It's Going to Explode, But Why?

The noodle factory was already up and running. They received a flood of orders from the shops they had contracted with. Inside the factory, flour was constantly flying around due to the busy atmosphere.

"Good job, everyone. I have one thing to warn you about though, please be careful of flour dust explosions!" Ryu said, causing the employees to stop in their tracks. A sense of unease filled the air.

"Explosions?" the employees said in unison.

"Yes, a flour dust explosion. If you use fire in an environment saturated with flour dust, it can ignite and cause an explosion. So, please do not use fire and use it only outside the building," Ryu explained.

"Is it really that dangerous?"

"Yes, if it explodes, this shack will disappear without a trace," Ryu replied with a smile. The employees were shaken by his words and strictly enforced the ban on using fire.

Pasta became the main new menu item recommended by the proprietress, and it quickly became popular among customers. In this world, bread was the staple food, but the bread of the common people was black bread. This black bread was very hard and could not be eaten unless it was soaked in soup. Compared to black bread, pasta had a chewy texture and gave a sense of fullness when eaten, making it a popular alternative. As a result, black bread in the Landmark territory was pushed aside and became a portable food.

Ryu also recommended udon and a kind of okonomiyaki to the proprietress of the little eatery. For udon, they provided a deep bowl and chopsticks and strongly promoted it. They had trouble making the okonomiyaki sauce, so they ended up pouring tomato sauce from the pasta on top and sprinkled cheese, which became popular and was called okonomiyaki-doki. They didn't know what that was.

Currently, the most popular dishes were tomato sauce pasta, followed by okonomiyaki-doki, and udon ranked third.

"...Udon. I know your goodness, so..." Ryu said quietly and cried, or maybe he didn't cry. After that, whenever Ryu dined out in town, he ate only udon with chopsticks, and his figure was often seen by the people of the territory.

"What's that wooden stick that the young master of the Landmark family uses so skillfully?" the people of the territory wondered.

When it came to food, there were only three things: knives, forks, and spoons. They had never seen or heard of a wooden stick before.

"Oh, that? It's called 'hashi' and was invented by Ryu's young master. Watch this... hold it like this and pinch it like this," the proprietress demonstrated.

"You can use it too, proprietress. You're quite skilled," the people said.

"Once you get used to it, it's very convenient. You can pick up even small items with one hand," the proprietress said as she picked up some soup ingredients with the chopsticks and ate them.

"Is that so?... It's true. This is great! Can you teach me how to hold it?" they said.

In this way, the culture of chopsticks gradually spread, but that was a story for another time.

Flour-based dishes seemed to be gaining popularity. They had already penetrated the Landmark family, becoming their signature dish. Although it was difficult for the family to adopt the custom of using chopsticks to eat udon, the eldest son, Tauro, demonstrated it, and Jiro imitated him, while the youngest daughter, Hannah, practiced it diligently. Even the parents started using chopsticks.

"Eating directly from the dish is not good manners, but... when you get used to it, it's easy to eat... Ryu came up with this idea, so it shouldn't be a problem for us to eat like this at home," Father said, realizing the usefulness of chopsticks.

"Indeed, convenience is an important thing. We are surprised by the ideas of children," Mother Cecil added, deftly eating udon with chopsticks.

Although Ryu couldn't say that chopsticks have a history and cultural significance of thousands of years in his past life, he was very happy that his family accepted the idea.

Ryu was looking forward to next year's production and sales of coffee beans, noodle sales, and collection of loan payments. "I'm looking forward to next year's advance payment, oh, I mean tax revenue," he said, still unable to shake off his yakuza language.