Chapter 72: The Remarkable Sang Family

After Sang Luo and Shen Ning placed the mushrooms and washed their hands, they lifted the lids off the two bowls on the stove table, only to realize what Shen An meant by “cooked” was a rather loose standard.

It was just barely cooked…

The two sisters-in-law exchanged a glance. Sang Luo asked, “Should we try it?”

Shen Ning nodded.

Sang Luo served some rice into a bowl, and considering the sight of the dishes, intentionally scooped a little less. She then used a spoon to scoop some cooked soybean residue, tilting the spoon against the side of the bowl to drain out most of the soup before putting it in.

It had to be drained, otherwise… well, it was like… hmm, four parts water to ten parts cooked soybean residue. How much water did Shen An actually add?

Then, look at it, he added some scallions, added some sauce, but it still looked… oddly peculiar?

After serving the dishes, the two sisters-in-law each took a bite…

It wasn’t that it was awful, but rather, not tasty?

Even plain cooked soybean residue might taste better than what Shen An cooked.

There was still more than half a plate of cucumbers on the table. Well, they called them cucumbers here. They were sent by Mrs. Chen in the morning. Unable to eat the cooked soybean residue, the cucumbers, aside from their somewhat unappealing color and being slightly overcooked and limp, seemed fine.

Sang Luo and Shen Ning each took a chopstick and put it into their mouths, then both froze.

Sour…

Not the kind of sour from vinegar, but the sourness from being stir-fried with sauce.

Shen Ning wrinkled her face, “Next time, I’ll tell my brother that cucumbers are actually quite good when eaten raw.”

Sang Luo shook with suppressed laughter, “Let’s eat, let’s eat. It’s rare to have a meal made by your brother.”

In ancient times, few men went into the kitchen. Shen An, being a young boy of nine, could cook, although the taste wasn’t great, but it was something that could be developed.

Both of them were too hungry to care. It wasn’t like they weren’t hungry. Normally, they had three meals a day, but it was already mid-afternoon today, and it would soon be time for dinner. They had only come back for lunch, so how could they not be hungry?

So when Shen An quietly came in to check later, he found that the rather unappetizing dishes he made for lunch were actually almost half eaten by Sang Luo and Shen Ning, who were being very polite.

Almost half, he himself couldn’t eat so much.

The little guy was quite touched and voluntarily took over the dishwashing chores.

Sang Luo didn’t object and, along with Shen Ning, went out to see the children working on the road foundation. After taking a break, the two sisters-in-law carefully cleared out the two baskets filled with mushrooms. They couldn’t just let those sour dates they saw in the morning lie on the ground. If they weren’t picked today, in a couple of days, they’d probably all go bad.

When Shen An saw the two of them emptying the baskets, he leaned over and asked, “Are you going back to the mountains again?”

Shen Ning nodded and whispered, “We saw a lot of sour dates on the ground this morning. If we don’t pick them, they’ll go bad. So Auntie and I are going to pick them up.”

Shen An also wanted to go, but he had his own business to attend to today. His friends were all helping his family with the stone road, so he could only nod and say, “Go ahead.”

After helping them get some snake repellent powder, he brought his sister into the courtyard and helped her apply it to their legs and feet, making sure they were protected from being brushed by grass and leaves. They even stuffed a bit into the ropes tied around their legs for extra protection.

Sang Luo naturally took care of herself. After packing up, she handed the bag of powder to Shen An to keep, and then led Shen Ning out again.

At this time of day, there were fewer people heading into the mountains. Occasionally, they would come across one or two people coming down from the mountains near the village. Seeing Sang Luo and Shen Ning going up the mountain, they would exclaim, “Sister-in-law, you’re so diligent.”

Sang Luo smiled and replied, “Yes, since there are no vegetables growing at home, we’ll take advantage of the mushrooms and go find some. We’ll dry them and save them.”

After exchanging these pleasantries, they continued on.

Following the same route as in the morning, they walked deeper into the mountains. There were very few mushrooms left behind, and occasionally they would see a cluster or two. They picked them and put them into Shen Ning’s basket. Until they reached the first sour date tree they saw in the morning, they quickened their pace and became excited. They placed their baskets down and began to pick.

Shen Ning’s basket was filled with mushrooms, so they couldn’t be squashed. They were all carefully placed into Sang Luo’s basket. After picking up almost half a basket of sour dates under one tree, they were finished. As for shaking the tree to collect more, there was no need for that. There were more trees ahead. It would be better to let the rest fall naturally in a few days.

As they walked deeper into the mountains, picking around the trees they saw in the morning, Sang Luo’s basket was already seventy percent full. They used the mushrooms they put in Shen Ning’s basket to cover the sour dates, making sure they were tightly packed.

Shen Ning’s basket was also half full, and they found some mushrooms and wood ears later on. After picking some wild vegetables and filling the bottom of the basket with them, they headed back.

Sang Luo was somewhat regretful that they hadn’t picked the leaves of the godly tree yet. Looking at the sky, she hurried back, needing to clear out the baskets before dark, so they could make godly tofu tonight.

They ran two rounds, luckily the godly tree was located on the outskirts, so they didn’t have to go too deep. When they returned home, it was time for each family to prepare dinner.

Shen An took orders for tofu from three families and said to Sang Luo, “Mrs. Lu brought half a basket of vegetables to our house, and Mrs. Shi brought four eggs, saying they were specially sent by Mrs. Lu and Mrs. Shi to thank you for helping them sell the mushrooms to Dongfu Building today.”

As he spoke, he roughly mentioned what kinds of vegetables the Lu family gave. Sang Luo listened and realized that some could only last a day or two, while others could last for several days. She smiled and said, “Then we won’t have to worry about eating vegetables for the next few days.”

Her backyard now only had perilla and mint available for picking, and the vegetables she had planted were only half-grown and not yet edible. Therefore, the vegetables they ate on weekdays were usually brought back from the county. Since they stopped selling at the stall, the three families occasionally gave some, or when paying for tofu, Sang Luo would request to exchange for some. With this arrangement, they wouldn’t run out of vegetables for several days.

Taking advantage of the remaining daylight, Sang Luo went to prepare dinner. Shen An and Shen Ning transferred the sour dates into a wooden barrel in their home, then carefully picked through the mushrooms that were emptied out earlier. Following Sang Luo’s instructions, they set aside the ones with poor appearance for their family to sample fresh that night, and the ones with good appearance were sorted by variety and placed in the baskets. Tomorrow morning, they would give the baskets directly to Qin Fangniang, asking her to take them to the county to sell.

The mushroom business only lasted for three days. On the second and third days, Qin Fangniang brought back two receipts, one for 212 cents and the other for 130 cents.

Afterward, even if Qin Fangniang and the others were more familiar with the surrounding area, the villagers were not much worse off. Everything worth picking had already been picked by someone else. In slightly deeper areas, relying on the snake repellent powder, Qin Fangniang also led them to search, but to be honest, they didn’t dare to earn that money.

But in three days, even those who sold fewer mushrooms, like Mrs. Shi, earned nearly 270 cents, while those like the Lu family and Sang Luo who had two people collecting in the mountains earned 600 cents. For several families, it was like a windfall.

In fact, they only realized this time that not all mushrooms were cheap. Most mushrooms were indeed inexpensive, especially in rural markets where they couldn’t fetch a good price because everyone could pick them in the mountains. But mushrooms like the black truffles were different. The price of a kilogram of black truffles was almost catching up to the price of meat.

Thinking about the money they earned this time, and then thinking about the mushrooms they had picked in previous years, regardless of the type, they had all been stewed together in a pot and eaten by the whole family. They felt heartache. It truly was a mixture of joy and pain.

It was Sang Luo who, following Qin Fangniang and the others as they radiated outwards from the village and circled around the outskirts and slightly deeper areas of the mountain, discovered quite a few things, not to mention the sour dates and devil’s tongue. In these days, she had made quite a few sour date cakes. She borrowed two large bamboo sieves from the Chen, Shi, and Lu families to dry the sour dates.

Thanks to her ability to work with her hands, she made two drying racks herself. Otherwise, her small backyard wouldn’t be able to accommodate so much stuff.

As the time came for Sang Luo’s appointment with the shopkeeper Xu to supply vegetarian tripe, as usual, Qin Fangniang helped with the delivery. The first day’s order was for ten kilograms, and Sang Luo produced eleven kilograms. On the previous night, she borrowed the scale from the Lu family and weighed out ten kilograms, then packed the extra kilogram separately, while the other kilogram was naturally used for their own food.

In the afternoon, Qin Fangniang brought back a receipt for 170 cents.

Shopkeeper Xu was overjoyed to see Mrs. Sang.

He needed more vegetarian tripe.

The initial order of ten kilograms had indeed been conservative. This fresh food was easy to sell, and if they only had ten kilograms, it would be sold out by noon.

“Mrs. Sang, let’s start with twenty kilograms per day. This stuff is not easy to store, and if not, our restaurant in other counties also has demand. Tofu and vegetarian tripe, the orders are far beyond this amount.”

There was a hint of regret in his words.

Mrs. Sang smiled, “Twenty kilograms is fine, but I can’t produce more at the moment. This stuff is not easy to make.”

Raw materials were not unlimited.

This was why she dared to sign an exclusive sales agreement with Shopkeeper Xu for ten kilograms per day. Even if they demanded more, she couldn’t meet it.

These weren’t soybeans grown by all the farmers, available for purchase with money.

Shopkeeper Xu smiled and agreed.

Following the protocol, Mrs. Sang still asked for receipts. Seeing this, Shopkeeper Xu said from the side, “Mrs. Sang, you should keep some money for expenses at home. There’s no rush to pay back the silver, no need to take receipts every time.”

Mrs. Sang smiled, “Did you forget, Shopkeeper Xu? My family has some other business.”

With that, she took out two full money pouches and several strings of coins from her sleeve, placing them on the counter with a smile, saying to the accounting office, “Here are two thousand five hundred cents. Sir, please count it.”

The accounting office was stunned for a moment before nodding and calling two assistants to help count the money.

Seeing this scene, Shopkeeper Xu shook his head and smiled, “Mrs. Sang, you’re quite capable. Even if I don’t help, you’ll be fine.”

“Where would I be without you? The price of grain has risen to eighty-eight cents, and without Shopkeeper Xu, I’m afraid I wouldn’t be able to do anything every day, spending most of my time queuing up at the grain store.”

It wasn’t close from her side, and if they arrived late, they might not be able to buy anything.

Just like Chen Youtian and the others now, they had to come to the county every day before dawn.

Sang Luo had considered leveraging her relationship with Shopkeeper Xu to help Chen Youtian and the others buy some grain.

But first, Shopkeeper Xu himself wasn’t the manager of a grain store; he needed to pull some strings to purchase grain. Helping her was already a favor, and asking him to help the villagers buy grain would be pushing it. They weren’t that close, and friendships couldn’t withstand such demands.

Secondly, while Zhou Cunzheng was relatively well-off, families like Chen’s, Shi’s, and Lu’s didn’t have much savings. They couldn’t afford to buy much grain at once. The money for buying grain each day came from the previous day’s sales of tofu, wild vegetables, and mushrooms. Recently, even Qin Fangniang and the others had become more resourceful. They brought some vegetables from the fields to sell in the county every day, which barely sustained them in buying one or one and a half dou of grain each day.

After having a cup of tea at Dongfu Building and waiting for the accounting office to count the money and prepare the receipts, Sang Luo bid farewell to Shopkeeper Xu and left with her carrying basket.

Shopkeeper Xu glanced at the jars in the basket, feeling quite curious. Besides selling vegetarian tripe and tofu, what else did Mrs. Sang sell?

He didn’t ask out of politeness.

Naturally, Sang Luo went to sell her sour jujube cakes. After traversing dozens of mountains with the old ladies, she had indeed made a lot of sour jujube cakes this time. She brought out four jars today. If they all sold, she would earn at least eight hundred cents.

She planned to try her luck at the two pastry shops she hadn’t visited before.

Established old shops like Yongfeng Zhai didn’t sell outside-made food, so small pastry shops shouldn’t be too particular, right?

She was just afraid the prices would be slashed.

As she pondered, she walked out with her load, considering how much to offer if the other party bargained. Suddenly, someone urgently called out, “Miss, miss!”

At first, Sang Luo didn’t think they were calling her. No one in the county recognized her. Those who did would call her “Mrs. Alie” or “Mrs. Sang.” Who would address a stranger as “miss”?

So, she didn’t pay any attention, still thinking about her money-making plan, and continued walking forward with her load.

It wasn’t until the person caught up, panting heavily, and said, “Miss, the girl who sells crystal fruit, wait!”

Hearing the words “crystal fruit,” Sang Luo finally realized that “miss” was referring to her. She stopped in her tracks and turned around.

Who else but the panting round-faced woman could it be if not the proprietress of Yongfeng Zhai?