Dating In the Kitchen Episode 4 Recap Highlights:
- Present Lu doesn’t want to eat anything because it isn’t cooked by Gu Sheng Nan.
- Gu Sheng Nan starts working at Yard Fry Diner and ends up knocking President Lu out with a flying bottle.
- Gu Sheng Nan agrees to cook for President Lu to pay off her debt.
Fired again
Gu Sheng Nan gets fired again by Manager Shen.
Manager Shen explains that the only reason Gu Sheng Nan was hired back at the hotel was to please President Lu.
If President Lu doesn’t want her food anymore, there is no reason to keep her on.
Gu Sheng Nan indignantly walks away from Manager Shen. With her fiery personality, she promises that she will get a new job at a different 5 star hotel.
As she walks away, she exhibits such moxie it is hard not to love her.
Nothing is satisfying
President Lu and Meng Xin Jie are sitting down at a hotel getting ready to eat.
The hotel looks like President Lu’s style. The food is laid out well and looks delicious.
This place is high class.
President Lu starts to cut into his food, but he pushes it away. He is completely uninterested in it.
He tells his assistant, Meng Xin Jie, he is not satisfied.
Meng Xin Jie protests. He reminds President Lu that he used to like the food at this hotel.
President Lu ponders the problem. He seems stumped.
Why doesn’t he like the food there any more?
President Lu concludes that his sense of taste has upgraded.
In the words of Meng Xin Jie, he has grown even pickier about his food choices.
In my words: he is spoiled by Gu Sheng Nan’s food.
President Lu leaves the restaurant.
Meng Xin Jie reluctantly leaves his perfectly delectable meal and follows President Lu.
At the house and on the road
Gu Sheng Nan is at her cozy home looking at her computer. She wants to see if anyone has responded to her resumes.
So far, no employers have contacted her. This makes Gu Sheng Nan disheartened.
To add insult to injury, Assistant Meng calls Gu Sheng Nan. He wants the money she owes President Lu for the car vandalization incident.
Men Xin Jie demands the money or he will take Gu Sheng Nan to court. This scares Gu Sheng Nan. She racks her brain on how she will be able to pay the debt.
The scene changes to Xu Zhaodi waiting on the sidewalk for a taxi. Guess who happens to drive by? Meng Xin Jie, who Xu Zhaodi refers to as “the driver.”
Meng Xin Jie offers Xu Zhaodi a ride.
As Xu Zhaodi gets in the car she is listening to a voice message from Gu Sheng Nan.
Gu Sheng Nan is telling Xu Zhaodi she will try to borrow money from her Grandpa.
On the voice message, Gu Sheng Nan tells Xu Zhaodi that if borrowing money from grandpas doesn’t work, they are both going to jail.
Meng Xin Jie figures out that Xu Zhaodi’s bestie is the chef who has been such a nuisance for his boss.
Xu Zhaodi finds out that Meng Xin Jie’s boss is the infamous guest in room 1123.
And we finally learn President Lu’s name: Lu Jin.
Grandpa to the rescue
Gu Sheng Nan goes to Yard Fry Diner to ask Grandpa if she can borrow money. He isn’t willing to lend her any.
Grandpa asks how much she owes. We find out she owes 70,000 yuan to fix the car she vandalized (over $10,000 USD.)
Gu Sheng Nan tries to convince Grandpa’s to lend her money. She says, if he won’t give her the money she will get it from her dad.
Grandpa has sad and sour feelings towards his son. Gu Sheng Nan’s father is absent from their life. But even this threat won’t sway him to lend the money.
Grandpa calls Gu Sheng Nan’s bluff. He tells her it would be great if she finds her dad. But then what? She hasn’t even known him in the later part of her life.
He offered to let Gu Sheng Nan work at the diner as an errand girl. Gu Sheng Nan gratefully agrees.
Lu Jin is Hungry
At Bauhinia Hotel Lu Jin is on the phone with his mom. Lu Jin says he still isn’t done acquiring the hotel.
Lu Jin’s mom says, the hotel isn’t worth his time and they hang up.
Lu Jin looks at Meng Xin Jie. Meng Xin Jie is playing on his phone giggling, but gets serious again when Lu Jin wants to talk to him.
Lu Jin tells Meng Xin Jie he is hungry
Meng Xin Jie is perplexed. He says he doesn’t know what food to get for his boss because Gu Sheng Nan was fired.
When Lu Jin hears this he gets mad, but quickly recovers.
In his aloof manner Lu Jin states, “Oh she should be fired. That is what you get for annoying me.”
Meng Xin Jie offers Lu Jin water. When Lu Jin accepts water Meng Xin Jie makes a joke about love making water palatable.
Where will he eat?
In the next scene we see Meng Xin Jie driving Lu Jin around looking for a place to eat. Lu Jin happens to direct Meng Xin Jie to Yard Fry Diner.
At the diner, Grandpa catches Gu Sheng Nan cooking.
He feels the meal she just made is sub standard and goes to throw it away.
Just as Grandpa is holding it over the garbage you hear a voice requesting to have that very meal grandpa wants to get rid of.
We see Lu Jin sitting down to eat.
Gu Sheng Nan sees Lu Jin and Confronts him. “Mr. Lu Are you addicted to embarrassing yourself?”
After all, in their last encounter Lu Jin said he never wanted to see Gu Sheng Nan again. And that is the reason she was fired.
Despite Lu Jin’s previous negative words, there he is, about to eat the food Gu Sheng Nan cooked. But Gu Sheng Nan is protesting with all the sass she can muster.
Grandpa sees Gu Sheng Nan giving Lu Jin a hard time. He comes out to intervene. Grandpa tells Gu Sheng Nan to treat the customer well.
Grandpa offers to throw away the food in front of Lu Jin and get him new food.
Lu Jin makes it very clear that he wants the very dish that is in front of him. (The food Gu Sheng Nan cooked.)
Grandpa goes back to the kitchen.
Gu Sheng Nan doesn’t want Lu Jin to eat the food. She and Lu Jin have a tug of war over it. Gu Sheng Nan eventually lets Lu Jin have it.
In the background of the restaurant there is a commotion. A customer is refusing to pay for their order and is being rude to Auntie Wang.
Gu Sheng Nan runs to the back of the restaurant to assist Auntie Wang with the difficult customer. She starts to argue with the customer too.
Lu Jin puts ear buds in his ears to block out the argument. He prepares to thoroughly enjoy the food.
Gu Sheng Nan gets pushed into a refrigerator by the unreasonable customer. To retaliate, Gu Sheng Nan throws a tub of peanuts at him.
The customer picks up a plastic stool and hurls it back in her direction.
Completely enraged, Gu Sheng Nan grabs an empty glass bottle and chucks it at the customer.
The customer dodges the projectile. Meng Xin Jie tries to swat it out of the air, but fails.
It hits Lu Jin in the back of the head and he is knocked out.
Escape
Gu Sheng Nan bursts through the door of her apartment. She is on the phone asking Xu Zhaodi if she can stay at Xu Zhaodi’s place.
Because she is trying to escape the aftermath of the diner. She is frantically grabbing things to escape with. She rushes out the door.
Gu Sheng Nan runs right into Meng Xin Jie.
Gu Sheng Nan tries to get away from Meng Xin Jie. She makes excuses about the diner incident. It was the hooligans at the diner’s fault, not hers.
To get Meng Xin Jie to let her go, Gu Sheng Nan offers to have Xu Zhaodi go on a date with him.
In the end Meng Xin Jie insists that Gu Sheng Nan go with him and she does.
Hospital
Lu Jin is laying down looking miserable again. This time, however, he is in a hospital bed.
The Doctor lets Lu Jin know that he fainted because of hypoglycemia. The damage from the bottle was minimal.
Meng Xin Jie brings Gu Sheng Nan to see Lu Jin.
Though Lu Jin is a cold person, he doesn’t look angry or mean when he begins speaking with Gu Sheng Nan. He is just straight forward.
Lu Jin tells Meng Xin Jie to calculate all the expenses that have accumulated because of the things Gu Sheng Nan has done. It comes to 130,000 yuan.
Gu Sheng Nan knows there is no way she can pay this back anytime soon. She tries to negotiate.
Gu Sheng Nan even tries to push some of the debt onto her Grandpa.
To this Lu Jin says, “I’ve never seen such a wicked granddaughter as you.” But he says it with a half smile. He is completely entertained with their debate.
Lu Jin offers another way to repay the debt.
Meng Xin Jie presents Gu Sheng Nan with a contract. If Gu Sheng Nan agrees, she will cook for Lu Jin to pay off her debt.
Gu Sheng Nan agrees, signs her name to the contract and leaves them with her contact information.
Seafood Feast
The first meal Lu Jin requests is a “Seafood Feast.”
Gu Sheng Nan, the mischievous little pixie, steals an assortment of seafood from her Grandpa’s diner. Then she begins cooking at her apartment.
Gu Sheng Nan cooking is an enjoyable interlude. The cinematography of the cooking is delightfully paired with the theme song.
Lu Jin arrives in Gu Sheng Nan’s neighborhood. As he looks for her apartment, an assortment of awkward things happen to him.
Lu Jin is almost run over by a moped and water drops on him from someone’s hanging laundry.
When he goes up some stairs to find Gu Sheng Nan’s apartment, he is knocked over by a girl running down the stairs. He ends up stuck in a box full of cabbage.
Still he continues on to Gu Sheng Nan’s door.
Anyone want a Reindeer steak?
Meanwhile, Meng Xin Jie is taking Xu Zhaodi out to eat. They go to a Finnish restaurant.
Xu Zhaodi makes it clear to Meng Xin Jie that it is embarrassing to go out with him because he is a driver. Meng Xin Jie seems to take it in stride.
The restaurant looks pretty high class, but everything is in Finnish and that is what the waiters speak.
Xu Zhaodi is a little stumped on how to order food since she doesn’t speak Finnish. Meng Xin Jie ends up impressing Xu Zhaodi because he does.
Dinner at Gu Sheng Nan’s
Gu Sheng Nan somberly invites Lu Jin into her home.
She is being super serious/professional. It gets a little awkward when she tries to take his coat and helps him into his seat.
Someone knocks at the door. Lu Jin has brought his own wine to the dinner via courier. He asks Gu Sheng Nan to decant the wine.
Gu Sheng Nan pours the wine and presents Lu Jin with his meal. It is beautifully presented.
Lu Jin inhales the food’s aroma and half smiles. He seems pleased.
As quick as he was to smile he is even quicker to tease Gu Sheng Nan. It’s almost like he is trying to hide how happy he is to eat her food.
—
The scene changes to Xu Zhaodi and Meng Xin Jie. Their meal is finished.
Xu Zhaodi makes it clear that she does not want to go out with Meng Xin Jie again.
—
Lu Jin is finished with his meal too.
Gu Sheng Nan charges him quite a bit for the meal. The meal itself only costs 500 yuan, but with all the extra service charges the final price ends up being 2,600.
Lu Jin knows he has been tricked, but pays the bill anyway. He haughty leaves her apartment.
Gu Sheng Nan is happy that her ruse was successful. She skips over to a decoration on the wall that is used to keep track of her debt.
She proudly moves the spoon towards a positive direction to indicate she has less debt to pay off.
Catching up on loose ends
Gu Sheng Nan celebrates with her besties, Xu Zhaodi and Gao Quan An. They are all excited that she was able to pay off so much debt with one meal.
Lu Jin meets up with the owner of Bauhinia hotel. The owner tells Lu Jin that other companies will buy the hotel for more than what he has offered.
Lu Jin makes it clear that he will not pay more for the hotel.
Gu Sheng Nan presents another delicious looking meal to Lu Jin. This time Meng Xin Jie is present.
Lu Jin and Meng Xin Jie have figured out ways to avoid Gu Sheng Nan’s extra service charges.
Lu Jin eats triumphantly while Gu Sheng Nan glowers in another room.
What trickery is this?
Gu Sheng Nan goes to Gao Quan An’s shop in a panic!
He is a tailor/designer and he has a measuring tape hanging around his neck.
Gu Sheng Nan explains to Gao Quan An that Lu Jin figured out her trick.
She begs her uncle to come up with a new plan.
He starts taking her measurements.
In the next scene we see Lu Jin sitting at Gu Sheng Nan’s humble dining table.
He nearly chokes on his water when Gu Sheng Nan enters the room.
She is wearing a beautifully designed dress with her hair down.
It is quite a contrast with the kitchen uniform Lu Jin is used to seeing her in.
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Comments
The writers leave us with a cliffhanger!
Gu Sheng Nan looks beautiful and Lu Jin is speechless. I don’t know if he is going to laugh at her or is enamored with her.
What do you think Lu Jin will say? And do you think this trick will work on him?
Please comment below!
