Watching most of the Red Bird staff being led away, Li Xiao and Zhang Li met each other’s eyes. Nothing needed to be said.
Li Xiao extended his hand to shake Zhang Li’s, saying gratefully,
"I really can’t thank you enough for this, Lawyer Zhang. If you hadn’t been here, I’m afraid things would have gotten much more complicated."
"Just send me the bill later, and I’ll transfer the payment immediately."
Li Xiao was being completely sincere.
It was true that Zhang Li had only helped because he was being paid a handsome appearance fee.
But compared to that trivial fee, Zhang Li had indeed saved him a great deal of trouble.
At the very least, he didn’t have to go through the trouble of arguing with them himself. As an ace lawyer, Zhang Li had only needed to throw out a few legal arguments to silence the once-arrogant manager.
Zhang Li didn’t act self-important, either. He wore a humble smile.
"I was just doing my job."
"To be honest, even if I hadn’t been here today, things would have been resolved smoothly as long as the two administrative departments showed up."
Of course, Li Xiao knew he was just being modest.
For one thing, Li Xiao knew he couldn’t have just called in inspectors from the Food and Hygiene Supervision Bureau of another district on his own.
He glanced at the time and extended an invitation to Zhang Li.
"It’s still early. Lawyer Zhang, would you like to join us for a casual meal?"
Zhang Li smiled and waved his hand dismissively.
"I’m delighted that you’ve invited me to dinner, Mr. Li, of course."
"However, I have a court hearing tomorrow and still need to prepare some documents tonight. So I’m very sorry, but I’ll have to decline your invitation."
Since he had refused, Li Xiao didn’t press the issue.
In the livestream chat.
"All you haters who were flaming the streamer earlier, get out here and take your beating!"
"This streamer is ruthless! He got the whole place shut down?!"
"Several chefs with no health certificates, tons of illegal additives, and sketchy sourcing for their other food... why shouldn’t a shady restaurant like this be shut down?"
"I strongly support the streamer exposing more of these shady restaurants!"
"Poor streamer, he’s been at it for two hours and only got to eat one bite of a skewer!"
"Since the stream is still on, you should keep exploring restaurants! Who knows, you might even get a second shady place shut down!"
...
Seeing the requests from his audience, Li Xiao rubbed his empty stomach. He really hadn’t eaten anything and was definitely hungry now.
"Alright. I remember there’s a well-established restaurant nearby. Since you all want me to keep streaming, I’ll take you there to check it out."
Seeing that most of his viewers were on board, Li Xiao and his three dorm mates quickly headed to the restaurant.
Soon, their Mercedes-Benz pulled up in front of a restaurant.
Li Xiao aimed the camera at the restaurant’s sign. On the solid wood plaque, three large words were painted in gold: Yu Feng Pavilion.
Since it was past the dinner rush, there weren’t too many people coming and going.
A waitress led Li Xiao’s group of four to an empty table, where they quickly sat down.
He took the menu she handed him, gave it a quick scan, and promptly placed their order.
While they waited for the food, Li Xiao gave his viewers some background on the restaurant.
"Don’t be fooled by the old-fashioned decor here at Yu Feng Pavilion."
"This is actually their newer location."
"Their original restaurant is on Ao Island and has been around for over seventy years."
"I’ve heard the food at the original location is even better, since many of the chefs here are just apprentices of the chefs from the main branch."
"But Ao Island is a bit far from here. If we headed over now, we’d probably only make it in time for breakfast. So, I’ll take you all to experience the original restaurant some other time."
"And even though this is the ’new’ location, it’s been in business for over a decade and has a pretty solid reputation."
"Besides the usual Cantonese fare, they also serve many unique specialty dishes."
...
Since it wasn’t the dinner rush, Li Xiao and his friends didn’t have to wait long. A waitress quickly brought out their first dish.
On a serving cart sat four plump, round objects wrapped in tin foil. The waitress beamed with a friendly smile.
"Good evening, everyone. This is our signature Portuguese-style Curry Chicken Baked in Bread. The curry inside is extremely hot, so please be careful when you eat."
The moment she finished speaking, she skillfully snipped open the tin foil with a pair of scissors, and a fragrant, citrus-orange aroma instantly wafted out.
Each loaf was slightly larger than a person’s palm, its oval shape looking all the more tempting nestled in its tin foil wrapper.
The aroma came from the steaming bread itself—a mixture of caramelized baking scents and the fresh smell of wheat.
A pair of golden scissors was placed beside each oval loaf. The waitress explained,
"You can use the scissors to cut the bread open. It tastes wonderful dipped in the curry sauce."
"Of course, if you need any help, I can open them for the four of you."
Li Xiao waved her off.
"We’ll give it a try first. We’ll ask for your help if we can’t manage."
Seeing that her help wasn’t needed, the waitress didn’t linger and turned to tend to her other duties.
Li Xiao reached out and touched the bread in front of him. A wave of heat radiated from the lid into his palm.
If the outside of the bread was this hot, one could only imagine how scalding the curry inside must be.
Holding down the lid of the bread with one hand, he gently twisted the two small, flag-topped bamboo skewers on top with the other. As he pulled the skewers out,
a fine crack appeared on what had seemed to be a seamless loaf of bread.
The faint crack gradually widened. With a skillful twist, Li Xiao lifted the bread’s lid, and a rich, mouth-watering curry aroma immediately billowed out.
"It smells amazing!"
Beside him, Zhou Yu copied Li Xiao’s movements and opened his bread lid. He leaned in to take a sniff, his face instantly lighting up with a look of pure bliss.
"This curry smells incredible! It’s so much better than the curry chicken from our school cafeteria."
Sitting across from him, Huang Zhiyuan rolled his eyes and retorted,
"Dude, are you even listening to yourself? You’re comparing cafeteria food to this?"
"You can tell the curry we eat at the cafeteria is made from cheap, pre-made curry cubes just by looking at it."
"It’s obvious this was made from scratch with real spices. The cost alone is in a different league, not to mention they have a master chef here. There’s no comparison."
Li Xiao nodded. Just from that brief sniff, he could already smell the rich spices in the curry.
He turned to his viewers and said,
"This curry is seriously fragrant. Just from the smell alone, I can tell it’s going to be good!"
"Alright, let’s see what this signature dish is all about!"