The dishes carefully prepared by Fang Yu and Ma Hao were sent to the three referees Zhong, Lai and Liao by the staff.

The three referees looked at each other for a moment, and they all picked up Fang Yu's breeze rice first.

Fang Yu was relieved to see the choice of the three referees. He was most afraid that the three referees would be bribed by Shuxianghui, and deliberately misled the guests and tourists of other scoring groups in the review process.

According to the basic order of food tasting, it is common to start with foods that are light in taste, and then foods that are too strong and special. In this way, the taste perception can be minimized and the perception of the dish will be deviated.

From the perspective of ingredient selection and cooking methods, Fangyu's Qingfeng rice should be regarded as a lighter food than cold pot fish. However, because the taste of Qingfeng rice is mainly sweet, it is reasonable for the referee to taste it in the order of main course first and then dessert.

Now, judging from the selection of the three referees, they should not deliberately lean towards Ma Hao.

The three referees tasted Fang Yu's breeze rice together, and their performance was obviously much more professional than those guests and tourists. Although they were surprised after tasting the first bite, they restrained their appetite and just tasted every ingredient on the plate and put down the dishes.

The three of them whispered a few words, and then began to taste Mahao's Mahao's cold pot fish.

Ma Hao looked at the three referees nervously, and found that the three referees only ate a piece of fish fillet, drank a small mouthful of fish soup and put down the bowl, without showing any happy or excited expressions on their faces, and couldn't help but beat the drum secretly in their hearts.

The three referees frowned and talked to each other for a few more words, and then the referee surnamed Zhong, who was sitting in the middle, turned on the microphone on the referee's bench and began to comment on Fang Yu and Ma Hao's dishes.

"Both chefs are young, and your dishes are characterful, if not outstanding. If it were a different environment, we would love to talk to you about it. But since it's a culinary showdown today, the responsibility of the three of us old guys is to express some opinions. ”

Referee Zhong picked up the black porcelain bowl, held the microphone and said:

"Ma Hao, your cold pot fish should be made from wild tarpon from the water source in the upper reaches of the river. It is indeed the soup with fresh meat and tender meat, fine selection of materials, and no expense, in terms of taste alone, it has won the true heritage of Tangjia cuisine. ”

Referee Zhong paused, and then said:

"But... Ma Hao, this fish soup of yours is made by simmering a lot of fish bones and fish meat over low heat, right? ”

"Yes, the three seniors are really powerful, and they tasted it at once. The base soup of this cold pot fish uses nearly 100 fish heads and bones of silver carp, adds more than 40 kinds of condiments, and it took ten hours to boil successfully" Ma Hao knew that he couldn't hide it, so he happily admitted it.

The guests, tourists and staff at the scene were surprised to hear Ma Hao's words, and some foreign exhibitors who did not understand Chinese did not know what everyone was surprised at first, and when others translated Ma Hao's words to them, they also exclaimed.

Referee Zhong looked around quietly, and continued to say to Ma Hao:

"Your idea is very good, the function of ordinary cold pot fish base soup is mainly to blanch the fish fillet at the same time, and infiltrate the spices in the soup to complete the secondary processing. In this process, the flavor of the fillet becomes richer, but the umami taste decreases. However, your method can further enhance the flavor of the fish fillet with a rich fish broth. However, this will suppress the flavor of the other condiments in the soup, and the fish fillet will not be able to achieve its original purpose during the shabu-shabu process. ”

"To solve this problem, I salted the fillets in advance." Ma Hao followed up on Chief Judge Zhong's words.

"That's true, and that's the way you do it." Referee Zhong did not refute directly, but nodded first and agreed with Ma Hao's statement. But then Referee Zhong shook his head again and said:

"But the biggest failure of your cold pot fish is in the marinating of the fillet. It's a great way to marinate the fillet in a jar, but you don't have lemongrass in the spices you use to marinate the fillet.

As we all know, lemongrass has a strong lemon flavor, which can remove the fishy flavor and enhance the flavor, which is originally very suitable for making fish dishes. It's a pity that the recipe of your cold pot fish is very complete and mature, and it has the characteristics of both spicy and spicy flavors in Sichuan and Shu cuisine.

The strong-smelling lemongrass in this dish is like a child who can't find a mother, and it can't be blended into the spicy flavor, nor can it be matched with the spicy flavor, which looks very incongruous. ”

Ma Hao smiled bitterly in his heart, he didn't know that it was not appropriate to use lemongrass, but in just one night, he really couldn't find a better spice to cover up the smell that people couldn't know, so he had to do it as a last resort.

In order to match the flavor of lemongrass and to cover up the taste of other special condiments in the fish soup, he actually increased the amount of pickled pepper and pickled ginger. Fortunately, Judge Zhong didn't know much about the authentic recipe of cold pot fish and didn't find out about it.

Regarding Judge Zhong's words, Ma Hao did not explain or refute them, so he could only eat Coptis chinensis dumbly and make an expression of being humbly taught.

After commenting on Ma Hao's cold pot fish, Judge Zhong turned his head and began to evaluate Fang Yu's breezy rice.

"Fang Yu, I like your breeze rice very much with Lai and Liao. The ingredients you use are all of the grade above the premium level, and we old guys rarely get to taste such good ingredients. As for your ingredients, I can't even say bad things about your Qingfeng rice. ”

Referee Zhong made a joke with Fang Yu, and then said:

"Judging from the details of your dishes, our three referees are quite satisfied. The characteristic of your fresh breeze rice is balance, whether it is the texture, taste, or nutrition matching, you are very thoughtful. From this point of view, your breeze rice tastes a little too skillful.

In addition, I would like to praise you for the precise use of the amount of ginger in the coconut milk sauce. It combines those tropical fruits to create a South Asian flair, but without breaking through the tolerance of coconut milk and mint, and let the strong spicy flavor ruin the taste of the whole dish.

But I'm still going to pick a little thorn in your breezy rice. Although your Qingfeng rice is very creative, the production process is much simpler than that of cold pot fish. If it's a traditional cooking showdown today, you'll still have to lose a lot of points in terms of culinary difficulty. ”

After Judge Zhong finished commenting, the cooking duel entered the most critical link, the voting session of the 100-person scoring group.

I have done so much and said so much before, and who wins and who loses still depends on this last time.

Lin Qiao switched the picture from the big screen to the voting counter, and the score of the two was immediately displayed on the big screen. The red number representing Fang Yu is on the left, and the blue number representing Ma Hao is on the right, and they are still only three zeros.

When the referee Zhong said to the group of 100, "Please start voting." ”

Whether it was the food hall or the viewing points of the various pavilions of the MITE Pavilion, everyone was clinging to the numbers on the big screen.

Ma Hao's number jumped first, starting from the beginning, and quickly increased to twenty, and then Fang Yu's number began to jump to one.

Although Ben and Mu Xueqi persuaded many guests to eat Qingfeng rice just now, there were still some guests who rejected their suggestions and resolutely supported cold pot fish.

On the lucky tourists' side, except for the more than a dozen lucky tourists who refused the cold pot fish because they tasted the breeze rice first, the other tourists are still struggling with who to vote for.

Lin Xiaoxiao, Qian Duoduo, and Qi Yi stared at Fang Yu's score, clenched their fists, and whispered together in their mouths, "Vote for Brother Fang, vote for Brother Fang." ”

It seemed that their prayers were really useful, and Fang Yu's score slowly but steadily rose, slowly catching up with Ma Hao.

“32、33、34...”

Fang Yu was originally quite relaxed, but at this point, everything he could have done was done, and he felt that he should still have a good chance of winning. But the constant muttering of the score in his heart made him a little nervous.

The numbers on the big screen beat more and more slowly, and finally froze on "Fang Yu forty-nine, Ma Hao forty-six", Fang Yu was slightly ahead.

Ma Hao hated it in his heart, he knew that the three old guys in the referee must have voted for Fang Yu.

But he did not give up hope, this voting mechanism was carefully designed by Du Feibai and adopted with multi-party relations. For the worst state now, there is another layer of insurance, that is, the five most critical votes in the hands of the five leaders.