Today the sun was shining brightly, and the villagers no longer had to worry about the “smallpox”. Everyone either gathered in the center of the village to talk, or the young lady and her husband took the children to dig bamboo shoots. On the way to the bamboo forest, Meng Yunshu and his friends met many people carrying bamboo baskets and hoes, with a pot of water on their waists.

In the winter, there was nothing to do, so digging bamboo shoots could not only add some income to the family, but also satisfy the winter cravings. Seeing more and more people coming, Meng Yunshu couldn’t help but worry that they wouldn’t be able to dig many bamboo shoots. Winter bamboo shoots are harder to dig and find than spring bamboo shoots. It’s considered good to dig a basket of bamboo shoots in one afternoon.

Walking into the bamboo forest, Meng Yunshu went to the place where they dug bamboo shoots last time. When he looked over, he found that it had been occupied by someone. He immediately frowned and grabbed the basket on his shoulder and changed to another place. Fortunately, the bamboo forest was large and there were other places that no one had set foot on.

After a whole afternoon, as he expected, they only dug a few baskets. This time, they did not peel the bamboo shoots, but took them back together.

Back home, Meng Yunshu and a few others sat in the yard, holding a bowl of water and gulping it down. It was a mistake to forget to bring water when going out.

“Uncle, little uncle, let’s drink milk paste.” Yu Zhining ran to Meng Yunshu with his bowl in his arms. He grabbed his clothes with his little hands, raised his head and blinked his big eyes to look at him coquettishly.

The milk paste referred to malted milk. Usually, Meng Yunshu would make him a bowl of malted milk or milk powder every other day. In recent days, he was busy and forgot this habit. Now when he heard Yu Zhining say that he wanted to drink it, Meng Yunshu rubbed his soft hair and said gently: “Okay.”

Of course, everyone in the yard did not forget it.

 He glimpsed a basket of carrots under the eaves. The orange-red carrots looked delicious, and the green tassels were still fresh. “Brother Huai, where did the carrots come from?”

He remembered that there were only white radishes and cabbages in the cellar at home, and there was not a single carrot.

Yu Jinhuai blew on the bowl, took a sip of malted milk, and said, “Aunt Sun brought it.”

“Oh.” He stared at the carrots under the eaves, and suddenly remembered the spinach noodles he had eaten in modern times. It happened that he also found a vegetable similar to spinach here called green vegetables. Now every household grows them in the fields. They grow very lushly and have wide leaves. They are a perfect pair with carrots. One is called Ruby noodles and the other is called jade noodles, which are just right as the staple food with oden.

 “Are there still many carrots at Aunt Sun’s house?”

Yu Jinyue raised his head from the bowl, frowned in disdain, and said, “Brother, do you like carrots? They are so unpalatable.”

Meng Yunshu turned his head to look at him when he heard the voice. Seeing that his brows were tightly knitted together in disdain, and there was a trace of disgust in his eyes, he joked, “You don’t like it? It’s so delicious.”

In fact, he didn’t like carrots very much, but he just came up with this idea, so he asked one more question.

“No.” Yu Jinyue shook his head frantically to express his resistance.

 Yu Jinhuai then added: “He has never eaten it since he was a child. He would tremble after eating a bite, until he vomited.”

Now Meng Yunshu finally knew how much he resisted, so he said regretfully: “Then you can’t have this good fortune.”

Yu Jinyue immediately replied: “I dare not have this good fortune.”

Yu Zhining, who was beside him, was concentrating on drinking his milk paste. When he raised his head, there was a circle of white milk whiskers around his mouth, “Is it something delicious?”

Yu Zhining, who always knew how to grasp the key points, rolled his eyes. His bright eyes were bent with laughter because he wanted to eat something delicious. His calves were shaking happily, and he tilted his head slightly to stare at Meng Yunshu.

Seeing his greedy look, Meng Yunshu couldn’t help but chuckle. He took out a handkerchief and waved to him, and when he came over, he circled the little man in his arms and carefully wiped his milk whiskers.

“Mm, little uncle will make you delicious noodles, okay?”

“Okay.”

——

Meng Yunshu searched for a long time at home before he found a piece of fine cloth. Before the sun went down, he washed the cloth first, boiled it in hot water in a pottery pot for a while, and then took it out and put it aside.

There was not much fine flour at home, so he scooped out half a bowl of fine flour and a bowl of coarse flour, mixed them evenly and divided the pile of flour into two halves.

Yu Jinlan brought the washed carrots and green vegetables in and put them on the chopping board. She stood aside curiously, watching Meng Yunshu’s actions.

She saw Meng Yunshu chop the green vegetables into mud and put them on the cloth he prepared. Then he picked up the cloth with one hand and squeezed out the juice of the green vegetables with the other hand. Soon the green juice dyed the flour green. When no more juice could be squeezed out, he put the wrung green vegetables in an empty bowl, and then he repeated the previous action and squeezed the carrot juice in.

 Yu Jinlan slightly widened her eyes when she saw his actions. Soon, the loose flour turned into two doughs under Meng Yunshu’s hands, one green and the other orange-yellow.

The next step was to roll the noodles. Meng Yunshu turned his head and saw the surprise on Yu Jinlan’s face. He became more and more proud. He talked to Yu Jinlan while rolling the noodles.

“Xiao Lan, what do you think about selling these two kinds of noodles?”

Yu Jinlan nodded like a chicken pecking at rice, “What beautiful colors, someone will definitely buy it.”

She immediately thought of oden and asked, “Does brother-in-law plan to sell the noodles alone or with oden?”

“With oden.” Meng Yunshu kept rolling the noodles. He continued, “There must be many stalls selling noodles in the county, so we can only make it with oden.”

Yu Jinlan nodded. Although she had never been to the county, she thought that there were many noodle stalls in the town. As brother-in-law said, we can make it.

 Meng Yunshu rolled out the noodles neatly, and cut them. Then he patted the flour on his hands, and shouted outside: “Xiao Yue, come in and light the fire.”

Yu Jinyue, who was making bamboo sticks outside, responded, patted off the bamboo shavings on his body, and entered the kitchen excitedly. He was hungry a long time ago. As soon as he entered the kitchen, he saw two noodles of different colors on the chopping board. His eyes, which were similar to Yu Jinlan’s, showed surprise. He ran to the chopping board and pointed at the noodles on it, “Brother, how did you do it?”

Meng Yunshu, who was beating eggs, turned around and smiled: “Secret.”

Yu Jinyue, who didn’t get an answer, was not discouraged. After lighting the fire, he ran around in the kitchen, looking for clues, until he saw the green and orange cloth on the side, and the green vegetables and carrots on the stove that were obviously dry. He touched his chin with his thumb and looked back and forth at these two things. Suddenly, a flash of inspiration came to his mind, and he suddenly realized it.

So that’s it.

 Meng Yunshu, who was pouring soybean oil into the pot, noticed his expression and knew that he had understood, so he didn’t say anything more.

Considering that Yu Jinyue didn’t eat carrots, Meng Yunshu fried eggs first, then poured in tofu and winter vegetables and stir-fried them. He added seasonings and stir-fried them a few times, before adding two buckets of water. After waiting for a while, he put a bowl of sauerkraut aside, and then added carrots.

The kitchen was filled with fragrance which attracted Yu Jinhuai in the yard to stop making bamboo sticks and stare at the door of the kitchen. He waited for someone to come out and call him to eat. The two wolfhounds had sensitive noses and had been lying at the door of the kitchen.

These days, except for the first two days when Yu Jinhuai cooked for them, Meng Yunshu cooked the rest of the time. With the title of breadwinner, Daqing and Dahei had long regarded Meng Yunshu as their own family. Sometimes when he came out, the two wolfhounds who were guarding the door would wag their tails and run over to rub his legs.

As for Yu Zhining, he couldn’t help it, and squeezed in front of the stove with Yu Jinyue, occupying a favorable position.

 The Yu family’s pot was very big. Meng Yunshu cooked a pot of noodles at a time, first the green vegetable noodles, then the carrot noodles.

The noodles were directly placed in a large basin, mixed with red, green and yellow sauce, which made the colors look more beautiful.

It was cold in the evening, so they ate in the kitchen.

“Brother Huai, time to eat.” Meng Yunshu mixed the sauce and served two different bowls of noodles to each person. Only Yu Jinyue had a big bowl, while the others had two small bowls, and the two children had even less noodles.

Yu Jinhuai, who had been waiting for a long time, responded. He washed his hands in the water, and walked into the kitchen with a cane, “I’m here.”

When the two wolfhounds saw him go in, they also understood that the meal was ready, and hurriedly raised their tails and wagged them. The could only see the afterimages, and Meng Yunshu knew that they were hungry.

 The remaining broken noodles were mixed with the multi-grain steamed buns and noodle soup and poured into their dog bowls. The two dogs had been scalded before, so they became more careful. They lay in front of the bowls and stared at the rice inside, slapping the ground with their tails and making humming sounds.

After everyone sat down, they started to eat.

Yu Jinhuai looked at the two bowls in front of him and saw that the color of the noodles was different from the usual noodles. He took a bite. He didn’t know if it was a psychological effect or something else, but he always felt that it was chewier than the noodles he ate every day.

“Ah Yun, what is this?”

Meng Yunshu’s eyes flashed with pride, and he deliberately kept it a secret, “Brother Huai, guess what this is made of?”

As soon as he said this, he attracted the attention of everyone at the table. Except for Yu Jinlan, who had been watching him cook from the beginning, and Yu Jinyue who came in later, the uncle and nephew didn’t know.

As a little foodie, Yu Zhining only focused on eating, completely ignoring the disturbances from the outside world.

 Yu Jinhuai picked up a chopstick of noodles and pondered it carefully. He thought of the green vegetables and carrots that Yu Jinlan washed today. His eyes were frozen with a trace of disbelief, “Could it be green vegetables and carrots?”

Meng Yunshu raised his eyebrows, and his eyebrows drooped slightly. He thought he couldn’t guess, but he didn’t expect that he guessed it right.

Yu Jinhuai saw his emotions and thought he was really a child, but he praised: “Ah Yun is really amazing, you have so many ideas.”

Hearing his words, Meng Yunshu couldn’t help but feel proud, and couldn’t suppress the smug smile on his face, “Very good.”

Yu Jinyue, who had seen everything, looked at the half bowl of noodles he had just eaten, and couldn’t help wondering why he was full after eating so little today.

After the meal, everyone in the Yu family held a bowl of noodle soup in his hand.

 “I named them Jade Noodles and Ruby Noodles. What do you think?”

Everyone in the room repeated the name several times and thought it was a good name.

“Xiao Yue, come to town with me tomorrow. The pot I ordered should be ready. Since we are going to make noodles, we need to buy flour.”

“I know, brother-in-law.”

“And brother Huai.” Meng Yunshu looked at Yu Jinhuai and said, “We also need to harvest carrots and green vegetables.”

“Mm.” Yu Jinhuai nodded.

After deciding what to do the next day, everyone went home to rest and waited for daybreak.

He never thought that he would not leave until the afternoon.