Starting a new chapter in life

"The quantity is quite large, but judging from the looks of it, you probably aren't making it for your own consumption. What kind of food are you preparing to sell?" Aunt Yuan was very clever.

"I can make braised meat. I was able to make a living with this skill when I was in Beidahuang. But the tastes of the people here are very different from ours. I just want to try it. I don't know if it will work."

Jingyan was genuinely unsure, "Even if the flavor is adjusted, I don't know where I can sell it."

Aunt Yuan smiled and said, "There's no rush. Even if we can't sell it outside, we can still sell it at home. I'll help you and let everyone know that you're making and selling braised meat."

Jingyan had this in mind all along. Yuan Xiaoling going to university is a big deal, and there's no need to keep delaying her. But Aunt Yuan is different. After spending time with her today, it's clear that she's a very warm-hearted person with a wide network of connections and good interpersonal relationships. If she were to open a shop in the future, she planned to hire Aunt Yuan to help with promotion.

However, it's a bit too early to say anything now. She's been a big spender in this life. Although she could save money, she prefers to increase her income. Life is only a few decades long, and if she has to save money on her own spending, it's a loss no matter how you look at it. It's better to work harder to make money.

"Thank you, Auntie. If we can find it, can we get the meat on Friday? My husband should be back this weekend, and Yuan Jie and her husband should be back too, since school holidays start around the same time," Jing Yan replied with a smile.

Aunt Yuan nodded: "Yes, they both come back every week, but your husband only comes back once every two weeks?"

“Yes, he said the schoolwork is too demanding. After so many years of university closures, it’s only recently that classes have resumed, and everyone is working very hard, so he has to get involved too.” Jing Yan shook her head, somewhat helplessly.

"My two kids are in junior college, so their studies aren't too demanding. Anyway, I don't ask them about their studies much. I've got your mind about buying meat, and I'll ask around when I get back." Aunt Yuan agreed readily.

The two walked and chatted, which wasn't too boring. When they arrived at her doorstep, Jingyan didn't even feel tired. "Auntie, why don't you eat at my house? I have noodles. They're quick to cook, so you won't have to cook them at home. It's almost afternoon."

Aunt Yuan thought about it for a moment and then followed her into the yard. Jingyan threw the four chicks and two young roosters into the coop. The chicks, now free, stopped chirping and started to adjust to their new environment.

Jingyan went straight into the kitchen to start a fire and boil water to cook noodles. Aunt Yuan, having nothing else to do, asked Jingyan for a small bowl of millet and went to feed the chickens in the chicken coop, while also checking on the vegetable garden.

"Jingyan, why are all the vegetables in your garden newly planted? I took a look, and the seedlings are almost ready to be thinned out. Some of them are growing too close together and won't grow big enough."

“These are newly planted. My fourth sister mailed me the seeds. I’ll thin them out at home tomorrow. Do you need these seedlings for your vegetable garden, Auntie? If you can plant them there, I’ll thin them out and send them to you.”

Jingyan checked the noodles in the pot, and once she was sure they were cooked, she turned off the heat. She used a large strainer to scoop the noodles out, rinsed them with tap water, and then divided them into two large bowls.

He took out the pork and mushroom sauce, scooped two large spoonfuls into each bowl, and carried it to the dining table in the main room with chopsticks: "Auntie, let's eat. Just have something light today. I'll cook something delicious another day and invite you over to try my cooking."

Aunt Yuan washed her hands, sat down at the table, picked up her chopsticks, and watched Jing Yan mix the sauce and noodles, so she started mixing as well: "Is this mixed noodles?"

“We call it braised noodles where I’m from. Actually, the braised sauce is more fragrant when it’s freshly made, but we don’t have much food at home right now, so I used the mushroom and meat sauce I made a couple of days ago as the braised sauce. Auntie, try it and see if it suits your taste. We eat on the saltier side where I’m from, so I didn’t dare to put too much sauce on it for you. If it’s bland, you can add more yourself.” After Jingyan finished speaking, she pushed the bowl of meat sauce on the table toward her.

Aunt Yuan nodded and took a bite. "Hmm, the flavor is strong enough. This is already a bit too salty for me. It's not fresh enough. You didn't add any sugar to this sauce." Aunt Yuan said this with certainty.

Jingyan started eating too. "No sugar was added. We don't use much sugar in our cooking. I've never understood what dishes need sugar, or do all the dishes here have sugar added?"

"Sugar is added to meat dishes to enhance the flavor, but generally not much sugar is added to vegetarian dishes. At least I don't add sugar when I make vegetarian dishes. Next time you make this meat sauce, try adding a small spoonful of sugar and see how it tastes."

"Now that you're here, you should at least try the local cuisine. Besides, you plan to run a food business in the future, so you'll need to modify your Northeastern dishes a bit," Aunt Yuan suggested.

Jingyan thought what she said made a lot of sense: "Yes, I will try to revise it. Why don't you all come over this weekend? You can taste it and see where it needs to be changed."

Aunt Yuan hesitated for a moment: "This is not good. You want to make pure meat, which is too extravagant. If the whole family comes, it will be too much. No, no."

“They say it’s impossible to please everyone. There are only a few of you in your family, so it’s a good opportunity for everyone to give their opinions. Besides, Sister Yuan and you have helped me a lot during this time, and I wanted to do something to show my gratitude. I don’t have anything else to offer, so this is a good opportunity to get together while we’re making braised meat.” Jingyan spoke sincerely.

After Aunt Yuan finished eating, she helped Jingyan clean up the kitchen before leaving. Jingyan saw her to the door and said, "Aunt Yuan, remember my meat and the weekend gathering."

Aunt Yuan smiled at her and said, "I won't forget about the meat. As for the gathering, I'll discuss it with Xiaoling later." Then she left.

Jingyan felt that she was really lucky. In the past few years, none of the people she had met were difficult to get along with, nor were they greedy for cheap things, nor were they sweet on the outside but bitter on the inside. Yes, such a simple and comfortable life was just wonderful.

After locking the door, Jingyan went back to her room, took off her shoes, climbed onto the kang (a heated brick bed), and lay down. Only then did she feel a sudden wave of exhaustion. Just as she was about to turn over and take a nap, she suddenly remembered that the chicks seemed to have only been fed millet today, without any water.

She sat up, slipped on her shoes, rummaged through the kitchen and found a rather worn-out enamel basin. She filled it with some cold water, carried it to the chicken coop, and opened the gate. The chicks, who had been wandering around, suddenly gathered in a group, huddled together, and kept their distance from her.

Jingyan placed the water in the corner near the wall, noticed some millet on the ground, then closed the gate. She stood outside the chicken coop for a while, watching the chicks huddle together, then, perhaps feeling safe, they dispersed.

The little rooster went to the water basin first and tentatively drank a couple of sips. Then it chirped twice, and the remaining fluffy chicks waddled over to drink as well.

Watching the little yellow chicks leaning over the edge of the basin to drink water, Jingyan was afraid they might lose their balance and fall in. But the chicks could swim and wouldn't drown. Once she was sure they knew how to drink, she went back to her room to continue sleeping.

In the following days, Jingyan was also quite busy. She spent two days pulling up the denser seedlings in the vegetable garden, putting them in a foot bath basin with water to keep them alive. After finishing tending to the vegetable garden, she put the seedlings into a basket, carried the basket on her back, and delivered it to Yuan Xiaoling's house.

Aunt Yuan was very happy to see her, accepted the vegetable seedlings, and insisted that she stay for a meal. However, Jingyan declined, saying that she had things to do at home and needed to go to the supply and marketing cooperative to buy some things before leaving Aunt Yuan's house.

She wasn't lying; Grandma had already agreed to move back. Knowing Grandma's habits, writing and practicing calligraphy were daily rituals, so it was good to have plenty of pens, ink, paper, and other supplies at home.

There were also seasonings for braised meat and ingredients for barbecue skewers to prepare. It took Jingyan a whole day to get all these things. In the midst of her busy schedule, by the end of May, her baby was three months along, and the first trimester of her pregnancy was finally over.

Aunt Yuan was indeed a local expert. On a Friday at the end of May, she delivered pork belly and ribs. The prices here were indeed much higher than in the Great Northern Wilderness. Pork belly cost 1.5 yuan per jin, and ribs cost 1.2 yuan per jin. Jingyan gave her 27 yuan and invited her again: "Auntie, remember to bring your family tomorrow."

After seeing Aunt Yuan off, she started cooking. Of course, she couldn't use all twenty pounds of meat, since the taste needed to be retested. She used one-third of the pork belly and about half of the ribs, leaving the rest for later.

We used the same steamer we had in the Great Northern Wilderness to stew the meat. Since it was time-consuming and produced little smoke, we did it on the small stove in the living room. It was also a good opportunity to warm up the kang (heated brick bed) in Grandma's room again. Well, she would never admit that she used the stove in Grandma's room because she didn't want to sleep on a heated kang.

This time, she reduced the amount of salt and increased the amount of sugar. She even made a note of the adjustment. Jingyan tasted the soup and thought it should be pretty good.

As the aroma of her stewed meat filled the air, He Zhijun returned. "Jingyan is making braised meat again? Why does it taste a little different from before? Did she adjust the ingredients?"

Jingyan gave him a thumbs up: "Your nose is really amazing. I just adjusted the ratio of salt and sugar. Chef Lin told me before that even if the tastes are different in different places, I only need to adjust the ratio of salt and sugar in my recipe. The other spices cannot be changed. I trust Chef Lin more than my own abilities."

He Zhijun smiled and ruffled her hair, then gestured towards the outside: "You've been working hard these past few days. There's a lot more furniture in the house now, did you buy it all?"

Jingyan nodded and said happily, "This is what Sister Yuan took me to choose. We went to the neighborhood office in a small villa. They said they were going to return the house to the original owner and that half of the office furniture needed to be disposed of. So I bought the furniture that our family needs. You can take a look. I think the quality is pretty good."

He Zhijun dragged her to the living room and pressed her down on the sofa: "Rest for a while. How much longer will it take for the braised meat to be taken off the heat?"

"It should be ready in another ten or twenty minutes. Poke it with chopsticks later; it'll be done when the meat is tender. Don't overcook it, or it'll be hard to cut into pieces," Jing Yan said, glancing at her watch.

"What should we cook tonight?" He Zhijun asked her.

"The rice is almost done steaming in the pot in the kitchen. Why don't you make a few quick dishes? Stir-fry some hot and sour shredded potatoes. We have dried chili peppers at home, and some pork belly and ribs that we haven't cooked yet. You can decide what to do," Jingyan said.

“This braised pork probably isn’t made for sale. How about we slice some braised pork for dinner and make a meat dish, a potato shred, and a seaweed and egg drop soup? What do you think?” He Zhijun didn’t think the two of them could eat much, so he didn’t plan to make too much.

Jingyan had no objections. At dinner, she tasted the braised pork and thought it was a bit bland, but it also brought out the flavor of the spices more intensely. She thought for a moment, then went to the kitchen and mixed some dipping sauce with chili oil and soy sauce and brought it to the table. The braised pork with the sauce was delicious!

He Zhijun also tried her sauce and found it very spicy. He thought the locals would be able to get used to the taste of the braised meat. As for whether they liked it or not, he didn't know, but he thought it was quite delicious.

After dinner, He Zhijun cleaned up the kitchen, and the couple slowly drank from a large enamel mug of hot water in the living room: "Zhijun, this meat was brought back by Yuan Xiaoling's mother through connections. Aunt Yuan also took me to Yanjiacun nearby to buy chicks before."

I invited them over for a gathering tomorrow to try the braised pork and get their feedback. The auntie even said that if the taste is good, she'll help promote it to the neighbors and see if it can be sold from home, since it's food and it's not appropriate to just set up a stall outside.

He Zhijun nodded: "That's only right, honey. Pregnancy must be hard. You don't have to be in such a hurry. You can wait until the baby is a month old. I won't stop you from doing whatever you want. You're just making things too tiring for yourself right now."

Jingyan leaned against him: "I'll rest when I'm tired. I won't disregard my own feelings. Otherwise, I won't have any energy if I'm idle at home. I'll just eat whatever I can find. If I have something to do, at least I can make sure that I eat three meals a day on time."

“Okay, I asked my classmate in Yixian County. Her family can indeed make bamboo woven items. I only ordered two reclining chairs from her. I originally wanted to ask you about the rest when I got back. Luckily, I didn’t actually order a coffee table or anything like that, otherwise it would be duplicates. See if there’s anything else we need. I’ll go buy it this time.” He Zhijun continued to ask.

"We're missing three wardrobes at home. Besides our room, the other three rooms only have desks and bookshelves. Putting everything else aside, we need at least one wardrobe. I put the suitcase we used in the Great Northern Wilderness in Grandma's room, but it would be more troublesome to find clothes later if we put them in it. A wardrobe is more convenient."

He Zhijun told her to keep sitting while he looked around upstairs and downstairs. "Later, move the suitcases upstairs to the room where the cots are. That room will be for the sister-in-law that Mom invited, so two wardrobes will be enough."

Jingyan felt drowsy after eating, and nodded absentmindedly, "Okay, you can do whatever you want, I trust you."

Seeing how tired she looked, He Zhijun felt sorry for her and helped her into the house to lie down on the kang (a heated brick bed). Within two minutes, Jingyan fell into a deep sleep, practically falling asleep instantly.