s to make a pastry. Once we get back, I’ll use the other one and bake a great pastry, so look forward to it.”

“I’m really looking forward to it! Kurt-sama’s pastry!” Tina shows a joyful expression once she starts imagining my homemade pastry.

Looking at that kind of expression from her, I come to really feel happy too.

☘

Looking at the market, I’m really surprised by the number and variety of meats, vegetables, fruits, nuts, seasonings, and liquors. I really came to wish that I lived here. As I thought, as a pâtissier, this kind of environment is truly attractive. From now on, I think I’m going to spare the time to visit here once a month.

Among them, my eyes are caught on whiskey. I wouldn’t have been able to guess that they were advanced enough to have distilled alcohol. I’ve requested rum from Marquis Fernandes, but if there’s dry spirits, it’ll be more suited to the rose cookies this time. Just by finding this, our visit to the market has become really valuable.

“Oji-san, can I have a taste? I want liquor as bitter and fragrant as possible.”

“You got the money, boy?” The stubborn looking shopkeeper stares at me and asks it.

My 15-year old figure probably looks like a boy’s in his eyes.

“Absolutely.”

I let him peek into my purse. It is full of gold and silver coins. I received them from Marquis Fernandes as the ingredients’ budget.

“……Come on. Give me the best grade liquor.”

The shopkeeper poured an amber-colored liquid into a small cup. I down everything in one go. So strong. But it’s a good one. If using this, it’ll go really well with the rose’s fragrance.

“Oji-san, I’ll take this one.”

“Thank you for your continued patronage.”

It’s a good liquor with a reasonable price. The taste only gets as good as the price though.

Tina is looking at the whiskey with apparent desire. She likes liquor. After drinking once, she’s completely into it. However, it doesn’t seem that she realizes it.

I can’t let her drink liquor. That’s the valuable lesson that I gained from the previous incident. When drunk, she’s unbelievably clingy, spoiled, and assertive, far from her usual self. In that incident, the one line was nearly breached.

From then on, in the market place, we bough the ingredients one by one, such as fresh milk and eggs, then returned to the Fernandes residence. The milk and eggs are given with an additional fee as a part of the negotiation, so that I could get the fresh ones sent to me early next morning. This is also an important point to make the best cookies.

Once we arrived, I made baked apples. I carve out the core of the apples, then add brown sugar, butter, and some whiskey to bake it in the oven. It’s an easy pastry.

Sure it’s simple, but a well done baked apple is one of the best pastries. The heating process will tenderize the acidity and strengthen the sweetness. The fruit’s flesh is moist inside, but the skin will be crispy, giving it a really seductive mouthfeel.

And then, the butter’s savory taste and the brown sugar’s strength, fusing with the bitter liquor, heightening the fragrance, creating multi layered taste that will in no way be contended by the raw form. I’m absolutely sure that Tina will like it and pester me to bake it again for her.

I tasted it, it seemed like it turned out really good. I can also taste the flavor, the aroma of heated whiskey. This is my goal by making a baked apple.

☘

On the next morning, Tina and I went to the Fernandes mansion’s kitchen. Right now, I’m going to bake the pastry for the duchess. It’s a huge responsibility. A duke rank has a status that’s only second to the king and royal family (grand dukes). If I present a sloppy product, I may get punished by guillotine.

Compared to the marquis, a duke has fewer assets and less military strength, but the authority and influence is stronger. The saying goes like this: prestigious duke, beneficial marquis. For Marquis Fernandes to give me the chance to present my pastry to the duchess with that kind of status, my gratitude is boundless.

“Tina, bring out the jar that we prepared yesterday.”

“Yes, Kurt-sama!”

Tina takes out two jars. One of them contains rose petals dipped in honey, while the other one is filled with rose petals dipped in whiskey. By doing it this way, I’m transferring the rose’s scent and flavor. I checked the smell from the lid. Yes, that’s a nice smell. The rose’s fragrance is extracted well.

“Kurt-sama, the fresh milk and newly laid eggs from this morning have arrived too!”

“Got it. With this, the ingredients are all present. Now, shall we begin?”

My invaluable rose cookies. Let’s give them the best appearance and taste.

Isecai’s Notes:

Damn it Kurt, you’re getting harem after all!? Isn’t Volg and your brother Ahem, isn’t Tina enough for you?