Kinoko Nasu's Nouvelle Cuisine
The visual novel scene is as small and new as the medium is. It’s also pretty tight. Everyone knows everyone, and as a result I regularly meet various scene luminaries and other creatives. Recently I had the chance to hang out with the great Kinoko Nasu at a inflation/vore fetish erogame release party we both were at. I didn’t care about the game much and the booze was shit, but Nasu turned out to be a super good guy. He’s pretty charming and as witty as his prose would suggest. By coincidence I found out that, like myself, he enjoys high level cooking. I expressed interest in his cooking and on the spot Nasu suggested we’d have a boys’ night at his place, dedicated to cookery and getting drunk.
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“So it’s like something you do to unwind yourself?” I ask him, as I watch him score eggplants with a ritual dagger of some sort. He nods, shrugs bashfully and tries to elaborate with his halting English. “It is like… I worry much less. It’s not stressful. Just doing with my hands and see what comes out. I get outside of my head.”
“I feel the same I suppose, at least on some level. On the other hand, it’s still an aspiration for me. I’m not a casual.”
Nasu nods his approval. I was unexpectedly quite nervous about this evening, but as soon as I got a glass of wine in me I settled down a bit. Nasu is a great host, and I like looking him cook. I can’t help noticing his delicate hands and enchanting, graceful moves. He had chosen a three-course menu of his signature dishes for us tonight. In theory I’m supposed to help him but he’s handling most of the work by himself, very effortlessly. I’m getting a little bit excited.
We sit to eat at the intimately small dinner table of Nasu’s apartment. His forehead is glistening with sweat and his cheeks are flushed. Cooking is a physical activity in a hot kitchen, after all. As we dig in, I see Nasu steal glances at my direction, trying to see a reaction on my face. Naturally, the food is excellent. There’s a wonderful harmony in the elements of each exquisite dish. I compliment Nasu profusely, causing him to blush deep red. He doesn’t really seem to know how to respond. Could it be that he doesn’t cook to other people often?
“Thank you again, the food was incredible.” I sigh as I sit down on the comfy looking sofa. The living room’s walls are full of posters of all the different versions of Saber from Fate/Stay Night. They continue all the way to the ceiling as well. There’s a life sized Saber statue in the corner and a replica Excalibur on the fireplace mantel. A toasty fire is burning, warming us up.
“You’re welcome. Maybe next time, I come to your place and you cook?” “Sure, that’s a deal.”
“Looking forward to it. But tell me Aura, what are you guys working on now?”
“Well… we have this great concept of…”
“Would you like to stay the night?” he asks casually after it’s already well past midnight. I had been sitting on his comfy sofa, lost in thought and cradling a sniffer of Chateau du Breuil VSOP calvados. The fire is already out. I feel pretty drunk. Suddenly I find Nasu sitting on the couch right next to me, reaching with his hand at my…
Poached Egg “Kinoko Nasu”
3dl aromatic mushrooms, like shitake, chanterelle, or other
whole black pepper and allspice
1. Concoct a solution by boiling all the reagents in a small pan. Add the mushrooms, boil for a minute and let cool. Drink a cup of tea with your sister while avoiding thinking of the insides of her thighs. Endure a sleepless night as the full moon haunts you.
1 garlic clove per eggplant
1. ——–When the dawn cuts in your eyes, command the blonde foreigner lying beside you to leave the house. She will comply without a word. Return to your laboratory. The blood on your hands is not your own.
2. Cut the garlic into very thin slices cut it cut it CUT IT CUT IT CUT IT CUT IT. Split the eggplants lengthwise and score the cut surface, carefully like a surgeon. Jam the garlic slices in the cuts. Rub with some olive oil and lay a quartet of thyme twigs on top, then return the eggplant halves back together as they were, as if undoing your own work. Enbalm with aluminium foil. Roast in your furnace for about 45minutes to an hour (longer if needed), until the eggplant is soft to touch and you can almost penetrate the wet, hot flesh with your finger.
3. Discard the thyme and scoop the eggplant flesh off the skins, a gruesome task but it must be done. Put in a food processor, add sour cream, salt and pepper and blend.
4. Heat a wok or frying pan and toast the caviar until it gets a bit thicker.
1. Violently rip the rucola leaves apart from the stems. Like an animal. Like a beast. Parboil the leaves in boiling water for 30 seconds. Blend them with the sour cream, salt, white pepper and a dash of sugar.
1. Grate a small pile of parmesan on a baking sheet and bake in oven for a couple of minutes, until the cheese has melted, bubbling and taken colour.
Construct the dish from the pure, the caviar, the mushrooms, a poached egg and the tuile. Garnish with thyme and rucola leaves and dried mushroom powder. ~ BAD END ~
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