Divorced woman with child travels through time

Now that the house is spacious and has plenty of grain, Dazhuang stayed at Chen Wenfang's house to help look after the house and feed the cattle. Before leaving, Chen Wenfang asked Dazhuang to steam some glutinous rice at home if he had time, rinse it, and let it dry to make some dried rice. Dazhuang nodded in agreement.

At the market in Lijia Town, Chen Wenfang's stall was still doing brisk business. However, she didn't expect that her hosting a dinner party would attract so much attention that word spread throughout the town. A man came up to Chen Wenfang and asked her for copper coins and a gift bag. Chen Wenfang smiled and politely declined, saying that the time for hosting the dinner party had passed and she would not be giving out copper coins and gift bags now.

Aunt Liu, who was standing nearby, also heard this and immediately played the bad cop, saying, "How can you be so shameless? It's been so long, and you're still asking people for money. If someone had treated you, why don't you go have some tea and take some leftovers home to live on?"

The man, blushing with embarrassment after being scolded, walked away. The nearby vendors were all gossiping. They'd seen shameless people before, but never anyone this shameless. It was rare to see someone come back asking for things after the treat had already passed. Were people all this crazy these days? Uncle Liu Hai and Wang Erniu were also very angry.

Chen Wenfang carefully said to Aunt Liu, "When we get back to Wangjiazhuang, you have to talk to the villagers about this properly. We can't let outsiders keep thinking about it all the time, otherwise I won't dare to do it again next time. I only invited them to dinner without accepting any gifts because I was thinking about that poor family in the village."

Aunt Liu nodded and said, "That's true. Most people in this world are too greedy. They want to take advantage of any little bit of benefit. I'll keep that in mind and talk to the villagers about it later."

Chen Wenfang cut up two more packets of donkey rolls and had Shi Tou deliver them to the Ouyang residence, also instructing him to convey that he was now working hard to make money and grow his business, and could no longer accept the young master's rewards. He added that he would send over more delicious food if he had any.

Ouyang Jin was also very happy to receive the donkey roll. He smiled knowingly and immediately understood that this Madam Chen was a truly honest person.

Sure enough, as soon as Chen Wenfang's Chen Ji Dim Sum sign was put up at the stall, peddlers came up to ask about the price. Chen Wenfang took out a plate for them to try and responded to their orders one by one. The minimum order was 10 catties, and the order price was less than 20% of the retail price. After tasting it, many people placed orders on the spot. Some even wanted to buy the donkey rolls and fried rice that Chen Wenfang had made in front of the stall.

Chen Wenfang laughed and said, "Boss, you can't steal business like that. It's not convenient. This is the first day we've put this on sale. The more I sell, the more famous I'll become, and the easier it will be for you to sell later. If you want it, you can pay a deposit first, and then pick it up from Wangjiazhuang."

The peddler smiled, readily agreed, paid the deposit, confirmed the date, and left. Later, many other people placed orders.

Chen Wenfang calculated that the two items together weighed about a hundred catties. She hadn't brought much with her today, and before long, just after noon, the fried rice and donkey rolls were sold out. She also didn't have much syrup left at home. It was early spring, and there weren't many people delivering syrup. She had only collected about thirty catties, probably because everyone was busy turning the soil. Chen Wenfang bought twenty catties of wheat and ordered eight hundred catties of glutinous rice, waiting for the grain shop to deliver it to her door. She would make some maltose later to use with it.

After working for a while, around 3 p.m., Chen Wenfang sold out of rice candy. She bought some soybeans and red beans, weighed a few pounds of fresh meat, and also bought three pounds of fresh bean sprouts when she came across them. It wasn't that she didn't know how to make them, but she was just too lazy to put in the effort. Now that she was making more pastries, Chen Wenfang felt that she was short-handed. Yesterday, Uncle Liu Hai spent most of the day just grinding soybean flour, which made her think about buying a donkey again. She needed to get a millstone. Although she had built two large rooms at home, she was afraid that the house would be too small after adding a millstone. Should she expand the yard? After all, there was still a large piece of wasteland outside.

Chen Wenfang told Erniu about her idea, and Wang Erniu said, "It's convenient to build a courtyard, but we need to move the wall again and level the ground. It would be best to level the ground outside as well, otherwise it will be difficult for the merchants who place orders to park their carriages."

Chen Wenfang thought it made perfect sense, so she entrusted these matters to Uncle Liu Hai again. Anyway, they had just finished the market and there were still about ten days until the next one, so there was plenty of time. It would also be easier to build the wall. Now that they had their own horse-drawn carriage and the road was repaired, it would be even easier.

Uncle Liu Hai still found Uncle Youdi, who, along with Zhuantou and Dazhuang, expanded the yard by more than double in just four or five days. They also found many people in the village to dig up a lot of river sand and pave it firmly on the road and the wasteland outside the yard.

Chen Wenfang, Aunt Liu, Wang Erniu, and the others were so busy at home that they didn't have time to rest. For the first time, they realized that running a big business was also very tiring. The first few days after they returned from setting up their stall were fine. They only ordered about a hundred kilograms of goods. Chen Wenfang thought to herself, "This is nothing. A few of us can finish it in two days."

Unexpectedly, just five days later, another big merchant came and ordered 100 catties of donkey rolls. Fried rice doesn't spoil easily, so he ordered 200 catties, saying it was going north. Donkey rolls can be sold on the go, and fried rice can be used as dry food or to make tea. It's so convenient. I don't know who invented it. Luckily, Chen Wenfang had a lot of dried rice, so it only took two or three days to fry it.

The traveling merchants ordered so much because Chen Wenfang ordered more than fifty catties, and the price was 30% less than the retail price. Glutinous rice syrup and other such things are not cheap to begin with, and Chen Wenfang worked hard to earn a little extra money. Moreover, these finished products could be sold directly, so the traveling merchants were happy to make easy money. Chen Wenfang also gave them jars, all pre-packaged. The fried rice was fragrant, crispy, salty, and crunchy, with a bit of oil. They could eat a handful whenever they wanted, and before they knew it, they had lost a few ounces. The peas inside could also be paired with wine.

After the second group of merchants left, Chen Wenfang's fried rice sold very well. Some even asked if he could sell peas separately. Chen Wenfang had a sudden inspiration: he could sell golden beans, orchid beans, etc. However, since these kinds of things were relatively rare in grain stores, he asked the merchants if they had peas, broad beans, peanuts, etc., which they could transport over to sell to him. The merchants were happy to oblige, as they didn't have to come empty-handed and could even make a profit.

Chen Wenfang then asked Aunt Liu to tell the people in Wangjiazhuang that she was now buying not only syrup, but also peanuts, peas, broad beans, and soybeans. She also said that nuts such as chestnuts, pine nuts, or walnuts were also acceptable. This made the villagers very happy, including those in the villages next to Wangjiazhuang. They usually grew vegetables, and there were only a few kinds of vegetables. Every household grew them, and they all harvested them at the same time, so they couldn't sell them. Now, they had so many things to grow. Chen's wife's business was growing, and she was sure she wouldn't lose money on the villagers. Everyone was figuring out what to grow this year to sell to Chen's wife.