Chef was faced with a difficult decision. On the one hand, he was originally planning to finally go get more flour today. Flour, being the magical ingredient that it was, made anything taste better. It was also the secret to making pastries. Chef really liked those.

Hence his conundrum. If he left to go get the flour first, he’d be able to turn the rabbit into a pie or something. Perhaps he’d finally get to add in milk and cheese to make something truly unique. But there was a fundamental problem with that plan.

Rabbit meat is so stringy though… it would be such a waste.

He didn’t have an infinite supply of flour. While he might not have paid complete attention to Therace while the mill operation was explained to him, what was very clear were the ingredients involved. Specifically, in order to make flour, you had to grow grains. The farm at the village was the only place he’d ever seen grain before, at least as far as he could remember. Once that ran out, he would once again be flourless.

Was it possible that Chef could make something delicious with the rabbit meat and flour? Absolutely, but at this point he was convinced that it just tasted worse than boar. That didn’t mean he’d given up on trying to make it taste good at all though.

Chef was going through all the different things he’d learned lately regarding recipes when he suddenly remembered the idea that Therace came up with. What if he smoked the meat with some cheese?

This required experimentation, and he didn’t want to waste the high leveled meat. Fortunately for Chef, he had plenty of rabbits to test this out on at the bottom of the hill. He’d also gone just a little bit crazy with his cheese making and had a good supply of that too.

First, he tried just chopping up the rabbit, putting some cheese on it, and smoking that. He used the kiln as the smoking location, placing the perforated clay that he built for cheese making on top of the chimney of the kiln to let the smoke through. It didn’t take all that long for the meat to be done. The cheese was great. The meat was dry.

The next thought he had was to wet the meat ahead of time, soaking it in some yummy stuff before smoking it. After all this time of creative cooking, Chef had actually gotten pretty good at coming up with tasty recipes on the fly. He was particularly good at figuring out what ingredients matched what meats.

He soaked the rabbit in milk and cream with added vegetables, garlic, salt, and pepper. The heat was brought up for making the stock originally, but the meat was soaked at a low temperature to avoid cooking it.

He didn’t let it sit for too long, after all this was just a test for the real deal. Half an hour later, he set it back up in his jury-rigged smoker with a little more cheese.

Using the power of his spells, he could smoke it faster. In fact, he could probably flash smoke the thing, but that wasn’t the goal. That would miss the point. He could make it quickly or he could make it right. For Chef, there was only ever one option.

The results showed a couple hours later when his cheese smoked rabbit was done. Taking a bite, he found the savory additions to the rabbit to mostly make up for the gamey taste. A good flavor overall, but Chef felt like he could make it even better. That’s when it occurred to him. He needed to add more sweetness.

At this point, Chef was still fairly limited in his options, relying once more on his tried and true honey but with a twist. Rather than add the honey to his stock for soaking the meat, he made a sauce to cover the rabbit while it smoked.

Stolen novel; please report.

He mixed honey with some cream, milk, and cheese to create a sweet glaze. Covering the smoked rabbit with it proved to be too strong of a sweet flavor, unbalancing the soak. But if he soaked the meat for longer and added the glaze before smoking, then he thought it would work.

He got to work immediately.

There was much more meat on the fanged rabbit than any other rabbit he’d seen before, coming close to some of the smaller boars he’d eaten. Even so, Chef was an expert butcher and didn’t waste a moment. Soon the rabbit meat was cleanly carved and added to the stock for soaking.

While it did, he got to work on melting down the bones for more meat stock. He wasn’t sure what to do with the superior stock just yet, but he wanted to have it ready when he figured it out. After all, he had plenty of containers for it.

Hours later, Chef got tired of waiting and decided to start smoking. He knew that he probably should give it another hour or so, but the anticipation was killing him. He pulled out the rabbit meat, coated it in his honey glaze, and placed it in his smoker.

His stomach was killing him, furious that he’d spent so much time smelling delicious flavors without indulging in them.

Guess I’ll just use the stock now.

There were plenty of boars around after all, so he went about making some boar stew using the aforementioned animal and the fanged rabbit bones boiled down to a broth. All the while he waited on the meat to smoke. It was quite good, but the difference in stock quality between the rabbit bones and his usual fair was slight at best. Chef hoped that this hadn’t been a day wasted by simply hoping this rabbit would taste better than others.

He wasn’t disappointed. When the smoker finished and he took his first bite, tears began streaming down his face. Chef loved pastries with all his heart, but this was really good! For a brief moment, his dedication to flour faltered as he thought about how many of these dishes he could make. Everything but the wild onions and the rabbit were infinite, but the strange forest seemed to have no end to either of those either. There was a chance that he could actually eat this forever.

Calm yourself, Chef. The pastries wouldn’t betray you, so you better not betray them!

He slapped his face to regain control for a moment. Then he took another bite, quickly forgetting his reasoning as he devoured a smoked rabbit half his size. Between that and the rabbit stock he used for his boar stew, he was almost satisfied. Well, not really. In fact, it was nowhere near enough food.

But it was good.

*Ping*

Congratulations! You have digested an entire Greater Fanged Rabbit[128]! You have gained some of its stats and abilities.

Congratulations! You have gained health, stamina, alacrity, gusto, sense, ability, inexplicability, hutzpah, and intestine!

Congratulations! You have learned Bite!

Congratulations! Your Bite has evolved into Greater Bite!

Congratulations! Your Greater Bite has increased!

Congratulations! Your Greater Bite has evolved into Devour!

Congratulations! You have learned Running!

Congratulations! Your Running has combined with Running!

Congratulations! Your Running has increased!

Congratulations! You have learned Hiding!

Congratulations! Your Hiding has increased!

Congratulations! You have learned Poison Resistance!

Congratulations! Your Poison Resistance has combined with Poison Mastery!

Congratulations! Your Poison Mastery has increased!

Congratulations! You have assimilated a trait!

Congratulations! Your Hardened Fur has combined with Thick Skin!

Congratulations! Your Thick Skin has evolved into Hardened Skin!

Well, that’s a lot to take in.

Chef was of course being figurative. He didn’t stop for a second and continued stuffing his face with food.