Wild matsutake steak.
Maekjeok-style grilled duck.
Mixed noodles with mountain greens.
“Nongseongeo” dumplings.
Seung-jun traced the simple menu board item by item and added explanations.
“For the matsutake steak garnish, we use carrot purée seasoned with yuzu and soy sauce, plus a pine-needle emulsion. Finish with roasted garlic and carrot tops for the plating.”
She had not seen the actual dish yet, so the explanation did not click at once. Once service started, she would watch and learn. Hae-som nodded.
“For the duck, we’ll skin it first, then confit it. You know what confit is?”
“I learned it as a method of cooking in oil at low temperature. The meat turns more tender.”
“Right. Once it’s tender, we coat it in maekjeok marinade, then give it charcoal aroma. The skin becomes a tuile for garnish. That’s Park Hwi’s job.”
Hae-som pictured Hwi carrying a large hotel pan out to the back yard. He must be doing the charcoal step before service.
“Add fried shredded burdock as garnish, then finish with orange gel and micro coriander.”
The explanation kept going. What goes on top of the mountain-greens noodles built on perilla-oil emulsion, and how the “nongseongeo” dumplings count as a kind of fish dumpling…
Hae-som’s head already felt crowded, and it threatened to split. Trying to picture dishes she had never seen had limits.
Seung-jun seemed to read her struggle from the way her answers lagged behind. He added in a sharp tone.
“I’m not telling you to plate food, so stop working yourself up.”
“Yes.”
“During service, handle restocks when we run short. That’s your role.”
“Yes, Chef.”
If she had ended up under a team lead like Jong-im or Woon-seop, she might not have felt this crushed. Hae-som’s shoulders sagged so far they felt ready to stick to the floor like scorched rice.
Even her lack of energy seemed to annoy him. Seung-jun made his dislike plain.
“Organize the station and start setting up the chef’s table.”
“By setup, you mean…”
“Do the oil setup and pick the herbs.”
He had to spell out every step before she understood, and his irritation showed.
Maybe she had pushed into this internship and made everyone’s day harder. Then again, what beginner moves like a veteran on day one? The unfairness stung.
With a pout, Hae-som loaded oil bottles into a long hotel pan in the correct order.
The matsutake steak gets pine-needle emulsion, and the duck maekjeok garnish is… what was it again? What was the next course?
She felt the limit of her memory and raised a fist to tap her rounded forehead—
Then a pine scent swept in and wiped her thoughts clean.
Her dazed gaze followed the trace of it, angled upward. Eyes with a glaze-like shine dragged over her, slow and heavy.
Hae-som bit her lip. She meant to demand an answer—why put someone with no ties and no experience into the main section? Whatever his intent, she planned to endure and say so to his face.
“Don’t tell me I brought in a rookie who can’t even put on an apron.”
“Ugh!”
But as her waist was suddenly engulfed by his large hand, all the words she had prepared vanished into thin air.
His hand, which had crossed between her arms and waist without hesitation, untied the string that had been loosely knotted around her waist and flung it aside.
“What on earth were you doing wearing something that wasn’t even tied properly?”
The wide fabric, stiffened by the tension, once again wrapped itself around Hae-som’s slender waist. The movement of his hand, rising and falling along the curve of her waist, was graceful.
The two strands of the sash, which had been split apart, were guided by his fingertips to cross intimately at her lower back, then quickly returned to the front, meeting again just below her navel.
Every time Jae-geon’s hand brushed against the uniform radiating the scent of a novice, his warm body heat seeped through her skin. As he applied pressure to tie the knot, Hae-som’s body was pulled helplessly toward Jae-geon’s chest.
Through their pressed-together bodies, Jae-geon’s steady heartbeat and Hae-som’s irregular pulse mingled into a dizzying tangle. Thump, thump—fearing the sound of her heart pounding against his chest might be heard, Hae-som swallowed her breath and asked.
Jae-geon, who had tied a neat little knot just below her navel and stepped back, was perfectly composed. His face showed not a trace of the heat that had so blatantly traced the curve of her waist—it was almost as if she had imagined it.
Ding!
Without even looking at the Hae-som who had frozen in place, Jae-geon struck the service bell and pulled everyone’s attention in.
“Thirty minutes to service. Stand by.”
At the chef’s call, the cooks who had been scattered across their parts began to gather in the main area. Hae-som read the room, stepped back, and managed to hold her place by the chef’s pass table.
Jun-won came into the kitchen from the dining room, and the briefing started. Jae-geon’s voice, neat and exact, cut through the air.
“Main rush piles up at seven, so prep tight at each station. Table four has a nut allergy, so watch it. Especially you, Seo Jun-young.”
“Yes, Chef.”
“What did you swap in for the pine-nut pesto?”
“Brown butter base, perilla-leaf chiffonade, lemon zest on top.”
“Make a tasting portion before servers take it out.”
“Yes, Chef.”
Jae-geon signaled to Jun-won with a glance and stepped back half a pace. The distance closed again, and tension rose with it. Hae-som’s head went light.
Her heart hammered so hard it swallowed every other sound. Jun-won talking about a special dessert request, Woon-seop answering back—gone beneath the rush.
What lodged in her ears was only Jae-geon’s voice.
“Seong Hae-som will stand at the pass with me. Get ready.”
It felt like an announcement both glorious and cruel.
The chef’s table. The place where the head chef checks each plate one last time before it goes to a guest table.
Was he checking the food, or Seong Hae-som?
It had become a fixed fact that Jae-geon did not think much of her, and if she wanted to survive this, she had one option: do her job well.
But after replaying Seung-jun’s earlier explanation, she sensed even that would not come easy.
It felt bitter. If Seung-jun had warned her even a little sooner, she could have prepared with more care. He also seemed to find her presence irritating.
Then again, how many people here did not? The stares stabbing from every direction felt like arrowheads. Hae-som felt like a hedgehog bristling on instinct. Once she stood beside Jae-geon, those stares turned harsher, to the point she could barely stand straight.
Clang—an edgy bell tone yanked her focus back.
“Order in! Tables five and thirteen. Total four courses.”
“Yes, Chef!”
She missed the timing for the call-and-response. When she muttered “Yes, Chef” a beat late, Jae-geon let out a short snort and snatched the new tickets.
“Order in! Tables one, seventeen, twenty. Total seven courses.”
“Yes, Chef!”
Once the flow started, orders kept coming. Jae-geon split the long chain of tickets with practiced hands and raised his voice. Veins stood out in cords across the pale back of his neck.
“Tables five, thirteen. Appetizers ready?”
Jong-im, the appetizer team lead, called out.
“Yes, Chef! One minute to send.”
“Good. Fire entrées right after.”
“Yes, Chef!”
Jae-geon rang the service bell to call Jun-won, the floor manager. During service, his job seemed to be matching Jae-geon’s pace at the center and coordinating servers.
“Table thirteen?”
“Table five too.”
“Table five has wine pairing, so we can delay if needed.”
Jae-geon lifted his brow with displeasure and yanked the ticket from the holder. The thin slip fluttered in front of Hae-som’s eyes.
“The pairing order is not on the bill.”
“They’ll add it later.”
“Do your job right.”
He clicked his tongue, turned his head, and barked.
“Hold table five’s entrée! Send table one’s appetizer!”
“Yes, Chef!”
Then does table five’s entrée go out with table one’s? When do tables seventeen and twenty get their appetizers if they came in with table one? What about mains?
Hae-som had no idea what was happening. Her mind went blank.
In the end, she fumbled through the whole course without finding her footing.
The garnishes for the four main dishes tangled in her head. She caught hints from fragments of Seung-jun’s explanation, but she could not trust her own memory.
Time ran on, and soon it was time for table thirteen’s main course—the first table that had ordered.
Hwi brought over duck that looked perfect from the grill.
Jae-geon placed fried shredded burdock and the duck on a warmed brass plate, then flicked a glance at Hae-som. His look asked, what did you forget?
“Micro coriander.”
“Oh—here.”
His eyes turned strict again, as if she missed something else.
“Answer.”
“Yes, Chef.”
Jae-geon skipped over Hae-som and addressed Seung-jun, who was bringing cooked items to the pass.
“You said you drilled the menu. Did you do it right?”
“I’m sorry.”
There is no shame sharper than your senior apologizing in your place. Hae-som pressed her lips together, feeling like a problem child and a walking mistake.
Jae-geon added, his tone full of contempt.
“Maybe you never had a talent for studying.”
“…”
“Stop trying to memorize in a fog. Think about why the ingredients fit together. That helps.”
A crisp burdock chip to answer meat softened through long low-temperature cooking. Orange gel and coriander leaf to cut the oil and keep the finish clean.
Once she thought in pairings, the garnishes that had been spinning through her head snapped into place.
As service continued, the chef’s calls grew more compressed. For example—
“Micro herbs,”
turned into,
“Herbs,”
then,
“Garnish.”
The more he compressed the word, the more moments Hae-som had to judge the garnish on her own. As the repetitions built, her stumbles eased, and a thread of confidence took hold.
By the time she looked up, service was near its end. Appetizers and entrées had finished long ago and had begun station cleaning. Now the dessert section ran at full speed.
Jae-geon studied the dessert Woon-seop brought, then turned at once and spoke to the main section, which had just started to breathe again.
“Portions left?”
“Yes.”
“Make one more plate each.”
“Pardon?”
“Want me to say it twice?”
“Yes, Chef.”
All mains on the bill had gone out. Did an extra order come in while she missed it?
Jae-geon shot Hae-som a look as if she had missed something obvious.
“Seong Hae-som, make it match what went out in service, then take it to table three.”