Half a day had passed. Eric and Leo had been hungry for a long time. Eating a few fruits still left them very hungry; they were carnivores, after all.
After such a long time, the tofu had also finished pressing. There weren't many beans, so he only managed to make two large blocks of tofu.
"This will be delicious stewed with meat later," Eric said to the curious Leo.
The rabbit was very fat and meaty. He deboned the meat, cut it into fist-sized pieces, and put them on skewers. Thinking that he would invite Michael's group to taste it when they returned, he skewered all the meat.
As for the bones, half were chopped into small pieces for stewing, and the other half was skewered whole for roasting.
Today, he started three fires: one for the pottery jar to stew the rabbit bones, another for grilling the meat skewers. Eric even set up a simple grill rack on top of it, placing all the meat skewers on it to be turned and grilled.
The remaining fire was for roasting the other half of the rabbit ribs.
If only he had soy sauce. Right now, he could only boil the bones plain.
After cleaning up, he told Leo to watch the fire first, while he himself used rabbit fur and a tree branch to make a hand-sized basting brush. He pulled a few threads from a linen cloth to tie it together. Although it was a bit crude and might even shed some fur later, at least he wouldn't have to use his hands anymore.
There must be trees here that produce resin. Once he collected some, it would surely be much better than painstakingly tying it with thin threads himself.
In autumn, animals store up fat, so they were very plump. The fat started rendering soon after grilling began. Eric scored a few lines on the rack of rabbit ribs to help the seasoning absorb better, while Leo helped turn the meat skewers beside him.
After grilling for a while longer, Eric took the brush and evenly spread a layer of thorn beast honey water on the ribs and meat skewers. The sweet aroma mixed with the smell of meat wafted into their noses, and the two couldn't help but gulp down their saliva.
Just like that, he would grill for a while then brush on a layer of thorn beast honey water, repeating this four or five times. Afterwards, Leo took over the task of brushing the honey, his expression as serious as if he were performing an incredibly important task.
Eric found it a little funny. He used small vines to skewer the cleaned mushrooms one by one and hung them next to the slices of Thunder-Fire Beast meat to dry.
Keeping some mushrooms aside, he saw that the stewed rabbit bones were almost tender, so he added the mushrooms. He cut the tofu into small pieces and added it to the pottery jar to stew along with the leftover wild vegetables from yesterday. Finally, he added coarse salt and a little fruit juice for seasoning.
The fresh, delicious aroma of mushrooms mixed with meat tickled their noses. The smell of the thorn beast honey-roasted meat was even more overpowering. The rich fragrance spread through the air, making every Snow Wolf in the tribe ravenously hungry.
Ironically, their own usually fragrant roasted meat no longer tasted good in their mouths. Smelling the aroma wafting from Eric's home while eating the burnt-on-the-outside, raw-on-the-inside roasted meat in front of them, they truly couldn't swallow it.
To think the Snow Wolves, who usually had such hearty appetites, would see a day like this.
Among them, a good cook was at best someone who didn't burn the meat or leave it raw. How could they compare to Eric, who had been molded by modern culinary culture?
They secretly glanced at Eric's roasted meat. Could it be that cutting the meat into small pieces like that made it taste better when grilled? It was strange. This kid Eric was no longer chasing after Max, and his cooking skills had become so formidable.
Forget the roasted meat, how was the meat he stewed so fragrant too? They also stewed meat sometimes, but it wasn't even as good as roasted meat—it was bland and tasteless. Adding the same kind of greens didn't make it any better.
Before stewing meat or making soup, Eric always washed the blood out of the meat thoroughly. Moreover, before cooking, he would briefly stir-fry it to render the fat, and the ratio of water to meat also had to be just right for the dish to turn out delicious.
In the distant 21st century, Vietnamese cuisine had even reached a global scale and was recognized by UNESCO. Many foreigners were crazy about Vietnamese food, let alone beastmen living in a nearly primitive society.
And this was under limited conditions; for fear of cracking the pottery jar, Eric didn't even dare to stir-fry. If he had an iron wok, one couldn't imagine how much greater the torture the Snow Wolves would have to endure.
"Wow, it smells so good! Eric must be cooking!" Sam's loud voice carried over.
Eric looked up. Sure enough, Michael, Kevin, and Sam had all arrived. On top of that, Michael had even brought along Max, whose face was scrunched up like a pug's. The two of them walked in front, while Kevin and Sam followed behind, carrying a magical beast that was three to four meters tall.
"Stop with the cold face. Eric is still a cub, after all. Before, he caught a high fever from being in the rain. You brought him back alone and then just ignored him. Come over and see how he is today," Michael secretly whispered into Max's ear, trying to persuade him.
Max shot him an impatient glare.
This childhood friend of his was good at everything, just too soft-hearted. Eric had only been quiet for two days and had just shown a slightly better attitude, and Michael was already softening up, forgetting how Eric used to target him everywhere before.
The feelings between the main top and bottom are really good, it's just that at this stage, the feelings haven't transformed yet.
Eric sneaked a peek, sighing internally. He couldn't ship this. When reading stories, he liked to see power-couples, but when he actually saw two tall, strong men with sharp, handsome features standing next to each other, with their bronze skin and developed muscles, he couldn't dare to imagine them being intimate...
Shaking the random thoughts from his head, Eric took out the stone bowls, chopsticks, and soup spoons he had prepared and first ladled a large bowl of stew for each person.
The thorn beast honey-roasted meat was also ready. Eric placed it on large leaves he had laid out and called everyone over to eat.
He didn't feel anything about Max's attitude; after all, the things the original owner did were indeed very troublesome.
Besides, he had a favor to ask of someone soon. Max's father was their chieftain. He wanted to borrow grain, so if he could ease the relationship with Max, it would naturally be better. In any case, he had no ill intentions towards Max and was acting openly and honorably.