After getting up the next day, Chen Mo first went to the meat stall to buy beef.

With the security of a cabinet, Chen Mo was quite generous, buying sirloin and rib roast from ten cows in one go.

Of course, for the rib roast, he only took the part from the sixth to the twelfth rib. This section has bigger ribs and more meat; it's the position typically known as the "tomahawk steak."

Sirloin is just regular beef steak, but in reality, domestic Chinese yellow cattle sirloin is somewhat disappointing when it comes to roasting steak.

Roasting it directly would result in an inevitable outcome: it's too tough to chew.

So the sirloin needs to be refined after purchase, and then the meat fibers should be tenderized to make it suitable for roasting.

Lastly is the upper rib position, where Chen Mo kept the meat on the bone.

This bone is the legendary T-bone steak.

It's an interesting cut; supposedly, the two sides of the T-bone represent poverty and wealth, with the rich eating the fillet and the poor the sirloin.

Once divided this way, there isn't much left from a cow that can be used for roasting.

Some of the sirloin is used for the most basic steaks, and the rest is for tomahawk and T-bone. Whether you get to eat one kind over the other depends on what the boss is roasting at the time—it's non-negotiable.

Carrying the ingredients back, Chen Mo also stopped by the pharmacy to buy a packet of Banlangen, uncertain if the recent Black Blade's temperature setting is too low, as he feels a bit stuffy in the nose.

Returning to the parking lot, Chen Mo placed the ingredients back in his food truck, preparing to start the initial processing.

Thankfully, this was an open parking lot with lawns and greenery around, making the environment rather pleasant.

If it were an underground parking lot with car exhaust fumes, that would have been unbearable.

The first task in processing the steak is refinement.

The fascia on the surface of the sirloin needs to be stripped off, a skilled task that can't be accomplished just by brute force. It requires using the Black Blade to pull it apart. Back in Hanyang, Chen Mo handled quite a bit of fascia but left the meat cutting to Uncle Biao.

Now, it becomes quite manageable.

After removing the fascia, next is to pick out any visible tendons within the sirloin, as these are basically impossible to chew and have a terrible texture in the mouth.

Finally, there's slicing.

The cylindrical sirloin is cut into slices, each 1 cm thick.

Yellow cattle meat quality isn't like the grain-fed beef abroad; it's relatively tougher. If you're still aiming for something like medium rare, that would be nonsense—it's got to be cooked through!

A single sirloin can be sliced into as many as forty or fifty steaks.

Finally, use a steak hammer to pound each steak to break down any remaining tendons and meat fibers that couldn't be picked out, ensuring the final product remains tender and doesn't become too tough to chew.

After sorting out nearly five hundred pieces of steak, Chen Mo placed the pounded meat slices upright in a steamer rack and eventually set them in the cabinet, with the temperature set to 2°.

To age.

Chen Mo, glancing at the recipe in his mind, was slightly confused, "What does aging mean, do you need to expel residual blood from the meat?"

A textual explanation quickly appeared from the system.

[After losing blood supply, beef cells undergo anaerobic respiration, producing lactic acid.]

[The purpose of aging is to decompose lactic acid into carbon dioxide, alcohol, and water, which volatilize, while adenosine triphosphate within beef cells is broken down into hypoxanthine under the action of enzymes.]

Chen Mo felt like he was back on the bridge, explaining why to use overnight rice. He asked, "What is hypoxanthine?"

[The main component of MSG.]

So that's it!

In other words, aging not only expels unpleasant flavors from the beef but also enhances its flavor, making it an essential step.

Learned something new!

Chen Mo tried hard to remember those terms. Such things may not be used regularly, but when there's a chance to mention them, it feels impressive!

Including the T-bone and tomahawk steaks, Chen Mo carried out nearly the same procedure, and while the beef was aging in the cabinet, Chen Mo couldn't just sit around.

A-grade flour was taken out to start making dough.

In Shanxi cuisine, there's a type of noodle called "heluo noodles."

This noodle doesn't have any unique features; initially, it was made by combining three types of flour—"buckwheat flour," "oat flour," and "bean flour," all specialties of Shanxi—hence the name "three-flour heluo."

Over time, heluo noodles gradually moved from people's homes to street-side restaurants, and for convenience, they stopped using three types of flour, switching to white flour instead.

The way heluo noodles are made naturally makes them very convenient to prepare!

Chen Mo didn't have a heluo frame for now, so he had to use an electric noodle maker, swapping the plate for one with round holes to begin making.

"Once tonight's charity event is done, tomorrow I'll flash back to Jingzhou to buy a heluo frame."

To be honest, that thing is quite interesting.

A metal pot is placed on the stove, with the heluo frame set above it. The well-kneaded dough is stuffed into the piston device, then someone pushes down the pressure lever, and out come the noodles.

In childhood, Chen Mo loved doing this, though he was too weak; each time his mom put the dough in, he'd lean his whole body on the lever—it was fun.

Kneading heluo noodles isn't very difficult; you just knead the dough until smooth, divide into evenly thick pieces, and let it rest in the cabinet.

Ingredients sorted!

The next step is seasoning.

"Although not making Western cuisine, I must say, the tomato beef sauce in spaghetti is indeed delicious. But tomato beef sauce isn't exclusive to spaghetti, is it?"

When cutting the steak, to ensure neat edges, quite a bit of sirloin was trimmed off—perfect for use right now.

"I'm getting quite good at waste recycling," Chen Mo chuckled self-mockingly, then thought maybe it shouldn't be called waste recycling but rather efficient use, preventing waste!

All beef trimmings were minced into a meat paste.

Chen Mo stored the mince and briskly headed for the nearest supermarket.

On a round trip, he bought red tomatoes, some onions, celery, carrots, a bag of lemons, and... a bag of chili peppers.

"Usually, the tomato beef noodle dish contains more tomato than beef mince, which is completely out of proportion!"

This reminded Chen Mo of a dish often seen in school cafeterias, scrambled eggs with tomatoes. It felt like this dish in the school canteen should be called tomatoes scrambled with eggs instead.

So the tomato beef sauce must be beef with a tomato flavor! It shouldn't be tomato juice with a beef flavor—that would be wrong.

So infusing the beef mince with tomato flavor is key to this sauce!

Fortunately, there was still plenty of time, as business hours were late, giving Chen Mo ample time to prepare.

Little did he know.

At that moment, Jia Mei Gym not far from the parking lot was in an uproar!

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