“Bwuuuh?! Wh-What in the world is this?!”
“Oooh, impressive! Tonight’s dinner is lavish indeed!”
《Hot damn, no kidding! And all of it looks great!》
《Wooow! So much meat and fishies! It all looks really yummy!》
“Heh heh, doesn’t it? I found some awesome stuff in my Online Supermarket, so I decided to splurge a little!” I explained.
My familiars’ eyes—which were wide with shock—were glued to the spectacular spread of food I’d laid out on the table. I’d served mountains of dungeon beef steaks and dungeon pork cutlets, plus beef and pork steaks I’d made using the Noto peninsula meat from my Online Supermarket. I’d seasoned the Japanese steaks very simply with just salt and pepper, since I wanted the flavor of the meat itself to take center stage. Then, of course, there was the assortment of sashimi and the yellowtail shabu-shabu, plus the raw crab, grilled crab, shabu-shabu style crab, and crab hot pot. Every last one of them looked drool-inducingly delicious.
“By the way, I made enough dungeon beef steaks and dungeon pork cutlets for you to have seconds, but this is all I have for the Online Supermarket stuff, so you’d better savor it!” I warned, pointing out the dishes in sequence.
“What?! You would serve us meat this clearly delectable without a chance to eat more of it?” Fel indignantly replied.
“Buying enough of it to fill you guys up would be problematic in all sorts of ways, so that’s all you get for today. That’s why I made extra dungeon meat dishes, just to make sure you’ll be satisfied.”
“Hmph. I would certainly hope we will be.”
“I’m sure you wouldn’t mind treating me to a beer as well, would you, my liege?” Gon hopefully asked. “Beer and cutlets are, after all, a match like few others!”
I guess he would ask for that, wouldn’t he? Fried food and beer’s a match made in heaven, after all. “Okay, but just a little,” I said.
“Hah hah hah! Cutlets and beer—a feast indeed!”
《Hell yeah! Cutlets are the best. I mean, everything fried’s the best, really!》 Dora-chan said.
《Sui loves the steak and the cutlets!》 Sui chimed in.
Everyone was ecstatic to learn that they’d be getting more of their favorite foods than ever...which meant that everyone was playing precisely into my hands. Heh heh heh...
While the gluttonous quartet was fixated on their steak and cutlets, I, of course, headed straight for the seafood.
“What to try first...?” I said to myself, hesitating for a moment before finally reaching for the sashimi. I dabbed a bit of wasabi on a piece of yellowtail, swished it through some soy sauce I’d poured into a little dish, and popped it into my mouth. “Oh, man that’s good!”
The fish was fatty and jam-packed with umami. It was an explosion of pure, fishy flavor.
“Perfect. This is perfection!”
It had been so long since I’d had any sashimi, and my first piece in ages was so delicious, I was actually moved. Not quite moved enough to stop me from grabbing a second piece of yellowtail right afterward, though. My expectations for the rest of the sashimi assortment had been raised, and I went for a raw oyster next, which I dressed with a little ponzu—a shellfish classic.
“Ahh! So good!”
The oyster’s flavor was like the seaside itself, with a creamy richness to complement it. It was the best. I really couldn’t describe it in any other way. The rest of the platter was delicious as well, from the sweet, slightly sticky shrimp to the light and refreshing flounder.
“Raw seafood just can’t be beat! Sashimi’s an addiction that all Japanese people have, I swear!” Of course, there’s still one bit of raw seafood I haven’t tried yet. “Time for some crab!”
How long had it been since I’d had crab sashimi? I hadn’t exactly been able to afford splurging on something that fancy very often back when I was an office worker. Now, however, I found myself facing a plate absolutely full of glossy, faintly red crab legs.
“Heh heh heh, do I dare? Should I eat a whole leg’s worth of crab in just one bite?”
I dared. I dipped the rather sizable piece of crab in a little soy sauce, then popped the whole thing into my mouth in one go.
“Oh wow, it’s so sweet! Now this is what happiness tastes like!”
Crab sashimi is a perfect food. It was so delicious that I’d eaten a second and a third crab leg before I snapped back to my senses and realized what I was doing.
“Whoops! That was close. Can’t fill myself up with sashimi when there’s so many other things to try!”
I still had to prepare the yellowtail and crab shabu-shabu, the grilled crab, and the crab hot pot, then sample all of them. I moved on to the yellowtail shabu-shabu first, which I tried with a little ponzu.
“Mmmh! That’s another one for the ‘delicious’ list!”
The time the fish spent being swished through the piping hot shabu-shabu broth had lessened its fattiness just enough to give it a completely different flavor profile. It felt like I could keep swishing and eating for ever, and for quite some time, I did exactly that. Swish, eat, swish, eat, and on, and on.
“What could I possibly call this other than ‘delicious’? ‘The best,’ maybe?”
I felt like sticking with the yellowtail for a while longer, but I couldn’t give in to temptation. There were still so many other foods left to try.
“Next up: crab shabu-shabu!”
This was, as a matter of fact, the very first time I’d tried crab prepared using this method, and I was incredibly excited to give it a taste. I swished a crab leg through the simmering broth, then popped it into my mouth.
“So sweet! And tasty!” I exclaimed. The crab was half cooked, half raw, and all delicious in the sweetest, most umami-rich way possible. “Not dipping this in any of the sauces was the right call for sure. Man, it’s so good!”
How on earth is crab this tasty, anyway? I wondered. Needless to say, the grilled crab and crab hot pot were both just as delicious. For that matter, the whole meal had been incredible.
“What could possibly be better than a feast’s worth of food where everything is so good it’s out of this world?” I idly mused. Hokuriku seafood can’t be beat!
By that point, I’d spent enough time waxing poetic about how good the seafood was that I’d finally caught my familiars’ attention. They tore themselves away from their meat mountains for long enough to sample the sashimi and the shabu-shabu as well.
“Hmm. This is not unsatisfactory by any means, but meat remains my preference,” Fel said.
“Mine as well,” Gon agreed. “It tastes quite nice, certainly, but it’s hardly filling, is it?”
《Yeah, I get that. Meat’s way more satisfying, and it’s tasty to boot,》 Dora-chan added.
《Sui thinks this is yummy, but Sui likes the meat better too,》 Sui chimed in.
Friggin’ carnivores. You have no idea how much of a treat all this Hokuriku seafood really is!
✦ ✦ ✦
