Chapter 10:
The Royal Kitchen (3)
“Prepare the dishes based on what’s written here, and you can’t go wrong.”
Sung-jae thrust the scribbled piece of paper toward Ji-yeong.
When she took it, all she saw were haphazardly scrawled Chinese characters.
In an era without dictionaries or computers, deciphering such hastily written text was impossible.
Ji-yeong set the paper down and confronted Sung-jae.
“What’s this? You expect me to just read this? Would it kill you to write in Hangul?”
“What? Hangul?”
It dawned on her that in this era, people wouldn’t call it Hangul.
Struggling to find the right term, Ji-yeong blurted out the first thing that came to mind.
“You know, the script King Sejong created. Ga, gya, geo, gyeo, that stuff.”
“…You mean eonmun? You, an outsider, know about that?”
“As if I wouldn’t.”
“…It’s forbidden.”
“What?”
“His Majesty banned the use of eonmun. It’s been some time since he prohibited it, saying the ignorant masses were using it to write and spread seditious texts against the court.”
As expected of Yeonsangun, a move befitting his title as a tyrant.
Ji-yeong let out a light sigh.
“So what’s your plan? Are you going to sit here and recite His Majesty’s favorite foods one by one?”
Sung-jae furrowed his brow, visibly annoyed.
But realizing he had little choice, he began scribbling eonmun next to the Chinese characters on the paper.
Though it differed from modern Hangul, it was legible enough when cross-referenced with the Chinese characters.
That Sung-jae was willing to use the banned eonmun showed his expectations of Ji-yeong weren’t mere empty words.
But just as Sung-jae needed Ji-yeong, she might need him too.
“I’ll prepare tonight’s royal table with these ingredients as a base. But I have conditions.”
“Conditions? What are they?”
“First, ensure the women who weren’t selected today aren’t punished.”
“What?”
“Jang Nok-su arbitrarily declared that those not chosen would face execution. Someone of your standing could surely intervene, right?”
Sung-jae looked troubled but, after a moment’s thought, nodded.
No matter how powerful a concubine, with His Majesty having personally seen the women in the suragan, Nok-su couldn’t punish them without proper procedure.
And any such procedure would require the cooperation of the Chief State Councilor, Sung-jae himself, who handled the king’s commands.
“I promise. But you must prepare an impeccable royal table to capture His Majesty’s heart.”
“One more promise. With your influence, finding an item shouldn’t be difficult, right?”
“Of course. Our family has sent envoys to the Ming Dynasty multiple times. I can procure anything from Joseon or even China.”
“Then find me one thing. Promise me that, and I’ll do my best to cook.”
“An item?”
Ji-yeong’s eyes sparkled.
“A book. Get me Mangunrok.”
Mangunrok.
When she first saw that book in a used bookstore in Hwanghak-dong, her initial thought was, How has such a tattered book survived this long?
Its cover was blackened with grime, frayed and worn. Mold speckled its pages, and it was riddled with tears and insect damage.
It was a tenacious book, surviving countless hardships.
“It’s almost certainly from the late 15th to early 16th century,” her father’s old friend, a professor at a physics research institute, had concluded after examining it.
Carbon dating confirmed the book was written around 1500 CE.
Which means it was created in this very era.
The opening lines of the book were tender, almost like a love letter.
Though I seek, I cannot obtain;
Day and night, my thoughts linger;
This night stretches long and endless;
Tossing and turning, side to side.
求之不得
寤寐思服
悠哉悠哉
輾轉反側
At first, Ji-yeong thought it was a yeongunga, a common literary work of the era expressing a scholar’s loyalty to the king.
But nowhere in the book was the author’s identity mentioned.
She could only guess it was written by a learned scholar, given the elegance of the prose.
What was even more astonishing was the content.
As mentioned before, it wasn’t a scholar’s anthology but a Joseon-era cookbook.
In its impressionistic critique of food, it resembled Heo Gyun’s Domundaejak. Its detailed and varied recipes evoked Sangayorok, Suwunjapbang, or Eumsikdimibang.
Yet Mangunrok was unlike any of them.
Its unique recipes were found in no other book.
And that wasn’t the only strange thing.
When Ji-yeong first found herself in a Joseon kitchen, the situation felt eerily familiar, as if she’d seen it in Mangunrok.
There’s something to it!
Her last memory in the modern world, just before losing consciousness on a Paris highway, was of that book, Mangunrok.
And now that she thought about it, the strangest part was its final recipe.
[Hwanseban]
A dish named “Return to the World.”
But the page that should have contained its recipe was cleanly torn out.
Perhaps—an absurd thought, but perhaps—that missing page held a clue to returning to her original time.
Ji-yeong knew her speculations lacked evidence or logic.
But wasn’t her inexplicable arrival in Joseon just as illogical?
Something beyond reason and logic was at play.
For some reason, Ji-yeong felt an eerie certainty.
If she could find Mangunrok, she might find a way back to her world.
“…I promise that too. I’ll find the book.”
Sung-jae’s voice snapped Ji-yeong out of her reverie.
“But you must absolutely captivate His Majesty’s heart with this royal table. Fail, and not only the book but your life—and the lives of all the women gathered in the suragan—will be forfeit.”
With that stern warning, Sung-jae swept his robes and left the suragan coldly.
Ji-yeong understood the situation.
With things having come to this, she had no choice but to focus all her energy on preparing the royal table.
She slowly recalled her knowledge of palace cuisine.
The royal table is served five times a day, if I remember correctly.
The earliest is the chojoban (early morning meal), typically light dishes like seaweed soup, rice porridge, or gruel to settle the stomach.
Next is the josura, the morning meal.
Around midday (misi, 1–3 p.m.), a light lunch of soup or snacks, called natgeotsang, is served.
After the king’s duties end and he retires, the evening meal, seoksura, is presented.
Finally, late at night, a small meal called yadasobangwa is served.
These five daily jinseon (royal meals) were undoubtedly grueling to prepare.
But the one requiring the most care was the evening seoksura, which Ji-yeong now had to prepare—the most lavish of the five.
Just moments ago, she’d barely escaped death, and now she had to cook again.
Ji-yeong sighed heavily, already overwhelmed by fatigue.
Just then, several cooks approached, carrying a massive tray.
“The main tray, daewonban, and the side trays, sowonban and chaeksangban. The seoksura consists of twelve dishes across these three trays.”
“…Three trays with twelve dishes?”
A large, heavy tray fit for a table of four, flanked by two smaller side trays.
She had to fill all three with the finest tributes from across the eight provinces.
All for a single king.
Her head spun again.
“Wait, just a second…”
Ji-yeong flung open the suragan door and bolted outside.
In the past few days since arriving in Joseon, she’d lost count of how many times she’d faced death.
She thought she’d survived by showcasing her cooking skills, only to now be tasked with preparing the royal table for that brutal king.
And now, she was responsible not just for herself but for the lives of the other women brought through the chae-hong.
“Argh! Damn it, what is this madness?!”
She slammed her head against the outer wall of the suragan, shouting in frustration.
Suddenly, she sensed someone behind her.
Turning, she saw an elderly man with white hair, hunched over, sweeping the courtyard with a broom.
He’d been staring at her as if she were some rare creature.
“What are you looking at?”
Embarrassed at being caught in such a state, Ji-yeong snapped.
The old man grinned broadly.
“In fifty years of working in the palace, I’ve never seen someone yell like that.”
“Ugh… I’m just going crazy.”
Ji-yeong let out another sigh.
A single dish was one thing, but how was she supposed to prepare an entire royal table for that ferocious Yeonsangun?
The old man, sweeping away, nodded as if he understood, chuckling.
“Well, well, you must be the new palace maid in the suragan. Word’s already spread like wildfire that you gave Jang Nok-su a good thrashing.”
“Word… spread?”
“Oh, one word in the palace becomes a hundred.”
The old man suddenly muttered something odd, as if talking to himself.
“By the way… it feels empty without the deer dung I sweep every day.”
“Deer… dung?”
“The late king raised deer in the garden with great care, but they say the current king killed the last one today.”
“He killed the deer they raised?”
“Tch, tch… Such a shame, such a fine creature…”
Humming an unfamiliar tune, the old man shuffled off, sweeping as he went.
He seemed to be an naenobi (palace slave tasked with cleaning), perhaps a bit senile.
A sudden spark flashed through Ji-yeong’s mind.
That’s it! Maybe… that could capture the king’s heart!
Bursting back into the suragan, her eyes gleamed like stars.
“Cooks, light the fire in the hearth and prepare the evening seoksura as usual. And…”
“And?”
“Tell them to bring the deer His Majesty hunted today to the suragan.”
