CH 412

The Great Mia, Taster of Peruvian Cuisine

“I see… Picking fruit with the villagers?” Rania asked.

“Yes.” Mia smiled and said, “I worry about getting in the way, though.”

Mia was on a roll right now, all those fruit juices has started her brain working.

After meeting up with Rania, they went to the mayor’s house for lunch.

“Wow, so this is the famous Peruvian dish, the tahkoe.” It took a while, but Mia’s patience was rewarded when a thin wrap of yellowish bread filled with meat and vegetables was brought to the table. It was traditional Peruvian food.

“Well, let’s see… This looks like a small flatbread. Or how about a crêpe? The dryness reminds me of the bread they make for rituals that doesn’t have any leaveners.”

After a first look, she bit off a piece to try it. When the spicy spices hit her mouth, they quickly melted away, leaving behind the soft sweetness of well-baked dough.

“Oh, I see,” she said. “It has its own special taste and sweetness. Now, let’s try the whole thing.”

Mia took a big bite in the middle, being careful not to let the filling fall out. There was a burst of flavors. The ambermoon tomatoes were sour. Sharp red mustard strings on her tongue. She couldn’t name the spices in the mix. Then there were the delicious juices of roasted meat. The bitter taste from the crunchy greens added another layer to the complex taste.

“Wow, that was a very unique culinary experience. Oho ho. Since Rania told me about them, I’ve been wanting to try them. They are, in fact, very good.”

For the record, Mia could handle her spice, which may surprise some people. She could not only eat spicy food, but she could also enjoy it to the fullest. This was thanks to the head chef, who had been giving her all kinds of different foods because he thought that a wide range of flavors was a good thing. Mia’s tongue had been through a lot of different tastes, from bitter to sweet, sour to hot. At first, she had trouble eating a lot of things, but now she could enjoy even foods that were very bitter. You could say that her taste buds had grown up.

You could also say that her taste buds were like those of the average grandma, but not everything that could be said should be said.

The point is that Mia could now enjoy spicy foods just fine. Along with sweet, salty, bitter, sour, and any other flavors that were out there. She could like any taste. Which, if you think about it in terms of body weight, was a pretty dangerous ability. On the bright side, it did make her very open-minded about how people from other countries eat. She tried new foods with an open mind and an even more open stomach.

“I must say, though, this bread is very interesting. If I just look at the filling, I might as well be eating a sandwich, but for some reason, wrapping it in this bread makes it taste totally different.”

“The dough is made from the flour of a type of grain called fullmoon corn. It’s related to wheat.”

“Oh, so it’s not wheat flour. That makes sense,” Mia said to herself as she took another bite.

“Mmm, but it’s very good for sure. I see. It has different properties than wheat flour, so it makes sense that there are different ways to prepare it. Instead of making it into the bread I’m used to, this kind of flatbread seems to make better use of its taste.”

Every place is best enjoyed in the way that is best for it, and food is no different. Assuming that mushrooms taste good no matter how they are cooked shows that you haven’t paid enough attention or done enough work. The real pleasure of mushroom food comes from carefully considering the unique qualities of each species and coming up with ways to cook them that work well together.

“It’s clear that if I want to really enjoy all the different crops I can find in Perujin, I’ll also need to learn how to cook them. And to do that, I’ll have to eat more.”

What had started out as a reasonable thought turned out to be a bit scary.

When Mia had finished eating all the food, Rania slowly lowered her head and said, “I’m sorry things turned out this way, Princess Mia. I’m sorry that my father has put us in this situation…”

“There’s no need to apologize, Rania. I’d be grateful if you could tell me what’s going on, though. What really happened? You said in your letter that Shalloak Cornrogue is going to cause trouble….” Mia stole a look at Tatiana and saw that she was grimly looking at the ground.

Mia told Rania to tell her more.

“A little while ago, this merchant named Shalloak Cornrogue showed up,” Rania said. “It’s the time of year for Thanksgiving, so there are more merchants coming and going than normal. Sometimes it leads to new business deals, so father takes the time to directly answer each one. Shalloak was one of those merchants.”

It wasn’t a coincidence that Rania had overheard that unsettling talk, either. Mia had asked Rania to help spread the word about her sister’s study across the continent, so Rania had been looking for good people to connect with. Saint-Noel was a place where many foreign aristocrats met, so it was a good place to spread the word about her sister’s finding. Rania knew, though, that that alone would not be enough. A lot of nobles didn’t care what happened on the farms in their lands, and royalty was often so far away from farming that talking about it was pointless. Even if she was able to convince some people of what she was saying, the knowledge would at best only be spread in their own countries. If she really wanted to fulfill Mia’s dream of spreading information about cold-resistant wheat across the whole continent, she would have to reach out to a completely different group of people.

So, she set her sights on traders who do business across borders. There were, of course, some traders who only cared about making money and tried to keep the information to themselves. Those people were bad. She needed people who understood why spreading the knowledge was important and were ready to help her do it.

Because of this, she kept a close eye on the merchants coming into Perujin during the Thanksgiving season. Not just an eye, but also ears. She listened closely to the crack in the wall where her father talked to his guests.

Never say that Rania doesn’t have a sneaky side.

As a result, she found out about a plan to harm Tearmoon.

“I’m so sorry, Princess Mia. All of this is because of my father—”

“No.” Mia shook her head and told Rania to stop saying she was sorry over and over again. “If anyone should say sorry, it should be me. This is a mess that the empire made, and Perujin just got caught up in it. I’m sorry for making everyone so worried. I also understand how your father feels…more than a little confused about his relationship with the kingdom. As the King of Perujin, he can’t possibly like the way our nobles treat his country.”

Of course, Mia’s ancestors were the ones who started this whole mess, so she made sure to blame the way Tearmoon nobles treated Perujin. She was good at moving blame, after all.

Then she sighed and said, “I guess I’ll have to talk to the king about this in person.”

Her voice was firm.