Chapter 637 The Cold Noodles Debacle

Arranging the grilled cold noodles competition as the second-to-last segment was a selfish decision by Meng Chang.

His sole purpose in organizing this street food competition was to market the Cold Noodles Girl.

Placing the grilled cold noodles competition near the end would leave a deeper impression on the audience, but putting it last would be too obvious.

By putting it second-to-last and scheduling a niche snack as the last segment, he could ensure that the audience wouldn't be too resistant and would have a strong impression of the Cold Noodles Girl. At the same time, he planned to have the judges praise her grilled cold noodles in comparison to others, reinforcing the idea that "the Cold Noodles Girl's grilled cold noodles are the best."

It was all a scheme.

However, President Pei had already seen through Meng Chang's trick. The grilled cold noodles competition would definitely not go as planned.

Soon, the grilled cold noodles vendors were ready and began cooking. Unlike the other groups, the Cold Noodles Girl's chef was also cooking on site, competing against the other vendors.

When the camera focused on the Cold Noodles Girl's chef, the viewers in the livestream instantly revolted.

"Damn! Caught off guard!"

"This is an ad for Cold Noodles Girl! I seriously watched this for hours!"

"So that's what this is all about. I was wondering why Cold Noodles Girl was bothering with this competition; it's all to advertise herself..."

Many viewers realized what was happening as soon as they saw the Cold Noodles Girl competing.

So, all that buildup, all that street food, was just window dressing to highlight the Cold Noodles Girl's taste!

Many viewers were disappointed and left the livestream.

The key to this kind of competition is fairness.

It would be disgusting if connections squeezed out truly talented participants to win the top prize.

Many viewers already foresaw the script and felt there was no point in continuing to watch, so they left.

In fact, according to Meng Chang's original plan, if the program were prerecorded and released after editing, viewers wouldn't be so resistant.

But now that it was live, the situation was completely different.

Pei Qian was overjoyed to see the number of viewers drop by several thousand as soon as the Cold Noodles Girl appeared, and it was still dropping.

Great!

He was worried because the room was too popular, but now everyone was leaving!

The competition continued on site.

Grilled cold noodles cook quickly, and staff members delivered them to the judges and audience on special trays.

The judges looked at each other and began to taste.

The livestream comments were unreadable.

"Rigged! Protest!"

"Heh, no need to watch, Cold Noodles Girl is definitely first, everyone else is just there."

"I predict the judges will praise the Cold Noodles Girl's taste, the chef will give an emotional speech, and the host will give the Cold Noodles Girl another wave of advertising..."

"Ah, what a great competition, everything was going so well, but they had to pull this stunt at the end."

"Okay, okay, stop advertising and skip to the next segment, I want to know what snacks are in the niche snack group."

The viewers in the livestream already assumed that the judges would start praising.

But they were all wrong, and completely wrong!

The first judge picked up the microphone and began to evaluate the grilled cold noodles in front of him.

"Overall, I think number 6's grilled cold noodles taste the best."

"Number 6's grilled cold noodles are the traditional sweet and sour flavor. Compared to other sweet and sour grilled cold noodles, its greatest feature is the precise amount of seasoning, which is just right."

"Sweet and sour grilled cold noodles should have less sugar and more vinegar. Because the high temperature of the griddle will evaporate a lot of the vinegar, and it will also make the grilled cold noodles more flavorful. If you put too little, it will only taste sweet and not sour, and the taste will be completely different."

"The amount of seasoning added must also be coordinated with the grilling time on the griddle, otherwise the taste and flavor of the grilled cold noodles will be off. So, in my opinion, number 6's grilled cold noodles have the best taste."

"As for number 1's grilled cold noodles, which is the Cold Noodles Girl's grilled cold noodles, I think there is a problem with the amount of seasoning: too little vinegar. I suspect that when calculating the amount of vinegar, they didn't consider the evaporation caused by the high temperature of the griddle, which affected the taste of the grilled cold noodles."

Then, the second judge began to speak.

"I agree with the first judge, number 6's vendor's grilled cold noodles are indeed very good, but I think number 3's vendor's grilled cold noodles are better in terms of texture."

"I specifically observed the production process of all the vendors. Everyone sprayed water on the wrappers during the grilling process, which is correct, because spraying the right amount of water can make the wrappers softer and more chewy, and the texture will be better. And vendor number 3's timing and amount of water spraying were just right, so from the texture of the wrapper alone, number 3's grilled cold noodles are the best."

"As for the Cold Noodles Girl's grilled cold noodles, I don't think the texture of the wrapper is bad, but it's not particularly good either. It gives people the feeling of being mediocre, without any obvious and impressive features."

The judges commented one by one.

What surprised the viewers in the livestream was that the "awkward praise" that everyone had expected didn't appear.

The judges' comments were realistic, even a bit nitpicky, and completely unforgiving!

Many viewers learned from the judges' explanations that even a simple grilled cold noodles dish has so much to it.

The grilling temperature, the heat, the amount of water sprayed during the process, the amount of seasoning... even a slight deviation will affect the taste of the final product.

According to the judges, the Cold Noodles Girl's grilled cold noodles were obviously not perfect, and immediately paled in comparison to these "ace" grilled cold noodles.

This undoubtedly answered the question that had been debated online: is the Cold Noodles Girl's grilled cold noodles really that good?

The answer is that it's not bad. Compared to the wildly varying flavors of roadside stalls, it may indeed be better, but it's definitely not as good as Meng Chang claimed, and it's still a long way from the so-called "God of Grilled Cold Noodles."

In the end, the Cold Noodles Girl's grilled cold noodles performed poorly in the evaluation, with an overall score near the bottom.

Objectively speaking, this result was a bit low. The Cold Noodles Girl's grilled cold noodles didn't taste that bad. It was mainly because the judges criticized the Cold Noodles Girl one by one, which had a certain impact on the audience, resulting in a very low score for the Cold Noodles Girl.

The host was a little embarrassed and looked at Qi Yan.

According to the original plan, after the scores were released, there would be an interview with the Cold Noodles Girl's chef, praising her unique cooking skills and promoting her.

But now the script had completely changed. The Cold Noodles Girl's score was at the bottom, so how could they do the interview?

Wouldn't that turn into a public flogging?

Qi Yan quickly waved her hand, signaling the host to skip this segment and move on.

The host was quick-witted and immediately understood, moving on to the next stage: the niche snack group.

Compared to the previous groups, the niche snack group looked more bizarre, with very rare street snacks.

For example, tornado potatoes, which use a whole potato as the raw material, cut into spiral-shaped thin slices with special knife skills, skewered with bamboo skewers, and then stretched to 30 centimeters without breaking. They are then deep-fried and sprinkled with sauce, making them look very attractive.

Another example is fried bananas, which are wrapped in flour or breadcrumbs and fried until golden brown, crispy on the outside and tender on the inside, making them very delicious.

In addition, there are fried yogurt, chicken wings stuffed with rice, seaweed cakes, etc., each with its own characteristics.

Because it was an evaluation of different types of food, there were naturally no unified rules. The scores all depended on the preferences of the judges and the audience.

...

The on-site event had already entered the next segment, but the comments in the livestream were still discussing the grilled cold noodles.

"Huh? Guessed wrong?"

"What happened to the ad for the Cold Noodles Girl? Not only didn't they advertise, but they also criticized her?"

"Did I see that right? This is a competition organized by the Cold Noodles Girl!"

"Spending money to organize a competition to criticize yourself? That's awesome!"

"What is going on, I'm so confused..."

The livestream viewers were all dumbfounded and didn't understand what the script was.

What was the Cold Noodles Girl trying to achieve by organizing this street food competition?

It would make sense if she wanted to advertise her grilled cold noodles, but not only did she not advertise, but she also criticized her own grilled cold noodles!

This was completely contrary to common sense and logic, because the Cold Noodles Girl had no need to do this.

Although there is a big difference between delicious and unpalatable food, most viewers are in front of a screen and cannot taste or sample it. Doesn't the deliciousness all depend on the judges' mouths?

Even if they were slightly perfunctory and gave the Cold Noodles Girl second or third place, picking out a few unimportant flaws, they could still ensure the fairness of the competition.

Was it necessary to be so strict?

Some people who had eaten the Cold Noodles Girl's food even felt that the score was too low. Although the Cold Noodles Girl's food wasn't as good as Meng Chang had claimed, it was still better than the roadside stalls!

For a time, the viewers in the livestream were confused and were discussing the Cold Noodles Girl's intentions, and no one was paying attention to the niche snack group competition.

...

At 7 p.m., the street food competition finally came to an end.

After the niche snack group evaluation ended, the final overall evaluation began.

The officials ranked all the participating vendors according to their scores and awarded trophies and bonuses to the winning vendors.

Undoubtedly, the Cold Noodles Girl's grilled cold noodles were not selected. They were at the bottom of the grilled cold noodles group, so there was even less chance in the overall evaluation.

The winning vendors were very happy, accepting the trophies and bonuses from the staff and proudly waving to the camera.

The other vendors who didn't win were also applauding and blessing them. The entire street food competition came to a successful conclusion after a fierce afternoon of competition.

Qi Yan breathed a sigh of relief. In any case, the event was completed!

It was good that there weren't any major mishaps.

Afterward, she had to sort out these video materials and have someone edit them before uploading them to Ailidao and other video websites to achieve the effect of secondary dissemination.

But Qi Yan and the vast audience had the same question.

What was President Pei's purpose in doing this?

Having the judges harshly criticize his own Cold Noodles Girl for having a bad taste, wasn't that making the already cold Cold Noodles Girl even worse?