I’m free today. As a result of pushing it a bit too far to save the asteroid general-purpose processing station, Tortilla Single got a bite taken out of it. Repairs are finally finishing up tonight, and I’m going to get it tomorrow. That also means checking out of the city hotel paid for with Alliance money… So I’m making the most out of the big bath this morning.
I was going to stay here until my fingers got wrinkly, but it’s cleaning time, so I have to leave at ten.
When I go back to the room, the girls hug me reeking of alcohol, and I barely manage to pry them off me and escape. I wonder why they’re so forward…
And so, I start walking around the area near the city hotel wondering what to do. It seems like the idea of having trees along the sidewalk exists here, but they seem artificial. There’s no smell, and they don’t really make a mess.
Lately I’ve taken up looking for remnants of Earth as a hobby, but I want to do that in a more relaxed place.
I look around to see if I can find a cafe or something, and see more cars and armor running around than I would’ve thought. I don’t think I’m going to find that sort of thing here, I think as I keep walking, but feel a nice smell.
Is it a cafe? Actually, it’s weird to sense a smell in the colony in the first place. I wonder what it is, and find an old wooden sign hung up high that says organic farmers market. I walk towards it, and see simple stalls lined up.
That’s right, I said I’d treat them to organic food. And I’m curious to see what a space farmer’s market is like.
“Welcome. Craft cola for twenty puni! Twenty puni!”
“All organic! No additives! A jar of blue nut butter for sixty puni!”
“Organic skewer grilled fish! Only salt added! A hundred fifty puni!”
“Offal stew~. Offal stew~. Of-fal stew stew stew~. With organic vegetables, a hundred twenty puni~.”
“Beef! Beef on skewers! Real and carefully managed calf! Only two hundred puni~!”
No, I’m not touching that. Thinking about it with Earth standards, it feels like there’s one or two extra digits there.
What’s that salt grilled fish that’s about fifty centimeters and stuck on a thick skewer? And I really don’t feel like eating blue peanut butter.
As for cola, I can have a float any time I want if I ask… Is that offal stew ten thousand yen? And the meat skewers twenty???
Also, the lettuce being used as a topping is sold for ten puni a leaf. And I can’t believe I’m seeing people eating meat wrapped in it.
“Sausage~. There’s nothing mixed in it~.”
“No, sausages are supposed to be stuffed mixed together.”
I respond without thinking. The middle-aged guy selling them is huge. He’s about two meters tall and his arms look like logs. Oh no, did I pick a fight with him?
“Ah!? Our sausages are made with eighty percent pork and some herbs mixed in…”
“So you did mix something!!”
“Ah! I did!!! Hahaha!!”
What’s this guy on about!? Anyway, meat? I know what sausages are, that’s common sense. They’re not mortadella.
This stall has refrigerated glass cases like you’d see in the meat section of a supermarket.
I see three centimeters long dry sausages inside, normal sausages with herbs that are about two fingers thick, pork jerky, bacon, among other things. Is the one that looks a little odd smoked cheese? There’s even a whole ham leg proudly displayed.
And the prices… If I buy too much, I’ll blow the girls’ wages.
“Mister, do you have stuff like hot dogs?”
“Ah, that processed stuff is over there. My two wives sell them. What, wanna buy ’em?”
“Eh, let me think… Do you have a bag or something for me to take it back?”
“Of course!”
Am I being a bit stingy… It’s not like I want to devour them, I’m sharing them with everyone, so…
“Just to confirm, these raw sausages and bacon have to be cooked, right?”
“Of course! If you grew up in a colony and don’t know how to grill them, you better stop!”
“I was born on a planet. Okay, one dry sausage, a pack of pork jerky… Six. One smoked cheese pack, and three packs of raw ham slices. And a bag.”
“Yes sir! That will be four hundred and ninety puni!”
I pay the equivalent of fifty thousand yen with my smartphone, and I’m given the meat in a thick black plastic bag that doesn’t reveal its contents from the outside.
“Watch yourself! You look a little on the weak side!”
“I am weak.”
I open my jacket and show him the laser pistol holster.
“That’s why I’m quick to pull the trigger.”
“You’ll be fine then! Stop by my wives’ place too! That crispy bacon is tasty and can be taken home in a sealed container!”
“Ah, I’ll stop there now.”
I wave lightly and head to where he’s pointing
Hm, that’s heavy. I think that’s three thousand yen for a twenty gram pack of pork jerky… I’m pretty sure this will disappear in an instant, so I’ll get six. One for each person, plus two to test.
If I was working as a mercenary alone I wouldn’t mind scooping up all this stuff. I could bring something like cooler bags.
“Welcome! Welcome! Hot dogs! Hot sandwiches! You can take them home!”
It’s a hot dog stand. They seem pretty standard. Sausage and lettuce with ketchup and mustard. They’re three hundred puni so let’s pretend we don’t see that.
The hot sandwiches are bacon, lettuce, and cheese, and boiled egg and mayo can be added. Should I buy a BLC? Let’s not look at the price. It’s two hundred fifty puni, but let’s not look.
The side menu includes things like coleslaw salad and a pile of sauerkraut. That’s thirty puni, so let’s not look. Nuggets and potatoes aren’t the ones that change flavor with a food printer, so they could be nice…
“Excuse me, I’ll have a hot dog, one bacon hot sandwich, a pile of sauerkraut, and one coleslaw salad. Oh, and two slices of saute bacon and two grilled sausages. In containers to go, please.”
“Yes! A thousand and fifty puni!!”
Oh, a third of the daily wage is gone.
With a nice hundred thousand yen transaction, everything is freshly made and put into somewhat three dimensional storage bags. I’m given two bags, like when I used to eat at fast food places. Uwah, these stand out.
“You’re a bit weak! Well! This place is safe! I dunno about the docks though!”
“Ah, I’ll be fine.”
I show the laser pistol, and see an expression of understanding. And I head back to the hotel.
Let’s not talk about the prices. I feel like if I do, the girls will hang me.
▽▽▽
Saratha suspends me with her hands. She’s too strong. There’s no place to hang me, so she lifts herself with her tail up and near the ceiling with a neck hanging tree move.
Sometimes she does this to clean the ceiling of the seven meter tall cargo bay. She doesn’t need a stepladder, and her spine is strong.
“Organic… Meat~.”
“Is there only one of each of these cooked products?”
“They were expensive, so I thought we’d share.”
“One for three hundred puni…”
Kori starts looking around what I brought, and starts on the pork jerky I brought as something to go with alcohol.
“What!? Gye… Its flavor is so intense…”
“Eh? Lemme see… Wah, smokey! What is this!?”
“Eh, lemme see~… Tasty~! Tough~|!
“Is it that strange?”
Saratha throws what’s left of what she was eating into my mouth. It’s smoked and heated crunchy meat made with borderline discard worthy fatty pork belly. It has a lot of fat, so it’s juicy enough to be mistaken for moisture despite being jerky. But each drop of oil is filled with a smokiness, along with the salty and spicy flavor. It really goes well with beer.
I thought this would be the most popular, but apparently not.
“Tough~. Tough~!”
“Hnu… It seems this would go with alcohol.”
“It’s tasty, but really fat. You don’t like it, do you Kori?”
“Hm~. I feel like it would go with cola~. But the fat makes me feel stuffed~~.”
“I thought this would be a sure winner.”
That’s not really the reaction I was expecting. Saratha puts me down, and we cut the cooked bacon in half, to divide the two slices for the four of us.
“Hnya~!? There’s a bitter part~!! It’s tasty, but…~”
“Oh, there is… It has a stronger flavor than food printer bacon, and it’s crunchy, but it’s so fatty.”
“It is tasty!”
“Bitter part… The burnt taste!? I guess something from a food printer wouldn’t have that.”
I’m surprised about the many reactions to the burnt part. Well, it’s not that burnt, just a bit crispy at the ends. Next I put out the sauerkraut and coleslaw salad, but the sauerkraut…
“Ogyah!? What is this~? It smells~!”
“Uwah, this is really acid. Can we really eat it?”
“S-so sour…”
One abstains, and two really don’t like it. Even when I put bacon on top and eat it, they look at me like I’m weird. Well, this one is peculiar, but it’s tasty with fatty meat. I can’t make pot-au-feu, so…
“I see, a food printer can’t make something this sour. It holds back the smell. I don’t think coleslaw salad is that intense, but…”
“Crunchy crunchy~… Is the mayo kinda sour?”
“It does seem like it… A little harsh…”
“I can handle this much… Ah, it’s like the fat disappears in the mouth. I get why Genma was eating all those rotten leaves.”
“R-rotten leaves… I guess that’s right, but… That’s called fermentation.”
Apparently fermented products are less popular than I thought. Come to think of it, food printer food holds back on the sourness and acidity a lot. Although it can make a salty taste.
“I wonder if people who have eaten organic vegetables feel like something’s off because they don’t have that crunch.”
“Come to think of it, it is rare for food printer food to have this kind of bite. Although it does have elasticity.”
“Crunchy is hard to eat~!”
“Now that you mention it… I guess? Maybe that’s it. But vegetables soften if you boil them.”
We split a hot dog in four, and they say the bitterness of the lettuce gets in the way more than they thought. Everyone has such sharp tongues!
The food and bread receive better reviews, being called far tastier than something from a food printer. And everyone likes the ham. What’s surprising is the smoked cheese.
“C-chemical~~~!”
“Ooh… Cheese has this thick flavor when in a lump…?”
“I don’t think I like this crispy layer on top. And it does feel chemical, uh?”
“That’s because it was wood smoked. Sometimes it gets this seirogan taste.”
But she can get used to it, says Suzuri as she nibbles on it and drinks. Saratha says it’s pretty tasty, and Kori presses something she nibbled on me. Actually, how does a cola float slime girl nibble?
“I bought it on the spur of the moment, but I’m glad I bought it all in small quantities. Organic food is more about preference than I thought.”
“True~. I didn’t think there would be so much stuff I don’t like~!”
“For me, it’s the fermented stuff. Do they have to?”
“I feel as though I once heard from a business partner that grew vegetables that they let it rot for preservation.”
“Ferment. They let it ferment. But I guess it’s close to rotting. Keeping it edible while it slowly decayed…. In my time, we had freezers and other cold storage, so it was more about enhancing the taste.”
They don’t like the dry sausage, probably because of the spicy chilly pepper flavor. But strangely enough, the hot dog mustard not so much. I want to go with them next time so we can all share in moderation while picking the organic food we like.
But at this rate, grilled fish is going on the forbidden list.
Maybe I could get a refrigerated case and keep the ham leg on display in the living room!
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Tortilla Single got a bite taken out of it. -> Tortilla Double got a bite taken out of it.
Thanks for the treat.