“Now then, one plate per person! Please enjoy this dish while you wait for our other one to be ready!”
Though this was the first time that these chefs had taken part in a Ruu banquet, they didn’t look intimidated in the least.
The person who got that very first plate was none other than Rimee Ruu. She looked adorable in her banquet attire, and her eyes sparkled as she looked at the plate. “Whoa, amazing! You put curry on top of shaska! What’s it gonna taste like?!” Rimee Ruu had already tried shaska at our study sessions at both the castle town and the Ruu settlement. However, this would be her first time having it in a proper dish. “See, look! This is shaska! Isn’t it neat? It’s all squishy and has a really interesting taste!” Rimee Ruu said as she handed the plate she had accepted over to Tara. At this point, it was pretty much expected for the two of them to stick together like that.
“Wow!” Tara excitedly exclaimed.
Ludo Ruu was standing behind her like that was totally natural too. This was his first time seeing shaska, and when he saw it, his eyes opened wide and he muttered, “What the heck is that? They’re like little specks. This is what guys from Sym eat instead of poitan and fuwano?”
“It’s a staple food there. It’s only natural for crops to vary from region to region, after all,” I explained as I prepared one plate of shaska after another, which the Fou woman accepted and added curry to before handing them out to the crowd. Most of the people around us were exclaiming in admiration.
“Please, go ahead and eat up while it’s still warm,” I told them.
Unsurprisingly, Rimee Ruu was the first one to take me up on that. She shoved a spoon into her helping and lifted an equal amount of curry and shaska up to her mouth. Then, after she chewed for a bit, her face started positively sparkling. “It’s really interesting! And super tasty too!”
“It really is! It’s totally different from dipping poitan into it!” Tara said. The two girls were almost jumping up and down in excitement.
As Ludo Ruu looked down at them, he brought his own spoon to his mouth, then his eyes shot open wide in amazement. “This stuff’s crazy soft. And it’s sticky too, but not as much as gigo... Hmm. It feels sorta like a mix of gigo and chatchi mochi, I guess.”
“Ah, you can make mochi with shaska too. I imagine it would end up a lot stickier than chatchi mochi, though.”
“Oh yeah, it actually is sorta like chatchi mochi too! I really like both chatchi mochi and shaska!” Rimee Ruu chimed in.
“Me too! But it’s all gone already,” Tara added.
To strike a proper balance with the other dishes, I had only prepared enough to give people about half a serving of shaska. Because of that, Tara was far from the only person who looked like they thought that what we had given them had been insufficient.
“We’ve got one more shaska dish, which we’re going to prepare for later. If you’d like, please stop by again after enjoying the other food.”
Toor Deen was presently preparing that second dish. It needed a little too much time to serve at the start of the banquet, but that simply meant that people would have a good gap between having our giba curry and trying that other dish.
“Okay, I’m gonna go bring some to Papa Donda and Granny Jiba! Give me a hand, Ludo!” Rimee Ruu said.
“All right. Granny Jiba could probably eat this stuff too.”
The two kind Ruu siblings and Tara then took off with some plates on top of a tray. In the meantime, a whole bunch of people had formed a line in front of our stoves. The Ran and Liddo women had been assigned to washing the utensils in a water jug after people finished eating.
“This shaska really likes to stick to these wooden plates. I wish I could use warm water,” one of them noted.
“Ah, that’s true. I’m sorry for all the trouble,” I said.
“Don’t be. We’re looking forward to eating it too.”
The chefs had gotten to sample the shaska too. Of course, we had prepared a bunch of batches during the Fa’s study sessions, so they were probably a little sick of it at this point. But for folks who were unfamiliar with white rice, it was probably hard to tell how delicious it was without actually trying it in a dish. Because of that, for the members of the Ruu and the clans that lived near the Fa who had tried it, their first impression of shaska had generally amounted to little more than, “This is interesting.”
“Ah, so this is where you were, Sir Asuta!” Bozl exclaimed as he approached through the crowd of people of the forest’s edge. Roy and Shilly Rou were there next to him too. “We were walking around wanting to sample your cooking first, but we nearly made a full lap around the plaza before we found you. There are wonderful aromas coming off of all of the stoves here.”
“Yep. I hope that you’ll take the time to try all of the dishes on offer.”
“Of course. But first, we’ll be trying your shaska dish, Sir Asuta,” Bozl said with a big grin.
Next to him, Roy’s nose twitched. “Hmm. So you really did add that curry stuff to shaska, huh? This is sure to make a good story to tell Varkas and Tatumai.”
“Both these herbs and the shaska are ingredients from Sym, but that doesn’t mean combining them in a dish will make something good,” Shilly Rou noted with a seriously doubtful look. But of course, she wouldn’t get anywhere without giving it a try. And so, after we served the people who were already lined up, the three of them were finally able to receive their plates of curry shaska.
“Hmm. It certainly is fragrant,” Bozl said with a big sniff before taking a bite. Roy and Shilly Rou then did so as well, and while they were chewing, their brows deeply furrowed.
“Well? What do you think? Do you like it?” I asked.
“Hold on a moment. I can’t say anything based on just a single bite,” Roy replied, hurriedly shoving a second spoonful into his mouth. Bozl and Shilly Rou continued to eat the curry shaska in silence too.
It was only after he had fully cleared his plate that Bozl finally said, “I see.”
“Well? Did you not think it was especially good?”
“No, I... I find it difficult to judge.”
Roy and Shilly Rou were one thing, but it made me a bit uneasy to even see Bozl wearing such an uncertain look on his face.