Locked: God is the matchmaker, neither you nor I can escape

After Yan Yiyi and Xin Ye sent their brothers into the examination hall, they had no intention of going back to sleep. Since it was a rare opportunity for them to go out, they decided to take a good walk around the capital and see the prosperous scenery of the imperial city.

As for the previous sensation caused by sweet potatoes, the eldest brother did not say anything, and they naturally would not rush over to sell sweet potatoes foolishly for a few taels of silver.

Haha, do they look like people who are short of a few taels of silver now?

With the cover of the spacious cloak, the two held hands and strolled leisurely on the streets of the capital, looking at the small stalls selling steamed buns and noodle soup on the roadside, passing by strangers, and enjoying the present peace.

"Wife, what do you want for breakfast?"

"I'm not hungry yet, let's see if there's anything delicious while we walk."

"Wife, I think the noodles over there look good. Do you want to try them?"

"Want to eat noodles with soybean paste?"

"I haven't eaten here for a while. I wonder how the noodles here are made?"

"But I want to eat it hot, not that dry."

"Then...what about the mutton noodles over there?"

"It smells like mutton."

"Huh? Is that spicy hot pot?"

Yan Yiyi looked in the direction he pointed to. It was too far away, and if it were someone else, they would probably not be able to read the words on it. Fortunately, both of them were not ordinary people.

"Hiss - it really is! Let's go and take a look. Does Malatang already exist in this era?"

The couple walked to the shop with a clear purpose. The name of the shop had a prefix - "Lu Dingji".

Yan Yiyi pointed at the three words "Lu Ding Ji" and asked, "Aye, why do I feel like I've seen this trademark somewhere before?"

Xin Ye said decisively: "It's a hot pot restaurant in Shacheng. However, the hot pot restaurant is directly named after Lu Dingji. I guess the owner behind the scenes made his fortune by opening a hot pot restaurant, and then opened other shops and used this trademark."

While listening to Xin Ye's analysis, Yan Yiyi recalled the information about the behind-the-scenes boss of Lu Dingji. She had asked the secret guards to investigate before. The founder of this hot pot restaurant was the wife of the Protector of the Nation General who started the business herself before she got married.

She didn't think much about it at the time, thinking it was part of the dowry business like that of any other lady from an aristocratic family. But now it seems that she had overlooked something.

Whether it is a hot pot restaurant or a malatang restaurant, chili peppers are needed, but as far as she knows, chili peppers are not promoted, and some families even plant them as landscapes.

Yan Yiyi couldn't understand why the general's wife didn't promote the product since she needed a lot of chili peppers. Was she trying to monopolize the market?

After hearing Yan Yiyi's question, Xin Ye thought for a while and guessed, "Perhaps, pepper is not suitable for promotion in Zhaoguo, because it is not a high-yield food like sweet potato.

As an ingredient, it doesn’t matter to ordinary people whether they eat it or not, but if it is sold to rich people, not all rich people can tolerate spicy food.”

Yan Yiyi was even more confused: "Then isn't our chili sauce selling very well?"

"We sell our products at a low price. Just a little chili sauce can go with rice. For ordinary people, a little chili sauce can replace some pickles or vegetables.

Wife, haven't you noticed? The people who buy most of our chili sauce are restaurants or wealthy businessmen, while ordinary people only buy it once every few months."

Yan Yiyi said that she really hadn't noticed. She was in charge of the money at home and was too lazy to look at the accounts. She just did whatever she thought of. After the shop opened, she left it to Li Adie to manage. After that, she was busy all the time. Later, she went to Shacheng. It was almost half a year in a flash. How could she remember so much?

Xin Ye continued, "Do you remember when we went to Lu Ding Ji Hot Pot Restaurant? A hot pot meal costs more than ten taels. Which ordinary family can afford it?"

"It seems there are a few taels."

“A few taels of rice is enough for a month’s expenses for an average family, and for country folk, it can last for several months.

There are many more poor people in Zhao State than rich people."

Yan Yiyi could not deny this, thinking back to when she had also experienced the difficulty of being poor. If it weren't for God's help in digging up some ginseng to sell, and the blessing of the plane system, she would not have been able to get rid of poverty so quickly.

"Moreover, Malatang was opened later," Xin Ye continued to analyze, "We don't know how long the gap was, but if there was only a hot pot restaurant, growing a few acres of chili would be enough for the store, so promoting chili would be a bit difficult.

Furthermore, without the support of the government, personal promotion is limited to a small area and will not receive strong support from the court like sweet potatoes."

Yan Yiyi understood that in an environment where people have not solved the problem of food and clothing, not many people would pursue delicious food and enjoyment. Eating chili peppers would not only not fill them up but would also burn their stomachs, and their chrysanthemums would probably suffer the next day. Most people could not accept it.

As for why the general's wife didn't make chili sauce to sell... Yan Yiyi guessed that she wanted to take the high-end and quick-money route, and she found it troublesome to work hard to earn a few cents for chili sauce.

I have to say, Yan Yiyi is telling the truth.

The peppers needed for chili sauce are much larger than those for hot pot restaurants. The general's wife opened a hot pot restaurant first. After making a lot of money, she looked down on the hard work of making chili sauce worth a few cents. Moreover, she could use chili sauce as her exclusive ingredient. Others wanted to steal her skills, but they didn't have the ingredients, and even if they stole it, they wouldn't be able to make the taste of her restaurant.

Yan Yiyi suddenly developed a strong interest in the general's wife. He called the secret guard over and ordered him to investigate all the information about the general's wife.

Afterwards, I followed Xin Ye into the Malatang restaurant, ordered two bowls of Malatang and started enjoying the late breakfast of the day.

The Malatang restaurant adopts the model of paying first and eating later. In this world, this method is very novel, but for Yan Yiyi and Xin Ye, this method makes them suspicious.

Looking at the ingredients they prepared, most of them were fish balls, meatballs, dried goods, fresh chicken, fish, pork, chicken offal, pork offal, as well as white radishes and cabbage stored for the winter.

The ingredients are only available in this season. It is impossible to have ingredients like modern times such as bean curd sheets, oil fruits, beef offal and various fresh vegetables.

The noodles were ordinary hand-rolled noodles, and the taste was average. I guess it was because the chef’s noodle-rolling skills were not up to par.

Yan Yiyi and Xin Ye thought in tacit understanding that after Hua Muchin promoted various products such as yuba, bean sprouts, sweet potato flour, and dry noodles, the content of the spicy hot pot restaurant would probably be richer.

Ah, this...is their family going to do business with the General's Mansion?

From this point of view, it is imperative to investigate the General's Mansion, and to get to the bottom of it. If they are suspected of treason, wouldn't it affect their own business?

If Hua Muchin were here, she would only complain about them: You're overthinking it. They are just suppliers doing business honestly. What does it have to do with them who the buyer is?

The two of them tasted the spicy hot pot carefully, and could only say that it was just so-so, not amazing.