After suddenly dying, Chen Changhe, a master chef of state banquets, returned to 1990, to the forestry bureau's family compound at the foot of Changbai Mountain.
It was the eve of mass layoffs. People were on edge, the winter was bitterly cold, and on the snowy plains, where temperatures fell to minus thirty degrees, even your breath could freeze.
The rice jar at home was almost empty, and his frail younger sister was so hungry she kept crying.
Chen Changhe hauled out a huge, rusty, two-handled iron pot, slung a boning knife over his shoulder, and plunged into a winter market in a small northeastern town!
Freshly butchered pork and blood sausage boiled with pickled cabbage, a steaming pot of sturgeon from the snowy plains, crispy golden fried cakes, braised pork bones still piping hot...
"One flick of the banquet chef's wrist, and the whole village was drooling!"
From celebratory banquets to bustling forest-town markets, he used the finest control of heat and the warmth of good food to bring comfort to the coldest era, healing laid-off workers across the country and gradually becoming the legendary "Banquet King of the Black Land"!
