Ramen I hardly Know her...

Hifumi has put out the call to the whole of New World. A massive food project is in the works. "If Ando-sama could do it... I can do it... of course he never had to worry about if someone had a cooking skill." he shakes his head. "Alright good good stomachs to throw at the gustatory grenades." he says and sets out bowls on a section of the bar he's corded off. The rest is being used by his normal staff and his normal customers. This side of the bar is for... TESTING...

Yeowang has heard there is food to be had, and taste-testers were wanted. She's an occasional contributor - as a hunter, she gets meat drops pretty frequently, and since she doesn't, herself, cook, it only makes sense. She's also provided some financial backing, but that's just good business practice. "Good evening," she greets Hifumi. "I'm looking forward to this." And she will select a few items to sample, taking her plate back to a seat and sampling.

Free food? Count Kotono and Miyako in!

Granted, Kotono's taste for instant noodles is on and off, but she'd be willing to give them a try again. Especially since she's always looking to try different things here. Bored of burgers? Not quite. Just... you know.

"Looks like there's a little variety," Kotono comments to Miyako as they get their plates.

    Each bowl has a block of dry noodles and a powder, it's instant noodles you have to add water to. His staff refuses to do it making people pour their own hot water.

Shiruba just happened to be passing through the right place in Dun Loireag at the right time to be nearby when two of the best words possible were heard -- free and more importantly FOOD. By the time bowls are being set out she's already sitting on a stool, tail wagging with anticipation. "Is this some of your new special recipe project you've been working on Hifumi?~" As far as she's concerned even bad Hifumi food is going to be better than soggy paper menu crackers so surely nothing will go wrong with this.

There is currently an 80/30 chance that you will get 'failed food' in some form... from black sludge, to what looks like noodles but tastes like pure poison.

    Miyako hmms to Kotono. They'd been in town to see to Estelle, and just haven't gotten transport back to Shibuya yet, but a stopover at the Ryokan isn't a bad idea at all. Instant noodles, though? "Huh, well," she muses. "It has been a while, I suppose."

    She takes a plate and sniffs at the seasoning powder. "Hmmm... Chicken? No... Gator, maybe?" She shrugs and reaches for the pot of hot water.

Thud thud thud thud. What the hell is that sound?

The door practically explodes inwards with Kaydon at the doorway, "I heard someone say free food!?"

    Hifumi smiles at Shiruba "This is the new project... food that can be cooked by people without the cooking skill. Right now the only flavor is... spices and umami... don't ask where the Umami comes from unless you REALLY want to know. Flavors comes later right now... not soggy cardboard is the goal." he sets out some beers and juices for his testers to wash the horrible out or down.

Yeowang has found out too late that she's part of the 80% that got a failed experiment. After a few bites, the food returns to her plate, and is henceforth ignored. She doesn't do anything as tacky as admit that it exists. No, if she ignored it any harder, it might spontaneously vasnish.

"Welp, nothing to be gained without a few risks." Shiruba waits for her turn to have the hot water pot to pour it on her bowl of instant-hopefully-ramen and add the flavoring.

"Please write down which bowl you took, how much hot water you added, and what result you got, then try getting another bowl." he says putting out a book that has places for Name: Bowl: Water: Result: "If you have the cooking skill please just get something to eat and drink from my staff... it's vital that you NOT have the cooking skill when you add the hot water."

Yeowang is certainly qualified in not having cooking skill, but she hadn't realized quite what the test was about. If this is an experiment, she out to participate, and so she'll write down, in careful, neat handwriting, just what she picked, what she added, and what it turned into. She does hesitate in picking something else to sample, though. Once bitten, twice shy.

"I'll go with shrimp," Kotono says as she adds the flavoring and some spices as well before going for the hot water. "I will say these 'exotic' flavors are interesting, but I'll stick with what I like." She shrugs as she goes to get herself a drink before finding a place to sit, making sure Miyako has a spot as well.

    Miyako nods and takes the seat beside Kotono before pouring the water on her noodles. ".... glurk," she says, ever so coherent as only a bard can be.

    "My gods that smells disgusting," she says, pinching her nose and hurrying to the trash can to dispose of the mess. "Right, that's a big nope," she tells Hifumi as she dumps the remains.

Kaydon heads in and sits down, "I'll give it a try. What do I need to do?" He asks, as he looks at the reactions the others are having. Maybe he made a mistake with this..

Kotono is a little wary at first of making her own ramen, but after the water comes on, she finds it smells rather good. "My sympathies, Miyako, as I never was too good of a cook. I think it was luck that mine came out so well."

    Hifumi smiles "A success! Yes it IS Possible to make food that people without cooking can prepare without it turning to goo." he starts to dance... like a man in his mid thirties who's been in a wheelchair for years... that is to say.. badly.

Shiruba picks up her chopsticks afterwards and digs in, pulling up several noodles and thankful it is at least noodles. Plops them in her mouth. Chews thoughtfully... and at least doesn't gag. Maybe because she's chewing a little harder than should be necessary. Snags another bite. Picks up the flavor packet and peaks at it to make sure the contents actually came out.

She grabs the notebowl and jots down the information. "... edible but rubbery to chew... extremely bland... like didn't absorb any flavoring..." Passes the notebook back. "Someone had to get one that properly works, Kotono."

Then picks up the bowl and her chopsticks to continue eating. It -is- still better than soggy cracker menu food, and Shiruba isn't one to let even poor tasting food go to waste.

Yeowang has always had someone to cook for her, so the cook-it-yourself thing is an entirely alien concept. But she eventually braves another dish. It does not go well, either, and after a bite, which is disposed of in a napkin as delicately as she can manage, she records her findings. Her hand is less steady than it was earlier.

    Hifumi smiles and pushes a beer at Yeowang "Have a drink, take an antacid and wait a bit then try again." he says. "This really is important once I know which process makes reliable food for people without the cooking skill food prices will settle down, and people lander and adventurer alike will have more better food available. Food stability will go a long way to helping settle things I think."

Yeowang nods to Hifumi and takes the antacid gratefully, but will decline the beer. "Water or tea are fine," she explains. She nods about the process, and says, "It is a good thing that you are doing this research. I hope you will have a positive result soon."

"Not to mention something like this will be great for those of us that travel a lot," Shiruba pipes in between mouthfuls of bland rubbery ramen. Despite the lack of taste it doesn't tkae her long to finish the bowl and start prepping another one.

After adding the hot water Shiruba reaches for the flavor packet... and by the time she's got it open her 'ramen' has already turned to greenish-black goop. She stares at it for a long moment. Two moments. And then politely pushes the bowl away. "Nope. Even I am not enough of a gastrophiliac to attempt and taste that." She still grabs the notebook to jot down Hifumi's requested information though. Because they are doing science. Food Science! Alton Brown would be proud... and mortified by some of the results.

    Hifumi nods "Good good, thanks Shiruba... that proves that this IS cooking if I don't do my job well enough... and the ones that have totally worked are proof that if I've done everything then the sytem considers it to be 'cooked' and adding hot water to flavor powder and properly flash fried noodles is NOT cooking."

Shiruba after a moment adds "Pass me one of the beers, please? I need to wash down the sight of that inedible accident."

    Miyako nods and takes another bowl, and this time a mug of beer as well. "Good, good. Now we just have to figure out how to tell the difference between successfully cooked, and partially cooked." She settles down to add water to this batch.

    It ... *looks* like noodles. It isn't turning weird colors or melting. She waits a moment, sniffs it. "Hmmmm. Maybe?" Then she tries a bite... and immediately spits it out and reaches for the beer. "Nope!"

Kaydon pours water onto the noodles, and then when he takes a bite of them, immediately turns around and tries not to keep himself from throwing up, "Holy shit. I thought the vegetarian omlette MRE was bad but what the fuck.." He motions for a beer for himself to try to get that taste out of his mouth.

    Hifumi passes Shiruba a beer with a smile and nods to Miyako "That is why you need to write down your results so I can go over which blends of spices, which timing of noodles, which kind of noodles, works best." he passes a beer to Kaydon "We won't feed the world without breaking a few eggs... or uhm... you can't make an omlet without an antacid? A stomache is a terrible thing to waste?"

Shiruba takes a chug from the beer. Then manages a smile. "It's somewhat fitting that none of those sayings are correct. But I have faith you'll figure it out Hifumi!... YOu did get one good bowl out of the batch after all."

Yeowang has written down her latest poor results and drinks her water and antacids. She will then wait a few before braving the samples again. There's only so much a stomach can take.

Looking to Miyako, Kotono gives a nod of sympathy. "I've been in that position before. It's why I sometimes prefer sticking with foods I enjoy." She smiles. "If this doesn't satisfy you, we can always go someplace else and I'll treat you."

    Puts a hand to his chest "You... would sugest eating somewhere else... IN my Ryokan?" he looks over dramatically wounded. "I do serve cooked meals you know... and bento... this is research for a vital need." he sips a glass of juice and tastes some of the powder and noodle combo.

    Miyako finishes off the beer and nods. "It's ok, Ko-chan, if the ramen doesn't work out we can just get burgers." She takes her bowl up to dump it and record the results once again. "Okay, I'mma do one more. Third time's the charm and all that, right?"

    Turning away to rejoin Kotono at their table, she pauses, turns back, and grabs another mug of beer first. "Right."

Shiruba reachs for another bowl once she's gotten over that last attempt. "One more try won't hurt. For science and empty stomachs everywhere, pass the hot water!" She's at least keeping an optimistic mood for moral support even if the results have been less than stellar.

Kaydon chugs his beer, putting the whole thing down in a few seconds, and then scrapes a hand over his tongue, "Ughh. Okay. Lets try again...At least it's not as bad as the first few days being stuck here.." He does grab another bowl and pour water into it, however.

Kotono gives an encouraging look at Miyako. "Give it another try. See what you can come up with, and if it fails, we'll go for burgers."

    The stench that arises when Miyako pours the water over this bowl of noodles is quite possibly the worst thing ever to be smelled by anyone, ever. It beats out old rotting garbage by a mile and a half. At least. She takes one whiff and *runs* to the trash bin, her face green... and as she dumps the sludge into the trash, her breakfast and lunch quickly follow after.

    ".... hurk!"

Shiruba adds the hot water. Adds the flavoring. Gives it an extra swirl with her chopsticks for good measure to make sure the flavoring gets mixed in good this time. Then finally pinches out a sizable wad of what definitely looks like ramen noods and plops it in her mouth.

And beams briefly. "Hifumi! I got another one that came out properly!" Quickly grabs the notepad to jot the info down before before eagerly chowing down the rest of the bowl of proper instant noodles.

Yeowang, after a break of several minutes, finally braves the samples again, and has put together something with brown gravy-like sauce and srips of meat and strange vegetables. She samples it hesitantly, particularly given her last two results, but actually looks surprised as she winds up with something decent. Not restauant-quality or anything, but 'not disgusting' is a victory at this point. She logs it appropriately.

Gritting her teeth, Kotono runs over to help Miyako. "I agree, this isn't the best. We may have tried, but it's not gonna help if you keep losing your lunch. Let's go someplace else, shall we?"

    Sips his juice and nods to everyone "Good good yes, please keep making bowls and testing, please make sure you make notes so I know which batches work." he says "I need to go fry the next batch and set them to dry for tomorrows tests." he nods "I'll be back, my staff can get you more beer..." he grumps at Kotono "Just eat from the customer side of the bar if you can't take more testing sheesh act like it isn't a going concern or run resturant." he says with a somewhat uncharacteristic sharpness. The small flower drake 'Snapdragon' appears on his shoulder and he stomps into the kitchen.

The second bowl gets water, Kaydon takes a bite, and then at least is nice enough to run outside before he throws up. This one was somehow even worse than his last bowl. It's not a pretty sight.

    Miyako sighs heavily as she rises from the trash can. "Oh gods that was horrible. Sorry Hifumi, I'm out. No ramen for me today." She sighs and grabs a mug of beer, draining it in a single long pull.

    Several deep breaths later, she leans against the bar and turns to look at Kotono. "No need to leave, we can just get burgers here."

Shiruba watchs Hifumi stomp off into the kitchen. "I think that was the Fey Mood talking. There's only one other time I've seen him upset and it was over something much, much worse." She shrugs, and resumes eating up her bowl of proper instant ramen.

"Of course," Kotono says, mentally slapping herself. "The usual, Miyako? I'm thinking I might try something slightly different."

After a few mintues Kaydon wanders back in, it looks like he might have washed his mouth out in a peko trough, "Ugh. I need real food, please.."

    Miyako looks over at Kotono, then nods. "I wonder if they can manage tacos today... It's been an age since I've had anything tex-mex."

Shiruba makes another extra note or two after finishing the bowl of proper instant ramen and sets the notepad aside. "Yeah, I think I'm done after that for now, too." She picks up the rest of her beer, and moves over to the 'customer' side of the bar, motions for the fox-eared cait barkeeper "Can I get a few beinto boxes to go? I'm heading out with some of the lower level Silver Swords to train and I promised I'd bring them some actual food to take on their scouting routines afterwards."